On a different mission

Passports

Ok, we finally got home.    There were a few bumps along the way.   The mission office in Guatemala City lost our passports.   We were worried so we decided to drive the very long way to Guatemala City to verify that our passports were okay and to pick them up.   A Really nice young man looked for our passports in the place where they were supposed to be. They were not there. So, he searched and searched and searched and finally after about 45 sweaty minutes he found them.  Yes, we were having night mares about not being able to leave the country, but, on the other hand, if we were forced to stay longer, we could improve our spanish and not face the downside of going home, like houses, bills, cars, politics, etc.

Going away parties

Our missionary friends and our wonderful president and his wife surprised us with humbling and amazing going away parties.  We were honored, feed, loved, got great gifts, and cried a lot.  We had hoped just to sneak out, but that didn't happen.  We had a royal send off which, to us, was very humbling.  We didn't feel that we deserved all the love and appreciation.  But, hey, it was wonderful!

Our two mountain missionaries.

We finished preparing Abner and rosa so that they could submit their mission applications.  The effort took us several months of hard work but we loved doing it.   With the help and effort of President Rohdas, we herd later that they both were on their missions, and, in the places they wanted to be.  They are going to be outstanding missionaries and we were so blessed to help them on their way.

Our last night in town

The day before our flight, we drove our car to mission headquarters to turn it in.   The man in charge of mission cars, kind of a grump, was giving us a hard time.  Just in the midst of what was going to be a heated exchange, a senior couple walked in and handled the problems for us, and, unbelievably, they were our good friends we had not seen for 50 years!!   Al and Kathy Burningham.  They are the senior couple in charge of starting up church public relations in Central America!!  It was a delight to be with them for the evening.  We had a great dinner at a local restaurant and lots of catching up.  What a blessing for us at a time when we were suffering with mixed feelings of leaving.

The flight home

We caught the shuttle to the airport at 4am.   We spent about 6 hours in our expensive hotel.  We got to the airport and checked in for the flight, and, Gary just about passed out!!  Delta was charging us $360 for each of our second bags, a total of more than 700 dollars!   Well, we had to put up with him complaing about this all the way to the Los Angeles airport.  We found out later that his near heart attack was not worth it, the baggage charge was in Guatemalan money and was only about $80.  He had to apologies to several family members and friends about his complaints about Delta airlines.

Our stay in LAX

Our plane to Salt Lake City ended up being delayed for 8 hours!  However, during that time, we made some wonderful friends, talked to returning missionaries for a long time, had some good food, and spread the gospel a little.   We consoled a young man that was returning early from his mission because of a health problem.  Before he left for his mission, he thought he had this problem handled, but, it came back.  And, Kathy had a very interesting conversion with some missionaries returning from Russia.  All in all, the delay was a blessing.

Our first impressions of USA

well, every one in the USA are giants!  Really tall!   For a year and a half we were taller that any one around us, and now, we felt like midgets.  Towering people all around us.  It was a bit disturbing.

The roads in the USA are like jet airplane landing strips.   We were overwhelmed with all the road we had to drive on.  We were used to tiny roads with other cars hitting our rear view mirrors.  Here, we can roam all over the road without being disturbed.

And, finally, the USA is clean.   Unfortunatly, the people we love so much in Guatemala, throw trash everywhere.  There are all kinds of paper and junk on the side of the roads including dead dogs.  While driving along here, we found our selves searching for at least one little chip bag or pop can.  But no.

Our big family trip

We travelled 6000 miles across the USA and experienced the most beautiful fall scenery ever!  What a gran blessing.  We visited each of our seven children and their families, and what a delight!  All the grand kids had grown a lot, and, all the families are doing well!

Our next mission

Four days ago, Kathy was diagnosed with breast cancer,   The doctor said that we caught it early, thanks to a 3D mammogram, but, the lump was malignant.  We had a downtime of feeling sorry for our selves, but, snapped out of that.  We put our thoughts in perspective:  this is a life threatening experience but life itself is a life threatening experience.  We were on the edge of death while driving or walking in Guatemala every day!  We have strived to be obedient to God's commandments, and, we firmly believe that what ever happens, we are in his hands!  We are focusing outside of our selves, upping our help for our family, friends, and anyone that we can be of service.

