It's About Such Random Stuff!

Last week as I was leaving the Kingdom Hall, Luis asked me to do something which I found to be somewhat ill advised. He asked me to be the assistant for the Watchtower Presentation at the next meeting. Of course I said yes excitedly. Although inside I was screaming no! Mostly because Spanish is a bit hard for me. For instance: While he was explaining the part to me, I was talking about plans on Thursday over and over again I said Thursday this and Thursday that. Finally I stopped and turned to Luis.
  "Am I saying eggs?"
           He smiled really big...
                "Yes".
And we all just busted up laughing.
The whole time I had been saying eggs "huevos" instead of Thursday " jueves" and no one wanted to correct me so they just let me keep saying it. So I was pretty sure that that part he had just given me was going to go terribly wrong. The part was with Stef. She is wonderful and made things very easy for me by writing everything down and only having me read one scripture. The night of the part I was nervous, but I knew that Jehovah would be helping me through it. Basically I said:

stef, me  and brother luis.

"Hope you got this Jehovah... because I don't!"
 We did well! Gracias Jehova. Stef was so calm and it was all over before I could make a total mess of everything. It was very encouraging, not only for me, but it was good for the congregation. I was told by Sarah that some of the brothers and sisters are afraid to give parts. But the fact that I was willing to give a part even though I dont speak the language might encourage others to be more willing to accept assignments. I think she was just being really nice but it still makes you feel good to know that even though you are a horribly slow learner and butcher the language constantly that some things you do help out the congregation.

jen & carlos

There is a brother and sister from the Lopez congregation named Jen and Carlos, who are builing a house in Machalilla. They're trying very hard to get it finished as soon as they can so they can move in. So me and Court took a Monday to go over there and help out. We got the glamorous job of sanding down the plaster walls. It was easy work and its nice to be able to help your brothers and sisters, so it was very satisfying to be completely covered in white dust by the end of the day. When we were all cleaning up Carlos looked at me and started to laugh.

the crew minus court who took the pic :)

machalilla sunset

 "You were white before" he said " but you are whiter now!"On the ride back to Lopez on Courts motor bike, she could hear me having a bit of an episode behind her becuse the sun set was just magnificent! So she stopped and let me take a picture. Enjoying the sunset over the ocean from the back of a motor bike. That's up there from me on the "wow my life is sort of amazing right now" moments.

the end of the beach

Mr.crabby

Today Mechaela and I took a little trip to the end of the beach in Lopez to some pretty amazing rocks. I get a little over excited about large rocks, mountains, boulders ect. In my over excitement to play on the rocks I abandoned my shoes behind a boulder a ways away from where we ended up spending most of our time. Several people came and went while we were there and one of them took my shoes with them. Who steals a persons shoes! Honestly! So i was a bit angry about that, but hey, they're just shoes. No reason to ruin an awesome day.

" the cave..is a good song"

sea anenomies

We were walking along the beach to go home (me barefoot) and I stepped on the sand and it felt a tad weird. So of course I immediately begin diggin' because you really never know what sort of interesting creature your going to find beneath the sand. I dug up part of what Mechaela and I assumed was a sting ray. I didn't want to run the risk of pulling a Steve Erwin (RIP crocadile hunter), so I quickly ran and got a large stick to pry whatever it was from the wet sand. I jammed the stick in the sand and a huge...

and very ugly fish came flopping out.
"What is that?!" we both screamed unanimously.

It immediately began thrashing around. Me and Mechaela were beside ourselves with excitement because it was just so bazaar looking. We were instantly fascinated. So we of course took pictures and played with it for a good while before returing it to its sandy home. You would have thought we found a bag of candy buried in the sand with the amount of happiness we got out of finding that fish.
Back at home (and with a new pair of shoes) I made donuts for Anna, Jenn, Court, Stef, Mechaela and Veronica while they watched "Miranda" and laughed.
"I prefer the term shenanigans"
Kelly

To Busk or Not to Busk!

