Umm, rule universe will I.

Hello Everyone,

Hows it going?  Jaide and I are bracing for another loud night.  For holidays, the popular thing here in Guyana, is to set up literally a wall of speakers,  measuring 10-15 feet tall, by 10 feet wide.  Then you blast your music as loud as humanly possible and offer food and alcohol.  People flood to the streets.  A massive sea of people walking, somewhat aimlessly, from one beer stand to the next.  Liming around and sporting it up (hanging out and drinking/partying).   For some I think its a Pavlov's dog's response.  They see large speakers, hear insanely loud music and start to feel the need to walk the streets and drink.  I don't know, maybe I need to get some funding for an experiment.

In the top picture, you see Ramzan and what he learned from his study.  This is the man who we have been slowly explaining the issue of Universal Sovereignty.  Well, if you look closely at the picture he has drawn that he will support Jehovah's rule and not Satan's.  And yes, that is Satan on the your right side of the paper, not Yoda. ( UMMM, rule universe will I.) He may not understand all the details, but he gets the point.

The other picture is of our sign language class.  Or, as we refer to it 'informally teaching sign language to some friends from the hall.'  Nothing official.  Starting from the left and going right, we have Roxy and Mary.  Now they are supposed to be doing the sign for Satan.  Where the learned the sign they are doing beats me.  Both at the same time, like they had been practicing, made horns with both hands.  The class has been really fun.  A good reason to get together, laugh and eat some good food.  The best things in life!

The Guyanese word of the day:  sleeping officer.  Translation: speed bump.  The first time I heard a brother use that expression I was looking around for a police officer asleep.  The brother noticed me looking around and asked, "isn't that what you call them at home?"  I responded, "yes, or sleeping police."  Another brother then explained what it means.  They all got a good laugh.

Love,
G&J

You only eat sandwich's!

Hello everyone,

How are things?  Jaide and I are doing good.  Last Sunday, we had our full sign language meeting.  There was 55 in attendance, 25 deaf.  We only managed to get 3 deaf from our side of the river to go.  As usual, we hired a private bus to take us.  This time we hired Rafeek, aka tall boy ( He is the Muslim man who knows 5 deaf that he is supposed to help us meet).  After we picked up everyone that were going, there was still empty seats.  Rafeek looks at me, shakes his head ands says, "Graems, next time tell me what this is for and I will fill this bus with deaf and blind!"  I appreciate his zeal.  Man, can he talk.  Oh, my favorite moment was when he told us, "white people don't cook, all you eat are sandwiches."  We explained that we like to cook, in fact we even cook Guyanese food.  That was the funniest concept in the world to him, he just kept laughing at us cooking curry and roti.  He said he was going to come by our house and teach us how to cook Guyanese.

How do you explain the issue of Universal Sovereignty to some one with a very limited sign language vocabulary?  That was the the dilemma we faced on Ramzan's study this week.  The hardest part was explaining what a challenge is.  To illustrate what a challenge is I drew a picture of a woman cooking, and a boy.  I explained that the woman is a very good cook, but the small boy comes up and tells the woman she is a bad cook and that he is a excellent cook.  What does the woman do?  Slap the kid?  No, she says, "okay, you go ahead and cook some food and I will cook some food, give it to people and see what they say.  Then, we will know who is a good cook."  Both cook, once finished they give their food to people. The woman's food everyone loves.  The boys is disgusting, it makes people sick.  Proof, the woman was right.  After, drawing and explaining that, I drew the same picture but with Jehovah and Satan.  Not cooking, but ruling the world.  Then I showed a picture of what Satan world looks like.  Followed by a picture of what the earth will look like under Jehovah's Kingdom.  I think he is starting to understand.  Next week we will work on it some more.

The cutest thing is trying to watch Mukesh do the sign for Jehovah.  You see,  he can't make the handshape to sign a J.  To sign the letter J, you make a fist, and leave your pinky sticking up, than draw a shape of the letter J.  Mukesh has to take his other hand and hold down all his fingers except his pinky finger, than draw the J.  The H he has no problem with.

Guyanese word of the day:  Plait.  You don't braid your hair, you plait your hair.

Love,
G&J

The casserole that united two countries.

Hello Everyone,
How are you doing?  We are doing good.  Today, Don and Jodee are leaving.  To quote one of the greatest movies of all time, "Muppets take Manhatten", in the song "Saying Goodbye", Scooter sums up how we feel,  "Saying goodbye, why is it sad?  Makes us remember the good times we've had.   Much more to say, foolish to try.  Its time to say goodbye."  We have had a blast with them.  The deaf and the Congregation will miss them both.  But, most of all I will miss Don's casserole (mashed potatoes, hotdogs, mashed potatoes, topped with a scrumptious layer of fake cheese. Sorry, Don, for giving away your secrets).   His casserole will be spoken of here in Guyana for years to come.  It was a smash hit among the local friends. Thanks for coming guys!

This week was great in the ministry.  It is nice to see the Bible students making progress, and starting to understand more.  Tuesday, on Ramzan's study, Don and I had to try to explain what sin is.  How do you explain what is sin is to someone with no concept of it?  That is what we were thinking.  Thankfully, Ramzan has a decent sign language vocabulary and knows right and wrong, good and bad.  After showing pictures of bad actions, and drawing a picture of a bullseye and a man shooting an arrow.  If he hits the center thats perfect, if he misses that is sin.  After much explaining, here comes the test.  We showed him a picture of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, before the rebelled, and asked "do they sin?"  He answered, "no."  We showed a picture of them after the rebellion and he said, "sin, health deteriorate, die."  That one paragraph took a better part of an hour.  We were exhausted but at the same time thrilled.

Pet of the week:  mostly pre-plucked chicken.  It greatly reduces the amount of time it takes to pluck the feathers before cooking.  Just one look at this beautiful specimen and you start dreaming of chicken nuggets or bbq wings.  If interested in adopting this mouth watering fowl,  please let us know.

