EL TEMPLO

Good bye Schroder

We got a call about a week ago.   The man said in Spanish that we have a new car for you.  We have needed a new car since we got here.   Schroder ( our old car) tries her best and has gotten us to places we should not have gone, but the kind of roads we travel just were not ment for Schroder.  And, she was in a real sense, falling a part.  We were not to excited because we have been told of a new car in the past and it never happened.  Well, we got in the car and drove to Guetemala city, a hard 5 hour drive.  We were worried about having to come back in the dark, which is very dangerous.  We got to the city and immediately got lost.  We could see the place we were supposed to pick up the car but we could not get there because of the divided roads.  We were very frustrated.  We take our frustrations out in different ways.  Gary gets mad, and Kathy cries.  Well, we finally got control of ourselves, said a prayer, and got on a road that took us to the place.   At the church area office, a guard directed us to to a ramp that went under the building.   And, they took Schroder, we signed a paper, and, got in the new car and drove out!!   All in about 15 minutes!  There we were in a brand new car, it had about 40 mikes on it, and, we were in shock.  We got a Toyota Rav4 four wheel drive.  The car is high off the ground and has big wheels.  Perfect for gigantic holes and bumps.   The ride home was lovely.  Here is the car.

EL TEMPLO (the Temple)

We have not been to the Temple since arriving here.  The is a new Temple about 1.5 hours a way in a town called, Xela (Quetzaltenango).   Well, the current mission president has implemented a new plan.   For those missionaries that are finished with their mission and are going home, they get to attend the temple.  (In the past, temple attendance was limited to those zones that achieved a very hard baptism goal).  We have two missionaries leaving.  In order for them to get to the 8am session they would have to catch a very early, and, miserable bus.  We stepped up and offered a ride,  We have mentioned before about spiritual highs, well here we are at the highest so far.  It is hard to describe how wonderful attending the temple was.  It was all in Spanish with a new presentation.   We had interpreter devices for part of the session, but, Gary's broke immediately.   For some reason, we found the Spanish presentation to be very uplifting and inspiring.  We were just amazed and felt blessed to be able to attend the temple.  We drove home, and got a call, that one of our zones had reached the goal, and, we went to the temple again the next day!!   We prayed in the temple for increased help with the language and we are being helped.

SANTA MARATHON

Miracle of conversion

We might have mentioned some time ago that we went with the missionaries to visit a family.  We were invited to talk to the couple about marriage.  They were having marital problems.   We gave our testimonies about how our membership in our church has helped our marriage and family.   The young wife is not a member and seemed very disinterested.  The husband is an inactive member.  They have a one year old son.   So, we did our part and went home.  We thought about this little family often with sadness.   Well a month our so later, the missionaries asked us to join them with this family for a family home evening.   We were not expecting much out of this meeting.  When we entered the house we could actually feel a radiance of happiness.  The wife came in to the room, and, we were shocked by the change in this women.  She radiated with the light of the Savior. She had prepared a family home evening with hymns, prayers, handouts, scriptures and Desert!  We had a wonderful experience with this family and we literally floated home on a cloud amazement and joy.   We had witnessed a total change and a spiritual birth of a daughter of God.  A week later she was baptized.  And on Sunday she was confirmed and received the Holy Ghost.  She was crying when the blessing finished.  She really was overcome by the spirit and was born again.  Here is a picture of this family.

Miracle of the keys.

We keep a copy of the keys to all the missionary apartments.  We have 14.  The missionaries in San Antonio area changed apartments and we had missed getting a copy from another apartment.  So, we had two keys to get copies.  We had lots of things to do this day.  We made a stop at a church to give some items to missionaries that were having a zone conference, then we went several other places and finally to the key copy place.  Kathy realized that she did not have the keys!!  We panicked.   These missionaries would not be able to get into their houses, and, it is near impossible to find the owners to get more keys.  For a while we just sat in misery wondering what to do.  So, we turned to fervent prayer.  Kathy thought she had them on her lap when we arrived at the church.  She forgot they were there when she got out of the car.  So, they fell into the street!  Now we were mortified.  We called the zone leader at the church we visited and asked if he would check the street for two keys.  We got a call back in just a few minutes, they had the keys.  The other zone leader happened to be by road and saw two keys.  He felt impressed to pick them up!   Saved by prayer again.

Marathon Santa.

We have a zone that is having a really hard time.   No baptisms for many months.  Gary talked to them in their zone conference to encourage them and Kathy suggested they do an activity to get contacts.  She told about a New York zone that in Central Park shined shoes and gave out hot chocolate in trade for a name and address.  We said we would helped them in any way we could.   A day later we get a call.  The zone leaders had an idea.   They wanted to set up Santa in the town center and take photos of Santa with families.  The missionaries would deliver the photos later if they would give them their contact information.   And, they wanted us to be Mr. And Mrs. Santa Clause!!  They had to find a Santa suit.  Oh how we hopped they would not find a suit.  A few days later we got a call, they found a suit!!  So, Saturday about 3pm, we let a competent missionary drive us to the Central Park.  The missionaries, with the help of members, set up a wonderful setting.  A seat for Santa, a decorated tree, a beautiful back drop, it was great.   Now, the kids here believe in Santa and they have little or no chance to see him.  We brought a big bag of candy and Santa, Gary, took his place.  Six hours later, at 8:30p, we finally finished.  The missionaries got 250 contact addresses.   The line to sign up was never empty.  Gary had to be a jovial loving Santa, with kids on his lap.  There is no place for him to conveniently go to the bathroom.  The only decent place to go is at a dominos down the block.  Santa can not just walk down to dominos with a heard of kids following him.  His beard covers his mouth making it impossible to drink or eat without raising his beard.  How could he remove his beard with 40 or 50 people looking at him intensely.  The crowd never went away.  His only choice was prayer.  He told Heavenly Father that this activity was so important for the missionaries to save souls.  Gary got a response!  "Focus on the children, they are very close to God.  So he did, and he loved and enjoyed the children. And, the time went by fast and Gary never weakened.  Kathy was on her feet the whole time ushering people, handing out pamphlets.

