Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Today started a 4 day training seminar for all of the Zone Leaders and District Leaders in the mission. They have come in from all over the capital and “South”. President Almonte is teaching the leaders a new training program the church has just released. All of the missions in the church will be receiving this training over the next 8 months. Then in May of next year it will be taught to the new missionaries in all of the MTC’s around the world. That way when the new Elders and Sisters arrive in the field they will be met by Trainers that already know and use the new program.



Last Monday when we met with President Viñas he previewed the program for us. As I understand it, the new program of teaching will still use all of the material in “Preach My Gospel” but it will emphasis a new and different way to use the material.




Today we got a taste of “Earl” a category 4 hurricane that is passing by the Caribbean. Now we can actually say we were in a hurricane while we served on our mission. Well…. we can say it with “tongue in cheek”! This afternoon it sprinkled for about 4 hours and that was it. There were no hurricane force winds; in fact there was no wind at all. But the moisture was definitely from “Earl”, it was one of the spiral arms of the hurricane that happened to reach out far enough to rain a little on Santo Domingo. The real hurricane was hundreds of miles away to the east in the Atlantic.

Monday, August 30, 2010

When we arrived at the office this morning we discovered that we had a new AP. His name is Giovanny Baré from Santiago, DR. He’s a very good Elder and will be an AP for only 2 weeks. He will be released from his mission on our next “Traslado” September 4, 2010.



Today we’ve been watching the path of Hurricane Earl. It’s a category 4 giant but the track is supposed to take it east of our island. The eye of the hurricane will be about 300 miles out in the Atlantic. We should be very safe on our Island of Hispaniola.



Tonight we had another special FHE with the Seniors in the DR. Everyone came here to our neighborhood for another dinner at the beautiful Dominican Fiesta Hotel’s dinner buffet. Most of the Seniors live at the “Casa de Huespedes” (Temple Accommodation Center) so their commute here took them about half an hour. Hna. Johnson and I live about 300 feet away so our commute on foot took us a couple minutes.






The “All You Can Eat” buffet at the Dominican Fiesta is really wonderful. We like eating here a lot. The food is great but the company was even better as we all got to visit for about an hour after the dinner. We had a great time.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Today in Primary at the Los Arroyos Branch Hna. Johnson’s lesson was on love. To illustrate the lesson she backed heart shaped cookies yesterday and let the children put icing and sprinkles on them today. They had a great time and did a great job considering how young the kids are. However there was a big mess to clean up. But Hna. came prepared with water and plenty of napkins.







After primary the children presented one of the cookies (the one that held up the best) to the Branch President to illustrate their love for him. He was very pleased with his cookie. He liked it a lot.




This evening we got another Webcam call from Nathan, Valerie and their daughters. Yes, we love talking on the webcam. We talked to them for an hour and twenty minutes!




Next we got a Webcam call from our grandson Joseph. As a reward for doing his homework without a fight and getting it done in a timely manner, Joseph is allowed to use the computer, webcam & e-mail. He’s a great kid. We talked to his mother, Wendy and his brother and sisters. Our son Jacob was at Stake Priesthood meeting so we didn’t get to see him. But we talked to the rest of the family and had a very good visit.



Next we called Jared and Tere on the Webcam. When they answered we got a bonus, Grandma & Grandpa Burk were there visiting and we got to talk to all of them. We ended up spending about 3 hours this evening on the Webcam. Have I mentioned that we love the Webcam?

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Going on a mission and living on a budget go hand in hand. We’ve been budgeting our money for the past 13 ½ months of our mission and trying to stick to it. We’ve done well but the end of every month is always a struggle to hold out until our next withdrawal from the bank. This weekend we got to go to the bank for our regularly scheduled withdrawal and do our grocery shopping today. It’s really nice to be able to go to the grocery store and restock our cupboards.

We have our family to thank for our financial support while we serve our mission. We wouldn’t have a budget at all if so many of our family weren’t working so hard to make our mission financially possible. We simply couldn’t be here if it weren’t for their long hours of hard work, unselfish service and love. Hna. Johnson and I love our family and extending family. The long hours of work at the flower shop is really appreciated. We love each of you and your support for us.

Friday, August 27, 2010

We sure have grown to appreciate air conditioning in our bedroom. For the 2nd night in a row we’ve had to sleep with only a fan on. It is hot and humid and sleep only comes in short intervals. We did make an amazing discovery during the night, we actually do have electricity. But only half of the apartment’s 220 Volts is getting to us. The other “Line” or the ground wire is broken/damaged/burned up. We thought the lights were working because the “Inversor” (Converter 12 VDC to 110VAC) was kicked in. But if it was working correctly we would only have electricity as long as our 4 backup batteries would last. If we had known we weren’t running on battery power we could have had more fans blowing on us all night.



