The last few days we have spent attending another yearly meeting session, this time of the National Friends Church in Peru. We are in Ilave, which is south of Puno and north of Juli, along the western side of Lake Titicaca. This is a small town, and the yearly meeting's headquarters and Jorge Fox school are here. Nancy was asked to give several short sermons during the past two days here. The first was on leadership, the second was on the work and role of FWCC (I talked about things related to the Americas Section) and today's message was about the role of the church. Judging by the faces in the room, I think they went over well.

The yearly meeting could be broken down into two parts: reading of reports from various groups and committees, and a business agenda containing issues that came out of the reading of reports (plus a few others.) One of the agenda items was a request by yearly meeting leadership to begin to contribute to FWCC's work, in recognition of the benefits the yearly meeting has recieved through the workshops we hold there. They agreed to hold a special collection for FWCC one Sunday this year.

The yearly meeting has a few tough issues that they will continue to work through in the coming years. In an attempt to get done early, it was decided in today's session that we'd all forego a lunch break and work straight through in order to get done 'early'...that led to a marathon 8 hour business session! Our reward was a delicious lunch and a chance to say goodbye to many Friends here in the Altiplano. It has been wonderful to meet up again with former FWCC reps I've gotten to know over the years at annual meetings and triennials.

Over and over throughout our time here, names of other Friends 'in the north' come up. Former missionaries are remembered with great fondness, and I have messages to relay to a few of them. We have also heard alot of positive comment on a fairly recent FWCC sponsored visit by two New England YM Friends who taught at a youth conference. Jesus Huarachi and Nancy and I have had alot of fun joking about which pair traveled to the most remote place; who had the busiest schedule and toughest itinerary, and who got to see the most interesting sites in this area (I think we did!)

Sunday we travel to Arequipa, and on Monday we'll meet Friends there, thus ending our FWCC visit. I have a notebook full of work to follow up on, messages to relay, emails to stay connected with, and photos and video to share, when I get back. Stay tuned!