Guyanese word of the day: learned me.  Translation: teach.  In a sentence it would go,  "She learned me good." Have fun with it.

Love,
G&J

Fattup!

Mukesh

Hello Everyone,
How is it going? I hope well. We are doing good, thanks for asking. I know I have discussed the music you hear in Guyana before, but I must do it again. You see, life in Guyana is filled with music, at all hours of the day. From sunrise to late into the night you hear all sorts of music. Now, today I am going to discuss the wonderful habit of playing the same song over and over and over and over and over again. No joke, some play the same song for hours. Sometimes its Indian music, sometimes Christian music and sometimes bad R&B. Over and over and over, as loud as they can. AHHHHHHH!

If any animal lovers would like to come to Guyana, beware!! Dogs roam the street with all varieties of ticks and fleas and I'm sure if any other parasitic creature can make a home on a mangy dog, it does here. Then the dog tries to help himself by eating or scratching all its hair off. The product is seen at left. Does anyone want a Guyanese hairless mut?? I'm sure he'll fit in our suitcase and won't shed too much. Perfect for those with pet dander allergies! Let us know.

A few months ago we met a little boy, named Mukesh. His mother called out for him to come meet us.  First, I thought, 'Why is she calling to her deaf child. I hate when people do that.'  Turns out, he can hear, but cannot speak.  He has invented some of his own signs for things, like food, water, and fish.  As we arrive for his study, he always jumps out of the house with a big grin, smelling of coconut oil, which his brother has slathered all over his freshly washed head.  I love when the students bathe for their lessons. We love a fresh smelling student! Anyways, we are studying the Bible Stories book with him. We teach him a few signs, then read him the lesson. When he listens to the story, his job is to sign the words he knows. He looks up with the biggest brown eyes that could make you melt and shyly and slowly starts the sign, looking for our approval. He always remembers the sign for lion. I think he loves to make a big roaring face.  Then we help him to draw and write his name.  His mother always thanks us with a cold drink and a snack.

Guyanese word of the day: fattup.  Meaning:  to gain weight.  This week we went to a family's house for dinner and the mother told us, "Graem and Jaide, come to my house and eat and you will fattup."

Love,
G&J

Don and his trusty camel

Toannia and her son at their first meeting

Hello Everyone,

Whats going on? We are doing good.  You want to know what the best thing in the world is?  Hammock time.  There is not much better in life than a nice piece of afternoon hammock time.  A cool breeze blowing, slipping in and out of sleep, listening to the sounds of the neighbors.  Its the best!  We are most definitely bringing our hammocks home with us.

This week we added up how many deaf on our side of the river we have met since we arrived in August. 24 new deaf, hard of hearing or mute persons have been found!  In Guyana there is a surprising amount of people who can hear but can't speak.  We will soon be up to 29 new deaf.  A Muslim man we met knows 5 deaf and is arranging for us to meet them all at his house.  We have still have many villages to go to and search for more deaf.


Has your Bible student ever said or done something that made you think "Where did I go wrong? Am I that bad of a teacher?" Well this week, it happened to both of us. Toannia is hard of hearing and is learning signs. Recently a DVD signed 'Priest', so Jaide showed her a picture and taught her the sign. After a Brother, the Circuit Overseer, visited for a talk, she signed "the Priest has a big Bible". Jehovah's Witnesses don't use titles, so  now we have to teach her that we taught you that sign but don't use it here. Is that confusing enough?

Haresh's brothers

Today, at meeting Graem was sitting with Haresh, when he started to get a little antsy as young boys naturally do.  So, Graem decided to have him start drawing each Bibe character as we talked about them, then have him write their name under them.  On the top of the page he, then wrote his name, "Haresh".  A couple lines down he took a word from the yeartext on the wall, "endures".  Finally, from the book "Sing to Jehovah", he wrote "Jehovah."  Put those words together and he just wrote the sentence, "Haresh endures Jehovah."  Is he trying to tell us something? Man, our interpreting must REALLY be bad!

Guyanese word of the day; longwata. translation; when you make your curry dish stretch to feed all your hungry kids and the gravy pools to the bottom of your rice like water (wata). Not nice. Not tick (thick).

Thanks for listening,

Love,

J&G

Where's the toilet?

Our new and improved bbq

Hello everyone,

How are things? Jaide and I are both sick right now. Some sort of stomach virus. The worst part is that this weekend is our 2 day Assembly. I am missing both days and Jaide is missing today. We had an interview yesterday that Jaide ended up doing both parts, mine and hers. Also, I was scheduled for a busy day of interpreting yesterday, including a talk about the wild beast from Revelation. But I had to cancel. I had spent so much time on translating scriptures from Revelation into sign language, I had my wild beast face down and everything. Blurg!

We have found that an effective way of teaching here is acting. This really works with the children we study with. Before watching the DVD, we will act out the story, teaching them a few new signs while acting. Also getting them involved in the acting, giving them one of the characters in the story. After that we watch the DVD. Doing this seems to help them learn more and keeps their attention. Well, Don and I with the help Haresh (the Bible student), acted out the bible story of Issac gets a good wife. Haresh played the part of Abraham's servant who goes looking for a good wife, I played the part of a camel and Issac and Don, well Don did he best imitation of Rebekah. Complete with batting his eye lashes and giggling. Haresh cracked up! He thought Don's portrayal of a woman was the best. For the rest of the study, he would look at Don and start laughing and copy things Don had done as Rebekah. The best part is he got the story.

We had our Pioneer day last Friday (a pioneer being one of Jehovah's Witnesses who is in the ministry full time). It was great! Whats really encouraging about pioneer day here in Guyana is that at the meeting besides regular pioneers, you have special pioneers and missionaries. There was 152 in attendance. The singing of songs were amazing. I have never heard sing like that before. Powerful!

