Hey! We are heading out the door to the convention in a few minutes, but just wanted to post a few of the pictures from last night. We had a special program for the Quichua course...2 talks, a slide show and a photo session. It was really great! The brothers worked hard to show appreciation for the families and friends who are supporting those in the class!
As I mentioned before, we had to dress appropriately!! Just wanted to post some photos of the night!
Awwwwww, and after the program, the Ochoa's surprised us with an anniversary cake and bottle of wine....how sweet!!! It was cute, because Beth went with me to a sister's house before the meeting to get dressed. There were a whole bunch of sisters there getting ready, everyone was helping each other and running around like crazy people. Anyway, we laughed because Beth said, "Just think, 9 years ago exactly you were doing the same thing with your bridesmaids!!!" Awwwwwww...I miss everyone!! Anyway, it was a good day all around! Oh, and on the not so bright side...the house fell through....Someone had the nerve to BUY it right out from under us!!! And we had already started to plan our first big dance party!!! Oh well.....I guess we'll continue to "suffer" here in our other beautiful apartment! hahahahahaha Ahhhhhh....what stress....
Don't worry, he wasn't lost here...he was listening to a comment!! haha
Can you tell it's almost over? He is looking very relieved!!!
Hey! So...with tons of preparation, and a whole lot of holy spirit, Chad has conquered giving talks in yet another language! He sure can fake it well...you never would have known he didn't really know everything he was saying!! But, really, he rocked it (and I am not just saying that because he's my Chad!!!) His first talk was the Bible highlights...he first wrote it in Spanish, then tried to translate what he could into Kichwa, and then one of the brothers in the congregation helped him finish it! He practiced, and practiced. The first time he went through it completely, it took him about 10 minutes! But, with practice he became very fluent sounding and had perfect timing. It was really good!
You never would have known that 2 minutes before going up on stage, he looked at me and asked, "Am I sweating droplets of blood yet?" haha Talk about nerves!!!! Just when Spanish was no longer so scary...oh well.
I took a video, but unfortunately I have tried like 10 times to put in on the blogsite and it won't do it!!!!! What a bummer!!! Many of you have wanted to know what the language is like...just wanted you to get the full experience...poncho and all!!!! I guess it wasn't meant to be....remind me when we are back for a visit, I can show the video to you then!
In other news, we have a busy few weeks ahead of us! This coming Wednesday, we have a special program for those in the Kichwa course. We are having 2 brief talks by the instructors, and then taking the class photo. Should be fun, because they are asking everyone to dress in native garb! So, I went with one of the bible students from the cong. this afternoon and bought mine. You should have seen the show! Any Kichwa-speaking person that passed by the store had to stop and stare at the "gringa" who was buying the clothes! They were all really nice, and helped me pick colors. Boy did they have grins on their faces! It was really funny! And for anyone who knows how much I LOVE attention....NOT!!!...It was an interesting experience! I will post pictures after Wednesday for you to see!!
Then, on Thursday, we leave for Guayaquil for the English DC...soooooo looking forward to that!!! Also, we did indeed find a house today that is really nice! It has 5 bedrooms and an office, 2 1/2 baths...boy, we sure do suffer here in Ecuador!! And the best part for Mark and Beth is, that it is only 2 blocks away from the KH!! So, anyway, we should be moving after the DC!
Busy, Busy, Busy...but that is what keeps us out of trouble!!!!
Soooo....things are going well here in good 'ole Ecuador! Our roomies, Mark and Beth, have returned and brought along Amanda, their daughter. So the house is once again full and happy! Although it seems a little too full...so we are currently looking for a place a little bit bigger. Mark and Beth are doing well. They will be in the new congregation that is forming from Banos (our old cong.). The division starts in September and Mark will be the only elder...so he better rest up! haha Amanda is going to be supporting the Chinese group here in Cuenca, she had lived in Taiwan for 6 months so feels more comfortable with Chinese than with Spanish! So, as Beth has mentioned on her blog...we are a very multi-lingual family now!!!
Quichua is going well....we are picking up little things here and there. We were officially named a congregation July 1st, so we have been having ALL of the meetings in Quichua, which will be a big help for us...poor brothers who have numerous parts every meeting! Chad has been assigned the bible highlights in 2 weeks...so we will let you know how that goes!!! He has been working hard preparing for it!
The ministry gets a little bit easier each day. I have found my lady at the market the last 3 weeks and we have studied a paragraph or 2, so she is officially my bible student now!! She has opened up a little bit and has been pretty friendly lately! I also found a new return visit...she sells mandarines at the market...very sweet! She just had the biggest grin on her face listening to me try and spit out my presentation in Quichua, and very politely said that I did very well! As I test, I asked her to tell me what I said in Spanish...and she did! So, I must be somewhat understandable! YAY! She will be a little harder to find again, because she is a "vendedor ambulante", which means that she doesn't have a stand, she just wanders around carrying her huge bag of mandarines. Since she doesn't pay for a stand, she cannot stand in any one place for too long, or the guards come and shoo her away...so we will see how it goes trying to find her!!!