Our final thought on our mission

THERE ARE FEW THINGS MORE REWARDING OUR MORE LIFE CHANGING THEN WORKING FULL TIME FOR THE LORD!

WE CAN CHANGE

Going home
Ok, we have 23 days left on our mission.  How do we feel?  Mixed.  We can hardly wait to see our family. That is what we miss the most.  But, it has been an a wonderful blessing to work full time for The Lord.   We have really not been in the world!!   We do not watch tv, we have no idea about world problems, we pay no attention to government issues here, or other strange things having to do with politics, we focus total on supporting the missionaries so they can do their work, and, on getting contacts for them  to teach.    We some times do not recognize who we are, we talk to people on the street and begin asking them about their beliefs, and writing down their name and phone number to give to the missionaries.  This is not the people we used be be!  We like our new selves.

All the answers
Part of our job is to encourage the English program for the Spanish speaking missioneries.   They have two exercise books.  The books require them to work on English words and phrases and then there is a mini test for each section.  (The books are totally based on the preach my gospel book).   An English speaking missionary checks the answers of the tests and signs off a section.   We are not in charge of the program but we make sure they have the books and we say a few words of encouragement.  The Spanish speaking missionaries are given the books when they leave the training centers.  But, they lose them, can you imagine that.   So, we keep some books around that we can get copies from.  We made a bunch of copies a few months ago and handed out 4 or 5 books.  We gave a book to an English speaking elder with a Spanish speaking companion. The next day, we get a call from these missionaries.  It turns out we copied a book that had all the quiz answers included!  Kathy spent the evening erasing the answers from our so called master book, and we got a good copy to these elders. We must have given out the real master by mistake.  Then we thought:  we gave out five other books with the answers in them.  Why did we not get more calls?

The switch
We got a panic call from our zone leaders.  They said that the sisters were showering in polluted water!  The elders looked in their water storage tank, on the roof,.  The top was off and the water was filthy.  Then they said, their new water heater was not working.  So, they have been taking cold showers with polluted water. We contacted our repair guy and rushed to their house.  We checked out the storage tank.  Yep, the lid was off and the water was filthy.  Then, we took a closer look.  The tank was completely shut of and not used! One down and another to go.  We checked the shower heater.  All these little heaters are at the end of the shower head and are connected to a breaker switch on the wall.  The switch was off! We turned it on and it worked fine.  Solved!  Our maintenance man would take no money.  We left the house patting our selves on the back for a job well done!

The earth quack.
About 5 in the morning about two weeks ago, we experienced an earth quake.  Now, we lived in California for many years an went through lots of earth quakes.  They were kind of rolling earth quakes and really didn't bother us.  This earth quack was violent.  Sharp movements and it lasted a while.  We rode our bed as it bounced across the floor.  Well, it finally stopped, we checked with the zone leaders and other missionaries and everyone was ok.   Yes, we were a little shook.  But, we figured that we were here doing the Lords work, and he would get us out of danger, or, take us out because it was time to go home.  We simple said, "go ahead Guatemala, bring it on".  Pictures included.

Courage
After the earth quake, there were not many injuries but many house partially or fully crumbled.  For several days, our missionaries were out helping to clean up.
Two sister missionaries finished helping a family clean out the rocks and blocks.  The father begin a conversation about his time in the United State.  He told them about the 15 year old girl friend he had and wanted to marry but the laws in the United States would not allow him.  One of the sisters asked him about his current wife.  Well, he was married to her while he was playing around with this other girl.  He said all this with the wife standing there.  The sister missionary bravely called him firmly to repentance.  Telling what he did was totally wrong and a sin against God and he better repent of his words and actions right now!!  The man coward and obviously understood how wrong he was.
It took a lot of courage for this slim little girl to stand up to this guy.  We are so proud of her.
We have several missionaries that are the only members of their family.  
We just got a new missionary from Canada.  He is the only member in his family and they do not support his mission.  He has paid for his own mission.  He is a committed wonderful missionary.  We are so impressed with his courage to do what his Heavenly Father wants him to do even in the face of a non-supportive family.  This missionary speaks three languages, Spanish, French, and English and is fluent in all three!

