An Amazing Moment, An Amazing Day

Ever have one of those moments when you realize that a lot of hard, hard work over a loooong, long period of time has JUST come together and culminated into THAT very moment, that very event…and you sit there (or stand as the case may be) marveling, basking in it, realizing that you are witnessing a smashing success of the efforts that you and/or others have put so much of yourselves into and for so long?  Well, I experienced one of those moments on Saturday, January 14th this year…and it was amazing, surreal, and incredible.  What made it even more special is that I realized and reaffirmed there and then that Jehovah is real, he is present, he has a hand in what we are doing, and he is truly blessing the preaching work being accomplished throughout the earth today to show more people what his Word, the Bible, really says.

What am I talking about?  Let me explain.  As you may have gathered from previous posts here, we absolutely love going to rural areas outside of the city we live in to preach.  Many people there are hard-working, sincere, receptive, salt-of-the-earth farmers who have a genuine respect for God and the Bible.  It is gratifying to be able to show them from their own bibles what God purposes for the earth and mankind in the future.  On top of that, add in the side benefits of having the gorgeous scenery of Ecuador’s Andes mountains all around you and the enjoyment of four-wheeling up and down rough roads to get to these remote communities and you might understand why we love it so much. 

The first year and a half of our time here we spent working with a group of about 30 local publishers from a place called Pablo Arenas that wasn’t yet a congregation.  All of their territory consisted of rural communities and we would pile 15-20 of us (or more) into our truck and work these areas.  Since typically we can only go out to the rurals once a week on Thursday’s these dear brothers, who are generally of very limited financial means, would take the day off of work to take advantage of our truck being available so that they could preach in those areas.  Well, Pablo Arenas (PA) progressed and officially became their own congregation almost a year ago and no longer needs our help; in fact, they’ll start their Kingdom Hall build in February.  But before all that had became official, we had been assigned a large section of the Carchi province and the group had started working the dozen or so communities there.  Once PA became official, they ended up being assigned the original rural territories and the rest of us, from Ibarra, we were assigned to continue working that Carchi area.  The challenge, though, was that without the PA group, that only left between 6-10 of us who were available on Thursdays to preach this huge area! 

We decided that we would try breaking it up and focus on just 5 of the communities that had shown a lot of interest and try to build on that.  We would start in one community, wrap it up, continue to the next, do that one, usually eat lunch, then go on to the others after lunch.  We started that routine about March of last year.  In the beginning we just preached, reading scriptures, sharing literature, offering bible studies, etc.  As different ones began studying regularly, there was less time to preach door-to-door.  So we arranged that whoever didn’t have studies in each community would keep preaching and those with studies would focus on those.  Soon, most of us had studies in all of the communities.  Sometimes, other publishers visit and join us for the day and they would start more studies.  When we came back the next week, we would just send whoever was available in the group of ‘regulars’ to continue the study.  We continue to juggle a number of the studies like that down to this day – whoever is available conducts the study.  Sometimes we even send visiting ‘day’ publishers to conduct studies!  It’s interesting that the students are ok with that, they just want the study, it doesn’t matter who conducts.  At this point, we have too many studies and not enough of us in the group to attend to them.  In one community, we have 6 regular studies and several others that are hit and miss.  When you only have 7 or 8 in the group it’s hard to fit everyone in before you have to go on to the next community!

Well, this is what we’ve been enjoying for quite some time now in that area.  Now that you have the background, I’ll tell you what led up to this great day that we had.  While we have a number of progressive bible studies there, I had never considered the possibility that we should try to hold a meeting for them.  I figured an official ‘group’ gets started after you have some in the area who decide to get baptized and then we start to hold meetings.  Not sure where I got that idea but the truth is I never really put that much thought into it.  So imagine my surprise when the Coordinator of our cong after hearing how many studies we are conducting out there (22+) suggests that we hold a meeting up there on a Saturday afternoon.  Whoa!!!  It’s one thing for someone to study in the comfort of their own home when they are available but would people really make an effort to attend a meeting??  I was very hesitant about the idea and I really worried that no one would come or so few would attend that it would be kind of disappointing for those few and even us.  The Coordinator was insistent – in fact, he thought it would be a great idea to hold a FULL meeting of both the talk AND the Watchtower study.  Ok, now I really had my doubts.  Could these folks really sit through a nearly two-hour meeting without losing attention and getting bored??  These are spiritual babes in my mind, and I recall that as a kid I could never last more than an hour without losing focus.  Well, who am I to argue with him since he was insisting even after I voiced my concerns?  So I did my best to humbly agree and start working towards making it happen.  That was early December.

