Getting Back to Normal

Even though we are still under Martial Law, things are pretty much normalized now. There's a lot of tension and confusion still since the President assures us that the National Police involved in the mayhem will not go unpunished. So we're not really sure how the situation will be once the Military leaves and the Police retake law enforcement. Since we are still under a "state of emergency".

Besides that, things are fine. On the other side of town is Monay Shopping, the citie's newest mall. Last week, a pack of gunman raided the mall, looting what they could. And that is about as close as the danger got to us personally. Of course, we weren't shopping at the mall that day; we were safely tucked away at home where we were told to stay.

Just another interesting experience in a politically unstable country of South America to write home about.

The past week's events did spur a rather interesting conversation today in service with a young girl who was very concerned that war and suffering would never end. She immediately brought up these recent events and said it makes her think more about the future. We talked about the bible's promise of repairing the situation and have plans to go back next week. Her English is close to perfect and she studied for a bit in San Francisco while on an exchange program, where she stayed with a Witness family who supposedly took her to meetings...? Really? Well anyway, hopefully she'll come visit us at the English meetings.

We've been told sooo many times by the brothers how much we have contributed to the small congregation and how grateful they are that we are here. They often consult us with English grammar questions and also about how we did certain aspects of service in Quito in order to organize things better here. So, all that makes us feel very good about our decision to come here, as hard as it was.

Que mas...? Oh, I felt lightning the other day. Here, it doesn't have to rain to get crazy lighting and thunder. Usually when we get a rain storm though, it is preceded by lightning and thunder. The other day, we were just cleaning the house; it wasn't raining or anything and suddenly, without any warning whatsoever, the loudest crack of thunder I've ever heard and a bright flash of lightning that filled the house came cracking down on us at the exact same time. Not even a mili-second apart. It was so close, I could feel the electricity in my fingertips. Hannah and I both simultaneously screamed, "Whoa!" It was really scary, but cool.

And that's all for now. I must get to fixing my invitations now. Since the congregation has no meeting invitations, (why haven't we ordered them yet? Not sure, but also not complaining.) we made our own
but I printed 100 of them saying the meeting is on Saturday instead of Sunday. So now I have to manually change each one. Grrrr! Anyway, toodaloo for now. Hope all is well up north. Keep in touch!