As with every story.....

Well friends, our journey in Roatan has come to an end.  It was such a great experience, and we made so many friends along the way.  It was hard to say goodbye to everyone.  Our adoptive family, the Welcomes, took us out to dinner on Friday night and then on Saturday there was a party on the beach for us.  Both times I forgot my camera though, so I have no pictures of that.  Then today at the airport, 2 service groups showed up to say goodbye and see us off.  We were touched.  It is just so wonderful how you can go to a foreign land, meet strangers from all walks of life, and become great friends with them because of the uniting bond you have.  You really get to experience the worldwide brotherhood that we have that is like nothing else.  We learned much from this trip, and have renewed zeal for serving Jehovah and are excited to take many more trips like this in the future.  And to experience the preaching work here was a real blessing too.  I have been having wonderful studies with Gloria.  She is just taking in everything that she is learning and absorbing it.  We are just now studying chap. 3 in the teach book, and I was asking her something about living on a paradise earth instead of heaven, and she went off on this big explanation about how that's what the bible says is going to happen and only 144,000 are going to heaven.... I just started laughing.  She has already read and studied most of the book.  I feel like I don't even need to study it with her, she already gets it and believes it.  It's so crazy!  We were very sad to part ways, but I am not abandoning her.  She is actually leaving for the States soon too.  She wants to come back (she is from the States) in August so she can go to school to be a nurse.  So we are going to Skype for our studies in the meantime and a sister is going to stop and see her, and then when she moves back to the States I will get her in contact with our brothers wherever she ends up.  She is planning either Boston or New York, so hopefully I will be able to see her again sometime! 

Well, I hope everyone enjoyed our journey with us, and I am glad I could share it with you!  Your friends that roasted in Roatan:)

Manny and Justin matched Dixie perfectly!  We had to get a photo.



 

 

A trip to El Progreso

Our trip to El Progreso for the assembly was exciting. We are glad to be back on the island though. Our trip started last Saturday at 6am. We met at the port to catch the ferry over to the mainland. It is about 1 1/2 ride. I was worried about being a little seasick, but it was fine. Actually the bus ride after that was worse! We caught our bus right outside the ferry port. Then we started our journey of about 3 1/2 hours to El Progreso . And our bus driver was crazy! He drove very fast, the bus was swaying all over and he would pass like 3 cars at a time when there was oncoming traffic. I think we had Jehovah's spirit with us. The road we traveled was mostly county looking, the houses were more spread out than here in Roatan. There were just little stores and local restaurants scattered along the road. Our crazy bus driver would slam on his brakes and stop about every half hour at one of these places and have his helper run out and get him things. One time it was for a local juice slushie. We sat there and watched the guy make them for him. Another time for food, and so on. Then one of the times he slammed on the brakes, he got up and ran off the bus. We thought, ok this time he's probably running behind a tree or something. But then we looked out the window, and he was laying on the road under the bus apparently trying to fix something. Yikes! And worse yet, he fixed whatever it was with some dirty rags! Then the rest of the trip he drove a bit slower, thankfully. (gee, I wonder why?) We finally arrived at our hotel unharmed. It was called Hotel Casa blanca. It was actually a pretty decent place, looked like an old tuscan villa on the outside.

Some kids in the congregation

 

This is inside the ferry.  Sorry I didn't get an outside photo of it.

 

Justin snoozing on the ferry ride

The scary bus

 

Our capable bus driver

Our assembly was the next morning. The building that it was held in was actually right across from our hotel, so we could just walk there in the morning which was great. It was at a college, and the room we rented was the auditorium they use for graduations and so forth. It was very nice and worked perfectly for an assembly hall. The program was very good. We had a guest speaker from the Mexico Branch. He was a great speaker. We met him after the program and he knew the couple that we had went to see in Belize (they are at the Mexico Branch now), in fact he works with April. Small world. After the program almost all of our group went to a mall nearby to eat and watch movies at the theater. The mall had a food court with BK and Pizza Hut and some others. Yay. We were really at the mercy of everyone else the whole time we were on the trip and just trailed along with anyone who would take us. Because we didn't want to go anywhere ourselves, seeing as we barely know enough Spanish to order ourselves food at a restaurant (we even needed help with that the one time). So, even though it was a fun experience and the assembly program was good, we didn't like being on the mainland. Just felt to uncomfortable. Some of the scenery was very pretty though... Big sharp pointed mountains. I wish I could have gotten some pictures of them.

At our hotel

Where the assembly was.  We met on the top floor, right hand side.

 

Inside the assembly hall

Justin helped with the stage duties

outside Hotel Casa Blanca

On the way home, they say the ferry ride is always worse because you are going against the waves. Well, it was definitely true! That boat was getting tossed all over the place. And I was horribly sick! I don't want to ever get on another boat again at this point. It was that bad. I was hoping that once I got back on solid ground, I would feel better after a few hours. But I didn't. I stayed sick for days! And then it turned into a head cold. So I am still not feeling well yet, a week later. Well, I'm sure many of you have heard by now, that we are planning on coming home sooner than we originally planned.  Actually, we are leaving Roatan a week from today. We are sad to go, but excited to come home for awhile and rest up and regroup. We're not sure what our next adventure will be. I am planning on making 1 final post before we leave, so check back. Adios!

 

The Gloria from Jehovah

I am posting this one especially for Heather. She sent me "hate mail" complaining about my lack of blogging. So this one's for you girl... Our studies have all kinda been fizzling out since we came back, and we are a little disappointed about it. But I got one new one from Jana. She was having trouble getting the girl and knew I was up in the East end more often, so she turned her over to me. Her name is Gloria, she is 21. And ever since the first time I was there, she has been an amazing study! I have never studied with anyone quite as sincere and truly interested as her. She asks so many questions and really cares about the answers. She has been reading the bible on her own, and asking me questions from what she's reading. Like she asked what "enmity" was. Which I thought was cool that she picked out on her own, one of the most important scriptures in the bible, and had questions about it. She has started coming to the meetings for the last 2 weeks, and has answered many times for the Watchtower study. She has already started making some changes in her life, like not going to parties and hanging with the wrong crowd. She said her mother has noted a difference in her, she isn't getting into arguments with her anymore. And she just truly loves studying. We have been studying twice a week. But this has all just begun for the past 3 weeks!!! Crazy right? She has already been asking about what steps she needs to take to get baptized. It almost seems a little to good to be true. But we will just see what happens with Gloria. When we were in Belize there was a gal that started studying and came into the truth within about 6-8 months, so I know it does happen sometimes. Maybe it is just the right time for her, for Jehovah to draw her!

On Thursday, in the morning we had a territory in Oak Ridge that included the Oak Ridge Key, a little island that is separated from the mainland by just a 30-40 foot waterway. It is only accessible by boat or foot via a little walking bridge. There is only about 20 houses on it. It was so cool out there! It was all sand. There was a little pathway that wound along the sea side of the island to take you to all the houses. It was so pretty, you almost forgot you were in 100 degree heat, cause there was a nice breeze coming off the ocean. But then the sad reality, when we were done and crossed back over the bridge, hit us hard! Like when your baking in the summer, and you're already hot and sweating, but then you open the oven door... bam! That's about how it felt. And Justin parked up at the top of this big hill. But then we went to Gloria's and sat on her porch and she put a fan on us. Then we felt much better!

Looking at the canal and the mainland

Cooling down in some hot ocean water!

You can't tell, but the water is up to my ankles

Well, we are leaving for the mainland of Honduras early tomorrow morning. It is our Special Assembly Day. So we are getting all packed. We will be back on Monday. So hopefully we live to give another post!