We only had three drunks, two men and a really old lady. 

The whole event was a blessing to all of us, but, we are still dealing with the physical effects. 

Here is a photo of the scene.

KATHY THE MOUNTAIN CLIMBER

Our weekly schedule includes rotating through the zones attending their meetings, attending a different ward or branch each Sunday, and visiting a different missionary house twice a week.   We have recently started going out with the missionaries after we check there house.  We go to work with them for an hour or two.   This work has become the highlight of our week.  And, believe it or not the missionaries love it. 

We went out contacting with one pair of our sister missionaries.   Sister Lopez and Sister Beckstrand (the Latinos can't say her name so they call her sister Becky).   It is hard to put into words how impressed we were with their work.   We knocked on two doors and the sisters talked their way in.   The family consisted of a middle aged lady and her mother.   The mother was in a wheel chair and here age is 94.   She can't here very well so her daughter has to yell in here ear.  The missionaries immediately showed their love to the elderly lady hugging her and trying to talk to her.  She likes singing, and as the missionaries always do they start with a hymn. The love and concern of these sisters filled the air, it was a wonderful experience.   And, as allways they got contact information and closed with prayer.  They knocked on another door, and this time it was a daughter taking care of here aged and invalid parents.   The pattern was the same with the same wonderful spirit.  However, We need to tell you about the old man.  He was sitting outside and then wanted to come in to visit with us.  He had a walker and it took him about 15 minutes to go 5 feet to another chair.  And with each step he let out a groan,  needless to say Gary did some reflective thinking about what we would be doing at that age, he is only 10 years older than us!

We will tell you about another visit after a few more comments.   

Thanksgiving was interesting.  One district of about 10 missionioneries talked a member into killing one his turkeys.  Of couse they videoed the kill, or muderer it, and then got the feathers and other things off and out and sent two missionaries to our house with the turkey in a bag.  The next morning we started to cook the turkey.  It had no breast what so ever!  We got a call from the leader missionary pleading for mashed potatoes.  Some how or another we bought potatoes, peeled, cooked and mashed two pans of potatoes in about two hours.   We feed about 30 missionaries.  It probably was a miricle.

Schroder, our car, had an incident.  We checked traffic and turned right onto a road and immediately got side swiped.  The guy was traveling so fast that we didn't see him approaching.  We we have no idea what happens when you get in a wreck here.  So, Gary got out and we checked his very nice car.  It was only a scrape.  I checked Schroder, just another scrape of many.  So, Gary said to the driver "está bien" which means "it's good".  He agreed and drove off (we found out later that's what you do here if it is no fault).  We went to drive off and a man signaled to us that a part came off Schroder.   We took the part home.  When we got home, Gary placed the part in the front and it snapped in!  Schroder is amazing.

Ok, now, we went out with a pair of elders.  Elder Lopez and Elder Wilkes.  We drove the car up a road that went up a mountain.  When the road ran out, we got out of the car and we started to walk up a tiny trail through the jungle straight up a mountain!  The total climb was less than a hundred yards and it took us one hour to climb it.   We finally got to this house literally built right on the edge of the mountain.   Concrete walls, dirt floor, corrugated steel ceiling.  We taught two inactive women.  A middle aged women and a 16 year old pregnant girl that planned on getting married in a few days.  As before, we sang, prayed, read scriptures, gave blessings, and the spirit was wonderful!   After lots of hugs and goodbuys, we started down the trail.  After a terrifying hour we reached the car.  What a great experience.

Here is a picture of Kathy on the trail.

Here are the elders

Here is the primary of a small branch just after they finished their sacrament meeting primary presentation

THE SOCK SPIDER

Some time ago, we were getting into bed and on Gary's side, there was a big black spider by Gary's shoes.  He thought for sure that it came out of his shoe.  After smashing the spider, Gary apologized to what was left of the spider, reminding it of our arrangement, if they are in the house, they die!  Well, Gary had some nasty bites on his foot, so, he fully believed that the spider was in his socks.  Then, we began to see lots of sock spiders.  Black spiders ranging from small to large.  Keep in mind that neither of us see to great.   And, after closer examination, since we wondered why these spiders we so slow, we found that we have been killing little pieces of black sock that came from Gary's really cheap walmart socks!  We had killed hundreds of pieceses of sock!

We have named our little Toyota carolla "Schroder" after sister Schroder who has now returned home.  When we first came to Guatemalla we had no car and the only transportation were these little three wheeled Tuk Tuk's.  We were afraid to get into the Tuk Tuk's.   Sister Schroder is a very pretty girl that is tall and very strong.  We mean very strong!   She literally threw us in a Tuk Tuk and since then we pretty much ride in every thing.  Since our car is a girl and since she has handled any road we give her, she is strong, we named her Schroder.  Well, Schroder was very dirty, and, were were just leaving church.  The young men's president approached and asked if we would have our car washed satuday by the young men so that they could raise money for an activity.   We said ok and he took our phone number?  Well, we have been to many youth car washes in the states.  They cost about $5 and take about 15 minutes.  So, we went our way and forgot about it.  Come Saturday and we get a call reminding us of the car wash.  So, we go to the church and there was the young men leaders and about seven young men.  We got out of the car and begin our 15 minute wait.  Well, two hours later, the car had been detailed inside and out, wheel wells and all!  In the state it would have cost us $250.   This wash cost us about $3.  (And, you never tip down here, if you attempt to pay more, they look at you like you are crazy)

