The last week of 2010

The tagua nut from a variety of palm tree that grows in Northen South American is used to make jewelry and small sculptures. It is referred to as vegetable ivory and is quite beautiful. This was purchased by the Yosts and shows the process used to create the bird.

12/26 We were in the Cólon ward and I thought Sacrament meeting was especially good. Two women spoke. The first about gratitude and the importance of recognizing our blessings rather than focusing on what else we wish we had. The second woman spoke about ¨President Benson's 14 points about the role of a prophet. They both spoke clearly and slowly enough that I could follow almost everything they said. Yea, it only takes three missions to begin to understand.

Again our Gospel Principles class was excellent. I was worried because I didn't see Juan Carlos in Sacrament meeting but he was there all along and sat next to us in class. He gave us a map of Quito with some postcard sized photos inside. How nice of him. All of the senior missionaries came into our class that morning. Lewis said, "We either need more chairs or fewer missionaries." Everybody laughed and they got more chairs. When we went around the room and made introductions he said, "I am in investigator but I count myself one of you." At the end of the meeting Juan Carlos told us that he had had his baptism interview and he will be baptized on New Year's Day. How wonderful! He is an intelligent and thoughtful young man. I hope this is the beginning of his lifelong appreciation for and living the Gospel.

In the elevator Lewis said our Sunday tradition is grilled cheese sandwiches and invited everyone to come have a sandwich. Only Sister Naylor came but we enjoyed her company and took her photo in front of our Christmas tree wearing her Christmas scarf so she can sent it to her family.

12/27 Went to the office. We expected that at 10:00AM or so they would move our desk configuration two feet closer to the window so they could put a dividing wall between us and two stations for the call center. Paola and I are practically back to back now. Good because I am supposed to keep close supervision but bad if we are all trying to talk on the phone at the same time. So we figured it was a great time to go to the Otavalan market that is only about a block away from the office. It is spoken of often by the sisters but I hadn't been there. The Yosts didn't have anything pressing, so they took us. The men petered out after a couple of rows of stalls but Sister Yost and I wanted to see it all. She says she likes to go often and has a monthly budget to spend there. There are about 150 stalls that are crowded together under a roof with narrow aisles between. There is an open space with benches in the middle and that is where the men ended up. It is delightful. There are a million things, many of them beautiful and they are inexpensive - at least compared to what you would pay for a similar item in our country. I didn't try to take photos this time. It is probably not a good idea to flash a camera around. Some of the women are dressed in dark skirts with white blouses embroidered in bright colors with colorful belts that tie around their waists. There was a very cute little girl with her mom and I did ask if I could take her photo. I wanted both of them but she said just her daughter. If you like bags, jewelry, shawls, ponchos, sweaters, blankets, tablecloths, figurines that are made of nuts and look like ivory, leather goods. You name it they have many versions. I did buy a big purse/bag. I like the pattern and the colors and it holds my small umbrella and my purse that Dan and Jenny gave me that has my camera in it and there is an inside pocket for my translator. Lewis bought a tablecloth because our table is covered with glass and he doesn´t like it. We paid $10.00 for my purse and $12.00 for the tablecloth and napkins. Sister Yost and I will be going again. We can't find a set of dominoes anywhere though!

We went back to work and no one had come to move our desks so I worked on my birthday emails and recording the replies I had previously received. At lunch time we went out with the Yosts to a restaurant that we are happy to know about. For $3.00 I got a big piece of very thin beef (tough but tasted good) plus lots of rice and beans. They have a sauce called Ají that looks like thin watery pico de gallo but I liked it a lot and so did Lewis. Lewis got a plate similar to mine but with the addition of two fried eggs. He didn't enjoy the beef much but really liked the rest. His cost $4.00 and we each got a drink as well. We can't afford to eat out every day but at these prices it is hard to complain. After lunch we went to a tall commercial building that the Yosts had never been in. It was very unique in that you enter and you either spiral up or spiral down. There is a ramp that takes you past every store. There is an elevator but the line was long. I thought it was very clever. Every store gets lots of traffic to pass by their window unless they are at the end of the line.

I spent the afternoon going through old files. There were many versions of training and I kept the ones that looked useful and sorted them and threw out the ones that are way outdated. Lots of work has gone into creating things that don't reflect the current state of the program. I hate to throw out stacks of hard work but I'm sure that is what the missionary couple did in our office when we left the Dominican Republic. We all do things in our own way and processes change. I hope we can learn what is most helpful here. We look forward to our training scheduled for January 10th. We are trying to get a handle on the info here and make sure we have the info that the Area wants us to use.

Monday evening is Family Home Evening. It was my turn to give the Spanish lesson and I used some of the info I prepared for our old ESL class in Melba.