There was a lot to do.  First, we had to determine where we could have the meeting.  Two of the communities have small rural school rooms so that was the first thought.  We asked around among our studies and one of Sam’s in a town called El Milagro said that she didn’t think that it would be a problem to use the school in her town.  Amazingly, the next week (or maybe two?), who just so happened to be there at Sam’s study’s home when she arrived to study with her?  None other than the school teacher herself!  In fact, she sat in on the study…and really enjoyed it.  She thinks it’s great that we are teaching people to study the bible and she said she would be happy to offer the school room to us for our meeting!!

From there we got busy telling everyone about the meeting.  It is my impression (trying to be PC here) that most Ecuadorians don’t seem to plan very much.  This trait seems amplified in the rurals.  We had about 4 weeks or so, which at one day up there per week = 4 opportunities, to really work on getting the word out to our studies and hope that they would remember the date and plan to be there.  As is typical, many said that they would be there ‘if they could’.  Only a few were absolutely sure that they were going to be there which, after living in the Ecuadorian culture for this long, only gave me about 50% confidence of it happening.  So, we also invited every other person we came across.  We stopped people walking along the road to offer them literature and tell them about the meeting.  If a study cancelled, we used that time to visit all of the other homes in the town to tell them or remind them about the meeting, too.  We also brought copies of the Watchtower study magazine that would be used for that meeting and we encouraged our bible students to read that particular article ahead of time and bring it with them.  This, I have to admit, I did tongue in cheek because I was still convinced that most wouldn’t last the whole meeting. 

That last week before the Saturday meeting date, I began to really feel anxious about how well it would go.  To make matters even more stressful, then the Coordinator tells me on Tuesday evening that the original WT conductor can’t come after all and so he wants ME to do it.  What?  I’ve never even conducted the WT in English…and he wants me to do it in Spanish?!?  The conversation went something like this:

Nelson: He can’t come so you’re going to have to conduct the WT study.

Me: Ha ha, very funny.

Nelson: I’m serious.

Me: Ha ha, very funny.  Shouldn’t we have someone do it that actually speaks better Spanish?

Nelson: Well, if you want we could have one of the non-MS brothers do it. <obvious guilt trip>

Me: Um, well, shouldn’t it really be conducted by an elder?

Nelson: Ok, fine.  How about I conduct it and you give the public talk instead of me?

Me: Argh!!  Ok, fine, I’ll do it!

If you didn’t know it before, now you know what a wuss I can be.  As I evidently didn’t really have a choice, I got to work trying to prepare for it as well as I could. 

On that last Thursday of preaching as I conducted the field service meeting, I shared with our small group a few scriptures about how this is really Jehovah’s work and we shouldn’t worry too much about how things will turn out, we should just do the work he has assigned us and not worry about the rest.  I think it worked more to alleviate me than them. I wouldn’t realize until later how apropos those words would be. Plus, I said, the yearbook shows that some of the first meetings in Estonia only had a few people from the territory attend and yet they were still held.  Even if we only had 5 people there we could consider it a success.  I was personally thinking that if we ended up having 10 it would be a huge success, but that was probably too much to hope for as 10 is almost half of the regular bible studies that we have up there.  After the service meeting we headed out one last time to conduct our studies and try to remind everyone about the meeting coming up that Saturday.  We also arranged to have the key to the school left with the neighbor who lived across the street since the teacher wouldn’t be there during the weekend.