We were called by the Rio Blanco district president.   President Ochoa.   He presides over three branches way up in the mountains, only accessible by dirt roads.  He wanted me to met him and his son in front of a church, which is on a busy road, to release his son from his mission.  His son had just finished his mission in San Salvador, and, his family was picking him up this day at the airport in Guatemala City.  Guatemala City is a long way from us.   So, we drove, in the dark, to this chapel, parked along the side of this very busy road, and waited.  About 30 minutes later this old beat up car pulled in front of us.  President Ochoa had a friend drive he and his wife to pick up his son.  We chated a bit, and this young man is the forth missionary to fulfill a mission in their family.   I interviewed the missionary in our car while Kathy talked to the parents.  There I was with a wonderful young man interviewing him while gigantic trucks drove by us just a few feet a way,  for both Kathy and I it was one of our most spiritual experiences we have had.  This little family, obviously poor, but, just radiating with the spirit.  Dedicated members of the church, willing to sacrifice whatever The Lord asked of them. It was an honor and a blessing to be amongst them.

  This is Schroder 

And this is Kathy painting on our P day

THE MISSIONARY THAT WOULD NOT QUIT

A few things first.   For P day here the missionaries play a lot of soccer.  Almost every chapel has a combo soccer/basket ball court.  We were with a zone when they were getting a soccer game going.  They asked Gary to play goaly.  He felt all impressed until he found out the reason they wanted him because he is so big!  He could just lay down and fill the entire goal.

We travelled to a liittle mountain town called Leguna Seca to do temple recommends.  For branches that are not part of a stake, but, in a district, Gary has to do a temple recommend interview after the branch presidents interview.  We had a really hard time finding this chapel.   Finally, we saw a little sign that said, La iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los últimos días, on a tiny obscure building.  It is about a large as an American Front room.   The toilets are the kind you find in camp grounds.  We waited a while, then a man approached us.  A nice looking man, but in very dirty clothes.  He is a counselor in the district presidency.   He was with his mom.  She is what they call here, a "tipico".  Which means, they dress in the original Indian style.  Both were very nice.  The mom had 12 children, but several had died.  Then, the branch president showed up in dirty work clothes and his "Tipico" wife.  As usual here, the had very few teeth.  However, we have a hard time describing the fine spirit of these people.  They are knowledgable, solid, Mormons.  They told us that this is the smallest church building in all of Guatemala, and, with the largest membership.  They cram 48 members in this little building.

The Other set of Sister missionaries, hermana nielson And hermana terry had their first baptisms:  a Grandma And her grandson.  A wonderful baptism.  Two elderly ladies were there.  They are recent converts.  They are really great, but, no teeth and they have a particular smell about them.  The insisted that we sit by them. (See pictures).

We were called by the Rio Blanco district president to travel to Rio Blanco, a harrowing experience, and do a missionary interview.  When we finally got there, we met two delightful sisters.  Both single, one is the primary president in the branch, the other wore a missionary plack.   They told us they lived two and a half hours away.  They travel back and forth on narrow and very hilly dirt roads to attend church.  And, travel four hours on a rickety old bus to get to the temple.   Their dedication was overwhelming.  They come from a family of seven children.  Four girls and three boys.  Three of the girls have served missions.  The parents do not support their membership in the church or their missions.  Gary interviewed the returning missionary.  She cried.  It is very hard for some missionaries to come home to parents that don't welcome them and are not happy with their service,  We finished the interview, and the branch president asked for her plack, she would not give it up!   For these missionaries that have no family support, the mission is so very dear to them.  On the mission they get all kinds of support and love.  It is very hard for us to think how they feel coming home.  These sisters are wonderful examples to us of full commitment to The Lord.   We have included a picture.

BFF

Gary has parasites again!!  His Best Friends Forever!!  Well, he is a bit miserable.  So he decided to try to make the relationship with his parasites a little more symbiotic and not so one sided.  He knows morse code, so he tapped this message on his tummy:   ....  .  .-..  .-..  ---    Which interpret means:  HELLO.   No response, just another burp.  So, back to the sample test.   He prepared a nice sample in a little plastic bag.   He put it on the table while we got ready to go to the lab.  We decided we had a real bad case of parasites when the bag begin to move across the table.

Every morning a small heard of goats come by our house.  In fact right in front of our house.  And, every morning we have droppings just in front of our door.  Well, at this same time we noticed that other people on our road sweep the trash up from in front of their houses every morning.  We don't.  So, we begin to sweep up the front of our house so that it was really clean.   One morning we noticed no goat droppings.  No one lives on either side of our house, and, the droppings were one one side and the other but in front of our house.  Do you really think the goats know about a clean sidewalk??

We might have mentioned the friends we have made.  Cisely and Miguel.   Cisely helps us with our Spanish several days a week.  They are really wonderful people.  They travel by bus every week, a three hour drive, to work in the temple, and, they are always helping somebody.  One day we came to our Spanish session and Cisely was a little out of breath.  We asked was she ok.  And, she told us that her end her two daughters we doing service.   There is a store not too far from her house.  And, the ladies, usually with little kids and a baby on their back, are carrying heavy bags of groceries to their homes.  (Not many people have cars).   Well, her and her daughters went out on the road and helped these moms carry their groceries to their homes.

