Fuego Volcano Erupts!

We often saw the Volcano Fuego while we were in Guatemala.  You could often see smoke or steam coming from it.  We were saddened to hear that it erupted on Sunday at about noon and as of early this morning there were at least 70 people dead and there are more expected.  Some of the first responders were overcome with the gasses and ash and lost their lives.  Following is one collage picture that I "borrowed" from Elder Jenson and two from President Norman's blogs this morning. 

As you can guess these probably hadd little of anything to start with and now they probably have nothing. 

From President Norman

We are home but President Norman posted this on his blog and it made me cry.  I have such a testimony that the Lord is aware of all of his children. 

"Tuesday we got up and were at the temple at 4:00am for the Antigua stake that brought about 250 people to the temple.  It is a holiday here and the temple was very busy until noon.  It was closed in the afternoon.  President Flohr came to the temple about 9:00 am and took over so we could go to the Don Justo stake center where they were doing the second day of a three day dentist brigade.  Every three or four years, about 100 dentist and assistants, doctors and support staff come to Guatemala to help the youth prepare for their missions.  It is a well oiled machine and they treat hundreds of people each day.  I got home from Belize with a tooth ache and I went up there to talk to Elder Hogge who works in the dental clinic that the church has here in Guatemala and was there helping out. I explained that I had had a tooth ache all weekend and I had been in a lot of pain.  They decided that they would do a root canal and put me at the head of the line.  After 3 hours I was all fixed up.  This brigade was amazing. They had 4 endodontists, 5 oral surgeons, 22 regular dentists, hygienists and 4 medical doctors working and all of these people pay their own way and bring all of their supplies.  They had people cutting hair, giving eye exams, doing physicals and taking their pictures.  They even had someone making “flippers”—a temporary tooth after an extraction.  Every room of the stake center was being used: a room with 8 autoclaves, a surgery room, a recovery room, a room with backup generators.  It was like a mini hospital.  Every year they go to a different country in Central America. We feel so blessed that we got this problem resolved so quickly.  It was no coincidence that they were here when I needed a root canal. "

Last Little Bit of Guatemala

The reason that you should post immediately when you are 76-years-old is that things that are more than a week ago may be totally mixed up.  We are thinking that this is Saturday night after the temple was closed.  We walked down to Saul's and had dinner.  Gordon's, Us, Jenson's, & Holman's.

On Wednesday, as a goodbye lunch we were going to some place on a hill with great views but the Temple was so busy that some of the group didn't get out until 2PM and President Flohr needed to be back at 4 PM to do his first sealing and it was in Ketchi.  That really didn't bother us.  The temple was why we were there in the first place.  Instead we went to a very nice steak house named LaEstancia.  I could only find a night shot of it on the web.

It was quite close to the temple and our meals were wonderful.  John and Chris treated us to our meals as a goodbye. 

                                President John and Chris Norman

                                Clara and Oscar Flohr

                                Larry and Babette Jenson

We told a few other goodbye, Jenson's came down with cookies and a goodbye note and the Normans picked us up at 3:45 AM and helped us to get on our way.  What a wonderful 6 months we had!

Wonderful visit with the Rosales

President and Sister Rosales were released on March 15 and we were both honored at the last FHE for the Temple.  She had mentioned more than once that they would like to invite us to their home.  She sent an email which I answered but I guess that she didn't have email for a few weeks and never saw my answer.  This weekend she saw it, called and asked if we could come on Monday.  Then she said that her husband had suggested that we could come on Sunday evening and spend the night and they would bring us back after lunch on Monday.  We were both surprised.  Neither of us really felt that we knew him at all and my conversations with her had been quite limited.  We were free, honored that they would invite us and went.  What a wonderful closure to our mission it was.

They picked us up about 3:30 which was earlier than planned and we got home about the same hour the next day.  They live in San Jose Pinula which is an area that is only about a 15 minute drive from here when there isn't traffic but apparently it gets extremely congested regularly.  It was like stepping into a different world from what we have experienced.  The air was cooler and fresher and their housing area was very nice.
As we pulled into their neighborhood there was a little shopping strip mall that had a little of what your would need short term.  The gate for the entire neighborhood was there and had a scanner and then when we got to their section there was a guard letting people in and out.

Their condo was the last one in a row so they only had neighbors on one side and a beautiful country feel across the street and to the other side.  Their home had four bedrooms, three baths and luxuries we haven't seen it the few places where we have been like a dishwasher and built in microwave.
He is a civil engineer and spent most of his time working for the Church in the Central America area.  They said that they have "tightened their belts" and have been able to buy some other properties which he has and will continue to manage.

