A Fish and a Loaf of Bread

A FISH AND A LOAF OF BREAD

It's Easter Sunday. Church was full of talk of "la Pasquas", Easter.

The members bore their testimonies of how special this day was, and the spirit was strong, even though we could only understand parts and bits of their testimonies. We had fasted in preparation and we were blessed with understanding in our hearts.

After Church we came home to prepare our Easter feast. Grilled fresh salmon, scalloped potatoes made with our last packet of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese sauce that Tracy had sent us, a tossed green salad even with avocado and Thousand Island dressing, and cooked fresh zucchini. Then for dessert, a chocolate mousse torte. Well, dinner was ready. The table was set for the two of us. In the middle were our huge chocolate Easter eggs. I dished up the salmon; it filled almost half the plate. Steve commented, "This is a feast for a king!"

We sat down, and the phone rang. My first thought was that, "Oh, no, someone is sick on Easter." It was Elder Sullivan, one of the office elders. His question: "I noticed there was some chocolate candy on your desk, do think me and my companion could have some? We are starving and we haven't eaten anything, and we don't have a lunch appointment." I immediately answered. Yes, you can have the candy, but you get yourselves over here for Easter Dinner.

We immediately started dividing the salad, the fish, and the zucchini squash. This would work. There is plenty of potatoes and everything. The phone rang again. "This is Elder Sullivan again. Actually there are 4 of us." I looked, was there enough for 6 people. Of course there was. The answer was , "Yes, all 4 of you come, just bring 2 more chairs." We looked at each other, started dividing the salad once more, added a bit more lettuce, tomato, and the rest of the avocado. Divided those pieces of fish again, quickly micro waved another zucchini, and there it was-dinner for two, expanded into dinner for 6.

The Elders came and it was the best Easter dinner. The spirit is indescribable when you have the missionaries in your home. We had a great time. I must say, every scrap of food was eaten. Not even a crumb left.

A Roll of Toilet Paper and a Light Bulb!

This past Monday, one of our missionaries became very sick and was admitted to the hospital in a little town of Tumayan. Actually a fairly good size town in the farming area outside of Mendoza. There was the possibility that it was appendicitis. I kept getting the feeling that I should go out to this hospital to check on things. So just at dusk we drove there. A very pretty drive. We arrived at the hospital. From the outside it looked ok, not fancy, but ok. The Zone leader had assured me this was quite a big hospital and was quite good.

We found our Elder, and he was in a room all by himself, the other bed was not occupied. It was siple, old, quite worn, but appeared clean. He was lying in a bed with an IV running in his arm-normal saline. He was NPO because of his condition and possible surgery. The nurse came in and talked to me. I asked if he had been started on antibiotics, she said yes, we have given him this and this. She named the meds, but none were antibiotics. He had received medication for pain and fever. OK? She said he was scheduled for an ultrasound in the morning, but actually not tomorrow, but the next day, as the MD's were going on strike tomorrow. WHAT? How can we have our missionary here where he might need surgery and no doctors?

I attempted to lower the lights over his bed and turn on the ones over the empty bed, so the light wouldn't be in his eyes. Whoops! No light bulb. They don't put light bulbs above the empty beds as they would be stolen. HUMMM! Then our Missionary had to use the bathroom. THERE WAS NO TOILET PAPER! Oh this is normal. You bring your own. They don't supply it as it would just be stolen! So his companion had to run across the street to a store, buy a roll of toilet paper, before he could go to the bathroom.

We did make the decision to transport him into Mendoza to a more modern, closer hospital, but . . .I felt totally humble, extremely blessed, and amazed at how spoiled we are with our health care in the States. I will never take for granted a roll of toilet paper and a light bulb ever again.

It's Worth it!

Sometimes, not often, we catch ourselves thinking--is this really worth it. We could be home in our cute little house in Granstville. We could be planning our Spring Garden. We could be surrounded by those awesome children and grandchildren. We could be planning our next vacation. Instead here we are in a far away world, where bars cover every opening, the hot water runs orange when we first turn it on. Where it is turning Fall when at home it is Spring. Where everything is in Spanish and we don't understand very much. But . . then we open the door to our office at the Mission Office, and there on the board is this message left by those hungry Office Elders that we rescued and threw together a dinner for them.

Yes, it's worth it!. Then we start feeling a bit homesick, and here in the mail comes this wonderful drawing, and valentines, and letters from the family, and packages of goodies and we know that we are loved and not forgotten!Yes it's worth it.

We struggle to get medical care for a missionary who is having alot of lower back pain. We walk to the hospital with him for x-rays. And he is getting better and is able to be out preaching the gospel .He makes a bracelet to say "thanks" And then we know it's worth it. We go to a baptism and watch the excitement and thrill in these new converts eyes as they become members of God's Church, and then . . . .
We really know it is worth it. The garden can wait, our little house will be there when we return, and our families will love us no matter where we are. But our place right now is to be here, serving the Lord. Yes it is worth everybit of it.