12/28 In the office we finally realized that the messages we were getting when we try to call cell phone numbers couldn´t be right. It turns out that there is some error in our office phone system and the people who could fix it are on vacation. So we sent lots of emails but that is not what will get us good marks in SLC. Oh well, I guess we can improve next month. We went out to lunch with the Geldmachers and the Yosts. For three dollars we got a pork chop, lots of lentils and rice with a piece of fried plantain, preceded by a soup with yucca and some meat and vegetables, a juice drink (I liked mine (called maricopa or something like that), the others got juice of tree tomatoes) and chocolate cake for dessert. Oh and there was ají (a creamy orange sauce this time) and a small bowl of popcorn on the table too. Quite a meal for $2.90! I think we liked the previous day´s meal a little bit better because we liked the beans better than the lentils and I liked their ají sauce better.

12/29 Went to work and did birthday emails and Lewis and I went through the priority call lists and he called and I sent emails to those we couldn't reach. The numbers won't look very good but we are making a difference for a few. Lewis got several calls back and I received reply emails. We solved a few problems and made a few friends.

They finished up our office by moving everything closer to the window. Now there is a five foot padded divider between the two of us and the two service center stations. Hopefully that will allow us to supervise and be aware of what is going on but not get lost in the babble of too many conversations at once.

So, oh darn, we had to go home early. We walked to the office store with Yosts. She wanted tissue paper to wrap her nativity set in. It was a kick to explain what we wanted. They brought out bathroom tissue before we found the kind of paper she was looking for. We bought a compass for less than $2.00. Maybe we will get less lost. We had wanted to buy a set of dominoes. We thought that should be easy enough but we can't find any except very tiny ones. The Yosts took us on the Ecovia to Quicentro because there are some toy stores there. The Ecovia is cool. It is often very crowded and pickpockets are a real danger. Elder Vomocil lost his wallet yesterday and didn't even know it until a couple of hours later. They are like two regular buses connected by an accordion folded section that travel in a special lane reserved for them. When they stop at a platform in the middle of the street, the platform doors open and metal flaps come out of the buses to enter on. It costs a quarter to get on and you can go as far as you want. We went six stops to Quicentro. We found the Imaginarium store which is great fun and they did have a set of dominoes but they were all curved so you end up building snake trails and there were no doubles. The regular toy store didn't have any at all. So we failed in finding dominoes but I was very impressed with this mall. It put Boise to shame. Very high end shops and beautifully done. More like the ones in Hawaii on the beach. The food court is open and airy with a translucent roof and on two levels with a TV screen at least 60 feet wide and 15 feet high. Mostly it showed advertising for the stores but we were impressed. We ate at Taco Bell which I'm not anxious to do again but the cost was reasonable. It is a cool place. I want to go back to Quicentro.

At home I got caught up on my computer. My Google Reader is down to zero unread posts for the first time since we left the USA. No more excuses, it is time to get blogging.

This big open area is surrounded by restaurants and stores. They say it is very lively at night and we should stay away after dark but at 7:30 in the morning it is very quiet.

12/30 Now we are legal. We met the missionaries at 8:00 to get our Certificado de Empadronamiento. It is called a Censo. They needed to go to the office first so we waited at home and then went with them to the government office that issues them. We had to go next door to a little gift shop that also provides the needed photos. The lady took the photos, printed them and even put glue on the back so they could be stuck to the big envelope that held all of our documentation. I spend about 5 minutes with an officer while he looked it all over and stamped everything and printed out a card for me. I needed to go to another desk where it was laminated and copied for the missionaries. I didn't have 60 cents on me so a very nice man who was standing there and chatting paid my 60 cents for me. Lewis was being interviewed at the time. We were chatting because one of the officers was explaining that he was a missionary in Quito and used to take others through this process when he worked in the mission office. He told me that Elder Daniel Johnson was his mission president! I explained that he was our Area President in our last mission. Small world. The man who paid for me was another American who was getting his Censo too.

After we finished we went to the office and I finished the sorting and filing. We got as many of the priority calling and contacting done as we could.

We had packed a lunch but going to Kentucky Fried Chicken with the Yosts sounded more appealing. We went to a big two story new KFC. It was busy but there were lots of tables on the second floor with a good view of the busy street below. The chicken was very good and it only cost us $6.00 for the two of us. Too much grease but the chicken strips, french fries, soda and a cookie tasted good. We walked back through a cool park. There was a huge arch with sculptured figures in relief at the top. There was lots of playground equipment that looked more interesting than our parks. The kids had four wheel bikes that looked like cars. Moms could push from behind and the kids could propel themselves as well. There was a row of maybe 50 stalls selling handicrafts. Lewis chatted with one man who explained that he was a member in Otavala and ended up selling Grandpa a red wool jacket with llamas woven in the pattern. It is big enough (which is difficult to find) and cost $22.00. Now we both have something Ecuadorian. I saw some owls painted on small gourds that looked intriguing but it was time to go back to work. Much of their work is very beautiful.