We have made some friends in the market place.   Elena, a hair dresser that did our hair for us.  Jessica, a lady that runs a "used clothes" store, and Yuri, the lady we might have mentioned that lost her six year old daughter a few weeks ago.   Well, we have all three reading the Book of Mormon!

We have mentioned before that one of the reasons we came to the mountains was to make it possible to have sister missionaries here.  We have four.   There have not been sister missionaries here for some time because they got into trouble without someone looking after them.   Well our sister missionaries have been here for two months and one pair,  sister Lopez and sister Beckstrand, baptized two people this last Saturday, and, the other pair, sister Nielsen and sister Terry will baptize two people this coming Saturday!!   We have to say again, sister missionaries are amazing.

Here is a picture of sisters Lopez and Beckstrand

PRECIO DE GRINGO

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So, there is a thing down here about buying.  If you are from the USA and white the price goes up a lot.   Well, we have been shopping enough that when we ask for the price, we also say "no precio de gringo" .  We do a lot of bargaining, and, we get the price down but it probably is still higher than a local would get.  Anyway, we needed to buy a hat for Gary to sleep in.  Yes, to sleep in. There is a picture included.  Well, Kathy is getting very "vicious" at bargaining.  She found a hat for Gary in a little shop.  The clerk was a young man.  Kathy asked the price.   The young man told her Q3.  Kathy got very upset at the price and countered with Q2.   She miss understood the price.  He said "tres quetzales" but she heard "treinta quetzales".  A difference of 3 to 30.   Kathy was "hard barganing" over About 30 cents.  We all got a great laugh out of it!

We visited a liittle town Evan further in the mountains.  We usually have lolly-pops with us in case we meet missionaries or little kids.  So, in this little town, we parked by a house and several kids and a mom were looking at us (after all, we are white and twice their size)  we talked to them for a few minutes and Gary brought out of his bag some lolly pops for the kids.  We handed them around and the mom said "santa clause"  and she pointed to Gary's white hair and round tummy!! We gave lolly-pops to the mother and grand mother.

We drive and walk around looking for missionaries.  It is important that they know we are here for their support and to let them know that someone cares about what they are doing.  We were walking along and we met a pair of elders.  They said that they were looking to buy a kit, they had an appointment later in the day.  (They really should be talking and helping every one they meet)   So, here comes a man loaded with kits.  The four of us begin talking to him.  Kathy asked the man if he belonged to a church.  He said no.  She said, pointing to her plack, this is a really good church and these elders will tell you all about it and the we left, leaving the elders to do their job.

Believe it or not besides our work to watch after and take care of the missionaries, we are doing missionary work our selves.  We have failed miserably through out our life with missionary work.  One of our friends didn't talk to us for a few years after we talked to him about the church.  We watched a relative throw the Book of Mormon in the garbage can while leaving their house.   And on and on.  So here we are on a full time mission!  We usually have a few hours in the afternoon to ourselves.  We walk around the marketplace, buy a few things, and say hello but that was about it.  We decided to implement what we learned in conference:  pray for a missionary experience, prepare yourself such that you are able to have the Holy Ghost with you, and go around doing good.  And, The Lord will bring people to you, or lead you to the people, that will listen to your message.   We have tried to prepare ourselves by praying really a lot, studying the scriptures, and being obedient (this one is difficult).  And, we walk around being nice, saying hello, helping when we can.   And, we have four people that we have made friends with and, one may actually be taught by the missionaries.  ( our Spanish is doing ok but not quit ready for us to solo in a teaching meeting).  We can't believe that we actually had a missionary experience!

Here is Gary modeling his sleeping hat

Here we are in our Halloween costumes

OUR FRIENDS

We had our day all planned out.  We finally had a little time to catch up on a few things.   We planned on visiting a missionary house and give them a little message and some goodies and check on their needs.  (We visit missionary house two or three time a week.)   Then, we planned on using the extra time to walk around taking to people and do a little shopping.  Fat chance.   We made these plans the night before, we went to bed looking forward to an easier day.   So, we were awakened by a call. It was two elders with a bed bug problem.  They asked if tomorrow we could wash their sheets and bring them some bug spray.  We finished this call and got another.  It was sister missionaries.  They had seen the same man several times today, he was old  had grey hair and long side burns.  They were scared he was following them.   Well, we drive around every day and we see the same people every day.  It's a small town.  But, never second guess a sister, so we said we would take them to their first appointment and we would search around for the guy.  Now we were awake, and the thought came to mind that we received four new missionaries and they were probably freezing, so, tomorrow we would buy some blankets for them.  That was the end of our plans for a "free" day.  This kind of thing is typical every day, but, we love it.

One day a few days ago, we started our day and every thing was going bad:  we heard water running and when we came out into the main room, the other bathroom was flooded and the water was running through the house like a river.   We shut water off to the toilet and cleaned up.  Kathy got into the shower and the power went out in part of the house including the little heater at the end off the shower head.   Freezing cold water came out and that was the end of Kathy's shower.   Also, we were both still sick.  We pulled ourselves together and went to a zone meeting.  A few days before we attended a zone meeting and understood the Spanish quite well.  Not this day, we could not understand a thing.  We were severely depressed.  Kathy wanted to catch a plane home.  Gary said that we should not get on a plan today the way things were going.  Well, we had made friends with a lady and her three children.  We would talk to here several times a week.  We would bring her lunch now and then.  (she is poor).  One time she was not in her little shop and was not there for many days.  We were worried.   The lady in the shop next to hers said that her daughter was ill.   So, this "hard" day, we were walking along in town and Kathy got a tap on the shoulder. We turned around, and there was our friend.  She broke into tears.  Her six year old daughter had died.  Kathy and her hugged and cried for along time.  Kathy was whispering to her and told her we were sent here to share with her the message of eternal life. She said this in good Spanish. We said we would meet her tomorrow and bring the missionaries ( yes we are missionaries, but, we needed missionaries that can speak good Spanish).  We did meet with her and found out where her area is.  And, today, we got a call from a pair of excellent elders.  This lady lives in their area.  So, things are moving along for missionary lessons for our friend.   We don't know if she will get baptized, but, we know that The Lord wanted us to get the missionaries for her,  and, someone else was really trying hard to keep us from doing this.