YOU'VE BEEN WONDERING!

Yes, we really do have a mission office and we really do go there everyday to do our work. Yes, there are missionaries here. Here is the sign on our building and here is the front hall that the Missionaries wait in before they see El Presidente, la enfermera (me), the money secretary, the secretary who handles all the records and documents, buy stuff from the Mission Store, or just

have fun seeing each other. They stop in for a cold drink and a cool place out of the hot sun.

These are our office Elders. They keep the ship running. They fix the computers, mop the floors, translate into Spanish for us, handle all the apartment stuff, and keep us laughing..
Elder Williams (California), Elder Stevenson (Idaho) and Elder Salmon (Alabama) And two pictures of Elder Brown hard at work. (I couldn't figure out how to delete the second one. Oh well.

One reason the country may be doing so poorly is that "Obama" is actually down here. I think he is hiding. We have been trying to convert him and have him change his ways.!

These missionaries are headed home, a very mixed feeling time! They were having fun, one last time together. The mission office is our home away from home. It's where our days start and end, and where the Spirit of the Lord watches out for us and these awesome Missionaries here to serve.

OUR TRIP TO THE "BIG MOUNTAIN"

This is the beautiful valley and community of UsPallata. It is like an oasis in the midst of this very barren desert. It is the jumping off place for the mountain climbers and for the river rafters. We attended the branch there. These people had testimonies bigger than the "mountain". The little branch meets in a building with a bar next door that plays latino music and seems to purposely turn in up during the meeting.

This is the "big mountain", Mt. Aconcagua. All 23,000 feet of it. It was pretty chilly and very windy. Notice--not a single tree on these huge piles of rock. We did see 3 live llamas down by one of the rivers.

Puenta de Inca on the Chile border. This hot springs empties over the rocks right into the river. The colors are amazing.

These are our friends, the Jarvis's, from Heber, Utah. They serve in the mission office with us.

OUR NEIGBORHOOD

Join us for a walk around the neighborhood. The first step is unlocking our door and the gates to our apartment building. Here are our keys. They look like keys to a treasure chest. We keep looking for it, but so far-nada.

The streets are lined with beautiful, green trees. This makes walks lovely and cool on the hot summer days. Along the edge of the trees is an irrigation ditch called a "secio". It is deep and you don't want to fall in.

The homes are of great variety. Here is the house on the corner. It is huge, has a huge, lovely yard, and of course a big wall with spikes at the top to keep unwanted people out.

And then there is the house next door. They are actually remodeling it into an apartmento.
Everything has walls around it, so it is just an invitation for the neighborhood artists. Almost all walls are decorated. Some nice, some not so nice.

This is the neighborhood car lot. The bottles on top of the cars mean they are for sale. Pretty smart, huh!

Here is our local taxi. Just call them and they come. Just kidding. These are poor people who go up and down the streets and collect anything that they are able to recycle. All day long you hear the clip, clop of the hooves, and here they come.

We live across from the Mission Office, and it is quite a safe neighborhood. We have very friendly neighbors. There is a mixture of apartments and homes. All of the apartments and homes are built right on the street with no front yards. or very small ones. Most of the homes have lovely green back yards.

Thanks for strolling with us!

This is a little tour around our little apartment.

This is our tiny stove. The control on the oven only has two settings: Max and Min and in between there is an arrow that you just guess at where the temperature is. I do use an oven thermometer. My first cassarole was found cooking at 500 degrees. A little toastie I think.

This is our bathroom.

There is the shower, and in front of it is the cutest little bathtub.


Here is Steve getting ready to jump in our cute little bath tub. It'll be a tight fit, I think.

Here is our little table.

Notice the wonderful grandkid book. We look at it often, and instead of TV we have our wonderful digital picture frame to look at while we eat. Thanks for those gifts. Notice the bottle of thousand island Dressing.
A sample of our daily schedule:
7:00 the alarm clock goes off, playing the CD-Called to Serve!
7:15-Exercise, showers, breakfast-learn the new Spanish word of the day.
9:00-off to the mission office where we start the day with an "Himno"(song), un oracion (prayer), and announcements for the day. I often have follow-ups to do on medical issues, and then handling the medical issues as they call in. Steve is busy with office and computer things.
There are trips to the hospital, farmacias, etc.
12:00 Usually lunch doesn't happen until about 1:30 or 2:00. We run home, grab a bite to eat, and then back to the office until about 6-7pm.
7:00pm Quick trip to the store for food, or home to fix dinner.
8:00pm dinner
9:00 hopefully time to study
10:30 Bedtime at last.

The next entry will be a trip around our neighborhood!