The Day Arrives:

We had planned the meeting for 4p in a little town called El Milagro.  A brother loaned his son his 4wd vehicle so we could take a few more people with us and we ended up having 14 of us between those from our cong and a few from a neighboring cong that shares our hall in Ibarra, a good number of them young pioneers.  We arrived very early at about 2:30p because we weren’t sure what arrangements we would have to make at the school to make it suitable for a meeting.  We were pleasantly surprised to find a large number of plastic chairs (some were miniature for really little kids) and we got busy sweeping and cleaning and setting out the chairs.  When the guys had set out about 30 chairs or so I stopped them because I was worried that the place would look too empty if there were a bunch of unoccupied chairs.  Are you starting to see a pattern of worry and angst here??  O me of little faith!  Sam, on the other hand, was still pretty confident that we would have a good turnout

Me and Pablo then took off in the truck a little before 3p to head to the other communities and see if anyone who was coming might need a ride.  As we were leaving we came across an older couple as well as the husband of a woman we study with that live waaay up the mountain.  We reminded them about the meeting and they said they would like to come but needed to go home first to change.  We geve them a ride up the mountain, waited for them to change and gave them a ride back down – at least we would have three!  Unbeknownst to me, though, after I dropped them off they walked away to the local tienda or little store to wait for the meeting to start.  It was after 3:40-ish I think and Sam’s confidence was evidently dwindling fast because there was only one guy there that was actually in the schoolroom and waiting for the meeting to begin, so she and another sister left with their umbrellas in hand to help a couple studies overcome their fear of the rain that had started to fall.   

Pablo and I then took off in the truck again to the nearby town of Empedradillo.  How cool to find several there who had been waiting for us, all dressed up and ready to go!  We quickly stopped by a few more homes to see if they still wanted to come.  An older man went to change his clothes and several of the children from the neighboring homes came, too.  Over 10 came back with us.  Things were starting to look up.  We arrived back at the school with about 5-10 minutes to spare.  A few more had arrived by then as Xavi had also taken off to another town called Convalascencia to give rides…that brought us to about 15 besides our group, so in total we were at about 30!  We were already exceeding my highest expectations of 10!  But there was more to come…

Xavi then went looking for Sam in his truck.  He found her and a bunch of studies and interested ones gathered by the little town store.  Evidently, they had all congregated there waiting for the rain to ease up before heading to the school.  Many had dressed up, brought their Bibles and magazine, and were ready to go!  Xavi piled them into his truck and gave them a ride.  Sam followed on foot with one study under the protection of an umbrella.  Imagine her surprise upon arriving when she saw the entire schoolroom full!  When she had left there was only one seat occupied, now all the seats were full with about 30 visitors and we had to start pulling out the little kindergarten chairs.  And even more kept trickling in as we started the meeting.  I was blown away.  We kept putting more chairs out, and even little benches, as people came in until we ran out.  A few from our group ended up having to stand in the back.  In total we had 38 people attend from the territory.  When counting the 14 of us, our total attendance was 52!!!  Incredible.

But how did the meeting go?  Would they find it interesting?  Would they stay for the whole thing – talk, WT study, and all?  Yes!  Nelson gave a fantastic talk, clearly explaining from the Bible that the earth will last forever, what it would be like, and using illustrations that would be familiar to those with a farming background and living with so much nature around them.  The audience paid rapt attention and they did their best to find the scriptures in their bibles and keep up with the talk (we had interspersed ourselves throughout the audience with the purpose of being available to help them find scriptures, etc). 