Here is a picture of a friend of ours.  He is placed by his mom around town to get donations and has a little bag around his neck for the money.  He is severely CP.  He cannot hold the bag or talk or walk, but he has a great spirit and he feels ours.   When we approach him he gets a gigantic grin.   He starts grinning when we are some distance away.  He feels our spirit and we feel his.  We have a special place in our heart for people with CP.

THE RESULTS OF DISOBEDIENCE

We have mentioned before that we have a mission rule not to drink Coca-Cola.   Several years ago missionaries were drinking nothing but Coca-Cola  and getting dehydrated.  So the mission president made this rule.  Well we heard that the new president might drink a coke now and then.  The rule however has not been repealed.  Against Kathy's advice Gary decided to have a Pepsi or Coke now and then.  Kathy told him he shouldn't be disobedient or he would pay the consequences.  Gary repented but was too late.   His punishment came as a really bad case of the flue.  The flu here is called Gripe.   Up to now we have avoided catching this bad flue.  During Gary's sickness a friend called.  Kathy told her that Gary was sick with the flu.  The friend said well it must be a punishment for him drinking Coke!  Gary will never again be disobedient.

We got a call from a missionary about a week or so ago.  The missionary said that one of the elders had passed out and they can't wake him.  We asked if he was breathing.  They said maybe!   We rushed over to pick him up.  He is a big boy and it took four of us to get him in the car.  He was breathing, but out cold with his eyes open!  We were terrified, we pleaded with heavenly that he would be ok.  The elders had already given him a blessing.  We got him to the hospital and after about two hours he woke up.  He said he was having a bad head ache.  (His main concern was that he would miss general conference).  His blood test and other basic test came out normal.  The doctor wrote a prescription for a tomography of his head.  This procedure costs quit a bit and needed approval from the president.   We kept close watch over him for two days and we finally got approval.  We got the tomography and took the pictures to the doc.  It turns out he had a very bad sinus infection.  We got him on strong meds and he has been ok.   Another direct answer to prayers.

Several times a week we walk through the town park.   Here, each town has a "parque".  There is a large Catholic church with a large patio in front.  The patio is surrounded with markets and vendors.  We walk through saying hello and talking to people when we can.  We saw a young man in a wheel chair.  As we approached him he gave a gigantic grin.  He has CP and can't talk and barely move.  He has a bag on his lap for donations.  He reminded us of our grandson, who has since passed away.  He had extreme PC.  Every time we visited him, he would great us with excitement and a gigantic grin.  So now, every time we visit the park, we find our friend, we can feel his spirit and we know he can feel ours.  We found and older lady with the same problem.  It is the highlight of our week to visit our friends and give them a little money.  It is comforting to us that we know that our friends, and our grandson, will some day be  renewed with wonderful bodies!

Here is a picture of our little English speaking group watching general conference.

And here is Kathy having received "goodies" from home

THE BLACK MOLD MIRACLE

It is cold here and Gary needs a sweater.   We shopped and shopped but we surprisingly found out that Gary is too big.   We walk to a place that sells used clothing.  Gary asks for a sweater and the guy starts laughing!!   I assume we are known here as the giant white people.  We were driving several blocks from our house and stopped to talk to the men in the water bottle truck.  We asked them if they would deliver and begin trying to tell them where are house is.  But, of course they knew. ( there are no addresses here).   We are going to call for take out pizza and just say, bring it to the house of the white giants.

Gary has parasites again.   We had to take in a sample to get tested.  Gary didn't think he had them again.  Kathy did and she won the bet.  So, Gary brought two samples in.  The real one in a little bag.  And, another fake black bag with three, one pound bags of beans in it.  (See picture)  We entered the lab, told them we needed a lab test for parasites.  The lady asked for a sample, and, Gary brought out the fake bag!!  After an aukward pause of silence, we thought the lady was going to pass out, we brought out the real one, and, we had a great big laugh!

A few days ago, we got a call from a missionary.  He said that his companion had passed out from excruciating chest pain.  They gave him a blessing and he woke up, but, with terrible pain and he could hardly breath.  We all thought "heart attack"!   They got him to the hospital and the doctor did all kinds of tests, and they came back normal!!    He did not have a heart attack and the doctor had no idea what was wrong.  Well, he got better.  So, after a night in the hospital, we took him home.  After a few hours the pain came back worse than ever.  Back to the hospital, more tests, every thing was normal but he was in horrible pain.  It was unbearable to watch him go through this.  We said a very fervent prayer that The Lord would show us what was wrong so that we could help him.  After a few hours he got better again.   An elder that was with us said "he gets better in the hospital and worse at home.  When we took him home, his room smelled musty like mold".  We told the elder that if mold was the cause we would buy him dinner (he loves to eat).   We researched black mold on the Internet and found that the symptoms were exactly as our sick missionary had.  In fact, black mold is very dangerous (it emits spores into the air).  We have to say again that prayers are answered!  However, the answer may come by means you may not expect.