Although he speaks little English and Mike little Spanish they were able to talk about cars, watch movies and play chess.  Zenia and I did cooking and spent lots of time talking about natural healing.
We all took a walk in the evening and it was so lovely.  The sidewalks were smooth, there was almost no one driving down the street and the air was cool and fresh.  It amazed me that it could be so different so close.

We had breakfast on the patio.

After breakfast they drove us past the chapel where they had attended before the served in the temple (it has changed now) and then she and I walked the streets of the market and picked up some things.  It was so interesting to be with a native and she how she asked prices, selected products and pulled coins out of her pocket (no purse) to pay for items. 

They shared with us their story of how he met her in Honduras several years after he had finished his mission, he showed us his album of pictures from his mission to Senahu, they told us about his two brain surgeries in Utah  and she shared her photo album of her year spent in SLC living with the family of a missionary who had served in Honduras while she studied English at some program at Granite high School.

I'm not sure that she has shared with anyone the fact that she studied English.  She seldom spoke to me in more than a few words while I worked on shifts with her at the Temple but she totally opened up, translated for him and wanted to know how to say things in English.  (She wrote me an email in response to our thanks for the visit and asked if I would be willing to work with her on her English. ) Of course I am excited to do so.

 One of the fruits that we bought at the market was a cashew.  I understand why they are expensive.  Each fruit only has one nut.  She made the beverage behind the fruit and nut with the fruit.  She had us try a marandon, tomarindo, zapote, and jocotex, nance.  We had three kinds of drinks.  We spent about two hours cooking the salad (curtido) to go on top of tortilla for enchilada's.  It had peas, beans, carrots, beets, and cabbage and she cooked every one of them separately and then combined them so that the beets would color the whole thing.   The following are not especially good picture of the people but show the meal. There was also hamburger with a sauce and guacamole to put on them.  I'm afraid that I'd do some combining on the cooking but as she said, all Guatemalan foods are very time consuming to cook. 

, 

Mike and I both fell in love with this wood carving.  It is such a typical scene in the country to see men carrying huge loads of wood on their backs.

Their living room was lovely with a sitting area in front of a fireplace and the other couches in conversation setting at the other end of the room.

I had to go upstairs one more time and out onto their balcony to get a picture of the beautiful view that they have from their home. I told them that that little trip was like the frosting on a delicious cake. It was such a pleasure to get to know them better and see their part of this interesting country. 

PS - He had an interview with the Area Seventy last week.  I'm waiting to see if we hear his name at conference on Sunday.  At breakfast, after telling us about his brain surgeries he said that his life is the Lords in gratitude of his healing.  Time will tell.

Easter Celebration

One of the traditions for Easter in Guatemala is making sawdust rugs called alfombras to blanket the streets for a procession after an Easter mass.  We have a Catholic girls school across the street and we have never seen inside.  Last Thursday we were able to watch as they had a special mass before the students left for their Easter vacation. 

We walked over during the mass and I got a few pictures.  Our neighbor, Larry Jenson, got some good ones before and John Norman had some good ones on his blog that I "borrowed". 

Eash class makes their own design and alfombra.

Some of the older girls getting ready for the parade. 

We were there as the men of the band, all dressed in black, gathered across the street from us.  The closest description of the initial sound would be that of tune-up times for a junior high band.  My they were awful.  By the time the procession ended they seemed to be much better but I still wouldn't have paid much to obtain that sound.

The procession begins!

It was a very interesting experience that I am glad that we were able to see and hear.  There were several parts of the mass that were interspersed with lovely vocal solos.  We were providing lunch for the young missionary sisters that morning and they found us at the parade needing to eat earlier than we had planned so we hurried home and fed them.

One Reason That I Know I Was to Come Here, Too!

The other night I was sitting with my special Guatemalan friend when we had a down time at the temple and I told her that I felt that they were special people.  I told her this story about David Hamblin sharing this story with me before we left to come down here.  She asked if I could send it to her so that she could share it with her husband.  

 

"My brother-in-law is a Patriarch and was approached this past Fall by a young man who had been adopted by a Utah family from Guatemala.  The young man told him that he would like to receive his patriarchal blessing.  He told the young man to contact his Bishop and get a recommend.  Two weeks went by and he didn't hear back from the him.  

He was sitting in sacrament meeting during the passing of the sacrament when tis revelation about the young man's ancestors came to him.  He could hardly contain the emotions.  About a week later, he called the boys mother and asked if he had a recommend yet.  She told him that he was working out some issues with the Bishop.  He came a couple of weeks later.

The words that came out in the blessing were those that came to him during the sacrament: 'You have a wonderful ancestry.  In your ancestry there are people who saw Christ at the temple in the land Bountiful when He visited the Nephites who felt the holes from the nails in His hands and in His wrists.'"

