5/6/2012

Today we went to the Quisqueya Branch in the San Pedro District.  Both the Snows and the Yturraldes are assigned to help build up the branch.  The drive was beautiful along the ocean for much of the way then just forestry looking country.  There were many sugar cane fields and the above sugarcane factory adding to the pollution!
    The church building is actually a home but has more room for the organization meetings.  The area isn't quite as primitive and poor as the Los Llanos Branch we went to before.  They are both in the same district but quite a ways apart.  The meetings (all in Spanish of course) give me plenty of opportunity to people watch.  They always have me read from the book in Spanish - probably because they feel sorry for me and know that is the only thing I'm very good at! But then many of them cannot read.   Sitting among these people I feel so strongly that they are brothers and sisters of mine and I have a great desire to get to know them better - to know their strengths and their sorrows, to be able to help them in some way. Funny thing is they are the ones that would most likely be helping me!  The music was unbelievable - they have never been taught how to sing with music so they just sing anyway they can.  The first song threw my completely off.  I couldn't even tell what the melody was.  The next song Sister Yturralde turned up the sound on the keyboard so it was a little easier to hear the music and try to sing with it.  It would really help these areas to have a song practice sometime during their meetings so they could get a feel for what the notes sound like.  They sing with more heart and conviction than anyone I have ever heard.
  Sister Snow and I went to visit Sister Miller who had been hit by a car and had a broken leg as a result.  Her house is the one with the tin fence in front.  The cement house was actually much nicer inside than I expected from the outside.  She was a cute, warm and friendly woman with two children.  The doctor cast her leg and told her to stay off it for a month then come back.

This area was different in that it had some really nice houses next to some very poor houses.

The Snows had driven us to their branch and asked us to come back and have dinner with them.  Elder Snow has decided since Scott has learned to play the keyboard he is also going to learn so they were enthralled  setting up a new keyboard and seeing how it played.  Snows are great friends and just great people in general. 

It is Jared's birthday today so we are waiting to call him.