After the talk we started the WT study.  This will be interesting, I thought.  It would be a lot to really expect them to participate and comment at their first meeting.  Our group had prepared themselves well to handle all the commenting and demonstrate how our meetings work with the question and answer format.  And so it went the first 5 or 6 paragraphs with just the ones from our Ibarra group answering and reading the scriptures, etc.  Then, right around the 6th or 7th paragraph, a 15 yr old girl that Sam studies with, raised her hand and read a scripture (with the encouragement of the 13 yr old young sister from our group that was sitting next to her).  The next paragraph another hand from one in the territory pops up and makes a comment, then another hand to read a scripture.  And so, for the duration of the WT study, a large number of ones from the territory continued participating.  We found it especially endearing how once a few started to comment the rest got comfortable with the idea and they wanted to participate, too.  Early on, Sam had asked the mother of the 15 yr old who commented first whether she wanted to try to answer.  Oh no, she said, I don’t want to embarrass myself in front of everyone.  Then after everyone else started commenting, she changed her mind and asked Sam to help her find something she could say.  Two older women, who each really appreciate their personal bible study, wanted to find comments, too, and so one of our young sisters (Helena) who was sitting between them was trying to help them both find an answer.  Unfortunately, whispering is evidently not their strongest point so we could all hear them talking amongst each other and loudly practicing their comment until they eventually raised their hand and gave it.  One of them was having a hard time reading in the magazine what Helena was trying to help her say.  At the same time she badly wanted to comment, so she finally got exasperated and told Helena that she was simply going to raise her hand and Helena should whisper in her ear what to say if she got called on.  Another woman, who studies with Sam, was one of the first ones from the territory to raise her hand early on, and when called on, she ended up standing up from her chair first and then gave her comment.  After she spoke, she remained standing looking at me.  I quickly realized that she had finished her comment and was waiting for me to acknowledge it so that she could sit back down.  I promptly did so.  A young boy of 10 or 11 was being a little restless in his seat, so Pablo sat down next to him and encouraged him to prepare to read a scripture when it came up.  He settled down and ended up commenting at least twice during the remainder of the study.  The teen girl who answered first was clearly finding it so fun to participate that she ended up commenting several more times as well, up to the point that she was waving her hand vigorously at me on the last paragraph because she wanted to get one more comment in before the end of the study.  After the meeting the room was abuzz with chit chat, everyone smiling, happy, and enthusiastic.  As we gave many a ride back to their towns, they expressed to us how much they enjoyed the meeting, the format for learning and participating, and they wanted to know if we were going to have another one!  It is now our goal to have a meeting up there each month.  The next one is planned for Feb 25th, Jehovah willing.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

There were many more memorable little events and experiences with different ones that afternoon but you get the idea from the above.  All of us were on a high of excitement and appreciation during and after the meeting for having had the privilege to experience and be a part of all of it.  I personally felt so humbled and in awe as I thought about how I worried so much in the weeks and days prior to the meeting and, for what?  Jehovah is the one who draws people to him (John 6:44; Isa 2:1, 2) and he does the heavy lifting as it were.  I realized that we just need to stay focused on what he’s assigned us to do and enjoy all the times like this where we get to see up close and personal what Jehovah is doing on his end.  I recall thinking about that as I looked out at all of those people in the audience.  And that was my moment.  That realization, that dawning, that understanding that the doing of what Jehovah asks us to do brings us this kind of joy and success in the accomplishment of His purposes.  And it was a moment that lasted for the rest of the day.  I was still reflecting on the day’s events back at home that evening and I felt like I could really understand the joy Jesus’ disciples felt when they came back from preaching and excitedly related their experiences and successes to him (Luke).  It is an amazing thing to realize how Jehovah allows us to be his fellow workers (1 Cor 3:9) and works out his purposes through us if we do what he asks us to do.  The entire experience has made me even more resolute to work hard in the ministry and in the congregation and look forward to enjoying more of these kinds of amazing moments.

Pics:

Heading out from Ibarra about 1p.  We leave the purple car in a small town a little before we turn off the highway and go up the dirt roads and squeeze into the trucks:

Some of the crew that packed into the blue truck:

Your typical roadway obstacle up here…

Giving people a ride is always a great way to start a conversation:

And…we’ve arrived!  A quick pic before we get started…

Where to begin?!?                                     

This desk should work as a podium.  Do we use a little chair or a cardboard box to make it taller?  We settled on a box.

This dog adopted Sam a long time ago when she started feeding it scraps from our lunch.  It is her loyal companion every Thursday…

Almost all set!  Sam’s dog is supervising…

Sound check.  Sam’s iHome was our sound system for the songs.  Pablo daisy-chained on another one that he had – worked great!

We started small…                                        

Then it grew…                                                        

Until we used nearly every chair we could find…

Finding the scriptures:       

Singing the songs:                                   

Nelson gave the talk            

Fernando was our chairman             

Gianni was an attendant                       

And Jonathan and I handled the WT study

Many people can’t see the small print of the magazines and songbook so we reprinted them and made it bigger                  

Fernando with a woman he studies with in Empedradillo. She had missed us when we were giving everyone else a ride because she was changing her clothes so she ended up running the whole way on foot so she wouldn’t miss too much of the meeting.

The young girl on the left was the first from the territory to comment. To her right are three of the sisters who came to support the mtg

Piling people in to give them a ride back to their town:

Getting ready for the ride home to Ibarra:

Hope you enjoyed this post!  We send our love to you all and hope you are doing well.  As always, we would love to hear how you’re doing, so send us an email and keep us posted!!

