dem eh watch meh

Hello Everyone,

Whats going on?  How early is too early to start a party?  1pm, 3pm, 10am?  Well, the other day our neighbors started partying at 4am.  Started, not finished.  The houses here do not have double pane windows

Salima and Jaide

and insulated walls.  They're made of just some wood and the windows are paper thin.  Our neighbors might as well have been in our bedroom partying.  Then in the midst of the talking and laughing, we hear someone sweeping.  The wife next door is a little O.C.D when it comes to sweeping.  She sweeps around her house at least 3 times a day.  Now, in the midst of a party she decides to sweep.  Really, that couldn't wait.  We were so tired that day.  4 am, come on!

Guyana trash service

Two weeks ago, we found out that a deaf Bible student, Salima, that used to live in New Amsterdam had moved to our side of the river.  She knows ASL pretty well.  So, upon finding her, she was happy to see us and start studying again.  On Wednesday, Jaide, Tinisha and I (Graem) went to study with her.  We started discussing death.  She already understood clearly what happens when we die.  But, when we started discussing the resurrection, she would sign, "No, we die and go back to dirt.  Your family or friend dies you are sad, you go home pray and God helps."  She did not understand the resurrection hope the Bible promises. By using pictures and reasoning on scriptures she was able to grasp it.  It was wonderful to see her learn it.  We explained that in the future Paradise she would see her mother again and she would be happy and hugging her just like the pictures show.  Her smile was priceless.  Those are the moments that keep us going.

Another moment like that came when I was studying with Daio.  Daio is a man who does not know any sign language.  He has home signs, and knows a few we have taught him.  This week he learned God has a name. First, we had to teach him what a name is, and then the sign for name.  By using my driver's license and his ID card we got the idea that we all have names.  From there we went to God.  I drew my representation of God and signed, "his name what?"  Then I showed him part of the "God's Friend" DVD which explains God's name.  I pointed to the sky and signed, "His name what?"  Daio signed, "JH."  That the ASL sign name for Jehovah.  The best part was that he continued to use it.  Even at the end of the study when we reviewed, he remembered!

Guyanese word/song of the day: "dem eh watch meh".  Translation: They are watching me.  This is a popular song in Guyana.  Now, what the Guyanese tend to do is play a popular song over and over and over and over and over again.  When I hear this song, I want to rip their speakers out of their car or home.  For months, this song has been playing.  Also, when there is a popular song, people have stickers made for their cars with the lyrics (this is how we figured out how to spell it).  Every where we go we see or hear "dem eh watch meh." I'm starting to feel a little paranoid.

Love,

G&J

The secret ingredient is . . .

Hello Everyone,

How are you doing?  I learned something new this week.  I have noticed that under and around some of the homes here in Guyana the dirt seems different.  It looks more smooth and soft.  Well, I have learned the secret.  The secret ingredient is. . . . cow poop.  We had just arrived at Vicky and Popo's house.  They are two deaf brothers.  I saw that Popo was walking back with a bucket full of something.  He proceeded to dump the bucket out a few feet from us, fresh cow dung.  He then fetched some water in the bucket, came back and started mixing in cow dung by the handfuls.  Elbow deep in the bucket, kneading the special concoction.  The smell, sound and sight of it was almost to much to handle.  I know its just cow poop, but that's nasty.  I controlled my urge to dry heave, and continued the study.  Popo then dumped the bucket out and started spreading the cow dung paste around with a broom.  Cow dung mixture flinging everywhere, getting closer and closer to us.    I made sure Popo kept his distance as now he was pretty well covered in the mixture.  The deaf sister I was with said it was making her feel sick.  So we finished up and left.  I guess I am no country boy.

At Memorial we had 98 in attendance, of which 54 were deaf.  So we fell short of our goal of 100.  From our side of the river 14 deaf and 8 hearing went.  We were stressed about getting everyone there. We hired a bus, and called over and over again to make sure they were still going. We had so many that wanted to come that we had to ask one of the students, Imran, who has a car to drive.  We were relieved that he was happy help out. Well, picking everyone up went well.  The only hangup was that one deaf man wasn't ready, which didn't surprise us because we don't think he ever learned the calendar. We had tried to call his neighbor to tell him to get ready. But when he saw us, he hurriedly got ready and jumped in the bus.  

The Memorial started at 6 pm, so we started picking up people at 3:30.  We had the goal of having everyone picked up by 5.  That worked out perfect. But there was one problem.  To get to New Amsterdam, where the Memorial was taking place, you have to cross a bridge.  Everyday, this bridge closes for an hour and a half to allow boats to pass.  It was scheduled to open at 5:20 pm.  That would be fine, great we would arrive by 5:45.  Well, the bridge opened late.  It stayed closed waiting for a tug boat.  It finally opened at 6.  Needless to say, we were late.  As I was the speaker, everyone waited for us.  That makes for a rushed, stressful feeling as I was trying to deliver the most important talk of the year.  Oh well, the deaf all seemed to enjoy the Memorial.