Missionary approach of the month.
Consider an investigator being taught by two missionaries.  The teaching is going well, then they get around to talking about the gifts of the spirit.  The senior missionary tells the investigator that he and his companion have the gift of tongues!  At this point, the Canadian missionary rips of a little French!

How many people can you get in a Rav4
The missionaries had lined up a young family to come to the church and be married and baptized.  (we have a lot of these marriage-baptisms)  They we on a tight time schedule but the family called and said they could not get a bus.  So, they asked us to go with them to pick up the family.  The missionaries instructed the family that they could only bring four people.  Ok, we drove away with 11 people in the car, the couple, dad, mom other kids, dog, no, no dog but why not.  The dad pushes his way into the front seat with Kathy.  Her rear end is pushing up against the gear shift and Gary can only get it in low gear.  Then, Kathy get a "charlie horse" in he leg and begins moaning with pain.  We stop, switch three little girls from the back with the Dad. We finally get them there and the Dad tells us that we forgot grandma.  So, back to the house and her comes this tiny little lady.  We could have put her in the jockey box!  (the missionaries were in stuffed in the back).  They all got there and were married and baptized.  A wonderful ending except Kathy ended up with a pulled muscle and is limping around and complaining about pain.

We can change
The every present dark side would like us all to believe that we can not change, Such statements as: that is just the way I am!,  i can't help it I just have a bad temper!  Or, I can never stop drinking!  And, so on.  Well, it just is not true.  The Gospel of Jesus Christ is based on change.  We believe anyone can change with the help of their Heavenly Father.
We have a few examples:  some time ago a man and his wife got baptized.  Well, the old man had stepped out on his wife and wanted her forgiveness but she was not forgiving.  They, got baptized but she did not like him at all.  This was probably four months ago.  Today, the daughter of the this mom and dad got baptized, completing the family.  The man is totally changed, they are very happy, very involved with the church and I am sure they are temple bound.  All in a few short months.
We visited a family with the sister missionaries.  They were very poor.  A small house made of corrugated metal.  The small area was total taking up by two beds with a small area on one wall with a plank and a cook top.  The Dad was totally unresponsive.  When we left Kathy and I said that there is no chance these people will be baptized.  A few months later the sisters told us that this family was ready to be baptized.  The man has a bad drinking problem but promised the interviewing missionaries he was going to change.  They did not trust him so the zone leaders interviewed him two more times. They were impressed with his commitment to change.
Ok, they got baptize a few weeks ago and we saw him in church.  The whole family on the front row listing very attentively to the speaker.  The sisters told he has not had a drop of booze and is really doing well!
One more example, we helped teach a family several months ago.  The mom and two sons were members but very inactive.  But, they are a really nice family. Now, after lots of work in the missionaries part, the sons and he Mom are very active.  The sons wife was baptized and we are helping the younger son get ready to put in his mission papers!  The big hold out was the Dad.  When we help teach him the sisters said that the parents we getting a divorce.  Well, yesterday the youngest son baptized the Dad, a wonderful and intelligent man!!  What a blessing to witness!!  They are doing well and are happy and the family is staying together.  Ok, what else would we want!!

