First of all I am a bit depressed that I have five days to catch up on - then even more depressed that I spent one and a half hours last night catching up only to have the computer shut off and since I hadn't saved it - the whole blog was gone. Since this has happened before I am usually much better at pushing save when I first start. Oh well.......
So I begin again--
7/31/2013
We were so happy to be able to go to the temple this morning. We will surely miss that when we get home and it isn't quite as convenient to do. Our friends are usually working at the temple so it is special to be with them in the temple so often.
We took Sister Cuenot shopping to La Serena so didn't get home until after noon. That gave us three hours to eat and prepare to go at 4:00 to Las Caobas for two lessons there. And of course, when we got there the gate was locked. I can't wait to just drive into the church parking lot without waiting for someone with a key to let us in and out of the gate. Finally a boy came with a key and let us in. He even knew how to start the converter so we could have power for the teclados and the air-conditioning. It takes half and hour for the room to cool off a little, an hour for it to cool off a lot but as soon as it gets below 75 degrees the kids start shivering and rubbing their hands together to get warm. The funny thing is it begins to feel too cool to me also. This summer, although hotter, has not been nearly as hard as last summer. There must be something to getting used to the heat and humidity.
Everyone says when you get home it's like your skin drying up everywhere. Personally, I am looking forward to breathing lighter air - sometimes here it feels like you can barely draw a deep breath. A little hurricane would be nice right now because they tend to cool things off a bit.
We were able to arrange for someone local to teach the music class after we leave. It is difficult to know if they all will actually follow through or not. Being able to follow through with things is not a strong point of the people we have met here. As we look back on our lives we realize what an amazing influence growing up in the church is on it's members. You learn all through Primary on up how to be reliable when you are assigned to give a talk, be a class president, etc. What a wonderful organization the Church is in helping with the development of responsible people.
Got home late - as we usually do. Scott gets on the internet to listen to the news and by the time he gets off I am usually too tired to blog, or I am asleep. No excuse, I know....
8/1/2013
Can it really be August 1? I have thought " boy when August comes we will know we are on our way home" and here it is.. What a learning experience this has been for us in so many different ways.
We went to the temple again this morning to be with the missionaries. There weren't too many this morning but tomorrow they are expecting 35 new North American missionaries. When they come to the temple the session is in English. I am going to have to readjust to that after eighteen months of Spanish.
We had arranged with the Despains to pick up a pizza at PriceMart when we went to develop film to do the kids scrapbook and bring it back to their apartment to have lunch. Elder Marino and Sister Hyde were also invited so it was fun to spend some time with them. Elder Marino and his wife went last week back to Utah to a funeral for their nephew. She had heart surgery not too long before they came here and had since missed her 6 month checkup so she went back to her doctor. Her heart was so out of rhythm (she has a pacemaker) that he wouldn't let her come back here until they were able to stabilize it. So they don't know if she will be able to come back here or not. It has been difficult for her not to be able to say goodbye to everyone but we all just pray that she will be ok. She has added so much to our mission experience here. It has been fun to get to know Sister Hyde from Kaysville. These senior missionaries are amazing people. From left to right: Sister Hyde, Sister Despain, Elder Despain, and Elder Marino.
On Thursday night we got to Santo Domingo lessons without our music bag. It's a good thing we are going home because we are losing our minds! Many of the students from both Tuesday and Thursday lessons are coming both nights now to work on their recital pieces. Their's is the last recital we have.
We have made some good friends in this group. One of the women was telling me how much she would miss us but she was ok because she knew she would see us somewhere in the spirit world. That is a bit comforting! She is the one that is coming to the States without her children because she wants to bring them there eventually where they can have a better life. She just graduated with a law degree but they are paid so little here and jobs are difficult to find. I hope she is successful.
Michelle, our non-member friend, is our best student. She has a keyboard at home and practices daily and can play just about anything she wants to. Scott told her that she needed to use all of her fingers not just two or three. She was unhappy with that and said he just didn't understand that with that song you only played with three fingers. The whole thing was pretty funny! Just love her. We stayed late because now they are concerned about playing for the recital. Heaven only knows how it will all go.
8/2/2013
I had so many things to do today that Scott went to the temple by himself. I cooked and washed and worked on music stuff. Some of the food we have to make things needed to be used up. I haven't made cookies for a long time so started the oven heating with Sister Yturalde's oven thermometer. An hour and a half later it still hadn't reached 375 degrees. We had lessons at the Institute but the cookies were still baking so Scott went by himself to teach the two classes. the summer classes consist of around six to eight students that cone off and on because they are not in school and don't have the money to travel into the Institute for the lessons. It worked out well because only five of them came during the four hours and the Mahons were also there to help. We are so happy they will be taking over the class and continuing it during the school year.