Decisions, decisions, decisions…

It’s hard to believe that we have been in Ecuador for almost TWO years now.  July 14th will be the 2-year anniversary date.  What can we say after nearly 2 years?  Well my first thought is…what an amazing privilege it has been!  We truly, really, seriously feel blessed to have had the opportunity to learn and experience a new culture, new language, new congregation, country, and pretty much new life.  Exciting stuff.  They say one’s experiences shape who you are – an ever-changing process.  I’d have to agree with that.  I’ve seen a lot of changes in myself these last 2 years.  For one, normally I’m not exactly what you would call a laid-back person and patience isn’t one of my greatest strengths.  Unfortunately that doesn’t bode well for those that venture south of the border.  I had to quickly learn what ‘ya mismo’ means, which is a phrase pretty much said anytime you are waiting for someone or something.  Basically it means that who/what you are waiting for is imminent, could be here/happen anytime.  Problem is that its anytime either in the next couple minutes OR next couple DAYS…or heck, even never.  Combined with my initial complete lack of Spanish, I really had to learn to just chill out and wait for stuff because no amount of arguing (especially when the other party can’t understand you), sheer willpower, and/or micro-managing seems to make any kind of difference here.  Stuff happens when it happens; no sense trying to rush it or worry about it.  That was a tough lesson…that I’m still learning, but I am a LITTLE more relaxed than before.  To prove my point, the other day an electrician was supposed to be at our place at 1p…I stayed home all afternoon to wait for him.  Sure enough he finally shows up a little before 5p.  Hey, at least he showed up!  I felt fortunate for that instead of frustrated that I waited all afternoon for him (getting the electrical outlets in the office working again was also a plus (Welcome back Internet!)).  Surprisingly I didn’t have the urge to give him a piece of mind, it really didn’t even bother me…weird!  I’m not saying it’s the way it should be, but hey I can at least accept it for what it is now.  Anyway, experiencing new things like this, not just for a few weeks on vacation, but rather an extended time truly immersed in a different way of ‘doing’ life…it can really change  your perspective.

Also, I gotta say how cool it is to me to be able to communicate in another language! (notice I said ‘communicate’ and not ‘speak’…we’re still a ways from fluency).  Every week I feel like we’re progressing, becoming better teachers in the ministry, better able to illustrate and explain bible truths, better able to joke around with our friends.  It doesn’t take 5 minutes to get the joke anymore; ‘late laughter’ is becoming less of a problem…it’s awesome, I love it.  We’re essentially learning a new skill or ability, which, as is typical, becomes more and more enjoyable the better you get at it.  One thing I would like say to those considering learning a new language: be REALISTIC.  Personally, I felt kind of betrayed not long after embarking on this adventure.  A sister had told me that I would pick up Spanish fast, especially living here – in 3 months I would have a good idea of what people were talking about, and in 6 months I would be easily communicating.  Now look, I fully understand that I am NOT among the really really smart people out there in the universe.  However, I do figure that I’m at least of average intelligence (ok, my close friends need NOT feel obliged to chime in with their opinions right now).  Besides, I figure for what I lack in smartness I can make up for with pure determination and stubborn will.  So, I thought, if I study like a madman, I’ll be right in the mix of it after 3-6 months.  I really believed that sister.  Didn’t work out that way for me.  Yes, I studied like a fool on a mission.  Yes, we learned a lot fast.  Did I speak Spanish after 6 months?  No.  Well, then other people told me that really I was doing a great job and that the real mark was at one year.  So from the 6 month mark to the 1 year mark, I studied, I tried, and I worked like crazy on my Spanish, eagerly awaiting that day when it would all just ‘click’ and I would realize that I had ARRIVED.  Well, yes, I made marked progress, and I could communicate fairly well after that first year, but for sure, I was definitely NOT the bi-lingual marvel that I had envisioned.  So, finally I started asking the brothers who had been here for a long time what should I realistically be expecting in order to be able to speak Spanish fluidly and without so much darn effort.  From at least 2 brothers, one of which is European and speaks about 5 languages, the consensus was that one needs about 4 years to really be comfortable in a new language.  Wow.  I’m pretty sure I can’t keep the gas on all-out-full for that long, so the last year or so I’ve been taking the pressure off of myself and just trying to let it come to me without pegging a date or a timeframe to success.  Even as we wrap up this 2nd year where I know I have progressed a ton, I find it’s still a lot of work for me to speak in Spanish.  I am still hesitant to spontaneously answer at the meetings, preferring instead to have the Spanish words well-thought out in my mind before raising my hand (which often means the study has moved on to the next paragraph or someone already commented on the topic by the time I’ve got it!).  I still mostly read my parts and talks from a manuscript at the meetings and I don’t see myself using an outline anytime in the real near future (although it remains a goal for me).  Anyway, I’m just saying, if you plan to learn a new language, be sure you are realistic with the investment in time you are about to make.  I’m not saying don’t do it!  But do it knowing that for most of us who are of average intelligence, it’s gonna take a little while…but boy is it worth it!!!!!!  Now then, if either you know that you ARE one of those super super smart people out there, or you simply believe that I have given myself way too much credit and I am far LESS intelligent than I think, then you can probably ignore the above rant.

