2014 Convention in El Salvador *Spoiler Free*

We had the best week in El Salvador. So many good stories, I don't think I can tell them all. Anyway, I'm going to try to keep from posting any spoilers, just in case someone hasn't had their Convention yet.

So we picked up a bus in Ceiba with the friends from Roatan on Wednesday. The original plan was that we would spend the night in Santa Rosa and then cross the Salvador border the next day. Well....earlier that week, there was a lovely little 7.4 earthquake in Salvador that may have completely broke the road we were supposed to take. So instead we got to take a slightly different route, staying in Copan Ruinas and going through Guatemala. 

Copan is really cute, it's built into a steep hill and has cobblestone roads. There are lots of little restaurants and there is a great view. The only taxis are tuk tuks, which are really fun to ride, especially with three people, three large suitcases, the driver and hills you don't believe you can get up.

Copan,we will get back to you.

Early the next morning, we headed to the border at Guatemala. We almost had a slight mishap when Honduras didn't want to let a brother out, but that got worked out.

It turns out Guatemala looks a lot like the States. And we now have passport stamps for a new country.

Now we had to go through the border into Salvador. When you check out of Guatemala, you have to cross a bridge of no-mans-land. Salvador has guards on the other side of the bridge that check your information and have to let you cross before you can even get to the Migracion. Well, now they didn't want to let a sister through. She had a flight leaving San Salvador on Monday, so it was kinda important to get there. I think she was held on the bridge for an hour before they decided she could come through. But thankfully, everyone made it this year.

What I want really to know though, is on that bridge, did we actually exist in physical space since we were neither in Guatemala or El Salvador? Where were we?

I'm over-thinking this again. 

Anyway. When we got to San Salvador, there were friends from a local congregation there to greet us with sandwiches. I was so excited. We stayed with a local friend from Pioneer School- the same one we stayed with back in March. Yay second mom!

And now....Pictures!

There were at least 18 countries represented at our convention- the four in the Circuit: El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua- PLUS: USA, Canada, Scotland, England, Denmark, Austria, Australia, Sweden, France, Belize, Ireland, Italy, Mexico and Malawi- there may have been others as well. So it really was a mini-international. 

These friends are from Sweden and are currently serving in Belize.

One of the best parts of going was that we finally got to see everyone from Pioneer School again. It's been over two years, so a reunion was definitely overdue. 

The auditorium we met in was a bit smaller than we are used to for conventions. The attendance was less than 1000. I liked that though, because you could easily talk to almost everyone. And we all sang so loud, you couldn't tell we were a small group. This picture shows the entire room. 

Julio always plays the difficult character.

This brother is from Colorado too!

On Sunday, many of the friends wore the native dress of their home. This brother is from El Salvador, he matched the sisters we were staying with. I don't know how it happened but I never got a photo of all of them together. As you can see, I am in the native dress of my people. 

Proof that we live in a super small world. I started randomly talking to this one sister, she is visiting from California and going to Nicaragua to spy out the land etc. Hey, what part of California? Northern- in this tiny little town that you would have to live there to know about. Hey, that's where my uncle lives! Great, so picture, talking, how cool is this. We go to exchange info and I tell her my maiden name cause it's in my email. Wait a second...are you so and so's daughter? Turns out when I was super little we were in the same congregation.

My twin!

So, there's the highlights of Convention- spoiler free, which was super hard. We are so glad we *finally* made it to Salvador for this. It was such an incredible experience, all the friends are so awesome. Everyone is either a missionary, graduate of one of the schools, need-greater, learning a foreign language, or considering one of those options. That means that we get to hear amazing experiences both on the platform and off. I'm not saying "best life ever" but....Best Life Ever!

I'm a Terrible Person

Did you miss us? We missed you. I've been horribly lazy about writing lately. Sorry :(

So... what have we been up to in the last month?

When we left off, I was going to Colorado. Well, I did that. It was awesome. I had been a little sad to go in September when it wasn't going to actually be cold, because I miss the snow. Well, somehow there was a freak storm and we actually got a tiny bit of snow. I think it's because my Grandma came out to see me, and every time she comes to Colorado it snows.

So, I came back from Colorado. We moved apartments. Our new place is pretty awesome, we have two bedrooms, so we have room for guests. I'm excited about that. Of course, it felt really silly to be moving literally around the corner, we are still on the same block. And Zach's primo Curtis moved down here. For one of his first service experiences, cows tried to interrupt the call he was on. Also, they may have considered climbing over the truck to get to him, but that's unrelated.

Two weeks ago, Zach's study came to the meeting with his mom and sister. The mom already studies with another sister in the hall, and another son studies with a brother in a Spanish congregation. We didn't even know he was coming, so that was a nice surprise. Then, his sister, who has been on the island for a while, said that she would like a study as well. So last Saturday she sat in on her brother's study and tomorrow I am going to start studying with her.

We also started our invitation campaign for the Convention last week. We have the Convention in El Salvador in two weeks. In the meantime, Zach is currently in California. He had to renew his visa before heading to Salvador so he doesn't get turned away at the border, which actually happened to a lot of friends last year.

So..convention in two weeks, CO visit in November, and we have visitors coming in December and January from Germany, Warwick and New Zealand. It's going to be very busy, I think.