The Mahons had invited us to dinner so we went to LaDulceria. We had been there once before with the Despains and knew it was a good place to eat with a fun atmosphere. The more afluent Dominicans come there so you see a whole different set of people.
The ones that aren't us are the Mahons! We have really appreciated their friendship and help in so many ways. They live in Eden so we will get to see them again. We had a fun time. Scott and Elder Mahon have fairly similar backgrounds so they get along very well. Sister Mahon is the chief barber and hair cutter here - she always has someone in the laundry room of the Casa cutting their hair. She also does energy work in what spare time she has and has been an invaluable help to me in so many ways.
The Yturraldes had invited us to dinner at their apartment with the MacIntyres and the Ruckers so when Elder Mahon had a meeting at 7:00 we got home early enough to go visit with them. What a great bunch of people! The MacIntyres came back down with us to fax something from our machine but of course I didn't know how to do that with the new program so Sister Ygturralde came to help us so basically the party moved to our apartment. I am glad we got to know the MacIntyres before we left. They are from Wichita, Kansas.
8/3/2013
Ok - it's another Saturday. But - we didn't have to leave for lessons until noon! What a nice feeling that was. Since we have one less class on Saturday we moved the Caleta lesson ahead. Of course the gate was locked when we got there but after twenty minutes the counselor in the stake presidency came and let us in. He stayed and talked to the kids and was just generally a great support. We left 45 minutes late for our class in Hainamosa because these kids with a recital on Wednesday were so not prepared. This week of recitals is probably going to be an interesting experience in frustration and a bit of sadness leaving these people. Scott had me read an article in the Liahonna that had to do with leaving a mission. It was great. Talked about how life is just chuck full of experiences that help you grow to be the person you were created to be. Rather than to be sad about leaving, be grateful for the opportunity to know and love other people and move on to other good and fulfilling experiences. For some reason that has really helped me this week understand that it is time to move on. We are so excited to get home to our awesome family and friends.
When we finally got on the road to Hainamosa we were late so thought maybe the gate there would be unlocked but no such luck. Most of our students were sitting on the curb across from the church waiting to get in. Finally Felix, our older student in the previous class who still comes to practice, arrived and called around to see if he could get a key. Half an hour later we finally got into the church.
The twins from the first class also came so it was great to see them. It was soooo hot in that big room. Even the Dominicans were fanning themselves! So our 3:30 lesson didn't even start until 5:30. Is there ever anything here that just goes off without a hitch???
8/4/2013
Picked up the kids for church this morning. It was nice to have Gregori back with us. The girls were to practice "I Am A Child of God" for their part on the program next Sunday. We are hoping to get both William and Oglvidia and Pamela and Leni's parents to come see them. The primary woman in charge told them they needed to wear skirts not pants. I don't know if Pamela and Leni even have skirts but Scott says not to worry, it will be okay no matter what they wear. I know that is true but I don't think the Primary presidency thinks so. It is interesting to see how many of these people look down on poorer people and how they choose to not interact with them. Sad actually when the people you love are the ones they refuse to associate with. The ex-bishop was put in as the music president in the ward and he is doing a great job. However, I think he was a bit frustrated trying to work with these Primary kids.
We had decided that Scott would play for them but he hasn't played to accompany anyone and was so frustrated he vowed not to play while people sang again. I got out my camera to take some pictures and immediately Pamela and Cati were posing over against the wall so I could take their pictures.
Snapped a picture of the kids waiting for Sacrament Meeting to begin - just missing Eliana and Scott.
Starting from the front: Cati, Pamela, Gregori, and Leni
So Scott decided each week we should remind the kids that we will be leaving - I think that is just torture but he thinks it will help them adjust. Maybe he is right. I know their mom is trying to prepare them. At least today Eliana was in a better mood - they just want to hug and kiss you all the time. Which is very sweet.. I know a piece of my heart will stay here with them. Wish they had access to Skype somewhere but no one they are acquainted with has anything like a computer or other electronic devise that could be used.
We had half an hour at home before leaving for San Cristobal. Sunday is definitely the best traveling day! These students should be the best prepared but when we left I felt like we did in the Primary when the kids practiced the last time for the program and did such a lousy job. Somehow the program always came off just perfectly - hope it is the same for the recital but I doubt it. Just love these people! They are sad we are leaving but I think happy to be ending weekly lessons.