Living in a foreign country for this long has made me consider how other cultures and values, while so different from the modern and theoretically progressive culture of the States, are at times, IMHO, better.  That’s not to say all of it, heck not even most, is better (I mean pulling your car over at any random location and peeing on the sidewalk with the open car door being your only shield to the public eye or should I say poor victim’s eye is just wrong in every culture…just my opinion) but some things, other things, yeah.  For example, whether done by choice or necessity, those who live the simple life clearly have advantages (no kidding, I think I read that in a good *book* somewhere).  Also, the family closeness that generally exists here is unquestionably enviable.  Not to say families aren’t close in the States, but here it’s different.  Parents and kids actually seem to LIKE each other (believe that??).  It’s not uncommon for kids to live in their parents’ home well into adulthood.  And its not because the kids don’t always have the means to leave (although that can be the case); the family is just close and it doesn’t seem to be as common a desire in young people to assert their independence or escape the ‘yoke’ of their parents.  Parents, too, don’t seem to want their kids to leave.  When kids finally do leave the nest, it seems to be a pretty grievous event as far as I can tell.  An 18-year old sister who recently started pioneering and just switched over to a foreign language cong (Kichwa, of the indigenous Indians here) told me that the change was a challenge for her because now she could no longer go out in service with her mom as regularly as before (mom is still in our cong) and she is really missing that.  Awwwww, cute.  At least she still sees mom everyday since she’s still at home.  I mean, how much time do American kids want to spend with mom and dad at 18 years old??

Ok, changing the subject as my opinions probably aren’t that interesting.  So…well, now that it has been nearly 2 years here, what now?  Well, a few months back we had already decided we would be staying at least another year, perhaps longer if we could.  In April and May we had already started making plans to renew our current visa, which expires in July.  Then, we got ‘The Letter’…and it made us do a double-take.  ‘The Letter’ came from the branch.  It was sent to all need-greaters here regarding a change, effective immediately, that the branch could no longer renew our 12-7 missionary visas to stay in the country.  Ouch!  Unfortunately, this would/will affect HUNDREDS of brothers & sisters serving here, including us.  And we only had 2 months left on our visa (now 1 month as of this writing).  Well, we did some soul searching and prayer to try to figure out if this meant we should be moving on.  Are our days in Ec done?  Unfortunately, for a number of our need-greater friends and also many others we’ve heard about, once their current visa expires they don’t have the circumstances to pursue a different type of visa.  However, for us, it did look like there might be an option or two we could pursue.  Decisions, decisions. You might remember that 2 years was the goal we had ‘updated to’ after being here a couple of months (original goal was 1 year).  Well, on one hand, that goal is accomplished and perhaps now we could seriously consider the option of returning to the creature comforts of the States, where good coffee can be had on every corner (and even in between the corners if you’re downtown Seattle), where what we consider ‘normalcy’ reigns, where food I can safely eat is readily available everywhere, and the list goes on and on of the things we miss and would love to have back at our disposal (let’s not even start on Sam’s list!!!)…well, trust me, we put some serious thought into that.  We also considered switching countries where we might find at least a few more comforts and familiar things.  A number of places in Mexico sounded inviting – they even have Costco!  And those pics of Panama’s beaches on Chris Greer’s blog look soooo relaxing.  Well, we’ve put a lot of thought and prayer into these ideas.  Ultimately though, instead of thinking of just our own comforts we tried to determine what Jehovah would want us to do and we prayed for and continue to seek his guidance.  We ultimately decided to stay.  Well, let me qualify that…we decided that we should TRY to stay…to do everything in our power to do so and, if Jehovah wants us here, we trusted that he would bless our efforts to make it happen despite the very tight deadline (you do remember that ‘ya mismo’ thing right??).  So, long story short, we are in the process now of applying for another type of visa…and still praying.  I’ll let you know how it works out.