The ministry continues to be great. We keep meeting more new deaf. Thursday we met a hard of hearing girl. I can't tell you how many times we have passed her house, never knowing she lived there. It wasn't until we met a lady in the next village down who gave us detailed instructions on which house to go to that we meet her.

A game of spoons

The rain is about to hit

That same day we discovered a new "restaurant." I got chicken curry and Dal puri ( its like an Indian tortilla with a layer of smashed split peas) for $1. It was delicious. Jaide and Don ordered channa, a dish made with chick peas and spices.  Don got his first and started eating, Jodee taking a couple bites as well.  The woman brings Jaide her plate and Jodee asked what kind of meat is in it.  Mind you, normally channa has no meat in it.  The woman responds, "no meat, liver and gizzards."  I instantly look at Jaide, I realize she didn't hear the woman.  What do I do?  Tell her or just let her go ahead and eat it.  Jaide asks," what did she say?"  I stay silent, Jodee answers, "liver and gizzards."  I have never seen Jaide move so fast and decisively.  She grabs the roti which the channa is sitting in and yanks it out from under the channa like a table cloth from off the table with all the dishes and silverware remaining.  Jaide just won't eat the "trash can of the body."   Jaide and Jodee really needed a bathroom so they asked if there was a washroom. The women said yes and lead them out back. This is where Jaide will take over writing.

The woman points to a small wood structure. I figured we would have to use an outhouse, but when I opened the door, I was shocked to see that there was nothing inside. 'Is this the right place', I thought, 'where's the toilet?'. Then I noticed toilet paper in one opening in the wood. The whole room is the toilet. Let's just say, I washed my shoes when I got home.

Love,
G&J

Get a Passion!

Sharda & Jodee

Graem and Don were missing the thrill of BBQ'ing meat, so they used their best ingenuity to construct this lovely piece of work. I have no idea what exactly is making up this marvel of design, but it sure made some delicious grilled eggplant (called boulangie, here in Guyana).  Good thing we had that too, because while they were manly trying to build a fire, JoDee didn't realize their plan and cooked the meat on the stove. Oops, next time we'll use the BBQ. The meat was still good, JoDee!

In a foreign country, of course, there are many new customs  and we hope that we don't make too many mistakes trying to figure it all out.  Sometimes we fail. Don's first day here, he went to Haresh's Bible study. His family is Hindu.  Don noticed a small house-like structure in their front yard, and innocently asked Haresh's dad, "Is this the kid's play house?" He got real close to Don's face, touched his shoulder and answered "No, this is where we pray."  Thankfully I don't think he was too offended because he didn't kick them off the property and still hospitably made us garumba (I don't know how to spell it and those I asked, didn't know either), a spicy jam made from mangoes. Also delicious.  I told a sister that we put it on french toast. She laughed. Ahhh, probably another cultural faux pas.


Monday, we visited the Branch Office of Jehovah's Witnesses. Thankfully we arrived in one piece, even though, our driver saw this as a chance to practice for nascar. If we did crash, we would see you all in Paradise (no seat belts here!).  Anyways, as you can see we are all safe. Once we arrived, we met brothers and sisters from Chile, England and Suriname. The couple from Chile, Fernando and Cindi, have only been married for 7 months and don't speak much English. But, here they are, willing to help out where there is a need for those to preach. Funny too, they know my friends in Chile. Small world.

The Brothers and Sisters are busy here in Guyana. We learned about the many isolated groups. In one area, there is one sister conducting all the meetings. The Branch showed us the radio they use to contact some the friends in the interior that don't have phones.  It is encouraging to hear though, that the traveling overseers try to visit every group in the interior, even if it is only one Witness. One area in the interior, Baramita, speaks Carib.  It was not a written language, until the Witnesses got ahold of it. They have translated "God's Friend" and "Would You Like to Know the Truth".  Now, they are busy teaching people how to read their own language. You can imagine their disbelief to finally see their language in print.

Brother Hinds with a Carib brochure

We miss you all,

Keep in touch,

Guyanese expression of the day: "get a passion". Translation: "get angry."

J&G

Her own little prison

Black Caimen

Hello Everyone,

How are you doing?  We are doing good.  Don and Jodee Cabral arrived on Friday.  We are excited to have them here for 6 weeks.  And in typical fashion, Don gave the talk on Sunday and we had him start teaching some friends sign language on Sunday night. Right to work.  Welcome to Guyana Cabrals!

Last Wednesday we meet 4 hard of hearing people.  They are all family.  We will start studying with them this week.  Yesterday, we meet 3 more new deaf, both of which are going to start studying as well.  So many deaf we are meeting.  There seems to be clusters.  One village may have one, two, but the next village has many.  Some live all in the same neighborhood.  Strange.

Sunday, Jaide accidentally locked herself into our room.  You see if you close our bedroom door all the way you can't open it up.  I was not home and Don & Jodee had to leave to get to meeting because Don was giving the talk.  Jaide was alone in her own little prison.  Don't worry, she had water and things to read.  I had locked myself in the room before and figured out how to get out.  So I was trying my best to explain to Jaide over the cell phone as I was riding in a bus, how to take the door knob apart.  I can only imagine what the other passengers were thinking. Over and over I would say the same thing to Jaide.  You see, my ability to explain clearly what Jaide needed to do was lacking.  I could see it clearly in my minds eye, but to explain it, well that was another thing.  Finally, Jaide figured it out and sprung herself.  Now our room has no door knob.

Word of the day next time

Love,
G&J

Weekday market

Welcome in Suriname!

Pappi and Seloch at a Javanese Resturant

Meet Jack the monkey

Hello Everyone!

How are things?  We are doing great!  We went to Suriname this week.  They speak Dutch.  What a crazy sounding language! We tried to learn to speak a few words, but quickly figured out we should stick to sign language.  And everyone wears wooden clogs and all the women are blonde with braids.  That's all the stereotypes I have for the Dutch, now I can continue.