We finally got our apartment electricity fixed. And none too soon, it was 5:30pm before “Edesur” arrived and replaced the burned wire. We were afraid we were going to have to spend our 3rd night without AC. But it’s fixed now and we have our AC back. We love our little window AC unit in our bedroom.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Today was a rough day in the mission. One of our good friends, an Elder that worked with us in Duvergé is being released early for medical reasons. Elder Arreola is a very good Elder, hard working and dedicated but he’s been sick for over 9 months now. We’re sorry to see him leave and wish him the best of luck.

Three weeks ago Elder De la Cruz was given a leave of absence from the mission to go home for brain surgery. It was determined that no surgery was necessary so he returned to the mission to see if he could handle the rigors of mission life. He hasn’t been able to adjust successfully so today Elder De la Cruz was given an honorable release from his mission because of medical reasons. He pointed to his missionary name tag on his shirt pocket and with tears in his eyes said, “I want to be a missionary”.

Today we also found out that there are a lot of “Emergency Transfers” coming. We will find out in the next few days how many missionaries will be affected. It is really a shame that some Elders don’t obey the mission rules, thus disrupting the routine of the whole mission. I feel sorry for the good missionaries that obey the rules but are still transferred because of someone else’s sins.



At noon Former Elder Conner Ruggio came to the mission office to say hello and pick up a map to Pres. Almonte’s cabin near Jarabacoa. They will be spending the night there as they tour the country. Traveling with Elder Ruggio are three others, Haley Donavan (Elder Ruggio’s girlfriend), Josh Goodrich, who served in this mission from 2006 to 2008 and Chason Archuleta who served his mission in Argentina from 2006 to 2008. They sure look like a bunch of tourist!

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Last week we received 8 ½ cases of hard cover Book of Mormons from Centro de Servicio. There are enough BofM’s for one for every missionary in the mission. President Almonte ordered them last December and they finally arrived. It only took 9 months for them to get here from SLC. They must have come by boat around Cape Horn, South America!

The missionaries have been teaching their lessons with “soft cover” Book of Mormons, the same ones they give away to their investigators. Last year Pres. Almonte decided that the Elders should always carry and teach from the hard cover BofM. They are much nicer in appearance and the Elders look and teach better using them. During this week’s Multi-Zone conferences all over the mission with Pres. Viñas, all of the BofM’s will be distributed to all of the missionaries. Everyone has been waiting a long time for them to get here.

All of these hard cover BofM’s are not free. Each missionary will be charged $110.00DRpesos for their copy. That is about $3.00USD. For four hours today Hna. Johnson’s only task was to go into the “Internet Mission Office System” (IMOS) and deduct the $3.00 from each missionaries “Apoyo” (Support Money). It took her so long because she has to access each missionary individually to make the deduction. She has to access the missionary, down load the files, change/deduct them, save them, and then upload the file again. The internet is so slow it took her one to two minutes per missionary. She had to repeat the process 202 times! She worked straight through without a lunch break. I did detect a little squeal of glee when she finished the last one.



At noon the electricity in our neighborhood went out for 3 hours. That isn’t unusual; it goes out for 3 to 4 hours almost every other day. In fact power outages are planned and scheduled by the government run power company called “Edesur”. What was unusual was the power went off again at about 6:00pm this evening. Two power outages in the same day means something is really wrong. Edesur usually gets the unscheduled outage fixed and restores power pretty fast.

So this evening after an hour and a half without electricity Hna. Johnson asked me to check and see if the whole neighborhood was without power or just our apartment. Our fears were realized, it was just our apartment. I spent the next three hours trying to find out what the problem was and how to get it fixed. No luck, we spent the night in a hot humid apartment.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Today was a miserable day of “Diligencias” (Errands). I started outside of Bravo looking for a parking place. I found a perfect spot right in front of the store under a large “No Estacionamiento” (No Parking) sign. I was really lucky to find it open; there were 3 other parked cars already there. When I got out of my car to run into the store (I was in a big hurry) an “AMET” Officer (Traffic Cop) called out to me and said I couldn’t park there, it was a no parking zone. I called back to the officer and said, “But what about these other cars? They are OK, I gave them permission to park there! (Sooo Dominican!)

Next I was off to pay three different bills at “Bella Vista” Mall. When I pulled into the huge parking garage I noticed that all of the prime parking spots close to the door were inexplicably roped off and guarded by a security office. Most of these prime spots were vacant so I rolled down my window and asked the guard why they were roped off? He said they were reserved for employees! He told me I would have to drive up to levels 2 thru 4 to find parking. I found a spot up on level three. (Sooo Dominican!)