Summary and Testimony
This is probably the last blog entry of this mission.   We thought we could "kick back" the last few weeks, but, no, we have more work to do than usual!!
In the beginning, we had some thoughts about a mission but we decided we had to much going on.
We took a trip to visit our son in Ceder Rapids Iowa, and, several very telling occurrences happened that convinced us that Heavenly Father wanted us on a mission!   But, maybe we did not want to go!.  We spent the drive home discussing how we were going to dodge this, but, then, finally decided to be obedient.
We had two friends that are mission presidents that wanted us to join them.  But, we decided if we were going to do this, we were going to let the Lord tell us where to go.
We spent many days debating over the little check box on the application that said "do you want to learn a new language, no, maybe, yes.  Gary wanted to, Kathy, not so much.  But, we finally sent it in with "yes".  (we regretted this later but it seems it was all part of the plan for us).
We arrived in Guatemala and the mission president asks us "why are you here".   This comment set us back a bit.  We didn't know why we were here, but, we knew that the Lord had sent us.  From that time our one prevailing rule was, that if the Lord wants us to do it, we will do it.
Our mission has been the greatest experience of our life.   There are so many blessing it is hard to think of them all at once.  What comes to mind the most is our testimony.  We had a testimony before we came but we have been tremendously strengthened.  We have learned by necessity to fully depend on Heavenly Father. It has been an "eye opening" experience.  We have been asked to do many things that in our wildest dreams we would never do, but, we simple applied our rule, that if Heavenly Father wants us to do it, we will do it.  We considered what ever the Mission President told us to do, it was from Heavenly Father.
We have such a strong testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  And, the love our Savior has for us, and, how he wants so much to gather his people to give them joy, protection, spiritual growth, and, above all eternal life, and, the hope for eternal life.
The Book of Mormon is the most amazing collection of truth, inspiration, insight, and an instruction book on how to get ourselves back to live with our Eternal Father.  This book is the one tool we have that can stand in the face of any false doctrine.
We are witnesses of the most astounding miracle that can happen on this earth, and, that is the miracle of conversion.  As we have mentioned before, to see the light of Christ rise in a persons sole and open the door to the entire world of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, is a miracle beyond imagination.
We are humbled to the ground that we were able to be a tiny instrument in the hand of the Lord to help bring about this conversion in his children.

Hermanas

LAS HERMANAS

One of our two zones have had four sister missionaries for as long as we have been in the mountains, since September.   Gary was made a counselor in the mission presidency and we moved to the mountains and one of our main assignments was to watch after these sisters.  We probably mentioned before, that, many years ago there were sister missionaries here, but, they we very disobedient along with the Elders, parties and things.  And, the president at that time took the sisters out.  Well, now here they are.  With the sister missionaries here, baptisms have slowly increased.  They bring a wonderful spirit to the mission and there are some people that respond better to sister missionaries.  They have also bought out the best in the Elders.  They really do work harder and are more obedient with the sisters around.  We guess it must be a mixture of them trying to impress the sisters on the one hand, and, not wanting the sisters to get more baptisms then they do on the other!

We have had some trying experiences with the sisters.  They have been chased, followed, and whistled at.   We also had a sister that was followed and she turned around a slugged the guy.  This is Sister Nielsen.   A great missionary, that was really savvy and tough.  Now, we have only sister missionaries that are either latino or that look latino and can run really fast.

We have been with the sister missionaries on appointments with investigators.  They are amazing, like all missionaries, wonderful testimonies, not afraid to enter the most humble of homes and eat the food.  Like the rest of us, we just assume we are going to get food poisoning one or two times a month.

Just this week, the president sent up three more sister missionaries.  A forth will be added soon.   In the past, all the sisters were in one zone.  The new sisters are in the other zone.  So, we have sisters covering both our zones.  On their first day, the new sisters got six contacts.  These sisters were put in a ward that has very little priesthood.  The bishop is the only one on the stand.  When we visit we sit with him.  In the past, the bishop wanted only elders in his ward because he needed the help.  Well, our inspired president believes in the old saying:  give a man a fish and eats for a day, teach him to fish and he eats his whole life.  The hope is that the sisters will covert families with men that can handle the priesthood.

Today, we visited this ward.  The sisters missionaries met and talked to everyone and gave the talks in the meeting.  The talks were sweet and inspired.   It was a special meeting for us.  We sat on the stand to keep the bishop company and we gave testimonies after the sisters talked.  For, Gary, it was a very spiritual day.  There was only one boy available to pass the sacrament.  So, he helped.  We only had about 30 people in the meeting, but, as he was passing, he had thoughts of the Savior himself passing the sacrament.  It was an unbelievable spiritual experience for him.