Jaide brought snacks to give everyone on the bus so they would not be tempted by the bread being passed.  She fed everyone cheese crackers and banana bread. After the Memorial, they got oatmeal raisin cookies.

Guyanese word of the day:  dhol.  In a sentence, "get a dhol with me."  What does it mean?  No, it is not a foreign Barbie.  It means to quarrel or get in a argument.

Love,

G&J

B.O.

Hello Everyone,

Sign language section

How are you?  We are doing good.  Been real busy lately.  Yesterday, we had our Special Assembly Day.  The attendance was 888, including 22 deaf.   The whole program was interpreted.  That is a stressful job, both before and during the assembly.  Our friend, Brian, did a fabulous job organizing it all.  It made me appreciate having assemblies and conventions in full sign language. Also, there are no assembly halls in Guyana, so we rent a school hall.  This requires a lot of work.  Before the sessions, we are busy moving out all the desks, cleaning, and setting up all the chairs that have been trucked in from all the Kingdom Halls in the area.  After the program, since school starts the next day, we have to break everything down.  We load the chairs back in the trucks, clean the hall again and bring the desks and chalkboards back inside.  Jaide regretted wearing her heels which stick perfectly between the wood boards on the floor.  Thankfully, she managed to not fall on her face. Oh yeah, the hall we use is on the second floor.  We got a good work out loading and unloading the chairs.  I will never take an assembly hall for granted again.  Afterwards, some Missionaries and those who have moved to help where the need is greater got together for some encouragement and Chinese food.

Speaking of Chinese, recently, a group was established in Georgetown.  They have four Chinese unbaptized publishers and one baptized. If only, my Dad taught me some Chinese! Oh well, I'm pretty stuck to ASL anyway.

Jamacia & Niasha, deaf students

We are looking forward to the Memorial.  We have been trying to make sure all the deaf in our area are invited.  The goal is to have 100 deaf in attendance.  Last year, 69 deaf came.  We will let you know how many show up.  So, last week and this week we are explaining to, or reminding our students why the Memorial is so important.  Its a challenge to explain the concept to people with a limited language. We're beginning to learn how to simplify our teaching.  We are so thankful for having so many pictures in our publications. Also, the Great Teacher DVD's explanation is awesome.  I showed only half of  it to one student, and without me even telling her, she got the point and signed "Oh, we need to thank Jesus".  Fabulous!

The other day there was one of those moments that I will always remember.  We were on a minibus going to New Amsterdam.  We have talked about the joys of public transportation in Guyana, crowded, hot and frustrating.  It was a typical ride, the bus was full, yet they squeezed one more person in Jaide's row.  Making a Jaide sandwich, with two old Aunties on each side of her.  The driver was taking his sweet time, stopping to run errands every few minutes.  We stopped so he could air up his tires.  Jaide, who is in the row in front of me, turns her head ever so slowly with a sweet smile on her face.  I expect her to make a comment about needing patience.  Instead with that sweet smile still on her face, she finger spells B.O. (body odor) still with the smile on her face, she slowly turns to face forward again. I couldn't help but laugh.  Poor Jaide was literally stuck to a person with bad stink.   Another adventure in transportation in Guyana!

Guyanese word of the day: Sweet meats.  What is that?  Bacon dipped in syrup?  Honey glazed ham?  Chocolate covered grasshoppers?  No.  Translation: sweet pastries.  You know, they are like meats. . . I guess.

Love,
G&J

White Girl Don't Watch Cricket?

Practicing the sign language songs

Want to hear something funny (at my husband's expense, of course)? Remember Graem's amazing study with his student's deaf friend, Errol? Well, last week, we went back.  Graem was super excited to see that he was there again, ready to study.  We sit down and wait for him to come in.  He walks in and we wave hello. I'm curious how much sign he remembers.  Then he says, "Good afternoon. Would you like some guavas?" We tried to hold in our laughter and Graem, his embarrassment.  Errol is not deaf!! The week before, Graem had an amazing study with him and Renny.  He never voiced a thing and just signed. The crazy thing is, though, that Renny seemed surprised that Errol was talking too. I guess he is a great example for us to sign, not voice, when we are with deaf.  One sister says that Graem's not the only one to get the hearing and deaf confused. Another sister had a study for quite awhile before she found out that the deaf person was actually hearing.  From now on, we're thinking about implementing hearing tests when we start studies.