Inside I had to wait in lines that should have been 30 minute long. They turned into 2 hour lines. At the “Orange” (Our cell phone provider) I was in line behind 7 other people and no one had been helped in 15 minutes. There wasn’t anyone at the service window to help customers! I finally found the manager and she told me the ONLY customer service agent was probably getting a drink of water. Counting their security guard there were 5 other employees standing around doing nothing while we waited to be helped. I finally was able to pay my bill after 45 minutes. (Sooo Dominican!)

My next stop was at “The Pastry” shop. I figured the mornings “Diligencias” couldn’t get any worse but I was wrong! Yesterday we placed an order for 60 loaves of “Pan Sobado” (Conference Bread) to be picked up at 11:00am. When I got there at 11:45 they apologized and said they put our order in the over late and for me to come back in an hour. The loaves were for the Multi-Zone conference at the La Paz chapel and they would be getting out of the meeting in 15 minutes. (Sooo Dominican!)

Monday, August 23, 2010

Today was a very full and busy day. It started off with an emergency run over to Centro de Servicio to give Hna. Grace Montera a passport for a Sister Missionary who is waiting to go to Puerto Rico. Her Visa is finally ready Hna. Maria Jimenez from Santiago, DR. will finally be going to her assigned mission in San Juan, Puerto Rico, she has been here waiting for her Visa since June.

While I was at Centro de Servicio I got a phone call from Bro. Conner Ruggio. He and his companions were stranded at the Avis rent-a-car office. I gave them a ride back to the mission home because they were not allowed to rent a car. It turns out that no rental car company will rent to a driver under the age of 25. For the rest of their week in the DR they will have to take Taxi’s and buses everywhere they want to go!



Back at the mission office Hna. Johnson left to go shopping for the last minute items to put the finishing touches on preparations for the visit this afternoon of the Area President, Elder Viñas. We went to “The Pastry” shop and bought lots of baked sweets. They really looked really good; you should never go shopping at a place like that right before lunch. We also picked up 40 loaves of “Conference Bread” while we were there. It is tradition to serve the missionaries “Conference Bread” for lunch after these large Multi-Zone conferences. We will be buying a lot of “Conference Bread” over the next 4 days as President Viñas is holding a conference a day until Friday all over the mission.



Pres. Viñas’ visit has been fraught with a lot of worry and anticipation. The official agenda described his visit to the mission office as an “Interview” with the office Elders and the Senior couple. It isn’t everyday that you are interviewed by a General Authority! Well, our fears were for naught. Elder Viñas didn’t interview anyone. He held a mission office staff meeting and invited all of the Zone Leaders from this morning’s conference to come as well. The meeting lasted an hour and a half. The purpose was to introduce the new teaching program the church is implementing starting this fall. It was a very good meeting and we were much more relaxed than we than we had anticipated.




This evening we were in for a surprise for FHE with the other Seniors at the “Casa”. Elder Bowcut was in charge and he showed an hour long video of a fireside given by a convert named Mario Facione. Bro. Facione told his life story and his conversion to the restored gospel. His life before being introduced to the gospel was very interesting to say the least. The DVD is entitled: “From Mafia to Mormon” and the book can be purchased at Deseret Books! The movie was made in 2009. I had never heard of it before but… Wow… what a life story!

Sunday, August 22, 2010

This morning we received a phone call from Elder Conner Ruggio. All of their luggage was found and no emergency trip to the clothing store was necessary. He did ask us for a ride to church this morning. He and Haley are going to attend the Piantini Ward her in the capital because it has translation available and they also have a Gospel Doctrine class that is taught in English. We were glad to give them a ride, the Piantini chapel isn’t much out of our way.



Our detour to the Piantini Ward this morning didn’t put us behind. We arrived on time for our own Sacrament meeting at the Los Arroyos Branch. We needed to be on time because Hna. Johnson and I were two of the speakers today. Hna Johnson’s subject was on “Charity, the True Love of Christ” and my subject was on “Family Home Evening”.



Hna. Johnson doesn’t speak Spanish so when the counselor in the Branch Presidency asked us to speak he said it would be alright if Han. Johnson just bore her testimony. Well, Hna. Johnson was given a subject so she tackled the challenge of giving a real talk. She consulted material in English that the church has also published in Spanish. She wrote her talk knowing exactly what she was going to say. Then she repeatedly practiced saying all of the Spanish words correctly. In the end her talk lasted about 5 minutes and she did a great job.




