I really thought that when we came back to Honduras, we wouldn't have much in the way of "new" experiences, since we had been here before and knew what was up. Well, I have been so very wrong.
That may be the only time I will ever admit to that, so you might want to make note of this post, lol.
Of course, with my fabulous memory, I can't remember everything that has happened the last five days that I wanted to share.
We have had a really good time doing the campaign. Many people are interested, and because this is a religious country, many answer that yes, the dead can live again. Many also ask for a tract in Spanish because they want to give it to another person who doesn't read English, and they are disappointed when we don't have one. So we have been making sure to show them the QR code and website, and let them know they can read it in Spanish there. I told one man that he could use it with his copy of the Bible and he kept asking "Really?" "My bible?" "A Catholic Bible?" Yes, this will show you what the Bible actually says.
We enjoy doing business territory here too. People are very friendly, and don't act bothered by us. Often you can have a good conversation with someone, even while they are working!
Of course, not speaking Spanish has caused some problems. One place I went into was a book store of some sort, and when I asked if anyone spoke English, she kept asking me questions I could not understand. Finally one of the brothers came to rescue me, it turns out she thought I was asking for someone to translate the tract and print copies of it! Thank you, but we have a wonderful translation team of our own.
The other exciting news, is we have a new Ministerial Servant! We are all so happy to have this brother appointed.
After the campaign ends, our congregation is going to get to work on those virgin territories. We have a lot to cover, but Jehovah will surely help us find those thirsting for knowledge. To go along with that, I think we might have found a car that will get us to those far to reach territories, now we just have to sell ours!
Well, that's all the interesting congregation news. Feel free to tune out now as I talk about what else we have been up to. But if you do keep reading, I'll reward you with pictures. We're not above bribery.
The latest excitement is the opening of the new shopping plaza. There's only a couple stores, but they are possibly the best stores in the world. One is a department store and the other is a supermarket. This past weekend everyone in a thirty-mile radius and from the islands was at the new mall, taking advantage of all the sales. We didn't quite get crushed to death, but we did come close a few times. It's all worth it though, they have products that we can't get anywhere else, like Pillsbury flaky biscuits. Those are very important to have.
While I'm on the topic of stores, I want to comment on a practice here in Honduras. At the supermarkets, often times there will be a young boy who will bag your groceries, then push your cart to the taxi and load it, and in exchange you give him a couple
lempira. It's very nice to have, and it's a good way for them to make money, so everybody's happy. However, these boys are obviously not employees because they are usually around ten and they aren't dressed in a uniform or anything. Now. At this new supermarket today, there were two boys at our check out, and they were bagging the groceries. But this time, they were in uniforms from the store, and the older one was giving the younger instructions on how to bag correctly. So.....are they employees? Are there child labor laws? Do I still tip them? Tipping isn't very common here, except in certain circumstances, so if they are employees, it's probably not expected, but if they aren't employees then we would. My head hurts.
The other excitement is that it is election time in Honduras. In fact, that is the reason for the power outage of my last post. There was some political rally going on, so they cut everyone's power to make sure the rally had it. The election is on Sunday, so all weekend any form of meeting is banned, including religious services. That means on Friday, we are going to meeting an hour earlier than normal so we can do the Watchtower study as well. We can go out in service Saturday, but after that everyone will be staying at home until Tuesday. There isn't really any activity expected, but "t
he shrewd one sees the danger and conceals himself." (New Bible, yo) So everyone has stocked up on supplies and us foreigners have our "go bags" ready just in case. And, of course, for Zach and I, this also means we went out today and bought several bottles of Coke.
We had a small tragedy the other night. I have been having computer problems and although I have a back up hard drive, the last time I had to factory reset my computer, some files moved from the back up to the computer instead of just copying. What does that mean? Well, when I had to factory reset again, we lost all our documents, videos and photos from the last seven or so years. We maybe maybe maybe have some stored in different areas and jump drives, but the majority of it is gone for good. On the bright side, other than the photos, I can't remember the majority of what we did lose. Unfortunately, we still have our tax documents.
We also had a very unique experience last Friday. This one was so strange, I can't even say it's not something I thought we would ever do, because the thought that this was even a thing that could happen would have never occurred to me. I was getting ready for meeting, and took a shower. The water stopped. And it didn't come back on. Now, I could not just get out of the shower, I was soapy. So I wait...and wait...and it's gonna be time to eat dinner and leave for meeting soon. Usually the water comes back within a few minutes, so we don't have a reserve for that. Because we are used to drinking the water from the tap, we don't even have a spare jug anywhere. Suddenly, Zach knows where we can get water. It's spaghetti night! And dinner's done!
No, I did not smell like spaghetti afterward, but I did get some water in my mouth and it was delicious. Since then, we have used a pot to store water just in case, and we heat it up so we can have a warm shower. It's actually quite nice.
Monday we were bored so we decided in the late afternoon to go to the Cascadas. It's a really pretty river with waterfalls, you pay 10 lempira a person and hike in and spend as long as you want there. That day, Zach and I were the only ones there, so it was very nice. We brought our snorkel equipment and swam around looking at the fish. Well, apparently, the river is also inhabited by little shrimps, and they don't like people. When we first got there, I was sitting on a rock in the water, and felt little animals brushing by my feet and legs. Then I got to learn something about shrimp that I did not know. They have claws. I learned this when I got pinched on the butt. Then they started chasing me. That was awkward. But we did get lots of photos and now you get your reward for reading all of this.
You just skipped down to the pictures, didn't you? That's ok, I would too.
So there might be shrimp in the last few photos, they were moving so it was hard to get a pic.
