Headlines - Diospi Suyana Meets with the President of Perú!

19 June 2017

Two articles of this meeting were posted by Klaus on the Diospi Suyana website news.  I have made a few editorials to these for clarity in English;

From left to right - Ing. Máximo San Román, Dr Klaus John, President PPK, Dr Martina John and Dr Jens Hassfeld.

A great honour for Diospi Suyana was with the invitation of the President of Peru, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (popularly known as PPK).  Doctors’ Klaus and Martina John and Dr Jens Hassfeld met PPK in the government palace and were given the opportunity to present the vision of Diospi Suyana. The atmosphere was very warm.  

The presentation of over 100 images was enough to guide the president through the history and the different working fields of our mission.  In a personal statement, Dr Klaus John made it clear that Diospi Suyana exists to show the love of Jesus Christ and to share and honour God.

 

The band of the President’s Palace.

The highlight of the visit for Diospi Suyana was when the President willingly announced he would attend the big anniversary celebration of our hospital on 31 August.  We thank God for this special audience with the highest dignitaries of Peru.  Soli Deo Gloria! (Glory to God alone).  Without doubt this will add a special touch to the ten-year anniversary of Diospi Suyana.

 

A special meeting with an extraordinary man.

Anyone who obtains information from Wikipedia about the current Peruvian president, will probably take off his hat.  The son of a Jewish father from Berlin speaks several languages and has extensive knowledge in the fields of economy, politics and art. He has held many high offices during his life. And during his training, he studied at the elite universities of Oxford and Princeton, among others. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_Pablo_Kuczynski

We (Klaus, Martina and Jens) went with a certain tension to this meeting with the head of state.  But the palace meeting was partly funny, sometimes serious and definitely extremely cordial.  We spoke in Spanish and German.

"So a hospital such as Diospi Suyana, we would need everywhere in Peru!" said PPK.

In recent weeks, the personal adviser to the President Ing. Máximo San Román, the German Ambassador Jörg Ranau, the Governor of the State of Apurímac, Venegas Wilmer and a close friend of PPK had been working toward making this meeting happen.

Diospi Suyana wishes to the President of the heart a successful term of office, which continues as planned until July 2021.

Here is the link to the two consecutive Diospi Suyana posts of this visit by Klaus (in English);

http://www.diospi-suyana.de/eilmeldung-peruanischer-staatschef-empfing-missionsaerzte/?lang=en

http://www.diospi-suyana.de/sternstunde-palast/?lang=en

Regards,

Chris

Remote Monitoring for all Diospi-Suyana Transmission Sites

12 June 2017

This post is a continuation of my blog dated 27 March where I have summarised my proposal for remote monitoring and control for Diospi Suyana transmission sites.  If you want to refer back, here is the link for convenience;

http://welchesinperu.blogspot.pe/2017/06/remote-monitoring-and-control-proposal.html

Here below is a progress update on this matter by Dr Klaus John (with a few edits for clarity by me);

 

We believe the satellite manufacturer ND Satcom has the best satellite modem solution for Diospi Suyana.

Chris Welch of Diospi Suyana had thankfully been doing a lot of engineering homework for our remote sites.  Last Thursday, Dr John visited ND Satcom, and presented the media vision of Diospi Suyana.  CEO Stefan Schröder and Sales Director Bernd Lehr looked with interest at the PowerPoint presentation of Diospi Suyana.  The company ND Satcom from Immenstaad, Germany offers satellite communication equipment including telemetry systems, exactly what Diospi Suyana needs to monitor all its own remote transmitter sites.

Once telemetry is installed in our media centre, devices can be monitored and controlled at these and other future locations where we have our satellite systems installed.  The management of ND Satcom provided a cost-effective solution and we hope to make a decision to purchase it in the next four weeks.

 

ND Satcom Sales Director Bernd Lehr (left) after the interview with Dr John.

Here is the link to the Diospi Suyana post of this visit by Klaus (in English);

http://www.diospi-suyana.de/telemetrie-ueberwachung-fuer-alle-diospi-suyana-antennentuerme/?lang=en

Regards,

Chris

Echarati - Our 6th FM License

09 June 2017

It is now 84 days until the big feast! (the Diospi Suyana 10^th Anniversary).

On Thursday 01 June, Diospi Suyana took possession of a VHF FM frequency in the district Echarati. This area is one of 14 districts in the state of Cusco and is estimated to be home for some 65,000 people. It lies mostly east of the Andes. A surprising number of patients in the Diospi Suyana hospital come from Echarate. The trip by car takes 7-8 hours and takes you through the Urubamba Valley which is rich in Inca ruins and history and is the gateway to famous Machu Picchu.

Our site assessment team comprising Doris Manco, Udo Klemenz and me (as Klaus is in Germany this time), took 3 days out to Echarati.  We found Echarati is a neat and clean little town (unusually so in Perú) and is only about 1,000 meters high with both sides embedded by 2,000 meter mountains, and is in the transition zone to the Amazon rainforest.  This provides a climate which is almost tropical and where citrus fruits, pineapple, banana, peanut bushes, cocoa, coffee, etc. grow in abundance.

Down to business – I soon ruled out all but one hilltop range to obtain the maximum population coverage of the Echarati district with a single FM transmission.  We explored the options but the local guide we employed to take us up to the hilltop in his 4WD would not agree to take us to the highest option.  That was to me clearly a better coverage point as it would service much better into the river valley to the north, reaching a number of towns that would otherwise not be well serviced with our radio program, if at all.  The reasons given were high foliage, fear of snakes and poor road access. 

So without further options available at the time, we located the “el presidento” of the land and returned with him to peg out a lot of land 12m x 12m for our proposed FM tower overlooking the district capital of Echarate.