You fellow Americans, do you ever watch cricket?  Before coming to Guyana, I had no clue. I still don't understand it (honestly, though, I don't understand football either. Superbowl is all about half time nachos, anyway. Right?). It's baseball with a fat golf looking thing, right?  I'm beginning to think that we're the only ones that are just not into it.  The other day, a few guys delivered water to our house.  I had the TV on, watching the news.  As one guy passed me, he asked "White girl don't watch cricket?" At first, I thought "What white girl?" Oh yeah, that's me. Then, I thought, "Cricket? What? Come again."  By the time I processed his question, he was already in the truck driving away. Sometimes white girl, a little slow.

Sarah and Jaide enjoying ice cream

Yesterday, we went to the monthly ASL meeting in New Amsterdam.  Four deaf students and five hearing brothers and sisters accompanied us.  For three of the deaf, this was their first time to the meeting. All together, attendance was 68, including 30 deaf. It's always incredible to see deaf communicate freely with one another, even if they know limited ASL.  Another fabulous example for us hearing.  Don't be afraid to communicate, even if you don't have the same language. Even a hearing couple from Chile was there.  They are learning English, but still managed to answer in sign language.  Here, the important thing is not how you sign it, but that you tried.

Guyanese word of the day: boulanger.  Translation: eggplant.

If you are considering "stepping over into Macedonia", please email me.  We would love the help!

Love Jaide and Graem

Thats beautiful!

Phagwah people

Hello Everyone,

From left to right: Popo, Sharon and Vicky.  The boys are Bible students

How are you doing?  Living in Guyana we get exposed to an assortment of holidays that we have never heard of in the States.  The three major religions in Guyana, Muslim, Hindu and Christian, have like 3 national holidays each.  The Muslim and Hindu holidays are normally new to us.  For example, yesterday, Phagwah, a Hindu holiday.  It is the festival of colors.  People go around throwing buckets of water at each other.  Or they spray squirt guns with dyed water in it, or throw colored powder on you.  Sounds lovely right?  Before Sunday we were warned not to go out because we will get sprayed.  Then someone else told us not to worry about it, that they will respect us and leave us alone.  Well, Jaide got sprayed with red dye on the way to meeting and I got sprayed with blue dye out in the ministry in the afternoon.  No respect, I tell you.

I need to tell you about Renny's friend.  A little over a week ago, I went to Renny's study.  When we got there he excitedly introduced me to his friend, Errol.  Errol sat in on our Bible study.  He learned so fast.  He doesn't know sign language, but he picked it up quick.  He learned God's name in a snap.  We were discussing the Bible's promise of Paradise, and he was understanding everything.  He even pointed at a picture of Paradise and signed "beautiful."  After the Bible study had finished, I showed him the ASL alphabet and to how to fingerspell his name. It only took one time, and he had it.  You don't understand how amazing that is.  We have students that have been studying for months, some even years, who don't know how to fingerspell their name.  He even wrote his name in the exercise book and then under each letter drew the ASL letter hand shape.  Blew me away!  Normally I do that to help them learn their name.  I hope he will be able to sit in on more studies.  He seemed to really enjoy it.

Our Kingdom Hall flooded again.  That means thorough cleaning to disinfect the place.  It has been raining a lot.  Its a muddy mess every where.

Guyanese word of the day:  aawbee. (This is spelled phonetically)  Translation: we.

Love,
G&J

Me duh know she!

Hello Everyone,

Traffic jam with cows and sheep

How are you doing?  Some weeks writing the blog is a piece of cake.  Good. funny or exciting things have happened.  Other weeks, we sit down and have to struggle to have anything to write about.  When that happens you get blogs like last weeks, discussing my bowel problems (I am doing better, thank you very much).  But, this week I couldn't wait to write it.  Why?  Awesome ministry experiences.

We will start with Imran.  He used to study the Bible, but stopped probably around a year ago because of family opposition.  He and his family are Muslim.  His sister is deaf also, but when their family gave her a hard time she continued to study.  Jaide is studying with her and she is doing amazing.  Well, a couple of weeks ago Imran told Jaide that he wanted to talk to me.  After a couple attempts I finally met up with him.  We gaffed for a bit.  He told me I should start to work with him.  He would teach me how to cut

hair, and that we would make a good team.  Then he asked about the meetings.  I explained what's up with us interpreting the meeting into sign language and the last Sunday we have a full sign language meeting in New Amsterdam.  He said he wanted to go.  "Sweet!" I thought.  Next I asked," before you studied the Bible, then stopped, what's up?"  He explained his cousin and friends got mad at him and yelled at him.  So he stopped.  He said he had gone to the Muslim temple, but they don't teach him.  He then said, "I love Jehovah.  Muslim, Hindu, Christian Churches alright.  But, Jehovah I love."  I wanted to jump off that couch.  He then said, "I don't care if my cousin is mad. If my Mom calls (she lives in New York), I am deaf and I can't hear her."  This happened Tuesday and Thursday he surprised us by coming to meeting, along with his sister and cousin.  He was all smiles, nodding when he understood things.  After the meeting it was beautiful to see all the friends come up and meet them. This came at great time for us.  We were starting to feel down, because we haven't had any deaf come to meeting in awhile.  Jehovah again gave us what we need.