Wednesday the new sisters arrived.  The zone leaders called us and asked us it we could meet them and take them to their house.  We arrived to pick them up.  There were the three of them with 6 gigantic suit cases that weighed about 100 pounds each and two medium sized suit cases and back packs and bags.  How Gary got us all in the little Rav4 is a miracle.  We pushed 4 big suit cases in the back, stuffed two more big suit cases in the back seat.  Stacked two sister in the back seat.  Pushed two medium sized suit cases in the front seat and stacked the third sister on Kathy’s lap.  And stuffed the rest of the stuff around the people and suit cases.  The little Rav4 barely made it up the hill to their house.  Gary was so happy that we made it until he noticed all the girls including Kathy were gone into house leaving him with the luggage.  Now, keep in mind how old he is.  He managed to carry a thousand pounds of luggage up a tiny stair case made for midgets without passing out.  However, today, he is still pain.

Here are our wonderful sisters.

THE BIG PIG

The really big pig

So, we had to go to this little town again, further up in the mountains, to do temple recommend interview.  We parked on the side of the road across from the chapel.  On this side of the road is a vacant area with bushes and trees.  We have parked here before, Kathy’s side of the car is up against the “wild”.  When parked here before, Kathy had to deal with some really big chickens.  Well, this time, she went to get out of the car and heard a big snort.  She looked around, and there was the biggest pig ever!!  She jumped back in the car as the pig continued to snort very loudly.  Gary got out and surveyed the situation.  The giant pig was tied to a tree and very upset it could not reach more grass, so, it was grunting loudly.  Since the pig was secured, Kathy got out of the car.  Here is a photo.

The breakfast

We have two zones we are responsible for.   One zone, over the last two months, we have not done much for them.  So, we thought we would surprise them with a very nice breakfast before their zone meeting started.  There are 16 elders in this zone. We planned well ahead, made the sure the meeting was going to be held, at what time, and where.  We got up early and cooked for several hours.  We made scrambled eggs, bacon, ham, fried potatoes, and blue berry pancakes ( we bought the mix in Walmart in another town some time ago).  

Then came the challenges, we got everything in the car in tinfoil containers, and, started out.  It was important to get there before their meeting started.  Well, it turns out there was a giant foot race going on in our area.  We spent probably 30 minutes trying to drive around the race, every road we took, there was the race.  We finally got through, and got to the chapel where the meeting was held.  We went to the room where the elders were meeting and, cracked open the door, but, the zone leader was really mad and reproving the elders strongly because they had no action with investigators the past week or plans for the next week!  We were sure they deserved it, but, it seems we had another failure with this zone.  We closed the door, and, found we forgot the drinks, another challenge, so we went to a store to buy the drinks and came back.  When we arrived, things had calmed down and they were about finished with their meeting.  At the close of the meeting, we brought the stuff in and served the breakfast.  And, it was a big hit!!  They loved it.  So, we finally did something nice for this zone.

The pinchazo

We are always so worried about something happening to our car.  We need it working at all times in case of missionary emergencies, for traveling to handle temple recommends and other important tasks.    And, we have not a clue where to get the car fixed!

Well, the worst of worsts, the back tire on the drivers side was going flat.  We remember that next to a restaurant we have gone to several times, is a pinchazo.  That, is a tire place.  Well, this is not like a tire place we may be used to in the states.  It is a tiny room, no window, and open to the street.  Just a hole in the wall.  The man that owns the place works unbelievable hard on giant truck tires with manual tools!  The tire work is done on the side walk and on the side of the road.  We drove up and pushed our car in between tires and stopped.  The man was handling with big steel bars a really large truck tire.   We got out, and, with broken spanish and hand signs we got him to understand that the back drivers side tire had a slow leak and needed to be fixed.  The tire was taken off, a screw had punctured the tire, they fixed the puncture and got it back on in about 15 minutes.  The cost was about $1.30!! 

here is a picture.

The new missionary

As we mentioned before, we have been assigned to help future missionaries get their applications down and get them on their missions.   One girl, Cleidi, has been called to Veracruz Mexico and left today.  We have struggled for the last two months to get all her vaccinations done.  It is very hard to get vaccinations here.  We have to wait for the 2nd thursday of each month and meet this man in the local fire station.  He has a little cooler with all these vaccines in it.  And we have to pay.

