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!!