After work we stayed to watch the New Year's tradition. The people make effigies of people to burn. It symbolizes getting rid of old problems and beginning fresh and new again I'm told. But it is a bit startling to watch what looks like a person go up in flames. They made one to represent Efrain - he works in the building and is one of the counselors in the ward we are attending. He looked pleased. I guess it is an honor to be burned to ash. They stuff clothes and put on a mask. It even had very small shoes. They doused it with several cups of gasoline and put a match to it. The missionaries all gathered around. All of the senior missionaries wanted to watch and there were many workers and some older boys as well. We all watched as it looked like a bonfire and then burned down to not very much ash and two charred shoes. They tell me that New Year's day will have black spots all over after the New Years Eve fires. The office is closed tomorrow so that is why this one was early. There are masks for sale at many street corners and whole "people" in some places. All ready to burn. When we got home to our apartment building there is one at the doorway holding a box with a slit in it thanking people for their "colaboracion." They are thanking people for putting money in the box to pay for the effigy. Seems a little gruesome to me but I guess it is one way of "getting a fresh start".

Elder Arellano with the effigy

The man it represents pouring gasoline over the effigy

The missionaries always love a photo op

Lots of us watching in the parking lot.

It burns.

It really burns!

12/31 The office is closed today. Some of the missionaries went in for a few hours but I wanted to work on my computer and get my blog up and running. It was a day of frustration. The internet connection kept falling off and I couldn't even get the blog to accept a photo or the PEF site to bring up the pop up to record my contacts. Bah! I've run all of the spam and anti virus programs and Lewis has changed the settings and nothing has improved. The other missionaries walked around town to see the sights and took lots of photos. We should have gone with them. The blog is still pending.

We went to the New Year's Eve party at the Yosts. We took cornbread to go with the ham and potato soup Sister Yost made and vegetables and dip. Sister Yost also made home made pumpkin pie with squash she bought at the store downstairs. It was delicious. We enjoyed lots of good food again and played Buzz Words. This time the girls won. Elder Hakes was with us because he became ill on Thursday and has been at the Geldmachers since then so he wouldn't share his illness with his three roommates. We also played Blink and dominoes. After our trips to all the stores we could think of to buy dominoes, Sister Yost mentioned our quest to Sister Geldmacher who said they had dominoes in their apartment that they never used and we could have them. Elder Hakes was very good at Blink and Sister Geldmacher won the domino game. We left about 10:00 and the noise of the fireworks woke me up at midnight but only very briefly. We heard reports later that Sister Dresen and Naylor watched until 12:30 or so and Elder Gelmacher had the best view but I enjoyed sleeping.

Elder Geldmacher wearing a mask he bought on the street. Now we know where all the left over Halloween masks go.

Christmas week in Ecuador

12/19 We went to the Colón Ward again with the sisters. Sister Yost was not feeling well and needed to stay home. There was some problem with the sacrament (perhaps they didn't have enough bottled water) so we had the talks first and the sacrament after another sacrament song. We went to the Gospel Essentials class again and saw the video The Restoration which always gets to me. It is wonderful. Have all of the grandchildren seen it recently? We sat next to Juan Carlos who was friendly and seemed very interested.

We took a little nap after eating our toasted cheese sandwiches and afterward went to a Christmas concert at a not so nearby stake center. It was surprisingly wonderful musically and a lovely tribute to Christmas. This choir practices four hours every week and in addition to the Christmas hymns they sang Carol of the Bells and did the Hallelujah Chorus in English. The best part was that Juan Carlos came and sat next to us again. He is a university graduate in computer systems, is working in Quito and has a car. He said that he has always thought that there should be more information from God than the Bible and was surprised when he read the first page in the Book of Mormon that it claimed to be what he thought should be available. He is reading and studying and hoping that it might all be true. He loved the music and enjoyed that they also had a screen showing scriptures and pictures and some of the video of the Savior´s birth and life along with the singing. It was good to be there because we had an opportunity to talk with him about how we feel about the Savior and how the restored gospel brings added understanding to all that the Bible teaches. Grandpa had brought his little Spanish hymnario and we were reading the hymns as they were sung. Juan Carlos was especially interested in finding each song and following along with the words. We gave him the hymn book as a Christmas present and he was very pleased.

It was a wonderful evening for us and helped us feel like it is Christmas here as well as at home. It would have been a nightmare for us to get there on our own in the pouring rain and holiday traffic. The wife of the mission president has been involved in the choir, has all six of their children here for Christmas and invited the senior missionaries to come with them in a big van. I'm so glad that we went.