Left in a hurry because we ran over with recital practice with the Bishop who knew his piece perfectly ten minutes before and couldn't even play through it during practice. I think he was a bit distracted because he had been called back into his office between times. Anyway we got to Oriental and the gate was open! Hurray.. The students were waiting and helped us carry everything in and set it up. I was helping an older sister in the class who has bought herself a keyboard. The problem is she has no electricity so we want to get her some batteries before we leave. Scott announced that we would only have one more lesson and she was startled that we were leaving and wanted to know why. I don't know if they don't realize we are missionaries that come and go like the young ones or not. So in my broken and humble Spanish I was trying to tell her that we serve for a certain amount of time then go back home. She wants to come to Utah so we can continue to teach her. Now that is funny! She is a sweetheart though and really appreciates what we have tried to do. Maria, who is taking over the class, will be terrific. That is exactly what we wanted to happen so they won't be dependent on missionaries to come in and do their music for them. One funny thing happened in class though. I was sitting between two young girls helping one while the other went to the stage to pick up a lesson book. When she came back I turned to help her and the exercise she was to do had C D E for the notes to be practiced. I could not figure out what that even was because there is no C D E in the books we always teach with. Here it is do, re , mi and it took me some minutes of serious thinking to realize it was an English lesson book. It's going to take some readjustment in many ways to come back to English - and most of them wonderful!! Music is the only place that I ever use Spanish because most everyone I talk to speaks English but there after eighteen months I am so ingrained with the Spanish terms for music that it will be different.
We have so appreciated the fact that we get to drive around and see so many interesting things. One is this man that lives on the side of the road to Los Llanos. We have tried to get his picture so many times but this time he was sitting there like a statue.
He lives here with his little fire pit and we see him many time sleeping and cooking things. There was someone up the hill from him that was not happy that we stopped to take his picture and was yelling at us. We have seen him walking for miles to find something to eat. When we got past him we were telling the Grays that there was a man like him on the way to Oriental who walked the street naked, looking like a wild man when all of a sudden there he was walking town the middle of the freeway, Thank heavens they just had a fleeting glimpse of him. Don't know what he was doing on the freeway but he wasn't too far from where we usually see him.
This is the end of this five day saga!
So I begin again--
7/31/2013
We were so happy to be able to go to the temple this morning. We will surely miss that when we get home and it isn't quite as convenient to do. Our friends are usually working at the temple so it is special to be with them in the temple so often.
We took Sister Cuenot shopping to La Serena so didn't get home until after noon. That gave us three hours to eat and prepare to go at 4:00 to Las Caobas for two lessons there. And of course, when we got there the gate was locked. I can't wait to just drive into the church parking lot without waiting for someone with a key to let us in and out of the gate. Finally a boy came with a key and let us in. He even knew how to start the converter so we could have power for the teclados and the air-conditioning. It takes half and hour for the room to cool off a little, an hour for it to cool off a lot but as soon as it gets below 75 degrees the kids start shivering and rubbing their hands together to get warm. The funny thing is it begins to feel too cool to me also. This summer, although hotter, has not been nearly as hard as last summer. There must be something to getting used to the heat and humidity.
Everyone says when you get home it's like your skin drying up everywhere. Personally, I am looking forward to breathing lighter air - sometimes here it feels like you can barely draw a deep breath. A little hurricane would be nice right now because they tend to cool things off a bit.
We were able to arrange for someone local to teach the music class after we leave. It is difficult to know if they all will actually follow through or not. Being able to follow through with things is not a strong point of the people we have met here. As we look back on our lives we realize what an amazing influence growing up in the church is on it's members. You learn all through Primary on up how to be reliable when you are assigned to give a talk, be a class president, etc. What a wonderful organization the Church is in helping with the development of responsible people.
Got home late - as we usually do. Scott gets on the internet to listen to the news and by the time he gets off I am usually too tired to blog, or I am asleep. No excuse, I know....
8/1/2013
Can it really be August 1? I have thought " boy when August comes we will know we are on our way home" and here it is.. What a learning experience this has been for us in so many different ways.
We went to the temple again this morning to be with the missionaries. There weren't too many this morning but tomorrow they are expecting 35 new North American missionaries. When they come to the temple the session is in English. I am going to have to readjust to that after eighteen months of Spanish.
