We have arrived!

Well we have finally made it to Cochabamba Bolivia after two days of grueling travel.  We left Charlotte, NC after a long goodbye to Anna, Kevin and Rachel's parents and my husband.  Our flight left an hour after it was scheduled 2:45pm and we arrived in Miami about two hours later.  Good thing we had a six hour layover and there was no chance we would miss our connecting flight!  We left Miami at 10:30pm on the overnight flight to La Paz Bolivia.  I tried my best to sleep, but for anyone who has been on an overnight flight they know how hard it is.  We arrived in La Paz at 5:30am and culture shock began to set in.  As soon as I stepped off the plane and down the hallway to the terminal my heart was racing and I was short of breath.  I was also getting dizzy and nausous.  I thought maybe I had thrown a clot and was having a pulminary embolism or somthing, but it turns out all I had was altitude sickness.  La Paz is 14,000 ft above sea level and the oxygen level is much lower than it is in the states so breathing is harder and it's easy to get out of breath.
Then we had our fun with customs and visas; no one spoke english and I know almost no spanish.  Anna and Kevin took it in high school so they weren't quite as lost as I was, but it was still hard to communicate.  After a few problems and miscomunications we made it through with passports and visas in hand.  From there we had to book a flight the rest of the way to Cochabamba, only about a 30min flight but the earliest one was booked already.  Luckily, a family friend of Rachel, a missionary who has been living in La Paz for 6 years, had come to help us get through.  Rachel had booked her flight in advance, so she was gone on the 8am flight as the rest of us were stuck in the airport trying to get another flight.  Kathy (Rachel's friend) helped us a lot and we would have been truly lost without her.  Thank the Lord for sending her!!  We didn't end up getting another flight booked until 8:50pm that evening, so we had to stay in La Paz for over 12 hours.  Anna was excited because she wanted to go on an adventure, me on the other hand wanted to be safe and not get lost in a forgin country.  Kathy said she would take us with her and show us the city, that sounded like a good compromise, safe and adventurous! 
The roads were crazy with people and cars!  Everyone assumes they have the right of way and force their way into traffic all the time.  Plus the roads are narrow and have no lines, I'm happy that I didn't have to drive!  We visited with a nice couple from Kathy's church who she was helping.  I was still feeling the effects of the altitude so I crashed on their couch and tried to will myself to feel better.  They gave us some special tea that was supposed to help with altitude sickness and it did a little.  We tried the best we could to talk to them, but it was hard with the language barrier.  After that we went to Kathy's house and relaxed for a while before going out for lunch at an authentic Bolivian restaurant.  Anna, Kevin and I all got the quesidellas which were good tasting but I didn't find anything special about them.  Kathy then took us around the city so we could take pictures of the breathtaking landscape before heading back up to the airport.  We were so thankful for Kathy who pretty much gave up her whole day to take us poor Americans around La Paz so we didn't have to be stuck in the tiny airport for over 12 hours. 
At 8:50pm we finally borded the plane and took off on our way to Cochabamba, our final destination.  Unshowered for two days with unbrused teeth and hair, and feeling exhausted; we finally landed in Cochabamba.  A group of people who had been at Hospitals of Hope volunteering came to pick us up, they were pretty easy to spot because they were white like us!  :-) After a 45min bus ride, we finally made it to the hospital around 11pm and pretty much crashed (after showering and brushing the teeth of course).  But we made it here with a little help from the Lord and now we can start our work.  Thanks for reading!
Sarah