12/20 Second week in the office. No internet connection at home so I need to use office time to do my journaling and at least download my Scrapgirls Christmas freebies. I look forward to getting our internet connection. They said that for sure it will be no later than today. I fear that we won't get it until after Christmas or maybe even New Years. Latins love their holidays, and take their vacations seriously, even more than we do.

Family Home Evening was at our house last night. The Yosts, the Geldmachers and Sister Naylor and Sister Dresen came over. The tradition here is an opening song with one verse in English and one verse in Spanish, opening prayer, FHE lesson, short Spanish lesson, a testimony in Spanish, any business and then a closing song and prayer followed by refreshments. We arranged for our Christmas celebrations. Christmas Eve dinner and party will be at the Geldmachers, Christmas breakfast will be at our house with Christmas omelets made by Elder Hakes and Christmas dinner will be at the Yosts. We are all bringing food to each meal and the four office elders will come to each one and the nurse and her companion will come to Christmas dinner. I guess I wouldn't get a lot of time with my computer anyway. We will come back to work on Monday. I don't know if any Ecuadorians will. We look forward to getting to know the other seniors well. They are lovely people with interesting histories. Sister Dresen is a jew who converted when her children were young. Sister Naylor lost her husband to heart disease about five years ago. He had been a pilot in the Army and they both taught school after he retired. The Yosts have one son who knows ten languages and is getting a doctorate in Asian religions at Cornell. We don´t know much about the Geldmachers yet except that this is a second marriage for them. Oh, and one of the office elders is Elder Arellano who is from Mexico City. We will know him better after this weekend as well.

Here are photos of Sister Dresen above and Sister Naylor below (though this isn't our apartment).



12/21 Off to the office. It was not raining but I was cold most of the day. I wish that I had brought high necked and long sleeved shirts. When we went outside for lunch it was warm outside but still I put my coat back on inside the building. I spent most of the day calling students and emailing those I could not reach by phone. I was doing the list of new participants who are behind in payments. There is a very huge backlog of 150+ past due participants here. Loans were given out without any screening in the beginning and there are many who we are unable to contact or participants who have not paid anything in years. So we are trying to focus on the new ones to be sure they get off on the right foot and understand how and why they should make their payments. Also we have a Renewed Hope program where those who are 150 days past due can make four monthly payments in four successive months and become current. The past due balances are then put at the end of the loan and they have a fresh start.

There is lots to do here. We are hoping to be able to help the participants become successful. I hate calling because I can't understand everything that is said but some of the calls turned out well. The kids usually try to help me understand and respond favorably. I probably made 20 calls but it took me almost the whole day. We were able to solve a few problems with auto debits and helping kids be aware of missing payments etc. Slowly things will get better. I send out birthday messages every day and some of them email back to thank me. That is fun.

After work I downloaded my photos to my laptop and tagged and rated them. There was a note in our mail cubby in the lobby of our building that they tried to install our internet but we were not home. They had agreed to call us first but we never got the call! I hope they call tomorrow.


12/22 Went to work. The biggest thing we accomplished was destroying all of the files on the PEF students. For some reason they printed the Personal Progress Report off the computer for every student and made a file. All the info is online and it is updated daily. We pulled all the papers, removed all the staples and shredded all of the paperwork. They are moving me into Lewis' office and rearranging things. We have stacks of files laying about. I hope we can get it all back together. Went to the store to get the things we need for all the Christmas meals. Got back and found two missionaries and Sister Naylor knocking on our door. We had agreed to go Christmas caroling with the Gospel Principles class members but had forgotten. We quickly changed, found our hymn books and flash lights and left with them. We couldn't find an empty taxi. It took 1/2 hour and still no luck. The missionaries called and by the time we could have arrived they would have finished, so we went back home. I felt bad for Sister Naylor but we were happy to return home. The best news is that they are coming to install our internet connection tomorrow. YEA!


12/23 We stayed home today to await the guys who would install our internet connection. They came. They were more than an hour late but they came. Things did not go smoothly but after another hour they were able to get it done. Lewis' computer worked great but they couldn't get our router to accept their connection and provide it to my computer. They tried for a while and gave up. Fortunately Lewis didn't give up all afternoon and finally he figured out how to make it work. I have internet access and can communicate with our family. What a great Christmas present. Life is good now!

I spent the day making cornflake cookies and toffee bars and cutting up peppers and onion and sautéing them along with mushrooms for the omelets on Christmas morning. I will cook bacon that morning and make french toast and provide juice. Hopefully we will have a fun breakfast together on Christmas morning.
I also changed out the external hard drive that has been making weird noises for the last couple of weeks. I got everything moved to it and started up Mozy again. I had downloaded all of the photos from the MTC and the ones I have taken here. It is so great to be in business again with my computer and my photos and everything to be backed up. I should be able to get some more fun photos of our Christmas in the next few days.

