See this report from Washington Gibaja Tapia: Oct 18, 2021
The filters were finally released in Peru and delivered to the communities Patacancha, Challhuaccocha, and Onora – Wayracpunku.!!!!
Jose had a few days off between flight attendant trips for American Airlines but volunteered to help our AAI mission to Peru deliver water filters from Clean Water Foundation Each of three team members was checking two 50 lb bags as part of their luggage with 16 water filters each. We had previously sent the information to Rotary Cusco who was filing paperwork on the Peru side for Customs. See picture of Jose to left on a previous mission in Colombia & on right when he met with our team in Seattle before the trip departed.
However, everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. Jose had to leave at 530 am to get to DFW early when it became clear he had to have a negative Covid test before embarking for Peru (even though he was vaccinated). In DFW the agents claimed the bags were oversized and had him pay an extra $300. He had to get to Peru as the plan was to introduce the team from Cusco to Rotary Lima who he had worked previously. On a flight attendant’s salary he personally donated $350 to fund a community kitchen for Lima Rotary.
The planned Mission Leader, Blair Krueger was denied boarding in Seattle. The United States would not allow the negative Covid test from Canada, and he had to schedule a new test at the airport before they would let him check in. So Blair would be delayed at least for a day.
Gratefully, Tsering Lodoe made it on as scheduled out of Seattle and he and Jose took the scheduled flight from DFW to Lima,. They were tired and groggy at 1:00 am when they were stopped by Customs agents announcing that the Customs paperwork by Rotary Cusco was insufficient and they were planning to confiscate the 32 water filters. It was Jose’s patient negotiating that had them hold the filters in Customs. They had planned to also donate 5 flters to Rotary Lima, but now that was impossible.
The following day Jose and Lodoe met with Chris Carthy of Rotary Lima for a brief lunch where the AAI team delivered funding for a community Kitchen for the community of Jesus Obrero – because of our assistance the community will have a new kitchen within two weeks!
Back to the airport, they went to continue negotiations regarding the filters and it was clear Customs wanted $. Ultimately it was decided to pay a Customs Broker. Airline Ambassadors has performed 674 missions hand-delivering humanitarian assistance and NEVER had this kind of problem before. In the future, due to changing regulations, we decided to mainly buy aid in-country for delivery.
The good news is Blair ultimately did arrive in Peru and joined Lodoe and our team with Alicia Kozuch and Washington Gaba in Cusco.