So, we got the vaccinations done.  Then, our president was planning on setting her apart but called us saturday night and asked Gary to to the setting apart.  We, he did some praying and pondering and got, what we thought, an inspired blessing for Cleidi printed up.

We went to meet her to set her apart in her little town about and hour and a half away, at 1p.  We got a call that she could not be set apart and would have meet today at 7am.  Her grandfather died and the day was a mess for her.

We got up and 5 and were ready to leave for the meeting spot.  A church in a town about 20 minutes away.  We got this call, we could not completely understand the message but the person that called said the roads were closed!!  We we did not know what to do.   Cleidi has to be set apart today, she is leaving for the Mexico MTC!  We said a pray and drove off with faith and determination.  We would walk to the town if we had to.   We got to this Church at 7am.  Their was no road closing yet.  We were worried that the road would be closed at any time and we would be stranded!   Then we got a call.  They could not make it until 8:30a.  So, we went back to our town, got some gasoline, and went back, continually worried about the road being closed.  We finally met Cleidi and her brother in law.  They said the road was closed on the road to the capital and not here.  Well, Gary did a good blessing, and they took off to see if they could get through.  The bottom line:  We cannot do anything that does good for the missionary work without lots of obstacles in our way.   We are use to by now, and, we say a pray and just move on.

ALL IN A DAYS WORK

Gloria

We were ask to go with the missionaries to visit a family.  The family consists of a mother, daughter, the daughters husband, and three really cute kids.  All about five or six, two identical twin girls and a little boy, all waring thick glasses.

The missionaries have been teaching the Mom.  The daughters family are members of our church.  The mom knows the truth of the gospel but she is afraid to be baptized.  We talked to her about eternal life and our conversion.  Gary has on his iPad the spanish version of “because of him”.  This little video of about 2.5 minutes has only music, pictures, and a few printed words.  The message is non-denominational, but, in a few minutes it just fills you with hope, and, a view of Gods plan of salvation.  That we are all eternal beings.

Well, surely not because of us alone, but, she got baptized the following saturday and it was a very happy moment.  For the baptisms we attend, Kathy gives the person that was baptized a print of her painting of the savior, with a message on the back that is a reminder of the importance of baptism.  We gave Gloria a framed picture of the Savior.  She is a very special lady.  Her mom died a year ago, and, of course she was in continual morning.  But, her belief in the gospel has given her hope of living with her mom again.

To us, it is all very exciting and rewarding and wonderful.

Trip to Malacatan

Well, in our quest to get these four young people on missions, we visited our third dentist with the two boys that have really bad teeth.   This dentist is about 1.5 hours away, down in the very hot and humid low lands.  It was one of those little miracles that happen often that we actually found the dentist.  We drove down this street.  Stopped and asked a lady in a little shop for the location of this dentist office.  And, it was right across the street.

While the dentist checked out boys out, Kathy and I asked to use the bathroom.  Well the toilet was way in the back in a little room with spiders everywhere.  The toilet had no water in the tank.  We had to carry water in a little bucket from a nearby sink to flush the toilet, and, it didn't flush.  There was a plunger near by, and, after about a hundred plunges we got it to flush just a little.  What a trial just to go to the bathroom.  But, this kind of facility is typical.   Bathrooms are not taken to seriously here. 

The good news is we got a good price for the dental work that our president approved.  And, these boys are going to have healthy and good looking teeth for their mission.

Shot Man

It has been very hard to get the inoculations we need for these young people we are trying to get on their missions.   We tried everything we could think of but could not get the shots we needed.  Well, it turns out there is a man that works for the government that comes to the local fire department the second Thursday of every month.  He carries a big case full of shot stuff.