Emily wrote that Evan and Emmett have been very sick. Emmett has RSV and has been hospitalized for three days. He is home now and improving but they sent home a suction machine for Emily to continue to use on him. I will call her tomorrow. It has been a scary ordeal for their family. She reminded me that Evan was in the hospital at the same age when he was injured. She said that having her baby in the hospital at four months is not a tradition she wants to continue. We pray they will be better soon.


12/24 Went to work this morning. No rain. My office has been moved and improved. I am in with Lewis and we have two desks facing each other with a low partition between us. The two call center stations are behind me. They will finish it next week by moving us a bit closer to the wall to allow room for a partition between me and the call center. We also have two additional stations in the next room. But we will not get the two additional computers we need until next year. We'll try to look on the bright side. We have new chairs that are wonderful and the office set up is very nice. The office closed down at mediodia since it is Christmas Eve.

We called Emily when we got home and Emmett is much better. She still has to suction him but he is eating normally and is back to his happy and smiley self (except when the suctioning is taking place). Edgar's family was over and they were making tamales in lots of flavors. They will all have a great dinner together tonight and Emily is only responsible for the salad. She sounds sick but says that she is feeling OK and is so grateful that Emmett is better. She said that the doctor sent them to the hospital because Emmett was so bad that without help he would not have the energy to get the air he needed. What a difficult ordeal for them all. She said that during the discussion about Emmett in the doctor's office, Evan said, "What about me? I am sick too." Yes he was, but fortunately not as sick as Emmett. We also talked to Jennifer. She came down with the flu last night and has been unable to function today. Fortunately Aaron was able to stay home. She may not enjoy Christmas day very much but with Aaron's help all will be well. We cleaned the house a bit for company tomorrow and took a little nap.

This evening we went to the Geldmachers and sang some Christmas carols, had an opening prayer and Lewis was asked to read the Christmas story from Luke. Then we took a plate of food to their neighbor, an elderly gentleman who lives alone. We sang Silent Night and he was very pleased to enjoy the food and hear us sing. We had meatballs, breaded shrimp and sweet and sour vegetables over rice, vegetables and dip, a cheese ball and crackers, and lots of desserts - my cookies and rice krispy treats and chocolate dipped pretzels and nuts, cornflake wreaths and macaroons. Everything was delicious and it was fun to be together. After eating we played BuzzWords. A fun game to play in teams and try to guess phrases that a key word appears in. Unfortunately the boys beat the girls, but by only by a couple of points. And they had the help of one sister. Sister Geldmacher gave me a tiny manger scene. She asked if I had one and when I said no she got one she had purchased for her family but turned out to be an extra. It is lovely and now sits under our Christmas tree. She also gave all of us a table runner that was woven in Otavala. They are beautiful and I love mine. The Yosts passed out presents also. They gave us a small calendar with paintings of the Savior by Simon Dewey and a little coin purse that says Ecuador on it. We felt a bit bad that we didn't get gifts for everyone but delighted to receive such nice items and have something to open even before Christmas. Thank you fellow missionaries. It was a fun evening and now we need to rest up for the big breakfast in the morning.


12/25 We enjoyed a very delightful and Merry Christmas. It started with breakfast at our house. The four office elders came in addition to the senior missionaries. Elder Hakes made omelets to order for each of us. We could choose from onion, two kinds of peppers, mushrooms, cheese, ham and fried pork (we thought we bought bacon - it looked just like bacon and had a picture of a pig on it but we bought costillas, ribs...I cooked the rest of the things ahead and planned to have the bacon cooking when they arrived so it would smell good. Oh well.) Brother Geldmacher had made sausage because he couldn't find any he liked here. He gave us some for breakfast and it was very good. No one complained about the lack of bacon. We had french toast as well. Lewis had made bread and we had several kinds of syrup. Sister Dresen made buttermilk syrup which was delicious. It all came together and everyone was happily stuffed. The elders were anxious to get to the office so they could call home and all of us were looking forward to talking to our children and grandchildren. That was the highlight of the day.

Elder Hakes, Elder Arellano, Elder Di Natale and Elder Vomocil

At 3:30 we went to the Yosts for Christmas dinner. Again everyone brought things and the food was delicious. The Yosts baked a turkey and a ham. Sister Rogers and Sister Nelson joined us. The Yosts borrowed another table and were able to set up three in their living room. There was room for everyone and everything looked so Christmasy and festive. We very much enjoyed our time together.


After dinner we reached David and so were able to talk to all eleven kids and Rosario today or yesterday. We are so proud of all of our children. We miss them but can feel close with Skype and emails. They are such wonderful people doing great things in their lives.