Before we went to Suriname, we spent a couple days with a Missionary couple, Brian and Shannon Geraghty, in Skeldon.  What a blast we had with them. They were so generous and encouraging.  Plus, staying at their house was a treat for us.  They have bug screens on the windows!  The bites on our legs even started to heal.  The bed was perfectly flat, not bowing in the center like our bed at home.  AHH, being forced to snuggle in hot tropical weather...priceless.  Another bonus was meeting their neighbor, Jack the monkey.  He had so much personality.  It was a treat to see how Missionaries live and pick their brain about what they learned at Watchtower Bible School of Gilead.  Awesome time!

After that, it was on to Suriname.  We had heard that once the boat arrives in Suriname, all the passengers gather up at the end of the boat, ready to exit.  And as soon as the gate opens, people run for immigration, pushing, cutting and stiff arming.  We were told that unless we want to wait in line for hours, we had to do the same.  So the time had come for us to show our athletic ability in sprinting for the immigration office.  I had the suit case and Jaide, well she was armed with her umbrella.  We all smashed up against the end of the boat like a bunch of cattle.  Then up the gate opened, and off we went like a bullet out of a gun.  Well, kind of.  It turns out only a few people actually run. I do feel sorry for spinning in circles like a helicopter with the suitcase leveling people, allowing Jaide to get a good start.  They will laugh about it some day.  We got through immigration and customs with no problems.  We spent the next two days a very sweet couple, Pappy and Seloch. They treated us like we were their kids. Seloch always said, "You don't worry. Your Mama will take care of you." Their faith in Jehovah caring for them was amazing.  They don't have much, but they will give you what they have.  Both so happy living simply and serving Jehovah , knowing he will care for them.

Suriname looks a lot like Guyana.  It has better infrastructure and is more clean, quiet and generally calmer.  The people are also more diverse.  You have the Surinamese, Chinese, Javanese, Guyanese and some from Holland.  By the way, Javanese food was delicious.

Hi!  Jaide here. I write this as I sip wine paired with sea salt chocolate. Yes you heard correctly. Sometimes we enjoy the finer things of life.  Travis discovered a shop that sells chocolate from Canada for $1.  It's delicious.  This bar is a bit old, but who's complaining? Not me.  And the wine? A little treat from the duty free shop in Suriname.

Tonight I made hummus. As I poured a can of chickpeas into the blender, I gasped as something jumped out! A frog. Better than a cockroach or tarantula, right? I was motionless as I thought, "Where did he come from? Can he live in can?" I should have acted sooner, because he then jumped onto my freshly made sada roti (it's a lot like pita bread, great for hummus).  After I disinfected everything and tried to clean off as much frog juice from our dinner, I was just thankful that I didn't blend that poor thing into my chickpeas.  I could imagine myself trying to figure out where the extra spice came from. Well, hey its not as bad as grabbing a drowned mouse out of your washing machine like my sister did.  FYI, if you don't have tahini for your hummus, a peanut butter does the trick, or I guess you could try a little frog.

To end, we provide the Guyanese word of the day, "fine." If a girl walks up to you and says, "You're looking fine!", she doesn't mean to hit on you. It means you need to eat some food. You're skinny.

Love you all,

J&G

On the boat to Suriname

Squatty boy, down so!

Our home (pic we had saved on pc)

Hey Everyone,

How is it going?  We are doing good.  We did run out of water for a day. Try to imagine a house with 4 sweaty people and no flushing toilet.  It's even more scary we you discover no water after 2 cups of coffee, some prune juice, papaya and a bran muffin. I have made a horrible decision.  I knew we needed to fill our water tank on Wednesday, but we had a long day in the ministry, then we cooked dinner.  By the time we were all through I figured we would be fine until the morning.  (Our water comes from a 480 gallon water tank that is on our roof.  The water in the house is gravity fed from that tank.  To fill that tank we have to attach a water pump to a pipe in the yard and a pipe that runs into the tank.  Turn on the valve on the pipe in the yard and let the water flow.)  Well, sometimes the water is turned off.  We normally have water available to pump in the mornings for a few hours and in the late afternoons for a few hours.  Thursday morning, I went to pump water and nothing came out.  No problem I thought, it should come on later.  Nope.  We made it through Thursday okay with the water left in the tank.  By Friday morning we were out.  No agua for us.  That means no flushing of the toilet, washing dishes, washing hands or showering.  Thank goodness the water came on about 5:30 that evening and we were able to pump water again.  I am so happy  to have a operational toilet again!  I was kidding about the prune juice, papaya and bran muffin.  Scary enough with just coffee.

Wednesday, we meet another new deaf boy/man.  I don't know, what do you call someone that is 18?  We had been asking the neighbors in the area if they knew anyone deaf and many responded, "yes.  Squatty boy down so."  Or, "fat boy.  He is young, but looks like a man.", while they puff out their arms just to make sure you know what fat means (not to be confused with "big", which means older.  Excited to see what a squatty boy looks like, we went to the house we were told he lives.  There he was, squatty boy.  Squatty means just how it sounds.  Not too tall and thick.  Some friends will go by him this Wednesday to start studying with him.

We also had our first study with another new deaf man, Dennis, we meet last week.  I am going to love this study!  He doesn't know ASL, but is very good at communicating.  Sometimes, he even gets it when I ask him a question.  Its funny, he doesn't want to use some of the signs we try to teach him.  If he has a sign for something already and we show him the ASL sign for it, ask him to sign it, he just looks at us like we are crazy and signs it his way.  His signs are pretty clear, and he does use some of the signs we teach him.  But most importantly, he understands the points from the Bible we teach him.

Guyanese word of the day: Manish.  No, it is not used in describing a manly woman.  It means mischievous.  "That boy is manish!"  Or you could say: "That boy is disgusting!"  Which also means mischievous.  Feel free to use these sayings liberally.   Oh, on a side note, the squatty boy we meet this week, Dennis (the deaf man mentioned above), told me that he is disgusting.