 

I did send it and tonight I received this touching response from her:

 

ooooh sister Ellington, you are a espiritual person, and wonderfull friend, 

i try to be better every day, (because is very very difficult for me),

but its to hard for me,

you are a greate example for me,

your whole family is good and live in good place, historic place,

thak you for comming to Guatemala,

and for your patience for me

the experience of your brother-in-law will always serve me

kisses

 

 

 

 

 

Sister Missionaries Birthday Luncheon

On Friday we were invited to a birthday luncheon for the Sister half of the couples that are serving in the Central America area by the wives of the area presidency.  We all paid for our own lunches and then they provided cake and a little gift for those of us who had February and March birthdays.

Elder Adrián Ochoa was sustained as a General Authority Seventy on April 6, 2013. At the time of his call, he had been serving as Second Counselor in the Young Men General Presidency. He is currently serving as President of the Central America Area. His cute wife was there when we arrived so we got to visit with her alone until others arrived. (We is Sister Gordon, Sister Jenson and me.  We walked to the place which was about 15 minutes from our apartment.)

 They are both from Mexico but served in Salt Lake and she speaks English very well.  They have five children and her youngest just started college.  

When we got there I realized that I had left spaghetti noodles cooking on the stove for Mike's lunch but he was gone when I started them and I forgot to tell him.  None of us had phones so I asked her if she could call the temple and ask for Sister Norman.  I then asked Chris to call Mike and save the day which she did.  I wrote Sister Ochoa a note when she forwarded the following pictures to me and told her that it all worked out.  She wrote the following great response to me. 

Oh those are good news, Im Happy that you had good noodles!!

💕

Here are copies of the pictures that she sent-  They gave each of the birthday ladies a little gift bag with nail polish, files, etc. 

💕

Being here has been an ego booster for me. It is very seldom that I am paid a compliment except perhaps on my cookingl  Not only have the Guatemalan sisters at the temple continually told me how beautiful I am and how much they love me but some of the missionaries down on our end of the table seemed shocked when I told them that I was 76 and one said to the other something about hoping that she looked that good when she was that age. Then she said something like, "I wish I had the opportunity to get to know you better."  Even 76-year-old ladies like to feel appreciated and admired.  

It was fun that President Ochoa and his wife attended our Ward yesterday so we got to visit with them for a brief minute.  It is always fun to realize how real and down to earth people in those positions really are. 

I'm just going to add our Monday trip here, too, without a special post.  I still wanted to pick up a few gift items but didn't want to go downtown to the busy market.  There is a lovely, high scale (higher priced) artisan craft market called Mercado de Artesanias that is closer to here.  John and Chris took me and Sister Jenson over so that I could get my last few items.  Here are a few "blog borrowed" shots of the place.

Trip to the Botanical Gardens

On Thursday Sister Flohr loaded all of the same group that went to the beach into their van while her husband worked in the Temple and she took us to the Guatemala City Botanical Gardens.  They must have been beautiful in their day.  They were built/planted in the 1970's and although there are gardeners and the plants are beautiful much of the walkway and display is worn and needs love and attention.  I'll include some of the pictures I took. 

Sister Flohr called this a banana fern because the leaves look like little bananas. 

 A good sized tree.  I asked Mike to give us a proportion.

 Some plants will find almost anywhere to bloom again!

 I was surprised by the huge variety of cactus.

There is beautiful color all year round all around the city.

Family Home Evening

President and Sister Rosales have finished their three years as counselor and assistant matron at the temple and will be officially released today, March 15th.  Since both they and we are leaving there was a family home evening held to say goodbye to the four of us on Monday evening. 

President Rosales, Sister Rosales, Sister Norman, Sister Funes, Predent Norman, President Funes

The Fajardo's are our new next door neighbors.  We have been told that he speaks English but not to us.  She doesn't speak any.  He writes a prose for each leaving couple, frames it with a picture of the Savior and them.  It is in Spanish so I am clueless what it says but John translated it as he read it and it was very complimentary. 

                                                             Elder Holman and Elder Reyna

Elder Reyna doesn't speak English either and really doesn't try but he and I have become such good friends with handshakes, hugs, smiles and a little teasing.  We asked them to join us for our trip to the other temple in January and it was fun to have them along.  (Sister Mijangos was there to translate along with Elder Holman). Elder Reyna asked Elder Holman to sing a duet of "God Be With You" in Spanish for the four of us who are leaving.  It was well done and touching that he wanted to leave us a blessing. 

Each of the four of us that were leaving were able to leave our thanks and testimonies and Chris and John thanked each of us in personal, meaningful ways.

It was a lovely evening. 

Trip with the Flohr's

When Clara took me for our haircuts about two weeks ago she asked if we would like to have a "treat" with them on the morning of the 12th.  I envisioned some type of breakfast dessert and was unclear but absolutely agreed to the idea.  As I have worked through the conversation I am guessing that she was saying "trip" rather than "treat".