We got the shots we needed for this one girl named Cleidi.  He did a good job and was quite professional.  Now, Gary is not great about speaking up to share the gospel.  But, for some reason today, as we were leaving, he turned around and ask this man if he wanted to know about our church.  He came right over and we talked to him a bit and we told him next time we would bring some information for him and he was very receptive.  As we left Gary was overcome with excitement that he had actually opened his mouth.

in a days work

Ok we just came home from the temple in Xela and the visit to the skin doctor for the missionary with the face infection.  It was an all day event.  Kathy managed to get a bad cold or the gripa, sore throat and ear pounding.  We decide to cuddle in for the night.  We just wrapped up and we got a call from the nurses to go see if one of the Elders was ok and take him some Benadryl.  Then we got this wild call from the companion of the Elder who needed the Benadryl.  He said the Elder was swelling up and was turning red.  Then we got another call, now he cant feel his tongue and his arm is numb!!

We jumped in the car and went to their house.  Out comes this elder and he looked like a Lego man-head with huge lips, a numb arm, and hardly breathing very good.  We loaded him in the car and rushed to the hospital.

The doctor there was young and smart.  They gave him a antihistamine shot. Took blood and then gave him two more pills of steroids. They decided to keep him over night for observation.  They gave him an IV .  After talking to the Elder he said he did not know what he was allergic too but had a previous experience and carried an eppi pen with him in the US.  But, did not bring them with him. (we are going to buy him one here)

He had a thing called pollen tea at an investigators house and then had this reaction.  They had to walk and hour to get home, as he swelled up.   We went back in the morning to pick him up and he looked good.  They told him he had, had a very bad allergic reaction, very dangerous.

We went home to allow Kathy to rest, when we were called by a sister missionaries that were at the hospital, one had a hairline knee fracture.  We drove around a found a place to buy her and knee brace.  Again we tried to get home but got another call. A sister missionary thinks she has parasites.  We got the sample, ugh!!, took it to the lab and got the report and sent it to the nurses.

Finally we got home in the afternoon and was able to let Kathy rest and get better.

The only explanation I have is that the missionary's are “on fire” with baptisms here. Five baptisms today!

Martin Short came to mind  in the movie, “pure luck” as we watched this Elder puff up!

After that was over, we all had a big laugh, he was all swollen up, slurred speech because of his numb tongue, dragging his numb arm around, and, bright red!!

It's all in a days work as a missionary!

Here are the zone leaders having fun with our allergic boy

Here is the temple we attended, Kathy's painting

Feliz compleaños

tropical storm

for the last four days it has been raining solid.  And, the rain is supposed to last for another 2 to 3 days.  All of Guatemala is under a tropical storm.  The problem is mudslides, the ground is soaked with water and areas that do not have lots of foliage are dangerous.  Also, the rivers are raging and the streets in the cities in the low lands are like rivers.  Our cities are so are OK since everything is on a hill.  It is very hard to find many flat places.  We were scheduled to travel to a low land city and were advised not to.  And, the schools are closed.

  Most of the houses have either steel or fiberglass corrugated roofs.  The noise of the rain hitting on the roof is unbelievable.  The air is cold and inside any house is uncomfortable cold, remember we have no heaters.

 Given all of that, our brave missionaries are armed with their umbrellas and are working.  We again say, we are so very impressed with missionaries.

Coming Home

We are happy to announce that we have a return date, August 20th.  Or normal return date was September 17th, but, we got approval to move it up a few weeks so that we could be home for our 51st anniversary. We had our 50th here last year and we did nothing. (keep in mind we were about 10 years old when we got married)

The interruption

We visit the missionaries in their homes in the mornings.  We study with them for a little while.  This helps to understand their needs, and, lets them know that we are interested in them and their studies.  So, we visited a pair a few days ago.  And the discussion was really spiritual.  So, Gary has a stomach problem, he has had it for a month or two.  While we were discussing spiritual things his stomach lets out a gigantic growl ruining a wonderful meeting.

Crying Lady at the baptism

We try to attend all the baptisms.   We attended a baptism of two young buys.  The families of these boy are very poor.  After most baptisms, food is served.  We had an appointment that we had to get to after the baptism concluded.  A lady brought food to us first.  We said we could not stay and had to leave.  Tears came to her eyes.  We left but we will never do that again.  The tradition here is to serve guests food no matter how poor you are.  And, Gary being a president makes it worse.