One thing I learned was some of the details of Morgan's surprise 16th birthday party. Susan and Randy and their girls and Paige went. Also, most of David's family was there. Morgan had learned something was up but she was blown away by the scope of her party that was held at the church. The cultural hall was decorated with a disco ball and amazing lighting provided by a ward member. Nancy's friend had made huge tissue paper flowers that hung in clusters from the ceiling. The food was wonderful. The DJ was great and David's family are wonderful dancers. The most memorable part was a photobooth that Aunt Kathy rented for the evening. It was a big box with a curtain like the old fashioned ones. But inside it contained a computer, a little printer and a seat that contained lots of props. Everyone could use it as often as they wanted and Sarah wanted to use it constantly. She yelled at the teenagers to hurry up because she couldn't wait in line any longer. She explained to her mom that she tried to be patient but she just couldn't. Apparently it was a big hit and everyone got all the photos they wanted and Morgan got a disc at the end that contained all of he photos that were taken that night. What a nice memento of her special evening. She told Susan, "You are not going to the football game. You came just for me?" I think she did feel honored and special but Susan and Nancy are telling all of the kids that there will be only this one 16th Birthday party and you all got to attend. Don't expect this on your 16th birthday. Sarah had heard Susan tell someone on the phone that they would probably sing to Sarah at Morgan's party. Near the end of the party Sarah complained that no one had sung to her. So Morgan gathered all of her friends that were still there and they sang Happy Birthday to Sarah. She was pleased but still insisted on her own party when they got home. Susan and the girls had to put one together real quick but it worked out and Sarah was pleased. Nancy says that Cohen still insists that he is not five yet because he hasn't had his own party. December is crazy packed full for the Evan's family!

I learned that the Preisler family gave out the presents under the tree to the person the present was from. That person then gave it to the recipient who opened the present. They focused on what they were going to give a lot more than they focused on what they wanted to get all season long and it made for a more thoughtful and appreciative holiday for their family. I love that idea!

It was a wonderful day. We got to open our packet of letters that were written especially for us. Thank you to each one of you who wrote or drew us a picture. We appreciate the love and the photos and the good wishes. We got to talk with all of our children. We have friends here and enjoyed good food together. Life is wonderful and because of our Savior we can enjoy family and joy for all eternity if that is really what we want. That defines what I hope for all eternity. Will you all please be my family and friends for all eternity? It is joyful to be together in our hearts even when miles separate us.

Love you. Merry Christmas!

On to Ecuador

This HUGE poster was in the airport in Quito. It says, Coca Cola - Take the lid off of happiness. Welcome. You have arrived at the middle of the world.


12/11 The alarm didn't go off! Forget the shower. Just put on clothes and jump in the car. David was up and wondering why we were so quiet. There was no traffic and we made it to the airport in plenty of time. It was a very long day but all the travel went smoothly. We flew to Chicago and then to Miami and then to Quito. On the last leg of our journey Alex was sitting next to Lewis. He is from Ecuador, has been working in Madrid for the last several years and was going home for Christmas. His mother didn't know he was coming and he was excited for the surprise. He was very nice and in our conversation Lewis gave him most of the first discussion. He was very polite and even interested. We didn't have a Book of Mormon to give him but he said he would get on the internet and learn more.

The senior missionaries came to the airport to greet us. They waited for a lot more than an hour since three flights came in at the same time very late at night. We didn't get through customs until almost midnight. The Area also sent a member with a taxi to take us to our apartment. The senior missionaries had put up a Christmas tree inside our apartment to welcome us along with enough food to get us through till Monday. The apartment has everything we need and we felt very welcome and happy to go to bed.

2/12 It was not easy to get up this morning but we met the other senior missionaries downstairs in the lobby and walked to church. We went to the Colon Ward that is only a 1/2 mile or so from our apartment. It was the Primary Children's Sacrament Meeting presentation and they did a wonderful job. There were about 8 older girls and 6 younger boys and 2 little girls on the stand. They all had a speaking part and did so well. They knew all the words to the songs and it was wonderful. We went to the Gospel Essentials class and the teacher was excellent. After an introduction of all the class members and to the topic he divided the class into groups and gave each group an assignment. This is very often used but afterward he numbered the individuals in each group and had them form new groups and teach each other what they had learned. He circulated among the groups and joined their discussions briefly. It was very effective and everyone participated. The class was about evenly divided between members and investigators and I was impressed with how well it worked. The logistics would be more complicated with a large group but it worked very well for our class of about 20. Relief Society went well also. It looks like the church is doing very well in the Colon Ward.

At 4:00 (thankfully after a nap) we went to one of the sister's apartments and enjoyed a great dinner with all of the senior couples and the office elders. The food was American and familiar and the welcome was warm. The humanitarian couple are sort of similar in situation to ours (not working directly with the mission) and will be showing us the ropes since they have been here for six weeks. After one day in Quito we are feeling ready to go to work tomorrow. This is Elder and Sister Yost who are the Humanitarian Services missionaries here in Ecuador. They are from Rexburg, ID.