There were some interesting twists with the final group size and the sardine packed van but I am glad that all were along and that we had a fun time with each other.

Clara sent me an email on March 5 that said:

helloooooo sister Ellington

about the our trip

1. Santa Lucia Cotzumalguapa: MUSEUM
2. LaDemocracia: OUTDOOR MUSEUM aand MUSEUM
3. Sipacate: BEACH (we do not bathe on the beach. we only wet our feet

Then she had a list of what we should bring that I'm pretty sure that was copied from somewhere followed by

in those places it is not safe to eat, sorry.

we leave at 7 AM
the monday 12
kisses.
thaks my dear friend

Who could turn down that invitation?  We found out that it was her birthday the day before so I baked a chocolate cake to take along with a big 60 on it.



We headed out of town and at 7 AM the traffic was heavy but once we left the city and had country driving  we moved much more quickly.

You can see on the map where our first stop, Santa Lucia Colzumalguapa is located.  Sadly the museum and area were closed for the day.   It appears to have been first introduced after the Spanish Conquest and has been occupied since pre-classica period (1000 to 300 BC)  later Jaredite and Mulekite years.  

"The Museo el Baul is a free, open-air museum which is a collection of sculptures found from all over the sugarcane plantation's estate.  At the entrance, visitors are greeeted by a massive stone jaguar (see below)  that is co-incidentally the symbol of Santa Lucia Cotzumalguapa.  Some of the sculptures have perplexed experts, such as the giant head with a full feard.  An excellent preserved stelae of a ballcourt player is sandwiched between two 3D sculptures of a style not often encountered.  There  is also a collection of heads with open mouths and you can see from how the backs of the heads were designed how they were supposed to fit into walls as 'bricks.'  Elsewhere on the grounds, archeologists found a ball court, a sweat bath (temazcal) and an obsidian workshop but these are not open to visitors.  

The sugarcane factory itself is no longer in operation but visitors can see an old German steam tractor and two steam engines that used to run on a system of private tracks.  We, of course, saw only the four stones pictured below since the museum was closed.

 I did a bit of research on the web and found this most interesting information about a stone found there.

 <Dated 600-800 A.D.

<< Note: The flames of fire coming off this descending God and the sun.  
There are two people carved upon this Stela looking up at this descending God.  
It is obvious from this carving that even in the 600-800 A.D., the descendants of Lehi still retain a knowledge and belief of a God whose countenance did shine, bright even as the sun, as he descended out of the sky.

The following four stones were outside the museum so we at least got their pictures. 

                                                 Jaguar

                           This old church was just outside the museum entrance. 

We next drove to La Democracia . The indoor museum was closed but we walked around the square and took pictures.  I am going to use some from the web for some of them because it seemed that these are most useful for the locals as a place to sit in the shade so the details were not available. :)

 

"La Democracia’s carved heads have content smiles and a Buddha-like countenance. Some are attached to bodies with huge bellies and have hands clutching their stomach—they almost look Eastern in appearance. Interestingly, these statues are strikingly similar to the Olmec sculptures found in the Mexican lowlands of Villa Hermosa.

The stone heads of La Democracia actually came from the site of Monte Alto, which is just outside town. The sculptures are thought to date to around 500 BC during the middle Pre-classic period. "

Church on the Square

       

Next on the list was Sipacate Beach-   I looked it up on the internet and this is the picture that I found.

Probably the only thing that we found similar was the fact that there WAS water, there WAS sand but as you will see we experienced something very different.  Actually, it was probably a much more accurate picture of a Guatemalan beach trip.

As we entered the town Oscar Flohr stopped and asked a fellow how to get to the beach. He was bare foot and riding a bicycle. We followed him to his home where he opened a congregated metal gate and had us park the van under a tree in the yard.  There were chickens, children, dogs and other items everywhere.  We got our lunch things,locked the van and followed him down the road to a mangrove tidewater area (a rather smelly pond like area leading to the ocean.

He led us to his "boat" which you had to use your faith to even step into. None of these pictures do it justice.  Boards were balanced across boards where you could see the water swishing inside.  There were patches of fiberglass that were pulling off and remains of a few coats of paint but basically raw wood.

 Probably the most exciting part for those of us who watched was when he began to scoop up water from the bottom of the boat and throw it over the edge.  Comfort indeed!

When we landed we walked up a wooded path and there was a beach and the ocean. The area was covered with trash, some poles with torn black plastic on top and a dark sand beach. 

It was Sister Flohr's 60th birthday so I had brought a cake to help celebrate.

I  think most of us at least put our feet in the water.  Boy the dry sand was a shocker, it was SO hot!











One of most interesting things on the little boat ride over and back was the bird array.  Here are a few pictures that Mike got.

Clara and I had to pose for one more memory of the beach.