LECHE DE CABRA

Every day a lady with two goats comes by our house.   We had no idea where she was going, but, then we found out.  She has plastic drinking cups on a string, and, if someone wants a hit, she milks a goat into a cup!   Yuk, a little to close to "nature" for us.

Included is a picture of a statue in our town.  If you look close, he is tilting.  We wondered why they made him that way.  Maybe the thing he is carrying in his left hand is very heavy, or, his left leg is short, or, maybe when whatever he did that made him famous, his left foot was in a hole.   After some thought, we decided that the earthquake of last November did it.

A missionary from the USA called us and said that his companion from Nicaragua was having problems.  He was fasting every few days, and, not eating much in between, and, continually out of money.   We visited them and talked to the one with problems.  He said he as not feeling well and he would start eating.  We gave him some meds and checked back in a few days to see how he was.  He was getting worse.  After a few more talks with him we decided to call our mission nurse to tell her the situation.  She said that they would have to get him therapy and so on.  This would end up probably ruining his mission.  We were really concerned.  This situation was going on for several weeks, and, all this time his companion never gave up on him.   By the way, the companion with the problem is a great missionary!  Finally, we get a call from the USA companion.   He had at long last gotten the real problem out of his companion.   IT turns out that in Nicaragua, you have to sign a contract with the church to pay the monthly mission cost, and recently, his non member parents told him they were not going to pay anymore.  So, this young man was starving himself to pay the debt.  We thought there were a few lessons from this event:   First, the courage of the USA companion to not give up on his partner is amazing.   He could of easily told us that he needed a new companion now!  Or, he could have said bad things about him to get him out, but no!  Second, the love that missionaries have for each other is something we would never have believed.   And, third, the determination of the missionary with the problem to "pay the church" was tipical of a great missionary.  The mission president will handle his problem.

By the way, the USA missionary is really prepared for marriage!

We have been here for several weeks and have had no communication with the president.  Kathy thought this was not right, and Gary said that we were doing our job and it was ok.  So, a few days ago Kathy woke up from her nights sleep and told Gary he had to email the president.  Gary, knowing that very often, Kathy gets the insperation to guide us through our problems, he wrote an email telling the president what we have been doing.   Well, the president came up here to conference with our missionaries and told them all kind of great things about us and that they could trust us!

We need to always remember to listen to our spouse!

Gary with our friends

PARALLELS

We have stayed in our house all day to day.   We have a little flue, called gripa here,  so, we stayed home.  We think the terrifying events of this past week ( high centered car by the edge of a cliff, and, the earthquake) has lowed our immunity.  Also, the water to the house has been on for just a few minutes then off.   The shower water heater is a device on the shower head.  It only heats up when there is a fairly good flow.  So, we wait around for the water to build up, run for the shower, scrub real fast, and get out.  We always end up getting the cold water, and here in the mountains, it is really cold.  But, we get along ok and just say to our selves like all the missionaries do, "that's Guatemala".

We had our 50th anniversary a few days ago.  We worked in the morning then we shopped and shopped around town.  We wanted to get something to remember this anniversary, so, we found a little on man that makes rings, and got a little gold ring for Kathy, the man in graves on the inside with our names and the date, here is the ring:

Gary got a gift also:

The most interesting gift of the day was the earthquake.   Last year, they had a bad one here that did lots of damage, so, that gave a lot of meaning to this one,  we had such a great day, we got our gifts, and, Gary got a hand made sweater ( he is too big for any pre-made sweaters we could find ) that cost about $20.  We had take-out Chinese food and we were sitting at the table eating and complimenting ourselves for such a great day, and then, the house started to shake.  Now, we lived in California for many years and experienced lots of earthquakes, one rocked us so bad that we could not get out of our water bed because it was waving back and forth.  But, all these earthquakes lasted for only a few seconds.  This one went on and on a started to worsen.  The fact that we are in a total concrete and cinder block house begin to worry us.  It finally ended, and, we spent most the night tracking Down missionaries.   Everyone was OK, a wonderful blessing.   That was our anniversary.  We reflected on this event, and thought that this is a graphic lesson about our total dependence on our Heavenly Father.   We were thinking how we had mastered the day, and, God showed us who was in charge.

After our scary situation in the mountains, we were hesitant to go back up, but, what do you do when you get bucked off a horse..  So, up we went.  This time we prayed at every split in the road, and, every near vertical hill, and we made it back and forth.  A major blessing.  At the top, there is a little town with 4 missionaries.  The town and the surrounding views are breath taking!  We thought that it was a little like reaching heaven.  Then,  we carried this theme a little further:  Our fear of beginning the trip must be similar to our feelings just before we come to this world, knowing it is the right thing to do, but, also, understanding the great risk to our salvation.  Our trip through life is dangerous similar to this trip.  There are many "Y's" in the trip that require correct decisions.  The wrong choice could be disastrous.  And, the trip does not get easier it is hard all the way, in fact, it gets harder just before the end.  However, when we safely arrive, it is all worth it.

This horse delivers its load all by itself.  We felt a little like this horse:  doing our job all a lone with a gigantic load, but stopping now and then for a little snack.

THE MENNONITE MIRACLE

Well, here we are I'm the mountains.  We have been living in a hotel for six days.  The house we are supposed to rent is a new house, small, but we like it, but, no electricity and no kitchen.  The electricity  is supposed to be ready by tomorrow, then, maybe we can move in.  A sink is also supposed to be installed.    However, we are kind of having an ok time in the hotel.  We are friends with the maids and there is a fairly good restaurant downstairs.  The only slight problem is that being senior missionaries we pay for almost everything our selves, so, we have to move real soon!