We had arranged with the Despains to pick up a pizza at PriceMart when we went to develop film to do the kids scrapbook and bring it back to their apartment to have lunch. Elder Marino and Sister Hyde were also invited so it was fun to spend some time with them. Elder Marino and his wife went last week back to Utah to a funeral for their nephew. She had heart surgery not too long before they came here and had since missed her 6 month checkup so she went back to her doctor. Her heart was so out of rhythm (she has a pacemaker) that he wouldn't let her come back here until they were able to stabilize it. So they don't know if she will be able to come back here or not. It has been difficult for her not to be able to say goodbye to everyone but we all just pray that she will be ok. She has added so much to our mission experience here. It has been fun to get to know Sister Hyde from Kaysville. These senior missionaries are amazing people. From left to right: Sister Hyde, Sister Despain, Elder Despain, and Elder Marino.
On Thursday night we got to Santo Domingo lessons without our music bag. It's a good thing we are going home because we are losing our minds! Many of the students from both Tuesday and Thursday lessons are coming both nights now to work on their recital pieces. Their's is the last recital we have.
We have made some good friends in this group. One of the women was telling me how much she would miss us but she was ok because she knew she would see us somewhere in the spirit world. That is a bit comforting! She is the one that is coming to the States without her children because she wants to bring them there eventually where they can have a better life. She just graduated with a law degree but they are paid so little here and jobs are difficult to find. I hope she is successful.
Michelle, our non-member friend, is our best student. She has a keyboard at home and practices daily and can play just about anything she wants to. Scott told her that she needed to use all of her fingers not just two or three. She was unhappy with that and said he just didn't understand that with that song you only played with three fingers. The whole thing was pretty funny! Just love her. We stayed late because now they are concerned about playing for the recital. Heaven only knows how it will all go.
8/2/2013
I had so many things to do today that Scott went to the temple by himself. I cooked and washed and worked on music stuff. Some of the food we have to make things needed to be used up. I haven't made cookies for a long time so started the oven heating with Sister Yturalde's oven thermometer. An hour and a half later it still hadn't reached 375 degrees. We had lessons at the Institute but the cookies were still baking so Scott went by himself to teach the two classes. the summer classes consist of around six to eight students that cone off and on because they are not in school and don't have the money to travel into the Institute for the lessons. It worked out well because only five of them came during the four hours and the Mahons were also there to help. We are so happy they will be taking over the class and continuing it during the school year.
The Mahons had invited us to dinner so we went to LaDulceria. We had been there once before with the Despains and knew it was a good place to eat with a fun atmosphere. The more afluent Dominicans come there so you see a whole different set of people.
The ones that aren't us are the Mahons! We have really appreciated their friendship and help in so many ways. They live in Eden so we will get to see them again. We had a fun time. Scott and Elder Mahon have fairly similar backgrounds so they get along very well. Sister Mahon is the chief barber and hair cutter here - she always has someone in the laundry room of the Casa cutting their hair. She also does energy work in what spare time she has and has been an invaluable help to me in so many ways.
The Yturraldes had invited us to dinner at their apartment with the MacIntyres and the Ruckers so when Elder Mahon had a meeting at 7:00 we got home early enough to go visit with them. What a great bunch of people! The MacIntyres came back down with us to fax something from our machine but of course I didn't know how to do that with the new program so Sister Ygturralde came to help us so basically the party moved to our apartment. I am glad we got to know the MacIntyres before we left. They are from Wichita, Kansas.
8/3/2013
Ok - it's another Saturday. But - we didn't have to leave for lessons until noon! What a nice feeling that was. Since we have one less class on Saturday we moved the Caleta lesson ahead. Of course the gate was locked when we got there but after twenty minutes the counselor in the stake presidency came and let us in. He stayed and talked to the kids and was just generally a great support. We left 45 minutes late for our class in Hainamosa because these kids with a recital on Wednesday were so not prepared. This week of recitals is probably going to be an interesting experience in frustration and a bit of sadness leaving these people. Scott had me read an article in the Liahonna that had to do with leaving a mission. It was great. Talked about how life is just chuck full of experiences that help you grow to be the person you were created to be. Rather than to be sad about leaving, be grateful for the opportunity to know and love other people and move on to other good and fulfilling experiences. For some reason that has really helped me this week understand that it is time to move on. We are so excited to get home to our awesome family and friends.
When we finally got on the road to Hainamosa we were late so thought maybe the gate there would be unlocked but no such luck. Most of our students were sitting on the curb across from the church waiting to get in. Finally Felix, our older student in the previous class who still comes to practice, arrived and called around to see if he could get a key. Half an hour later we finally got into the church.