 So to all of my American friends, to busk means to perform on the street for money. I didn't know that term 'til I met Courtz. She had suggested doing it a week or so ago and I had totally chickened out. But then we went to a concert on the beach on Saturday night. One of the performers had tried to get us gringas to come up on stage and sing an English song! Me not speaking Spanish didn't understand what she was asking. I thought she wanted us to dance! I was not going to go up and dance. Music moves me, but it moves me ugly ;) So I had stayed put. It turns out that she started to sing "Someone Like You" by Adele! Me and Mechaela had just sung

that song incredibly well, if I do say so myself, before we had left for that concert!!! We were both kicking ourselves for being such losers that we didn't understand and didn't get to sing that song for hundreds of people! It would have been ultimate Karaoke!! lol. So to make ourselves feel less like losers and to get it out of our system, we decided to busk. The first picture is the spot that we chose. It just so happened to be across from a street carnival that had bongos and fire dancers! So we didn't get too much attention. No money. But it was still super fun! And later we moved and the carnival went away. We met up with a brother and his family from Jipijapa and Stefania. So we sang for them. And then the brother sang

a couple of absolutely beautiful songs for us! I'm pretty sure that we all got a bit choked up listening to him singing. Kelly recorded it. So we'll have to let you guys listen to it when we see you again ;) After that we treated ourselves to some Batidos. And the best ones in town are at Luis' stand. It's our regular spot. So we headed over and got Oreo Batidos except for our monkey friend Courtz who loves her bananas. Then we sat on some steps nearby and Courtz played a few more songs. It's a night I won't soon forget. We all had such a good time. And it was such a unique experience. No where in the States would I feel so comfortable to sit on a city street

corner and just relax with a bunch of brothers and sisters playing music and talking. I feel so blessed to be here! It's such a priviledge and I thank Jehovah every day for it! 

Mechaela Enjoying Ecuadorian Service

 This was Sunday service for me and Mechaela. Our first time working together, ever! Super fun!

The first picture was taken after we got lost because I wasn't entirely sure where my return visit was. There aren't any road signs here, so it's understandable ok!!! lol! We wandered down the wrong road for far too long. But the clouds hanging in the mountains was absolutely stunning! We are now in the cloudy season here. It's been raining quite a bit. It seems to be a'lot more than I was expecting. But I love the rain! So after being hopelessly lost and talking to a man on a donkey we waited for Courtz to meet up with us so we could go on one of her studies. We got to contribute to the study a bit. Mechaela read an entire paragraph out of the Bible Teach book and I got to read off a couple of questions. Then the mother of the girl that we studied with was super nice and took this picture for us. All three of us crammed onto the bike to head to my return visit by the fish market, Tatiana. When we got there Tatiana wasn't home. But a lovely older woman named Flora spoke to us for a while. Mechaela used her presentation! :') So proud of her! I found out that on the weekends my study goes to a university in Manta. Which is about two hours away! So I will continue to call on her during the week.

Mechaela Has Joined the Crew!

 So Kel and I made our journey to Guayaquil! And then headed back home.... Not according to plan. But I'll explain more about that later.
 We headed out on Thursday to make our 4 hour trip to Guayaquil. We were terrified!!!!! Not that we would show it ;) Cause we are tough stuff! But we had quite a few problems before we made it out of Machalilla. We couldn't get our phone to work. So we went into town in Puerto Lopez to go to the Claro kiosk to try and get the lady there to fix our phone. It turns out that the problem was with the company and not the phone. We didn't know that. So we actually wasted about two hours before we left. Not that that was really a problem because we had plenty of time to get to Guayaquil. But I was just freaking out over everything... I didn't handle things very well, lol!
 So we finally head out to go to Jipijapa, our first and only stop before the big city. And on our way out we made very good friends with a man on the side of the road. The bus was parked and Kel looked out the window and spotted him. What peeked our interest was his shirt. It said: "Federal law #??? States that Wal-mart employees have a right to form a union". LOL! So Kel leaned out the window and tried to take a picture of his shirt. Which of course made him think that we were interested in him and not just the shirt! Thankfully he did not decide to board the bus, but remained on the sidewalk pointing us out to all of his buddies nearby.
 So we got to Jipijapa in about an hour with no problems. Then we headed to Guayaquil. The drive there is absolutely gorgeous!!!!! Mountains and beautiful different kinds of foliage. There is a short video on Youtube of the drive as well.
 We got to Guayaquil relatively early. Our wonderful sister Gabi came and picked us up from the bus terminal and got us set up in our room at her B&B. We just rested until it was time to go and pick up Mechaela.
 We didn't take any pictures of Mechaela coming through the gate. We failed! lol.
 So the reason that we didn't end up going to Pelileo and Cuenca right then was because our friends in Pelileo ended up having their convention that weekend. We had planned on only staying for three days, and of those three days we would only see them one. So we decided to just go home and wait 'til they had time for us to come.