Love,
G&J

BOOOM! goes the bottle

Hello Everyone,

How are things?  This week has been very busy.  It started Monday with a trip to Georgetown, or "town", as it is known here.  We were a bit nervous to roam around the place by ourselves, but it had to be done. We had to go to the Suriname Embassy to get visas for our upcoming trip to Suriname. That whole process was surprisingly simple.  While we were there, we treated ourselves to some of the nicer things "town" offers.  You see, in Georgetown, you can find places and things that remind you of home.  A lot of businesses and restaurants are air conditioned.  They even have a mall.  It is identical to the Galleria mall in Roseville.  Granite floors, Miley Cyrus blasting and expensive stores.  The expensive store was O Navy Store.  Not Old Navy, O Navy.  True they had mainly Old Navy clothes, but at three times the cost as in the states.  (And if you didn't know, I was being sarcastic about the mall being the same as the Galleria.)  We went to the Oasis Cafe for lunch.  It feels like a coffee shop back home.  It has a coffee bar, offering cappuccinos and other drinks and pastries.  There were a  ton of white people eating and hanging out using the free wi-fi. The food was okay.  Jaide thoroughly enjoyed her cappuccino, but the best was the passion fruit cheesecake.  It was so incredibly wonderful!  Somehow they made the passion fruit seeds edible.  After that, we went to Nigel's Supermarket, which seems to cater to the foreigners living in Guyana.  The store has more things that we have in the states, but you're going to pay for it.  The highlight of the trip to Nigel's was that we got sour cream.  OH MAN!  Did it make our burritos mind blowing!  After that, we picked up our visas and headed home.  A successful trip to "town", with no problems.  So we thought.  Then we discovered that our camera had been stolen in "town."  BLERG!  Thus the no pictures on the blog. So you have to use your mind's eye to see us madly devouring a cheesecake.

We also have some guests staying with us for a little bit right now.  A really fun and nice couple, Travis & Kristin Winzel.  They are from Spokane, Washington.  They found out the evening before they were coming to Rosignol, that the house they were planning on renting ended up not working out.  So, they are staying with us until they find a place. We've been having fun playing games and sharing the cooking.  Also, Travis found some delicious chocolate and can make homemade Bailey's.

Yesterday, we went with a group of us went by truck to an area that Jehovah's Witnesses are not able to visit very often.  All together, there was 41 of us.  You can imagine the people's faces as they see a cane-cutting truck pull up with 41 well dressed men, women, and children, instead of 60 smelly cane cutters smashed into it. We were separated into 4 teams and dropped in different areas and went to work.  The goal was to get to all the houses in our area, share a brief scripture and leave a Watchtower and Awake magazine. If someone wanted to know more, or had questions, we would take down their name and give it to the Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses that is closest to them.  It was super hot, but a fun, albeit confusing day. You can imagine trying to organize 41 people.

Also yesterday, I almost had a bottle blow up in my face.  I was burning our trash pile and I threw an empty bottle on it.  It had been on the coals for a few minutes when I bent down to grab a stick about two feet away from the fire and, BOOOM!  The bottle exploded. I felt the pressure from the explosion in my ear, felt dazed immediately and heard pieces hitting things all around me, including landing on the roof of our house, which is a good 40 feet away and two stories high.  Jaide's first thought was "Oh no, his beautiful face!" Thankfully I did not get hit. Dazed and confused, yes.  Hit, no. Happily, we amused the neighbor, who gave  me a enormous shout out of appreciation for the loud explosion.

Back by popular demand, Guyanese word of the day.  Todays word: Bad. It can be used to mean good and bad.  Its not like how sometimes we use bad to mean something is cool.  Here is a example:  "The wind is strong bad", "your talk was good bad", " he is funny bad." I hope you all start adding this new meaning to your vocabulary.

Love,
G&J

Guy Expo

Mario and his picture of the Garden of Eden

Hello Everyone,

Hows it going?  I can't believe it has been 2 months since we got here. Crazy!  

This has been a great week in the ministry.  We meet 3 new deaf on Wednesday and 1 today.  Today, it was by accident.  We knew a deaf woman lived over in this area.  We thought we were on the right street, so we asked a passing man if there was anyone deaf that lived on this street.  Turns out his brother is deaf and blind. We went over and meet him.  He is in his 30's or 40's.  He went blind two years ago because of diabetes.  Talk about feeling unequipped.  How do you teach someone who is blind and deaf?  Okay, actually he is hard of hearing.  If you talk really loud he can hear you, if you're Guyanese.  But over time its only going to deteriorate more.  We struggle with how to teach seeing deaf individuals sign language.  Where do we even start?  I felt bad for the man, just sitting there in a chair.  His sister-in-law would shake him to get his attention.  He has no idea what she wants.  Jaide puts her hand in his and he reacts in shock.  "Who is that?", he asks in fear.  He feels her hand again, then reachs out and feels Jaide's head.  A smile comes over his face and he says, " a girl.  How old are you?"  Jaide shouts back, "27."  Next she has him feel her wedding ring, meet me and feel my wedding ring.  We don't want him getting any ideas.  Then we demonstrated how to tactile sign in his hands.  We will see what happens with him.  All our Bible students are doing really good.  We have almost learned the best way to teach each of them.  They all vary in abilities to sign, communicate and understand.  But, they all are making  good progress.