The twins from the first class also came so it was great to see them. It was soooo hot in that big room. Even the Dominicans were fanning themselves! So our 3:30 lesson didn't even start until 5:30. Is there ever anything here that just goes off without a hitch???
8/4/2013
Picked up the kids for church this morning. It was nice to have Gregori back with us. The girls were to practice "I Am A Child of God" for their part on the program next Sunday. We are hoping to get both William and Oglvidia and Pamela and Leni's parents to come see them. The primary woman in charge told them they needed to wear skirts not pants. I don't know if Pamela and Leni even have skirts but Scott says not to worry, it will be okay no matter what they wear. I know that is true but I don't think the Primary presidency thinks so. It is interesting to see how many of these people look down on poorer people and how they choose to not interact with them. Sad actually when the people you love are the ones they refuse to associate with. The ex-bishop was put in as the music president in the ward and he is doing a great job. However, I think he was a bit frustrated trying to work with these Primary kids.
We had decided that Scott would play for them but he hasn't played to accompany anyone and was so frustrated he vowed not to play while people sang again. I got out my camera to take some pictures and immediately Pamela and Cati were posing over against the wall so I could take their pictures.
So Scott decided each week we should remind the kids that we will be leaving - I think that is just torture but he thinks it will help them adjust. Maybe he is right. I know their mom is trying to prepare them. At least today Eliana was in a better mood - they just want to hug and kiss you all the time. Which is very sweet.. I know a piece of my heart will stay here with them. Wish they had access to Skype somewhere but no one they are acquainted with has anything like a computer or other electronic devise that could be used.
We had half an hour at home before leaving for San Cristobal. Sunday is definitely the best traveling day! These students should be the best prepared but when we left I felt like we did in the Primary when the kids practiced the last time for the program and did such a lousy job. Somehow the program always came off just perfectly - hope it is the same for the recital but I doubt it. Just love these people! They are sad we are leaving but I think happy to be ending weekly lessons.
Left in a hurry because we ran over with recital practice with the Bishop who knew his piece perfectly ten minutes before and couldn't even play through it during practice. I think he was a bit distracted because he had been called back into his office between times. Anyway we got to Oriental and the gate was open! Hurray.. The students were waiting and helped us carry everything in and set it up. I was helping an older sister in the class who has bought herself a keyboard. The problem is she has no electricity so we want to get her some batteries before we leave. Scott announced that we would only have one more lesson and she was startled that we were leaving and wanted to know why. I don't know if they don't realize we are missionaries that come and go like the young ones or not. So in my broken and humble Spanish I was trying to tell her that we serve for a certain amount of time then go back home. She wants to come to Utah so we can continue to teach her. Now that is funny! She is a sweetheart though and really appreciates what we have tried to do. Maria, who is taking over the class, will be terrific. That is exactly what we wanted to happen so they won't be dependent on missionaries to come in and do their music for them. One funny thing happened in class though. I was sitting between two young girls helping one while the other went to the stage to pick up a lesson book. When she came back I turned to help her and the exercise she was to do had C D E for the notes to be practiced. I could not figure out what that even was because there is no C D E in the books we always teach with. Here it is do, re , mi and it took me some minutes of serious thinking to realize it was an English lesson book. It's going to take some readjustment in many ways to come back to English - and most of them wonderful!! Music is the only place that I ever use Spanish because most everyone I talk to speaks English but there after eighteen months I am so ingrained with the Spanish terms for music that it will be different.
We have so appreciated the fact that we get to drive around and see so many interesting things. One is this man that lives on the side of the road to Los Llanos. We have tried to get his picture so many times but this time he was sitting there like a statue.
He lives here with his little fire pit and we see him many time sleeping and cooking things. There was someone up the hill from him that was not happy that we stopped to take his picture and was yelling at us. We have seen him walking for miles to find something to eat. When we got past him we were telling the Grays that there was a man like him on the way to Oriental who walked the street naked, looking like a wild man when all of a sudden there he was walking town the middle of the freeway, Thank heavens they just had a fleeting glimpse of him. Don't know what he was doing on the freeway but he wasn't too far from where we usually see him.
This is the end of this five day saga!
HI, I know you dont know me, but I was wondering if you could help me find the Despains for one of my converts from Trinidad. They went to the temple in Santo Domingo in April and now they want to get back in touch with them. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
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