Our responsibility is sort of gone up really a lot.   We never thought our mission would be like this.  We had dreams of showing people through a visiter center that gets one or two visitors a day.   Now, we have been cast into the mountains, it is freezing, we have no warm clothes, there are no normal markets, and, we have 50 missionaries we are responsible for!  We keep buying blankets for ourselves, but, we have been interviewing missionaries in there houses, and, some are so cold, we give our blankets away!  And, every church event we attend,  they ask us to talk!  We get another time to make fools of our selves with our really bad Spanish!

In our old place, where is was really warm, we made friends with this little family next door.  The little two year old girl really liked us.   We would give her little treats now and then.  So, we moved and some missionaries moved into our house.  We got a call from the mom of this little girl.  The girl ran to the mom and said.  "Gringos have moved into their house"   I guess we got beyond the gringo barrier.  

Gary got into big trouble again.   For some reason Kathy's hair is thinning a bit on top.  It may be because of the Guatemalan hair dye she used.  Anyway, Gary thought she would feel better if he called her "captain Picard" from star freak.   It did not go over well.   Especially when he would not move the car until she pointed her hand forward the front and said "engage".

Ok, so, we have missionaries even higher on the mountains in a little place called Rio Blanco.  These missionaries have been sort of ignored since the ride up is a dirt scary roads.  Of course, we are going to do our job right, so, we took off in our Toyota corolla to Rio Blanco. The road is terrible, big holes, washed out in many places, seemingly straight up or straight down.  We finally got there In about an hour.   We had a wonderful experience there.  Two branches, really run well, and what a wonderful spirit.  Of course, we had to give a short talk.  Well, on our way to the car, there was a little mentally challenged boy.  Kathy stopped and played with him for a while, then got into the car and started to cry!  We took of, and after about 20 minutes of driving, we realized we took the Wrong road. The road was terrifying.  We tried to turn around and got the car high centered. Cliffs up on one side and down on the other.  We were really scarred and said a fervent prayer.  Well, down the road came three cars, SUV's, full of Mennonite families.  They pulled us out and helped us out of there.  There are some important principles we learned.   We always say a prayer before we take off in the car, this time we did not because Kathy was so upset.  After we got back to the hotel, we realized that missionaries are always under attack by the adversary, and prayer is our main defense.  By our praying before we drive, we have experienced miracles, saving our lives.  We missed this time and almost lost it.  However, our prayer for help was immediately answered.  We were taught a big lesson.   

Please read 2 Nephi 32:8-9.

Some mountain pictures:

VOLCANO

We are in the process of trying to move to the mountains to begin our new calling.  So, last week we drove to the mountains to see a house that the "mountain" missionaries had found.  There is lots of pressure on all of us to get us moved.  The president was very firm in his orders to get us up there by tomorrow.    The drive is like going thru the "king kong's" Mountain.  The mountains and valleys are steep and rugged but covered with dark green jungle.  We expected a giant gorilla to jump out at any time.  So, it took us more than three hours to get there.  Small mountain roads with many curves and switch backs, and, the usual insane drivers.  We had to negotiate ourselves through a fairly large town.  Kathy is the navigator and has been amazing in getting us around.  However, this time she has been taking lots of pictures to paint, and, we got lost!  So, we were roaming around this town not knowing what to do, and we came up a little hill, and out of nowhere, there was the temple!  It was a miracle in deed because we knew we were going the right way.

When we got to San Pedro, one of our mountain towns, we found the missionaries, and the house arrangement fell through, so, the missionaries were in some office looking for more house and they found one that we went to see.  It was terrible, Kathy was near tears, we thought we were in big trouble.  So, the missionaries continued to look after getting an earful from us and we went to our hotel.  The hotel is ok, things are small, not plush but functional.  We are of course always checking for insects and rodents.  But, the place seemed clean.  So, we settled down to sleep, Kathy got up to use the bathroom, and screamed bloody murder!   By now, this has happened so often that Gary almost slept through it.   Kathy said there is a rat by my bed, I heard it and it touched my feet, and there is a rat dropping right here!  So, Gary checked it out, and, Kathy's feet had brushed the curtained and the curtained had a plastic liner and made a noise when her feet brushed it.   The dropping was a sock lint from my cheap Walmart socks!  

So, the next morning we took off for home, we got lost again in the big city but finally got through.  We were driving down this big canyon and in the distance, we witnessed a real volcano eruption!  Gary panicked.  He had seen some years ago a documentary on volcanos and how deadly volcano gases are.  (See picture).  We thought we were going to die.  Which was ok since we had decided we could die any time here and we were ok with it as long as it was quick and we went together.  Poison gas was acceptable.  It turns out the people here could care less about the eruption.  So, we forgot about it and drove on.

Last night four missionaries came to our house.  One is an assistant to the president.  He went on about what the president want us to do, then, he said the mountain elders had found a great house.  They emailed us pictures, see below, and, it seemed, Great.  We asked for a pictures of the kitchen, they mumbled on and finally said the kitchen needs work, it has a sink but not many cupboards.  So, they went on like this until Gary called one of the missionaries that were at the house that he knew would give him straight talk, he said, well, there is no kitchen, just an empty room!!

Kathy and could not stop laughing at the not to well planned out story they had worked out to get us to take this house.  We said we would take it, after all, in Utah, we had lived without a kitchen for a long time.

Today, some sister missionaries which we had visited an investigator family with, and, bore our testimony of eternal families, told us that the whole family had decided to be baptized, and, our testimonies had supported their decision.  We were humbled at this announcement.  Our blessings from our bishop and our stake president before we came both mentioned that we would bring souls to Christ, but we could not see clearly how that would happen.

