On Our Way to Cuenca!

On Tuesday the 3rd we made our way to Cuenca to see our girls there! We were slightly nervous, but definitely excited as we headed out. The drive there was absolutely gorgeous. We tried to take some pictures to capture it, but a camera cant hold how amazing it truly is. I did take video as well. So there's a little bit of the on Youtube. We, of course, had to get McDonald's on our way through Guayaquil. It is a requirement. There was talk of Pizza Hut... but McDonald's won out. So we were happily full and on our way. To get to Cuenca we had to travel through a rainforest in the mountains. I kept my window open as long as I possibly could. My ear almost got frostbite it was so cold and wet though. So the window eventually did have to be shut. Going through the mountains is a bit scary in the bus. There are sheer drop offs where there have been mudslides and such. And then on the other side of that, there are towering walls off rock that could fall at any moment. And then there was the fog. Tight winding corners and the bus driver wants to pass a car on a blind curve in the dense fog... It got my adrenaline pumping a few times. But I was the one that wanted to sit in the very front so that I could see everything that was going on, lol. Despite our near-death experiences, it was still worth it to stay up front.
 So we survived the trip to Cuenca! The Cuenca girls met us at the terminal. And we headed to Fabiano's for Italian pizza. They actually import the cheese from Italy. It was amazing! And we met with some brothers and sisters there. Falsto, Jasmin, Anita Munoz. John Lopez and Kah-mei... don't know her last name. lol! They were all very sweet and nice. After the pizza, which was around 8pm, we headed down the street to a Karaoke bar. We all got really into it and had a blast! Kel and Mechaela belted their heart out to "We Are the Champions". And then everyone in the group got up and sang "Dancing Queen". Stefanie sang some Spanish songs that totally blew my mind. The worst was "Ojos Asi" by Shakira. It's so fast!! And there was an attempt at singing "Jenny From the Block" that definitely didn't go too well, lol! But was still super fun to try. Many more songs were sung, since we didn't get out of there until midnight. There is a video of Stefanie and Ariel singing, with a special wave from Kaitlyn.

Los Frailes

Los Frailes is a beach in the national park of Machalilla. It's so gorgeous! The first day we were with Anna, Jenny, Stefania, and Courtz. Carlos was nice enough to give us a ride in. Otherwise we would have had quite a bit of a hike back there. It's about a mile or mile and a half to get back to the beach from the main road. But thankfully Carlos had time to drive us.

So all of us girls hung out on the beach for about an hour. We had been a bit slack and had taken our time getting there. It only stays open 'til about 4pm. There was an exchange of stories. Animal attacks and nasty things you've accidentally eaten... Good times!

Then we headed back to Jenny and Carlos house that they have been working on. After a berry battle in the front yard, Carlos drove us home. And we had a big dinner of alfredo, chicken, and spaghetti. Then later on we watched one of my favorite movies, Despicable Me. "It's so fluffy I'm gonna die!" The favorite quote that has been used to describe a countless number of things :) Including the pancakes that we ate this morning. Thanks Kel!

The next day we went back. This time we went early enough to go hiking around and see the other beaches. You're not allowed to swim at the other ones. But they were still pretty to hike all around. There was one specially preserved for sea turtles! Didn't get to see any. But it was still neat. We hiked up the top of one hill and there was this beautiful overlook of Machalilla. We could see our house from there! lol. We found quite a few interesting little sea creatures as we were climbing all over the rocks. Some sort of hat/octopus looking thing. I wanted to touch it, but I refrained. And we also saw a sea slug. I took video of it. It looked so cool. Like it had coral growing from its eyeballs.

Then we hiked up to the highest point where there's a little lookout hut. I thought at that point that my lungs were going to shrivel up into nothing and that my legs were going to split in half. I had been in bed sick for a couple of weeks before we did this. So muscle mass was seriously lessened at this point. But I made it to the top and got my picture taken.

Then we had lunch. What did it consist of you ask? Snickers, a couple Ecuador specialty candy bars (kind of gross), Doritos, and animal crackers. The perfect combo to get yourself moving again! After that we hiked all the way back down and spent the rest of the time swimming. Cartwheeling through the water, front hand springs, hugging the waves... yes we did, lol! Don't be jealous. Ended the day with a picnic on the floor of our kitchen. A lantern covered with a red scarf as our fake fire. It's great that we can be so silly and just have fun here.

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