Two weeks ago we traveled outside the city for the day to one of the outlying towns. One of the brothers in the course has family that lives up in that section and he knows many of the neighbors speak quichua...so off we went!! It was a beautiful day...so nice to escape the city and work country territory...and boy was it country! We got out of the car and climbed the mountains and hills from 9:00 until 2:00, when we finally got back into the car to head home!! I was sooo tired...the combo of hiking, carrying my 10 pound bible (well maybe I exaggerate a little..haha), and trying to speak Quichua and understand what they were saying, was exhausting!!! But what fun! They funny thing was, they didn't really tell us how the day was going to pan out, so our nicely packed lunch was left in the locked car that we never really went back to, so we were starving by the time we got back...and I finally had to just go to the bathroom behind a bush at around 1:30. Not a problem if I am on a hike...but first time I had done that in service!!! Good times!!!!
We have our English convention coming up in 2 weeks, so we are really looking forward to that spiritual shot in the arm! It truly is the highlight of my year! What an encouragement!!
Other than that, there is not too much new here...I think that is enough, eh? We have bought our tickets to come for a visit for Sept 14th...so we hope to get to see all of you when we get there!!! We miss you all and look forward to hearing from you!
I posted some pictures from the class to show you...I haven't quite had enough nerve yet to pull out my camera at the market when we are preaching. I am afraid it will get stolen!
PS. I just got a reminder from my friend Michele Fair. If you read the Sept 15th watchtower life experience of Harley Harris it is really interesting. He passed away recently and she still serves at Bethel. We had the pleasure of meeting her a few weeks ago visiting some friends here in Cuenca. Anyway, they started out here in Cuenca as their assignment! See how the work has really exploded since then?
Our instructor, David, (standing) is a 24 year old ministerial training school graduate and special pioneer. He has been in Quichua for 6 years and is practically native speaking. Very fun guy...anyway, here he is re-inacting for us a typical gathering in the culture of the Quichua speaking people. One thing that is very important when trying to learn any new language is to understand and learn about the culture. We had a lot of fun doing this, although our backs hurt us later! But the food was DELICIOUS!!!!
YUM!!! The yellow patty looking thing, is a potato, mashed, seasoned, made into a patty and fried. The corn-looking things are called "tostado" it is a special type of corn that they bake in the oven with oil and salt...very yummy. The meat is called "hornado". It is pork, but they put the whole pig in a HUGE oven and bake it! It was really good... you can see the skin on the left, very crispy and DELICIOUS!!! I think the skin is called 'chitlins'? or something like that in the states! Correct me if I am wrong....sorry
One the left is Erica, she is from Chicago. She came to Ecuador 3 years ago and didn't speak much spanish. She immediately joined Quichua. She learned Spanish and Quichua at the same time and now speaks both beautifully! What a woman! One the right is Selina. She is one of our "native speaking" bible students. This was the first time she was a householder in the school. Everyone was soo proud of her!!!!
One of the activities we did in class was a "game-show"!! David, was the host, and the panel of brothers on the left were the judges. The brother standing had to read a random paragraph out of the bible story book and the judges then held up numbers from 1-10 rating how he did!!! It was really funny...but some of the judges were kind of harsh!!!!
One class we were learning antonyms (opposites) like strong, weak...David assigned each of us a word that we had to act out the following class. Chad was good (alli) and I was bad or wicked (millay). So, as you can see, Chad dressed up as a angel...cough, cough....and I dressed up as a devil! It was quite a stretch for me!!!! I had to search the closet to find where I had stored my pitch-fork and horns......
Here we are learning the different styles of dress from different areas of the country. It is very important, because when we have our assemblies we are expected to dress accordingly, and if we don't do it just right, it would be an insult to the native speaking people. The sister is native speaking, from Otavalo, she came to Cuenca to help out the group. She gave us a lesson in how to put all of the pieces of the clothing on properly!!! whew!!! What a chore!!!
Well....it seems everyone else is changing their blog background...I don't want to be left out!!! Does this count as a new post? hahahaha I have a new post planned for tomorrow...sorry...but bed is calling me! Quichua class is kicking my........bottom (as my mom would want me to say).
Had a good class today and we start at 8am tomorrow so I am going to go to bed now and hopefully find time to write a blog tomorrow! Things are going well....I have one official bible study and another hopeful!!! I tell you all about it...
Oh, and on the not so bright side...the house fell through....Someone had the nerve to BUY it right out from under us!!! And we had already started to plan our first big dance party!!!