After Sacrament meeting several people came up to us and commented (in Spanish) to Hna. Johnson how they enjoyed her talk and how well she spoke Spanish. During her talk the counselor in the Branch Presidency, sitting next to me, leaned over and said how well she was speaking Spanish. Well, there is a good reason why she can “Speak Spanish” so well. For over a year now, Hna. Johnson and I have been reading a chapter in the Book of Mormon in Spanish every day. She has gotten very good, after so much practice she reads Spanish perfectly.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

This morning we were off to Juan Dolio Beach again. We really enjoy going to the beach to hunt for sea shells on our p-day. It seems we come home with a new treasure each time we go to the beach. And today I found another gem of a shell, well actually two.



Today we had the fortune of very good timing at the beach. First, the ocean was dead calm, no breeze and no waves. Second, this morning we arrived an hour before the absolute lowest tide and we stayed at the beach until an hour and a half after the lowest tide. The conditions were perfect for hunting for sea shells. But the part I really liked was the snorkeling at low tide in a perfectly calm ocean. The reef was exposed and I snorkeled out beyond the reef about 200 yards and the water was still only six feet deep. The reef was beautiful, the fish were beautiful and the pictures turned out very good because it was a sunny day.






On our way back from the beach we stopped off at the “Yellow Steps” store and dropped in to Freddy’s Gift Shop. Last week I dropped off my High School graduation ring I’ve been wearing for the past 42 years. It is very warn and it was showing its age. The school crest, all the words and all the numbers were worn away. I decided to replace the imitation stone (glass) in the center with a real gem. As a souvenir of our mission in the Dominican Republic I chose a “Larimar” stone for my ring. (See: Larimar Gemstone- Wikipedia) “Larimar” can only be found I one place on the planet and that is here in the DR within our mission boundaries. Freddy had his jeweler do the work. The ring turned out beautiful. I am very pleased with my New: “Dominican Republic Santo Domingo West Mission Ring”. The total price was very cheap too, only $300.00DRpesos or about $8.50USD.





Elder Conner Ruggio is back in the DR. (See: Thursday, August 27, 2009) He was the AP when Hna. Johnson and I first arrived here. He is traveling with a former missionary to the DR as well as a former missionary to Chile. Also in their group is Conner’s girlfriend Haley. Their arrival was not without some difficulty. The airline has lost all of Haley’s luggage. He has been on the phone with the airlines most of the afternoon. He may be calling us back later if they need a ride to the clothing store for Haley to buy a new wardrobe.

Friday, August 20, 2010

As missionaries we live under and obey mission rules. They are important rules, they keep us focused, they promote spirituality and they protect us as well as protecting the good name of the church. Good missionaries learn this and obey the rules. Good missionaries teach by the spirit and that is possible because they are obedient. Good missionaries lead and teach by example. Bad missionaries succumb to temptation and loose the companionship of the Holy Ghost. They not only can’t teach by the spirit, they set bad examples for their companions, the members and their investigators. As the spiritual head of this mission President Almonte cannot tolerate the least bit of insubordination. There is too much at stake.

Yesterday I wrote that the “Special Transfers” were because of the vacancies created by 2 Elders that went home mid “Traslado”. Today I found out that statement was mostly accurate but there was at least one “Emergency Transfer” because of breaking mission rules. That transfer will bring a disobedient Elder to the office. That Elder will be living in the apartment with the office elders but he has no assigned proselyting area. He can’t leave the apartment for any reason, not even to teach or work. For the time being, I guess you could say he is under house arrest!

Thursday, August 19, 2010

This morning I got an interesting phone call from a frantic teller at Citi Bank. Yesterday when I went to pick up the mission office’s petty cash they gave me $2000.00DRpesos too much! I didn’t notice the error so this morning Hna. Johnson counted our petty cash and we were exactly $2000 over. When I went back to the bank this morning the teller was sure glad to see me. This has never happened before. All of the tellers count and recount the cash three times. Amazing.



Not all “Emergency Transfers” are bad. Every time missionaries go home in between regular “Traslados” it necessitates “Special Transfers”. So today the AP’s spent all their time shuffling Elders around to their new areas.



Yesterday Hna. Johnson was asked to make arrangements of flowers by the CES Senior couple, Elder & Hna. Finlayson, the their institute program today. Hna. Johnson really loves the opportunity to design flowers.



The big wrought iron gate in front of the mission office broke today. I called Hno. Veliz at Centro de Servicio and he sent a crew right over to fix the problem. With the gate broken we couldn’t park any of the mission vehicles inside so I was really glad the repairmen got here and fixed the gate so quick. It’s a shame we have to have a huge iron gate to keep the bad guys out. We’ve had our pickup trucks broken into by thieves and everything stolen out of them while they’ve been parked right in front of the office.