We have had a few funny experiences that happened to us over the last year which, because we haven’t blogged much, are kind of old by now.  I’ll relate a couple anyway… 

Above is a picture after the pioneer meeting w/ the c/o last year in May.  Likely, you know that I just started pioneering last September.  Well this picture is a few months before that.  You are all aware of the arrangement where aux pioneers get to attend the first half of the pioneer meeting with the c/o, right?  Well, I had been auxiliary pioneering the prior months but I wasn’t pioneering the month of May when we had the visit because I was prepping for our trip back to the States in June.  So it happened that, during the week of the visit, it was after one of the meetings, I gave one of our local elders a ride home.  In making conversation on the way to his place, Pablo mentioned that he was looking forward to seeing me at the pioneer meeting the next evening.  Well, I sheepishly replied, actually I wouldn’t be there because I wasn’t aux pioneering for that month.  ‘What?’, he says, ‘Clint, it doesn’t matter…as long as you’ve pioneered anytime in the last 6 months since the last c/o visit, you qualify to attend the meeting’.  Whoa, really??  Sweet!!  Ok, I guess I’ll be seeing you at the meeting after all!!  In retrospect, I have to admit that what he said sounded a little off but then again, things change from time to time, right?  And it should be safe to assume that he would have the most current information.  So, the next evening I show up at the meeting with Sam and take my seat.  We got there right as things were starting so I quickly got busy getting my notepad out and getting situated.  In the meantime, the c/o and Coordinator started doing a headcount to make sure everyone was there.  Evidently, something was wrong and they counted like 3 times and there was a delay getting going.  Unfortunately, I have a habit, especially back then when I had less than a year of Spanish under my belt, when something is going on around me in Spanish and I don’t think it pertains to me, I tend to tune out and start occupying my mind with something else because it just takes so much brainpower to understand – gotta save that for actual real conversations.  So when the brothers were delaying for whatever reason it was and they kept doing the headcount over and over, I figured someone probably forgot about the meeting and they were trying to figure out who it was or whatever.  So I dutifully exercised patience and started chit-chatting with my neighbor.  After wrapping up that conversation, I finally looked up and asked our Coordinator, who is from Canada and speaks English, what was going on and do we know who is missing?  He answers, while still trying to count yet again, that actually we seem to have one EXTRA person there but he can’t figure out why.  Figures, either yet another example of bad Ecuadorian record-keeping or someone actually has the guts to attend the meeting uninvited and try to get away with it!!  Believe that?!?  Well, finally the c/o realizes we are really getting a late start from all this hoopla and he decides to just forget the whole thing and start the meeting anyway.  He then proceeds to ask me to say the opening prayer.  I stumble through the prayer in Spanish and we go on to have a really really nice meeting.  Later, they excused the aux pioneers and so I left Sam there and arranged to come back for her after the meeting ended.  Well, they always have a ‘Pioneer Dinner’ after these meetings, so when I got back, I joined everyone in sitting around eating and chatting for a bit.  Before long, one of the elders (Paul, also from the States) comes up to me and starts congratulating me on pioneering for the month.  So I have to explain to him, no, I’m not pioneering this month but I had pioneered the last few months prior and that’s why I was here at the meeting.  He got a very confused look on his face and was like, ‘huh?’  Hah!  Evidently, I knew something he didn’t.  So I proceeded to explain to him what Pablo had told me about qualifying to attend the meeting as long as you pioneered any of the months since the last visit.  Didn’t he know about that??  No………………and then I started to feel a little warm.  You know the phrase of when something ‘starts to dawn on you’?  It describes that event when you start putting together a whole bunch of events and things that had previously tucked themselves into the back of your brain or subconscious and you didn’t previously realize their importance.  Hmmm, lets see…the count was off at the beginning of the meeting…there wasn’t just someone missing when the meeting began, there was an extra person…shoot, I KNEW it didn’t sound right what Pablo was telling me in the car!  Well, then there is that other phrase, ‘it hits you like a brick’.  And instantly the room went from very warm to dang it’s a raging furnace in here!  It hit me like a brick that *I* was the bonehead that had the guts, or more aptly put, stupidity to attend the meeting uninvited, and then I even ended up getting away with it!  Heck, I even said the opening prayer!!!  And I was the reason we started the meeting late!  Oh man, I haven’t been that embarrassed in a long time.  Of course, in short order the c/o knew, the Coordinator knew, everyone knew, and they all got a laugh out of it, including the c/o.  I felt so bad about the whole thing that I ended up getting 52 hours for the month, even though I wasn’t technically signed up for aux pioneering.  That relieved my conscience a little and just slightly ebbed the harassment I was getting from Paul.  It was only appropriate that I took the picture above of everyone else there since I didn’t belong in it anyway!  But hey, now since last September, I’m fully legit.