I've never been so excited to see those golden arches! I don't typically like McDonald's. But after no regular food for a little over a month, you'd be surprised what appeals to you. And their McFlurries are way better here btw. They not only give you the oreo crumbly bits, but on top of that they drizzle the hot fudge sundae syrup! It makes it so much better. I'm going to start requesting that in the States ;)

I snapped this photo while the girls were sleeping. The bus was so hot!!! We typically would have got a nice swanky bus with air con, but opted out of that for the direct bus to Puerto Lopez. It was a'lot cheaper! But it was so hot.

Mechaela is my hero! She brought us junk food! I'm holding a huge piece of Jerky. It is so wonderful! I never knew how much I would miss Jerky. And peanut butter! The two together are pure magic. lol! We totally are living the bachlorette lifestyle ;)

Mi primero estudio de la biblia

 Had my first bible study yesterday. It was with a woman named Glenda who runs one of the little shops in town. Went there a few weeks ago with my sister stefania and the girl simply asked for a bible study... which blew me away. Jokingly stefania offered it to me, and I accepted it nonjokingly and somewhat to her amusement. So later I went back and she was not home but i called again and Court helped me set up a good time for her... which was the following day. Panic... I don't speak Spanish... what is wrong with me! Why did I promise to do this! But Jehovah provided me with Court who handled the study beautifully, allowing me to ask my questions and interject with scriptures or comments when I could find the words. The whole time I was praying for help and thinking how much I have taken for granted the ability to just have a conversation with someone about the bible and of all the times I had perfect opportunities and did not take them out of fear. Here you might want to but you just can't. Being here and experiencing the feeling of not being able to ask simple questions. And if you can ask, you are unable to understand what the answer is. It's incredibly humbling. You think your smart then you come here and fight the 3-year-olds for comments at the meetings and realize you have a'lot of learning to do. Makes the desire to learn the language so you can teach and preach effectively very strong. Even more so becuse people will listen. Kelly

Off You Go!

Ok. So I had to post a new video on Youtube! We were having dinner at Courtz this evening (Amazing!!!) and on our way out we met Godzilla's cousin, Fred. He was a bit of a creepo! But Kel and him had a bit of a moment ;)

The Headache in Class

Hola,
 School today. Bleh!!! It was good. But I seriously felt like the majority of the time I was staring at our teacher with my eyes crossed! A super headache developed. It's such a shame! Because today was our last lesson for a couple of weeks. And here's why.
 So Kel and I have been arranging all of our plans for the rest of the time that we are here. We are heading to Guayaquil on Thursday to go and pick up our friend Mechaela from the airport. And then we are heading up to the mountains to visit our new found friends from England and Germany. Then on the 26th we are heading down to Cuenca. After all that we don't have anymore plans for travel 'til we are on our way back to the states. I will post more about those plans later.
 This first picture was taken today in Machalilla. That's our wonderful sister Marguerita on the right. I went on my first study here with her. It was her study. But she helped me learn "quiero". Very important! It means "I want" hehe. The sisters around here call her the crazy one ;) So of course I love her!

 This second picture is in Puerto Lopez. I actually took it a couple nights ago while we were visiting Courtz. I just can't get enough of this view!