Birthday

We went to a zone meeting on Thursday.   We walked into the church building and a missionary said they were having the meeting in another room than usual.   We walked into the room and there was a big surprise party for Gary.  Tables all set, breakfast, cake, happy birthday song, and a card with lots of nice comments written on it  We were humbled and very appreciative.

Our Friends

Last night we joined are friends at a really nice restaurant.   Miguel and Cicely have been so helpful to us and we have become close friends.  We had yet another birthday meal and it was fabulous.  We were talking to them about a lady that recently got baptized but has no idea how to be a mother.  She leaves her boys, one is about 9 and the little brother is about 6, all day by themselves.   The boys are very disobedient and destructive.   Everyone simply cannot be around them.   The older boy a few months ago was in Miguel and Cicely’s house and was caught stealing anything he could put in his pocket.  Well, now, Miguel and Cicely hired the older boy to work a few hours a day at their house and they have loved these boys and the boys love them and they are improving.  We are one of the many people that could not stand these kids.  We were so impressed by what Miguel and Cicely are doing.  They are truly doing what the Savior would do!    We have learned some important lessons from Miguel and Cicely.

Here are some pictures:

BIRTHDAY 

Miguel and Cicely

The Catholic School

Tejutla

Last Sunday we went to a small town called Tejutla.  It is about an hour and a half away further in the mountains.   We went to attended a baptism followed by church.   The building is a very small branch building made quite a long time ago.   The front of the two room buildings contains the pulpit, sacrament table and another table.  These are on a raised floor that extends across the room and is about 6 inches high.   Where is the font was our question as we drove up.  We had been here before and we did not see a font.  When we arrived to our surprise, the pulpit and the two table had been moved off the raised floor, and, the raised floor was folded up revealing the baptismal font.  The baptism went well, a teenage girl.

Before sacrament meeting, the young president, a young man, and myself prepared the sacrament.  The president had a bottle water and carefully filled each cup to exactly the same level.  He got out a bread roll that he had brought himself and carefully arranged the sacrament.   This president does not live in this area.  He lives in another branch about a half an hour away.  He was called as president here because there was no worthy priesthood in this branch.   

We sat by him on the stand and noticed his carefully prepared agenda.  He has no counselors or secretary.   As he was conducting the meeting we noticed his jacket was frayed and torn, his shoes were old, worn, and dirty.  He was wearing the white shirt we gave him as a gift months ago.  But, he conducted the meeting with reverence and respect.   On the way home, we talked about the dedication of this young man.  He is very poor, but, every Sunday pays for the bus back and forth to Tejutla, and buys the bread.   We felt it a blessing to be with him.

The after-meeting-food culture.

We attended a baptism of two young boys from a small branch.   After the meeting, as usual, the sisters serve a hot drink and a tostado smeared with smashed black beans.  We usually always eat the food but this time we had to go somewhere.   A young mother brought us drinks,  we said thank you but we had to leave.  As we stood in front of her, tears begin to swell up in her eyes.  We left, and we have felt bad ever since.  The culture here is, no matter how poor you are you serve food to the guests.  We will not refuse good again.

Bling

Just a small note about Kathy.   We were walking around in town and Kathy said we have to go home,  I have to go to the bathroom really bad!  We were walking fast to get to the car and we passed a "bling" store.  You know, bracelets, rings, etc, all fake jewelry.  Believe it or not, Kathy stooped, went in to the shop, and enjoyed looking and feeling the bling.  What happened to the bathroom thing!!

The catholic school

Some missionaries were walking around and walked by a catholic sponsored school.   The director came out and told the missionaries that they were having lots of issues with families, and, they knew that our church was the best family oriented church and she wondered if the missionaries would come Friday and teach about families for a few hours.   Wow!  What an opportunity.  We were involved, I showed "Mormon message" videos and Kathy set up a display of pictures of our children and their families with silver ribbon leading from the pictures to one of her paintings of the temple and attached to the top of the temple picture was one of her paintings of the Savior.  Well, what a wonderful time, we were treated so very nice and we feed lunch and invited back for next months activity.

Here are some pictures.

This is Gary at his favorite place when we travel to a town called Xela.