LOVE YOU ALL!!

DIRTY MISSIONARIES

Before we get into dirty missionaries, we have to apologize for not writing a blog for a few weeks.   There is  reason:   We received a new calling which is way beyond what we expected for our mission.  We finally were moving along smoothly.   We worked out a contract with the cockroaches that seems to be working:  (they can run around all they want when we are not in the house, but, if they show themselves to us, we can kill them.)   We had our mission job organized and progressing.  We had become accustomed to facing near death when we drive, and, we were on a quest to get a new car, which can only be done if we put 100,000 kilometers on this one, so, we were driving every day.  And, we got used to sweating constantly.

So, Gary was called as a second counsellor to the mission presidency to watch over the missionaries in the mountain cities, requiring us to move to the mountains.  And, the president said "aprenda español rápido"  which is a command to learn Spanish now!!   We haven't slept much since the call, and, we have been either happy or crying, hopeful or in despair, ready to face anything or packing our bags to go home!  Since Gary is now a president, every time we show up in a church, we asked to talk!   Our first experience with a wonderful little ward was a disaster.  When we finally learn Spanish, we will have to go back and make amends.

Our move to the mountains means moving to the cold.  40's at night, low 70's in the day.  We have not one piece of warm clothing or a blanket!

So, we were really stressed by the need to speak and understand Spanish way better, and by the giant responsibility we have.  Kathy was saying our tenth prayer of the day, and we were clearly "rebuked" by The Lord:   We are here to save souls!  All else must be behind and in support of this!   So, we are now really know our calling and we will do it.

We have not had water in the house for nine days.  We get a trickle downstairs but nothing in the showers or bathrooms upstairs.  We fill up gallon jugs to take upstairs.  So, bathing is so hard that we went one day without washing and that was a really bad idea.  Kathy has five or six bottles of very expensive hair stuff.  Well, watching her take a shower with a gallon jug and a bucket was really amusing but just shows what a great sport she is.

Here are some pictures,  love you all

ARMY OF GOD

So, a few things first.  

We were sitting in a most amazing and fancy pizza restaurant we have ever been in.  Someone at the door to open it for you, sit down service, excellent waiters, he served us the first slice of pizza.  Then we paid at the table.  This is a Pizza Hut!!

We made an attempt to get to a ward house that is in the middle of nowhere, after two hours, we did not find it, however, we were on the worst roads ever, see the picture

(By the way, that is not a school bus.  Somehow they get USA school buses here and use them like taxi buses)

We just received 28 new missionaries.   20 of these are from the USA, and 10 of those are sisters.   These are amazing new missionaries, they know Spanish, they are focused and ready to go.  The current missionaries are overwhelmed by their knowledge of Spanish and their dedication.  They "hit the ground running"  We feel that the missionaries of today are the best and most able spirits and Heavenly Father has kept them in reserve for these last days.   They are in all ways an Army of God!

GARY IS FINALLY POPULAR

So, Gary has never been very popular.  For example he data one girl, that was Kathy, she data the entire east bench.   Well, it took getting to Guatemala to solve his social problem.  He now has lots of friends.  They all have the same name:  entamoeba coli, or, parasites.

We found out about his buddies because he had a constant tummy ache.   So, he had to get a stool test.  Well, thing are not to formal here.  No cute little envelope with a stick and all kinds of complicated equipment.  We just got some into a left over Chinese food take out box and took it to this doctors office.  The lady there looked at my name tag and said to come back in an hour.  No disclaimer forms or insurance forms or wrist bands, etc.  So we came back in an hour, the lady gave us a single typed page, and said, "tiene parásitos" and we paid her about $2.50 dollars.

However, he has to brutally kill his friends with some antibiotics and he is back to his anti-social self.

On the other hand, here is Gary with a friend we hired.

PICTURES

LOVE IN THE MOUNTAINS

We went to the mountains to work with the missionaries there.   Three hours of winding roads, but, the place is beautiful.  And, the weather is cool and in fact cold, which means, no cockroaches and no Mosquitos.    So, this is what we do.   Kathy, as we have said before, is responsible for the Latino English program.    This is a church sponsored program to teach the Latinos some English before they go home so that the have a better chance of improving their employment and church service.  Kathy has made a really cute little video that we play on our laptop.   She gathers five or six Latino missionaries and shows them the video and encourages them to work on their English.  (They have study books) however, what Kathy really does is she shows them her love for them and her true concern for their personal improvement.  So, with really bad Spanish and her giant heart she really gets these kids to know that she cares about them and, as a result, most are working On their English.

Gary is responsible for the in-field training of new missionaries.   He meets with each training companionship, a trainer and a student.  (A seasoned missionary and a new missionary) They have a book that outlines how to do the training.   The training is really important since the MTC training has been shortened due to the tremendous amount of new missionaries,  however, the training is hard and takes time, so, many tend to not do too much training.   This is Gary's job, to get them to do the training.  So Gary mets with each training companionship.   He reviews the progress they have done in their book.  Then, he asks them to show him how they study.  Then, he does this little test.  He tells them that we are going to have an exam.  This is where they get a very worried look.  He says let's pretend I am an investigator, a Guatemala Indian that only know basic Spanish.  (This is to compensate for Gary's lack of Spanish),  and the new missionary is the teaching missionary.  Well all this ends up in lots of laughs and fun.  Gary tells them he loves them and he is very proud of them and will visit them again and then gives them a piece of candy.

So, after being here for a few months we are doing what we all understand.  The way to get your teaching understood is to prove to your students that you really love and care for them.

PICTURES