 

We visit the first Echarati site option with the land el presidento (second on right) and Udo pegs out the boundaries.

One of a number of GPS readings I took from the hilltop.

There was domestic power nearby, although this is also not the best for reliability and also the authority Electro Sur generally insists on the installation of a dedicated transformer for commercial installations.

 

Here is the domestic electrical termination pillar – note the precarious wiring typical with many of these!

We return to Curahuasi, but with more work to do on the legalities of the purchase, albeit I am not really comfortable with the selection from an optimal coverage perspective.

Also as of this time, construction on the antenna tower in Puerto Maldonado go ahead very quickly and in a few days the installation of the 50 m high tower to begin. In Casabamba the top of the mountain hill was pulled, pushed the subgrade for the antenna system and started the excavation. In Puno, the geological survey has been prepared and is scheduled to begin on Monday with the first works. As far as the current state of antenna systems.

 

The four tower foundations are concreted and the perimeter grows at our Puerto Maldonado site.

Progress is quick with our builders in Puerto Maldonado.

Where the excavator is on the top of the hill, the tower will soon rise at our Casabamba site.

The Casabamba site hilltop is removed and levelled for construction.  Here you see the foundation soil sample pit in the foreground.

Regards,

Chris

A Presentation in Front of Four Important Decision Makers

01 June 2017

 

50 important minutes in the Perú Ministry for Transport and Communications (MTC).

It was more than just a polite gesture when the Deputy Communications Minister Dr. Carlos Valdez Velásquez (center in photo above) listened to a presentation on the history of Diospi Suyana yesterday afternoon.  His advisor Dra. María Rodgríguez Cuba (left), the Director General for the allocation of radio Licenses Luis Catellanos Sánchez (third from the right) and his co-ordinator Dra. Guadalupe Guerra (second from the right) was also present.  A roundtable followed the presentation at which all officials promised to support Dr John.

In its protracted dealings with the public authorities, Diospi Suyana is dependent upon this positive fundamental attitude. Such a high-profile meeting, which lasted almost an hour, was a God provision for our radio and TV work.

Here is the link to a Diospi Suyana post by Klaus (in English);

http://www.diospi-suyana.de/ein-vortrag-vor-vier-entscheidungstraegern/?lang=en

Regards,

Chris

Health Tips on Radio Diospi Suyana

30 May 2017

Dr Martina John being interviewed by Jesús Hurtado in the Diospi radio studio.

The program is called "Your Health" (Tu Salud).  Three times a week our radio channel broadcasts the program on prevention and treatment of diseases.  In the picture above Dr Martina John talks on parasites and worm infestations relevant to the Andes regions of Perú.  That said, currently we only reach listeners from the Curahuasi district.  But we hope our five FM towers are in operation at the end of August. That would be the icing on the cake for the tenth anniversary of the missionary hospital.

Here is the link to the original Diospi Suyana post by Klaus (in English);

http://www.diospi-suyana.de/gesundheitstipps-im-radio-von-diospi-suyana/?lang=en

Regards,

Chris

Turning the First Sod of Soil for our Casabamba and Puerto Maldonado FM Sites

26 May 2017

It is 98 days until the 10^th Anniversary celebrations at Diospi Suyana.  The countdown is on to getting the Diospi Suyana FM transmission sites finished beforehand if possible.  We will do our best!

Casabamba: a 2.6m deep test pit has been dug for the tower soil to be analysed by the geotech enabling the tower foundations to be designed.  We hope to award the contract for the structural work within the next few days.  The 50m tower for Casabamba has been purchased from our now established supplier ICESE SAC based in Lima.

Puerto Maldonado: the subcontractor has started excavating the large four individual foundations for our 50m high tower, also from our supplier ICESE SAC.  Being the rainforest region, it is hot and humid and there are a lot of biting insects.  It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.

 

Manually excavating soil geotech pit for the 50m tower foundations in Casabamba – it would be unthinkable to do this by hand in affluent places like Australia.

In the Amazon rainforest near the city of Puerto Maldonado, the foundations are being dug for the Diospi Suyana's next 50m high FM broadcast tower.

Here is an AutoCAD drawing plot of our ICESE SAC 50 meter high free standing lattice steel towers for Casabamba and Puerto Maldonado.

Regards,

Chris

A Chicharrón Lunch at our House

18 May 2017

The Saturday before last we were blessed by our Perú pastor Tomas and his wife Conci with their family and church friends William and Corina who came and cooked a traditional Peruvian dish of Chicharrón at our house.  This is normally of pork belly and/or rind, deep fried in a wok accompanied by oven baked potatoes.

Our friends arrived and firstly got to work at the edge of our vegetable garden (where the soil is soft) making their traditional outdoor kitchen.  This consisted of two fires – one surrounded by rocks to support the pots and wok for cooking the meat.  The meat was firstly broiled in the pots and then deep oil fried in the wok.

The other fire was made in a dugout with earth formed sides.  After there was a good amount of hot coals, the potatoes were thrown in and the oven was covered over with earth.  After about an hour and a half of the potatoes cooking, the meat was deep fried and voilà!  Serve, say grace and eat.

Following photos describe the rest of the story details;

Broiling the meat in the pots over the first fire – overseen by Conci.

The potato oven was the second fire – here managed by William.

While waiting for the cooking – our Jessica (4) finds a new friend her age to play in the cornfields opposite.

The ladies at work demonstrating their methods to Sandi.

The process of deep frying the pork belly.

The outdoor kitchen in our vegetable garden at the back of our house.

The families in our dining room to partake of the lunch.

The final presentation of our Chicharrón lunch for serving. 

Saludos,

Chris & Sandi