Pic of our c/o, Joffre and his wife Ester:

Below is a typical one-vehicle family leaving the house together. We were ringing the buzzer at the house next door while watching their whole load-up process. The little girl on the end was last – I don’t think she had more than like 2 inches of seat left to try to squeeze onto. How she would stay on the bike while hitting even the slightest bump is beyond me.  Also, I don’t think CPS exists here, or they all died of heart-attacks seeing this stuff and there aren’t any case-workers left.

Below: the trespassing rules are a little different in the campo (rural field service) than in the States.  So there’s a chain and lock…puhleeease!  Believe it or not, we did NOT get shot at when we got to the house…actually was a nice call!

Below: An Ecuadorian brother wanted to help out when we went to a community about 3 hours away and decided to bring his work truck. The truck ended up breaking down. It was all a little clearer after we found that he doesn’t really believe the engine needs an air filter.

Below: Another brother’s truck in the campo.  It was looking like rain when we were headed out for field service so he put the tarp on.  What?

Misc:

Above: gave these school kids a ride down the mountain…every one of them all got their very own tract.

Below: why wouldn’t you do it manually if the labor is free? (Yes, that’s a baptism pool after the assembly)

Above: more scenery. 

Below: Yes, the sun shines here…Washingtonians and white people BEWARE!  If both, ouch…sorry, Aaron! Hope you guys are doing good and you come back again! (He was redder than that ketchup)

Above: Even a cute fleabag is still a fleabag! Just kidding, these guys were adorable. 

Sam actually bought a puppy from another woman in this pueblo to give as a gift to a couple that moved out to a rural town to serve there.  Being from the campo, the dog really was a fleabag when we took him home…they were launching off of him everywhere in the bathroom when Sam gave him his first flea bath.  Well, for the couple days we had him before giving him away, we affectionately (more or less) called him Tonto (which means dummy).  Pics:

Above: dumb dog would sleep anywhere in any position.

Below: all growed up…his new owners decided to call him Kye.

Below: Sam with more of her school kids in Carchi!

Above and below: It was more fun getting it dirty…

Above: Some of the adorable kids in our hall.

Below: Josh and Rachel got tired of the lack of decent wine options and decided to make their own.

Above: We took a trip to Columbia, just over the border.  We were shocked at the prices! Oh wait, that’s just in Columbian pesos…so why do they use the dollar sign??

Below: Sam’s bible study, Helena (on left), has her first talk, which just so happened to be in the front school…and during the c/o visit!  Talk about throwing her in the fire.  She did awesome!

Above: Evidently someone leaned up against the truck while it was dirty.

Below: Killer view.  If you look closely in the far mountains you’ll see that there are several more communities up there on each flat/plateau area…someone has to preach to those folks!!

Well, I actually have a lot more stories and stuff I wanted to share with you but they will have to wait since this post is already pretty long.  I hope you are all doing well and we would really love to hear from you.  Send us an email and let us know how you’re doing and what you’re up to!  Love and miss you all…