A quick note

Just a quick update. Kel and I will be traveling next week. We have a friend from Indiana heading in on the 21st. She will be staying with us the rest of the time we are here. So we're going to Guayaquil to pick her up. We might be heading North from there to see some new friends we made a couple weeks ago. And then we are off to see the girls in Cuenca. So I will not be blogging for a couple of weeks most likely. But then there will be tons of stuff for all you guys to see when I'm back in Puerto Lopez :) I did post a new video on Youtube of our apartment here. It's not entirely good. Slightly interrupted, lol. But you get the general idea of what it's like. I'll post again in a couple days.

Another Day

Hola!
 So this morning was my first morning back out in service since I have been sick. JOY! And it wasn't a half bad day. Not too hot. Although it was sunny enough for me to burn in a very interesting pattern across my chest. Argh! Oh well. But Kel and I worked together. Eden always likes to put us together whenever he is conducting the service arrangement. It challenges us more to use our Spanish. So we went door to door for about an hour. Kel took most of the doors. But we each got one good call. Exciting! I just wish that it was more of a two-sided conversation. We just can't understand what they are saying back still!!
 So after that we headed off to do a couple return visits! YAY! And I got to talk to a lady named Beatrice. But I made the mistake of asking for "Beatrice". I should have actually been asking for "Bay-ah-trees". My bad! So she didn't understand what I was saying when I was just trying to say her name, lol. But then I went into my presentation and she helped me with my reading. She's very patient and very nice. And she took the magazines again.
 Then after service we walked home with Merci. A wonderful sister in our congregation. She just snuck up behind us while we were walking though. I thought there was some creepy guy following us. I finally turned to tell him off and felt super ashamed of myself once I realized who it was. And that wasn't the only time that kind of thing happened to me today either! Cause later on Kel and I were walking home from class with some groceries we had picked up along the way home. And a red truck pulled up next to us and was following very slowly. I was getting angry. Again, thinking that it was some creeper (it's pretty common for it to be a total stranger oggling btw). Finally Kel turned around and saw that it was our next door neighbor, a brother. I felt ashamed of myself again! Cause I was hot! I wanted to turn around and tell him off so badly! But it was a friend offering us a ride home. Shame on me, lol! It's so nice that we have so many brothers and sisters around all the time that we have that kind of problem :) They're always following, haha!

This was the area we were working out in service. It doesn't show up well enough. But there are millions of purple flowers all over the hills. It's absolutely gorgeous!!

So Kel and I thought that this sign was really funny... til I realized that meant payment and not that they were 50% pagans as in worshiping false gods and such. lol.

This is right outside of our Spanish classes. It was so beautiful and calm!! There were absolutely no waves and the tide was out. Normally that dark mass off on the horizon is completely under water! It's been beautiful here.

Happy Anniversary!!

 So it is official!!! Me and Kel have been in Ecuador for a full month as of today! I can't believe how fast it has just flown by.... We have had a great time here so far. Despite sickness and a lack of transportation at times. So for this blog I figured I would just throw in some extra pictures that didn't make the cut the first time around.
 Thank you everyone who has been supporting us! We appreciate all of your kind words of encouragement and prayers! We cherish all the messages you send us. They are a healing when we are feeling low.

This was at the airport in Miami. We just got done eating the most delicious chicken I've ever tasted in my life! Maybe a bit of an exaggeration. But it was very very good anyway!

Kourt, this is for you! I know how upset you were that Pingo Po didn't make it on this trip. So while we were wandering through the airport, we spotted him. He's been with me on this journey the whole time! So put a smile on. He's been a comfort to me while I'm in a totally strange and sometimes scary country.

I never got to take pictures from any of my flights before! I've always wanted to, but never had opportunity on all of the short little flights I ever took.

This moment of misery brought to you by "Reality"! For when it dawns on you that there's no way that you are going to keep from burning while in Ecuador!

This, unfortunately, was a little girls t-shirt. Otherwise Kel and I would totally be sporting this look around town!

I think that this is Kel's favorite photo of the entire trip. The people in the background get her laughing every time she looks at it. She didn't know they were back there when she took the photo.

This is one of my favorites! Maxine and Courtz devouring the cake that me and Kel had made. It made me happy that they liked it so much.