Last Sunday, we went to Guy Expo 2010.  No it is not an expo to meet single men.  Its like Guyana's state fair.  People selling their goods, loud music, food and tons of people.  We went with a group of Jehovah's Witnesses.  I will be honest, Jaide and I were hoping for some delicious food.  Maybe something from another country.  Well, there wasn't too many food stands from other countries, unless you count Pizza Hut as Italian.  I did get some good sweet and sour chicken fried rice.  One thing we have learned about Guyanese culture is that personal space doesn't mean that much.  If you are trying to get through a crowd, you  are going to have people all up in your business.  Pushing, shoving and staring.  Some people push ahead of you even if there is nowhere to go.  It was a late night, we didn't get back from Georgetown until after midnight.  That made for a really early morning.  You see our neighbors are up around 4 am, cooking and bathing.  It wouldn't be so bad if the man next door didn't have a chronic phlegm condition that he tries to clear up every morning. Hacking and spiting in the wee morning light.  Ah. Stop smoking!

Lunch at Kevin's Cane Juice stand

Love,
G&J

Married Man Pork

Full Sign Language meeting

Haresh

Hello world,

Guess what? It's me, Jaide. I wanted to let you know that I'm still alive. Surprisingly, the mosquitoes haven't sucked all my blood yet.  I may not be as comical as my other half, but here it goes.  Graem does want to add, "What's up cyber buddies!!!?"

During our many young deaf  boy Bible studies, we try our best to keep their little minds learning, which isn't easy, given their one minute attention spans.  Many don't go to school or don't have big people waving their hands in front of their faces trying to teach them Bible subjects very often. The expression "boys will be boys", suddenly takes on new meaning for me, especially since I grew up as one of three very well behaved girls that never got dirty or caused any sort of ruckus.  We better do something fun fast or their little eyes gaze longingly over at their brothers and sisters playing, or they madly flip through books, asking what each picture is. Sometimes they just ask for clay, which we try to reserve for teaching the concept of making something.

 Mark is improving. When Jehovah's Witnesses first started going to him, he couldn't hold a pencil to write (he seems to have mild cerebral palsy). Now we teach him a story by using the signs he knows, asking him to draw each character and what they do.  He's so cute, laughing the whole time. As soon as we're finished, he's off madly riding his bicycle, trying new tricks.

Haresh was starting to get bored, so Graem stood up and enthusiastically is his best ASL, acted out  an evil snake talking, Eve eating fruit, coercing Adam into joining her, and then angels with swords casting them out of the garden to a life of grueling work in the sun. Haresh's face was priceless, like he was watching an action packed movie with all the suspense that this dramatic story entails. If you have ever seen Graem really excited about something, his face can go out of control. He's perfect for sign. Sorry hon, your English talks are just not the same.  We finished up Haresh's study by teaching colors. I have flash cards with colors painted on them. We got  his friend and sister involved and made a little game out of it. Competition also helps. When we were all finished, Haresh gathered up all the cards, but wouldn't hand them to me. "Oh great", I thought, "another battle over who has the upper hand is this relationship."  But then, I was surprised as he came over, shook my hand as he handed me my cards, turned and gave Graem a big grin. Maybe he was hoping that he graduated from learning his colors.

Mark

One benefit of moving to another country, is that I'm learning new foods and new words.  At the market, one can buy married man pork for 30 cents. What is this you ask? No it is not bacon with a ring or your wife's pot roast. It is...drum roll please....basil. Good old basil. It's the other other white meat. It's delicious with pasta.

Love,

J (&G)

Battle: Ticks

Cooking dinner during black out

Eion

Hello Everyone,

The battle lines had been drawn.  It was either us or them, and we ain't going any where.  Who was the enemy?  Ticks.  The source: The stray dog that hung around our house.  In his life of rooting through trash and rolling in weeds, the dog picked up ticks.  The ticks then spread to all around under our house.  You see, the ticks would feed until they are fat, fall off, lay some eggs, rest or do whatever it is ticks like to do, then reattach to the dog.  The cycle kept going and going.  Under our house and on our stairs are perfect breeding grounds for ticks.  Lots of pilers to climb up on, cracks and crevices to climb into and birth baby ticks. . . by the thousands.  I say no more!  I have unleashed an all out assault to annihilate the ticks from our house.  First: remove the source.  Done; no more dog.  He had a good run.  He served his purpose. I had to take a page from the ancient Israelites in getting rid of the dog.  "You stoned him?", you ask.  No, he was unclean so he is not allowed in the camp aka our property.  Second: destroy the enemy.  I have sprayed some poison.  Today, I thoroughly cleaned under the house and sprayed any cluster of ticks that I would find with bug spray.  So far no tick bites, but plenty of other bug bites.  I am so itchy!  What's that on my foot?

Yesterday, we had our full Sign Language meeting in New Amsterdam. There were 7 deaf from our side of the river that went with us.  All together 63 people at meeting, 30 deaf.  To get the deaf from our side of the river to meeting took a lot of planning, phone calls and negotiating.  It was pretty exhausting.  After all that, it was completely worth it.  We walked in with the deaf from around here and everyone was so excited.  Their faces lit up as they ran over to greet the deaf.  For some of them, this is their first time coming to a Sign Language meeting.  The friends were so happy to see the good turnout.  This was the first meeting for one woman who came with us.  She is Muslim, so her family was not always happy with her studying and were against her going to meeting.  But she is, as they say here "a big person", which means an adult with kids of her own.  She can decide for herself, and she loves studying and learning.  Even though she is learning ASL during the study, her home sign is very clear.  She is good at communicating.  I think it helps that her brother is deaf and another deaf man is friends with them, so she has developed good communication skills.

One last funny thing we have learned.  Here in Guyana, and apparently in England, they pronounce Z "zed".  One day we asked a boy how he spelled his name.  His name is Wizim,  "W-I-ZED-I-M."  Jaide and I both stared at him in confusion.  "Again," we asked.  "W-I-ZED-I-M."  We stopped asking him and just assumed he didn't know how to spell. When Jaide asked him, "What is zed?", he just stared back blankly.  Fast forward to this week, we are on a study and the girl's Grandma is helping her with the sign language alphabet and when she comes to Z, she says "zed".  We asked some friends and they said that is how they learned to pronounce Z.  A mother and daughter from England said they say it the same in England.  So I guess here we should say "we are catching some ZEDs".  Get it?  Because Z's are pronounce ZED.

