October 2009
This clown is from an orphanage we visited the other day. It was National Children's Day and children everywhere were having parades, special parties, etc. in schools throughout the country. The only two holidays I know of that we have in common with the US is Feliz Navidad and Columbus Day.
This has been an eventful two or three weeks. We have had a particular pesky medical issue arise during the last six months and dad has been perplexed and baffled by treatment and diagnosis. Our very insightful and intuitive Area President asked that we have a bit of help from Salt Lake. Two doctors from the Missionary Medical came down to Guatemala. We had set up interviews for the doctors prior to their coming so we kept them busy from dawn 'till dark for two days. It was interesting to see the medical detectives work to solve this mystery. Equations on the white board, interviews, questions and more questions. What have we learned? We know for sure this situation is not really solvable. There are so many variables that the three doctors finally gave their best guess and advised us to act accordingly. The two days could be put in an medical fiction format, but without a solid answer. The two days passed in a blur and we have been doing all the follow up the last 4 or 5 days.
We went to our first Guatemalan LDS Church) wedding reception. The weddings here are not "come and go" events, rather sit-down dinners. In Guatemala, if you come to an event on time (except for soccer) you are a few hours early. We had just come from a zone conference in another part of Guatemala and we were tired and hungry. We remembered, with the urging of the Bawdens, that we were supposed to be at the reception and it was already 7:30. We didn't eat, knowing it would be dinner, and drove about 15 miles to the place where the reception was to be held. We couldn't find it and the only place with the same name was a bar with only a few customers. We drove into the village and it was dark. We decided to go home and as we turned on to the main road we saw a beautiful chapel set off the street with many cars in the parking lot. There it was! Being an hour late, we were still an hour early. We were so excited to see the bride but she waitied till 9:00 to come out. This was in the cultural hall. She entered the room out of the Relief Society room with her little flower girls and wearing the most gorgeous satin dress. She walked through the cultural hall and met the groom and they had a little ceremony. The sealing had been done in the temple earlier that day. About 10:00, after a beautiful program, we ate dinner, finally. The bride and groom had come to our home for family night some time ago and we have worked with Laura and Jose each day for months and months. It was a lovely evening and we are so glad to have made the effort to get there.
Zone Conferences remain a special experience for us. We have had three days of mega-zone conferences in three different places in Guatemala, one being in the city. It is so nice to come home at night even if it does mean 3 hours of driving. This mission president and his wife were terrific. You can take the temperature of the president just by attending the zone conferences. The 180+ missionaries loved one another and loved their president and it was a delight to see the common goals they all had to do their best for the Lord.
Medically, this has been a challenging 10 days as Missions have called us with serious issues. We have been on our knees, lately, praying for these missionaries who needed more help than medicine and medical support.
It's interesting to work with a group of Senior Missionaries from the Area Office: humanitarin, PEF, Financial, Security, etc. A simple project seems to take on a life of its own as these wonderful missionaries start brainstorming. We have seen it time and again, and dad and I have two projects, simple projects, which have turned into huge affairs. We are going to a village on th7th of October to give out the last of our reading glasses. Everyone wanted in the group of senior missionaries wanted to come along. This project has turned into a mini-health fair. We will have dental hygiene, hygiene workshop, a story corner and baby kits. It is suddenly going to be a massive group with at least 16 of us going. Now we have to find hotels and transportation and make other elaborate plans. We are so excited by the help and support and know this will be of great service for the people in that area. The eyeglasses have been a wonderful window, no gateway, into serving many people throughout Central America.
General Conference was remarkable. We sat in our apartment and projected the conference on the wall and it was as good as being there. There were a couple of men working on the apartment next door. We were so excited at seeing our prophet and apostles we ran next door and asked the workmen to come and see a prophet of the Lord and his apostles. They noticed our Biblia on the table and asked about it. We then told them about El Libre de Mormon. They both wanted one so we ran to the office to find two written in Spanish.
Dad went to the Priesthood session with other English-speaking Elders and the women in the apartment had a baked potato bar, with Chimichurri, an Argentinian specialty that is delicious and very common in Latin America. I have a recipe and will share it with everyone when we get home...which will be January 7th.
A crisis has developed in parts of Guatemala as the rainy season never arrived. There are parts of Guatemala, as you have probably read in the paper, with a million or so starving people. Children have died and families are desperate. Help has come from around the world, our church, as well as many other churchs and humanitarian aid, has poured in to bring relief to the towns in the "dry area". Many of these people have no idea how to help themselves. The interesting thing has been so see how the Guatemaltecans have suddently become united in an effort to bring food to these people. People have donated food: rice, beans, sugar, maize and one other thing that I can't remember at the moment and a huge warehouse with volunteers from all over recieves the food and takes the food out to these people as fast as it comes in. Dad and I took this picture when we went to drop off food.
We know our departure date: about January 7th. What a blessing this mission has been for us!
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