Thanks again everyone!! We love you and can't wait to see you all again. It's only two months away now! Ciao Ciao

A Weekend with the Girls

 Well the chicas came and are gone now. We had so much fun while they were here! The first night we got some pizza for dinner which was delicious! And then we headed to the beach off of the main square in Puerto Lopez. It was Kaitlyn's first time swimming in the ocean!!! It was so adorable seeing her reaction. I did not get it recorded. But I'm sure they will be documenting it on their blog manzanameansapple.blogspot.com.
 Friday we all had planned on going for a hike to the sulphur springs in Agua Blanca, but the heat was too intense. So we headed off to Piqueros instead for a nice easy day at the beach. Everyone tested out the mud bath, mostly voluntarily. I didn't get any pictures of that. I'm counting on you girls for the photographic evidence for that experience as well. I have found out that the beach prices are much higher than inland. So I'm really excited about visiting Cuenca and being able to get more for less :)

 We went out in service on Saturday. Sadly this was the only photo taken. Ari was trying to steal my boyfriend Jonathan. It wont work though, we have a deeper connection, lol, jkkk! Ari got a couple return visits for Kel. And Ashley got one for me! Thanks girls! I got to make my first return visit that day with Kaitlyn. It was so exciting!
 After service we headed back to the house in Machalilla and studied for the meeting and hung out on the beach a little bit. Ari and Kaitlyn got to have their first bucket showers! I'm so proud :') haha.Then we went to the meeting. Everyone did an amazing job of participating at the meeting! I was so proud of everyone at that point :)

  Then we all went to Puerto Cayo! There's a family from Australia out of town that let us use their house for the weekend. The house was very spacious! We counted at least 7 bathrooms! There was at least one for each room. Everyone is so hospitable here. It never ceases to amaze me how awesome Jehovah's organization is. And we were directly on the beach much to everyones great joy. Courtz went ahead and had a restaurant stay open for us when we arrived and everyone that likes seafood got "Encocado Camaron or Pescado". It is so delicious!!! And I'm totally in love with Patacones. They are fried plantains. Salted and dunked in "Tomato Sauce" aka ketchup they are super fantastic.

  I do believe that the highlight for me was when we all got to ride on this truck to get to the beach house. There will be video on youtube, lol. I am so easily entertained ;)

The following day we all baked on the beach. It was so beautiful being on the beach. Puerto Cayo is even more aesthetically pleasing than Machalilla or Puerto Lopez to me. I loved it there! We went to a restaurant owned by a brother from Canada called "Con Coco". That was some of the best food I've had here. He had a trampoline in the front yard. So we had to play popcorn. Me, Ashley, and Allison were unpoppable! We suffered through some unbelievably awkward moments to keep hanging on though... lol.

 Then we headed down to see the sunset. It was absolutely gorgeous! And not only did we have a sunset, but we also had a full moon! It totally took my breath away. It was uncontrollable the thanks I gave to Jehovah for his wonderful creation.

 We got to swim in the water for a couple more hours. There was so much light from the street lamps and the moon that we could see just fine. Unlike the last time me and Kel tried to swim at night and we couldn't see anything!
 On our way back home we accidentally crashed a going away party. It just so happened to be for the brother that owned the restaurant we had gone to, Pedro. Everyone was playing a very interesting game called "Estrellas", aka "Stars". It looked like it was a lot of fun. Ashley, Ari, Allison, and Stephanie were all brave and played. Me Kel and Kaitlyn stayed on the sidelines and just watched. We were all sunburned, among other things. But I would definitely like to play it under different circumstances. It's like dodge ball on steroids! There were two teams. One team was trying to flip over all the bottle caps on the ground, while the other team was trying to hit the opposing team so that they were out and not able to flip the bottle caps. There were extra rules and such that I could not pick up on. All I got was that you weren't allowed to hit the ball into the street (which didn't stop some from doing that anyway) and you couldn't run with the ball.

 So today we all got up and gathered our things. The girls left. Then after me, Courtz, and Kel watched "A Walk in the Clouds" we finished cleaning. The girls had done almost all of it before they left. So it was super easy to finish. Gracias chicas!
\And now here I am. Totally tuckered out and ready to sleep for a couple of days.