Love,
G&J

Rick Roll'd

Our Kingdom Hall

 Hello Everyone,

How are you doing?  We are doing pretty good.  
Something I find funny here in Guyana is the range of music you hear.  You do hear a lot of reggae/Caribbean music, and most of that is just irritating.  Awful voices, lame lyrics and DJ's that interrupt the song, not to sing or remix it, but just to repeat the last line.  Spoken word.  Anyways, sometimes you will hear someone playing R&B, Celine Dion, Garth Brooks, Justin Bieber, Fresh Prince, Phil Collins (you hear a lot of old PC) and others.  But today I heard a song that really surprised me.  Rick Astley's "Never gonna give you up."  I thought I had been Rick roll'd.  But no, just someone loved the deep voice of the thin, red headed man that looks like he is 14 years old and his 1987 hit.  If you don't know what it means to be Rick roll'd, you can look it up on line.  Check out his amazing dance moves for yourself.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOU8GIRUd_g.  And, later when we passed the house again they were blasting ABBA.

Today, we visited Eion.  He is a young deaf boy.  Eion is a fun study.  He is next to impossible to get him into a conversation or respond to any question.  He just stares at you, fingers in mouth and baby powder all over his body.   This makes it hard to gauge how much he is learning or understands.  We start doing real basic things,  next thing you know he is signing something that we taught him weeks ago.  He is so smart and soaks it up like a sponge and doesn't forget it.  The problem is he doesn't use it.  Unless we are pointing at something and asking him what, he doesn't sign.  But if you teach him a point from the Bible and all the signs with that point, he will remember it.  He also recently started going to school.  A mainstream school with no interpreters.  We will see how well he does. 

Things I learned this week:  in Guyana, if you find a dead body do not call the police.  They will arrest you for the murder.  Makes sense, right?  There is a dead person, you found the body, that means you must have killed him and put him there.  Off to jail you go.  Brilliant!  Great police work!

Love,
G&J

A Minibus ride with our Brothers & Sisters

Do you like cricket?

Girl doing the sign for Jesus

Hello Everyone,

How is everyone doing?  Has the weather started to change back  home?  My last post, I said it had been crazy hot. But, it actually cooled down.  One night it stormed like crazy.  The noise from the rain hitting the zinc resembles the crinkling of a chip bag, as you dig around the bottom trying to find the last little niblets.  But, much more loud and powerful.  Actually, that morning I was a little chilled in bed.  I needed to get under the sheet to keep warm from that oh so chilly Guyana morning. The cooler temperature lasted a couple of days.  Now its back to melt you into the ground hot.

Yesterday, we had 3 deaf at meeting.  Urijah, Haresh and Jamol.  3 boys.  Jamol, feel fast asleep.  I could not wake him.  Either he is the deepest sleeper I know or he was ignoring me.  Urijah and Haresh needed more attention to help them behave good at meeting.  Neither of them go to school, or really any where that they need to sit down quietly for any length of time.  Its more like interpreting/baby sitting/life skills teaching. It was . . . fun.  They both were good.  Urijah did better at sitting and paying attention to the signing.  It was funny, when Haresh was not looking, Urijah would tell me that he, Haresh, was bad.  The best is when he was about to tell me again that Haresh is bad, when Haresh looked over at him.  Urijah froze.  Hand still on his chin about to flip away and down, what was he to do?  Like a seasoned pro, he just pulled one of those 'I am just stretching awkwardly' moves.

After the meeting, we went out in the ministry to visit a boy and a woman.  Both deaf.  The woman, Indi, was at her sister's house.  While we were there, out walks this guy.  This dude was clearly drunk.  Oh how I love to talk to drunk guys.  The aroma wafting from him, the incoherent speech, the honesty and yes, the touching.  First, he wanted to know if I like cricket, the sport.  Of course, I don't.  After a titillating conversation about cricket and why its important for me to watch, I thought our conversation may be finished.  Nope, now he moved on to confessions.  Also, he moved a whole lot closer to me.  He told me, " I drink rum."  Thank you captain obvious!  He also curses.  The best was when he asked if it is wrong to drink.  I told him, "the Bible does not say that. Drinking alcohol is fine.  But, the Bible says getting drunk is not."  His response, "if you drink you must get drunk."  I tried to reason with him on that point.  Then I realized, 'oh yeah, he's drunk."  Anyways, he says he will bring his family by the Kingdom Hall one day.  He reasoned that if I come visit him in his home, the least he could do is come by the meeting.  I made him promise not to start drinking until after the meeting.

Love,

Dinner
(no animals were hurt in the making of this blog)

G&J  

Macarena

Hey Macarena!

Wizem and Errol doing the sign for monkey

Hello everyone,

How are you doing?  We are both doing fine. Monday, is our day "off."  We do chores around the house and laundry.  We decided to shoot across the river to New Amsterdam to buy a few items that we couldn't find over here.  Everything was going great. We got most of the things we needed, including amazing soft serve ice cream that is served in an air conditioned building.  I know, living the high life.  We were all finished and headed to the area where you catch a bus to go back to Rosignol.  We waited an hour and a half to get on a stupid bus.  Literally, I can see the town we live in across the river from where we were.  It is a ten minute bus ride.  But everyday, the bridge going across the river is closed to traffic to allow big boats to pass through.  So what happened is a large crowd, including us, formed waiting to catch a bus.  This is not an orderly affair.  Once the buses started coming, people were running for them, opening the door as the bus is still driving and jumping in.  People pushing and shoving.  We waited a while to allow the crazy folks to go first.  I had just told Jaide its time to put our manners away and stick our elbows out, start swinging and go for it, when a man who is trying to organize things calls to us, "brother, come."  I don't know if you know this, but we stick out in Guyana.  As people everyday tell us, or should I say call us "white boy" and "white girl." Well, us getting selected out of the group, didn't sit so well with some people in the crowd (mind you, we had been waiting much longer than them). They started making comments about "white folk" getting special treatment and such. This provoked a riot in which the turned the bus over and lite it on fire.  Ok, the last part about the riot is made up.  Anyways, it all worked out.  The next bus Jaide and myself got on, and so did most of the irritated folks.  We made it home, tired, sweaty and with a pound of semi-melted cheese in my back pack.  I hate mini buses.