This was our first day on the job. The senior missionaries walk to work at 7:30 AM. The single sister missionaries need someone to walk with them and all of us work in the same building. It appears that our office building was the Area Office before the South America West and the South America North Areas were combined. Now five countries are in the South America Northwest Area - Venezuela, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. Our Area Office is in Lima, Peru now. So there is this nice office building that now houses all of the country functions like finance and membership along with the employment resources center and the Quito Mission office. Everyone is anxious to make us comfortable. Lewis has his own office. I have a space but no computer yet. And there is a service center with two computers and telephones for contacting the participants. One girl came in but the other one has had surgery and has not been in for a long time. We will be very comfortable with the office. All we have to do is get the work done! There is a lot of it. It will be easy to improve our record of calls made. There are over a 1,000 participants and only one girl who made about three calls today.

Monday is FHE for the senior missionaries. They have opening and closing songs and prayers, a short Spanish lesson, a regular lesson, a testimony given in Spanish and refreshments. Next week it will be at our home and we get to make the refreshments. This is Elder and Sister Geldmacher who work in the mission office and are responsible for all of the apartments and the mission finances.

12/14 Second day in the office. We walked with the Yosts, Sister Dresen and Sister Naylor. It takes a while to walk the mile and a half because the sidewalks are anything but smooth and there are lights to wait for. Pedestrians have no right of way so you have to be very careful of cars but it seems to be a bit better than in the Dominican Republic. (You might like to read Sister Yost's blog at http://mapayost.blogspot.com/ Go back a couple of posts to see her slideshow about the perils of walking in Ecuador. It is good to keep your chin up, except when you are walking.)

Sister Sloan and Sister Yost in the kitchen of the mission home. The Sloans have two daughters living with them and four children who are married and/or going to BYU. Their family home is in Lehi, Utah.

We were given the assignment to help the Yosts serve lunch at the Mission President's home. For Christmas, President Sloan and his wife were bringing in all of their missionaries for a day in Quito complete with meals. Apparently Sister Sloan has gone all out to treat the missionaries as pampered guests. They love it. The senior missionaries who work with the mission and others who have time help prepare and serve food. The missionaries from Esmeraldas were there today and were treated to sweet chopped ham in rolls, potato casserole, cut up fruit and soup. They had hot chocolate and mostly homemade cookies for dessert. The food was delicious and it was fun to meet the missionaries. It was our first chance to meet President and Sister Sloan. They are both impressive and down to earth. Sister Sloan is obviously very well organized and welcomed us warmly. President had only a few minutes to talk with us but was very happy that we asked for an opportunity to work in a ward or branch that could use some support. It seems that perhaps we will work along with the Yosts for a period of months in several units one after another. He would like us to teach how a ward council should operate. I like that idea because we can travel together and perhaps provide support for Primary and Relief Society. We may have very long Sundays. More photos from the mission home. The back of our mission president's head is visible below.

And just in case you thought missionaries are always serious and solemn, especially while in the mission home under the eye of their mission president...

12/15/It looks like we will have regular office hours as a default. The single sisters need someone to walk with them to the office and home again in the evening.

The light above my desk needed to be replaced so that took a while. The people in charge of physical facilities spent time with us. They have agreed to install another computer and phone to be used for the service center. That will give us three stations and they will arrange to have a space for a fourth when that is approved and funded. I will move into Lewis' office and they will arrange two desks for us. The previous space will become an extension of our Quito Centro de Servicios for FPE.

We had scheduled a time in the conference room to have a video conference with Samuel Gomez (Coordinador FPE del Área) and Henry Utrilla (Supervisor Centro de Servicios). But when the time came the Area had a conference going with Human Resources. We didn't have our cell phone yet so it took a while to communicate and set up something else. Our office phone wasn't working. Finally we communicated by email and got Skype to work with the videos and were able to talk for an hour or so. He told us that the previous South American West Area and the South American North Area were combined in August of 2009 to form the South American Northwest Area to administer Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. They needed to combine the policies and procedures of two different areas and now form the second largest Area in terms of participants. We have almost 10,500 with 1,300 new ones every year! They say it is very fast growing with the resources to support it growing more slowly than the number of participants. In the beginning there was little screening of participants and there is a huge number of old loans with problems. They want to continue working on those problems but put even more effort into training the new participants on how to follow through with their commitments to prevent future problems. So there are lots of concerns but also lots of very good things taking place. We have our work cut out for us but these men understand the goals and how to reach them. We are grateful for strong leaders and we understand that our Area Presidency is one of the strongest supporters of PEF in the whole world. I am assigned to be the Service Center supervisor in Ecuador. I am worried because we have three people currently calling and a workload of about 1200 participants to contact each month! I will have plenty to keep me busy.

