Zone Visit

Last Sunday we went to our first zone visit ever. It was in Guayaquil, which meant that either we had to go the day before or leave very very early that morning. As the other brothers in our congregation were going that same day, we decided to go with them. That meant leaving the house at 3 am! Is that crazy or what?

After the 4 hour bus ride and a 20 minute taxi, we arrived at the open-air stadium. We went expecting the typical sweltering hot guayaquil weather, so we weren't exactly prepared for the rain that awaited us. It rained through about half of the meeting, then the sun came out. Talk about some serious humidity, we all just pretty much melted away.

But the talks were great. We got to hear a lot about the history of the Witnesses here in Ecuador and some current stats. They interviewed one sister who came here as a missionary in 1953! She talked about what it was like preaching when there were only 200 publishers in the country. She related the experience of her first days in the country. She met with a group of brothers, an informal congregation meeting of just a handful of people. She looked around and noticed there were no women. She asked the Brother, "Where are all the women?" The Brother said, "Well... there are none yet," to which the Sister replied, "Well, I gotta fix that right away!" And she did.

Now there are over 73,000 publishers in the country! That means that in the past 9 years, there was an increase of 64%.

Current Country Stats:

Pioneers: 11,000, (about 15% of the publishers). Special Pioneers: 248. Studies: 140,000. Circuits: 49. Congregations: 901, including Kichwa, Shuar, Chapala, English, Chinese, Sign, Russian, Portuguese, and Hatian Creole.

The visiting brother from Brooklyn, Brother Derringer, gave an excellent talk as well, all about how we can praise Jehovah. It was also encouraging to see the 30,105 who had come from all over the country to attend. Below are just a few pics.

Waiting at the bus terminal, all still a little asleep.

See the coffee cup in Elsie's hand? There happens to be a Sweet & Coffee cafe, one of our favorites, inside the bus terminal in Guayaquil. After getting up at 2:30, we made time to stop and get a cup of coffee. 

It's cool how the stadium is right on the edge of the city and the jungle. 

Don, our neighbor and elder in the hall, giving a very enthusiastic smile for the camera.

It's amazing how it can be raining, yet so very hot at the same time. These are 5 of the Salazars, 2 are elders in our cong, the other 3 are ministerial servants. 

What a fiasco trying to leave. Imagine 30,000 people, almost all of them trying to get on public transportation. Let's just say it took about an hour for us to get out of there.  

From there we headed back to the bus terminal, had lunch, then started the 4 hour bus ride back. We spent a whole lot of time that day sitting down. But it was worth it.