Sunday, we had 3 deaf come to meeting.  One man showed up right before the end, but he came.  I am hoping he keeps coming because his ASL skill is much higher then most we meet.  You can have a full on conversation with him.  We are not always on the same page, but its good.  He is easy to teach.

Remember Loreen from the last blog post?  I love Loreen.  She uses the signs she learns, she loves her study, you can tell when she gets it and when she is frustrated with herself.  Its great!  Last week she was able to explain how we have the Bible.  Its a joy!  But, one of the funniest things is watching Loreen trying to do the sign for death/die.  It looks like she is trying to do the "macarena."  For you who don't know what the sign looks like, you can look it up on a free online ASL dictionary.  Jaide ends up going over sitting by her and doing it over and over with her.  We both love her study.

Love,
G&J

 

Cannon Ball!

Jaide, Loreen, Jamol

Swimming with the kids

Hello Everyone,

How is it going?  Sunday, we had our first two deaf come to meeting.  Jaide and I did our best at interpreting for them.  Based on Loreen's (one of the deaf) head nodding, we did amazing.  She agreed with everything we signed.  When it was good, she nodded yes.  When it was bad, she shook her head no.  When she was bored she feel asleep.  Great feed back.  Unfortunately,  Loreen does not know sign language or how to sign.  Jaide is currently working on helping her understand that we all have names, and what the sign for name is.   But, she is good at reading our faces and knowing what is good and bad.  Plus she really enjoyed the meeting.  We know she will continue to progress and learn.  We had hoped for 6 deaf, but 2 is a great start.

Today, Wednesday, is our long day in the ministry.  A group of us work our way up, going village to village visiting deaf along the way.  In the last two weeks, I think we have meet or heard about 8 new deaf.  Most deaf here do not know sign language.  Teaching them is very challenging and at times frustrating.  Its hard to help someone who has never learned how to learn, to learn.  It is hard for them to understand that we are trying to give them a language.  So, its small steps that we celebrate.

We had beef tongue curry the other day.  A couple that live down the street from us had us over and put on a feast for us.  Half way through dinner, she asked "what kind of meat do you think your eating?"  Kind of a scary question.  I guessed duck, I had no idea, it was curried and delicious.  I was wrong, it was tongue.  Even Jaide ate it.  If you know Jaide,  you know she could never be on the T.V show 'Bizarre foods with Andrew Zimmerman.'  Meats ain't her thing.  But she ate it up, did not seem to bother her.  I was impressed.   We also went swimming with some kids from New Amsterdam.  The pool was really warm, like swimming in a hot bath.  But it still was fun and refreshing.

Love,
G&J

  

Now we gaff!

Urijah and his picture of what he learned

District Convention stage 

Hello Everyone,

How are you doing?  I hope well.  So this afternoon we were trying to hang our hammocks under our house.  My days tying knots on a pirate ship failed me.  After trying a few knots I thought I had figured it out.  At that moment our neighbor yells "ya need more tight."  So I continue to struggle to make it "more tight."  He must have seen my struggling because he proceeded to come into our yard and take over.  He made quick work of hanging the hammock, using his mouth, arms, feet and toes in the process.  The whole time he is pretty quiet.  Once he is all finished hanging the two hammocks, he sits down on our bench, swings the hammock towards me and says "now we gaff."  To gaff means to chit chat.  Now you need to know, this man accent is so thick that I can only understand a word here and there.  When I hear those words, I repeat it and say "really".  His words run together and he uses phrases that I don't understand.  I think I agreed to allow him to sleep in our house sometimes and to go to a Hindu party.  Also, I think we have a gaff date tomorrow afternoon.

The ministry has been going good.  Wednesday, we met or heard of 5 new deaf people.  We hope to meet them soon.  We are getting back into the routine of teaching sign language to the deaf.  Our stick figure drawing skills are awesome!  Last week Chris Turner and I were at a little deaf boy's house.  We were about done. I had noticed he was wearing a little plastic ring that was a butterfly, so I started teaching him the sign for butterfly.  Out walks his mom holding two glasses with something white inside.  Now, remember its the middle of the afternoon in South America. . . . HOT!  My first thought was horchata, that delicious Mexican rice drink.  Then I realized Guyana does not have anything Mexican or anyone from Mexico.  She hands us the glass and asks "do you want sugar?"  Both Chris and I grab the glasses and feel that it is hot.  Yes, hot powdered milk!  Oh, what a treat!  As I stared at the layer of film floating at the top of the milk, I was thinking 'how can I get out of drinking this with out offending her?'  She sat down and watched us.  I thought about "accidentally" spilling it or sharing it with the plants, but I couldn't. So I chugged it down.  Layer of film and all.  My breath was horrible after that.  So, so powdery.

In the picture you see Jaide with some deaf at the District Convention of Jehovah's Witnesses.  Sunday, we had 39 deaf come.  For the two District Conventions in Guyana, a total of 66 people got baptized.  I think some deaf were baptized in Georgetown, but I am not sure how many.  One deaf bible student, Errol, took off 6 days of work for the Convention.  Why?   He helped with cleaning up the grounds and setting up the stage.

We are doing very good now, and appreciate all the encouraging emails we've received.  We will keep the blog updated regularly, so sit back and enjoy.

Peace be with you brothers and friends!