We went out to lunch with the Yosts after our call. There is a bakery just around the corner that makes sandwiches and sells bread and desserts. We got two little pizzas for $1.80 each. They are about the size of Pizza Hut personal pizzas and not bad at all! I took half of my pizza home, we should share next time. We also bought 2 rolls con mermelada that were like a croissant filled with jelly and topped with honey. Delicious. Better not eat those every day. There is a nice kitchen and dining room in our building where we can eat lunch. On the walk home from the office we were shown an English bookstore and where the Institute building is located.

Our landlady came to our apartment and we filled out a contract and paid our rent and a deposit. She is very nice and a profesora of Spanish. She also speaks English quite well. She agreed to take out some of our furniture and decorative objects so we will have more room.

12/16 We came early to the office for our Skype conference with Salt Lake. Then we figured out that it was at 12:00 noon rather than at 8:00. Two hours difference but later rather than earlier. We had to delay our appointment with Yolanda, our landlady, a bit but it all worked out.

The conference was to introduce the new e-learning available for PEF. It is wonderful. It consists of many short videos showing PEF functioning. There are interviews with participants, bishops interviewing students, stake leaders teaching, volunteers contacting and so on. It will be wonderful to show rather than just telling. We will find this very useful. It will be online and we will get computer CDs soon and after that they will make CDs that can be shown on the building library equipment. You can choose to show just what will be most helpful to any particular audience or individual learner. We invited Paola to view it with us and she is excited also. Apparently she has done training in the past and is willing to help us in the future.

A young man who works for the cable company came to our office to sign us up for an internet connection. It was much more convenient that going to their office and standing in line. He says we will have it installed by Tuesday of next week. I can hope that is true. Life will be great when I can use my computer with internet at home. I've missed my freebies from Scrapgirls and my Google Reader will be bursting at the seams.

We made it home in time to meet Yolanda. She came to take the furniture and decorative items that we do not want to keep in the apartment. It feels better to have a little more space and less stuff. I still need to organize and it is time to vacuum but we have done a load of laundry and things are coming together.

We went on a wild goose chase to look for a narrow table to hold my laptop and external hard drives. Finally found the stores that were recommended but they did not have what we wanted at any reasonable price. Lewis is thinking of making one but I predict that making one would involve more cost. We'll see.

12/17 Went to work in the rain and spent most of the day going through Lewis' filing cabinet. We threw away lots of stuff. Hope we don't regret it but no one needs pounds of training materials for obsolete processes.

We got very wet at lunch time. But it was our own fault. We went out to lunch with the Yosts and two sister missionaries, one of which is a nurse as is Sister Yost. The two of them have responsibility whenever any of the missionaries have a medical problem. It had rained on our way to work but the sun was out and it looked like no more rain. Not so, it was pouring by the time we were eating and we stayed to get the check because the others had appointments. When we left the restaurant we went the wrong way and it was raining very hard. We bought another umbrella. When we realized that we were lost we went back to the restaurant and started over. We got back to work just fine but in crossing the streets got our feet soaked and we were quite wet before we bought the umbrella. Back at work we took off our shoes and then dripped on our plastic carpet protectors at our desks and wiped it up with paper towels. It is very cool but not cold so we were fine.

We had gone to Pizza Hut. It was very impressive. Much more attractive than any Pizza Hut I have been to before. Our food was served on large heavy square white plates. I heard one crash to the floor in the back of the restaurant so they may not be very practical but they look nice. They had a lunch special where you can get two items for $5.99. You could choose from salads, pasta dishes, bread sticks, pizza or desserts. Those who had been there before were smart and got four different items and split them between the couple or companionship. The food was very attractive and they made squiggles on the plates like they do at Cheesecake Factory. And the "personal pan pizza" is much larger than we are used to. We asked the waiter how much an additional pizza to go would be and he said $7.95. (!?) So we got the pizza at a discount and an extra item and a drink besides. It’s making me hungry. I want to go back soon. But one must wait a long time to get the food and the bill. Our waiter had way too many crowded tables to attend to.

12/18 Saturday was the first day that we did not have to get up early and Lewis got up long before dawn to make bread. We had found whole wheat flour and also some quinoa flour and Lewis wanted to experiment. He made about 7 loaves and we gave a loaf to each of the two other couples and the two single sisters who each live in their own apartment. It was good but there is room for improvement. We organized a bit more, vacuumed and mopped the floors. I ironed all of the clothes that were wrinkled from being packed our suitcases. We gave up on finding or making a table to serve as my computer desk and went back to MegaMaxi and bought two very large TV tray type tables that will work fine. Together they cost $66 but anything else would have been much more. So we are in pretty good shape and only need our internet connection. We had bought a $35.00 desk chair on our first trip to MegaMaxi with the Yosts. I'm ready to have my computer with internet available to me so I can blog and make birthday photos and communicate with our family and read my favorite blogs.