Its been raining like crazy!  All day yesterday, we make it to our Bible studies, battling the mud and
downpours.  I slept with long pants and a sweatshirt, and I was still cold.  Keep in mind, I've been in Guyana awhile. I know this 'freezing air' is nothing to you in New York or Canada.  This morning, we again ventured into the rain to go to market. I told Graem he can never complain about going to Winco again.  If he does, I will tell him it could be worse.  Each person could  be sopping wet, whipping around umbrellas that keep slapping you in the face.  By the time we got home, Graem looked like he stepped straight out of a shower with all his clothes on.

Guyanese expression of the day: If you want to speak like a true Guyanese person, you must remove some words from your vocabulary. These words are "I, her, and him".  You must replace them with "Me, she, he".  Examples: "Me duh know she." "That she book."

Please writes us some time,

Love J & G

I need a bathroom, you know.

Hello Everyone,

Deuces Ashtyn!

How are things?  We are doing good.  The time has come for Ashtyn to leave us.  She arrived January 5.  We have enjoyed having her here with us.  It is great to have help with Sign Language.  I know many of the friends here will miss her.  As Ashtyn will tell you, there is a lot of work that needs to be done in Guyana.  So, come on down!  Email me and let me know if your thinking about it.

Sign Language class

Saturday afternoon, Jaide, Ashtyn and I were on a Bible study with a couple.  It was going really well when suddenly, a wave of pain swept over me, and I broke out sweating.  To quote Brian Reagan, "my insides seemed like they wanted to be on my outsides."  Something I had eaten wanted out of my body, in a bad way.  So here is the dilemma, ask to use their toilet or ride 5 minutes back to our house.  Using their toilet is a risk, because maybe they don't have toilet paper, or their toilet doesn't flush properly, which are both common problems.  Both could cause another embarrassing situation.  Or do I try to make the ride home?  Of course, no Starbucks or McDonald's toilets here.  If shops and restaurants have a "toilet", it is a wall outside. I decide to try to make it to our house.  I try to make my exit. Of course, its not that easy.  They are insisting that I have a soda that they bought for us, and Jaide is asking me why. "Did you forget something?", she asks.  "Why are you going home?"  At the same time I am trying to get out of waiting for a soda.  I thank them and tell them I don't need it and that I REALLY need to get home.  They're not having it.  I don't want to offend them, so I wait for the drink and pat my stomach and tell Jaide, "I don't feel good and I NEED to go home."  Jaide said I didn't look so good.  She said my veins were popping out of my head.  I get the soda and down it as fast as I can and after a few minutes I am off.  Now, about 100 feet down there path on my bike I am starting to doubt my decision.  I am afraid I am not going to make it home.  I think the exerting of peddling the bike isn't helping matters. I need to move and move fast if I am going to make it home "safely." I don't think I have ever ridden that fast.  All people saw was a white flash.  Alas, me and my sensitive stomach made it home in time.  Disaster averted! Maybe next time, I will pack some toilet paper and imodium.

Let me update you on how Renny is doing.  I wrote about Renny a couple of months ago.  He is probably my best Bible study right now.  We are studying the DVD 'You can be God's Friend'. He is getting it.  We will understand a little of the DVD, then I will pause and ask him "it what?"  Most times he tells me, "I don't understand."  So we begin to explain the point with use of pictures and drawing.  After he seems to get it,  then we watch it again.  Normally,  he gets it then.  Right now we are studying the Paradise earth and what the Bible promises it will be like.  Its wonderful to see him get it.  Here is an example of a typical answer to a question about the Paradise earth, "Earth change to beautiful all over, people eat, eat, eat fat.  Hungry no."  To teach him the concept of change we drew a picture of an old, dirty shirt and a nice, new shirt.  We asked, "If you are working in the yard and have the dirty, old shirt on, then want to go to the Kingdom Hall what do you do?  Change shirts".  Then we draw under the old shirt a picture of the world today, and under the nice, new shirt a picture of the Paradise earth.  From there he got the concept pretty easy.  It is a fun study.  He has a funny habit of shaking your hand almost every time he understands a point.  Also, he likes to hug.  Which is fine, I don't mind, I just wish he would shower before we come.

Guyanese expression of the day:  "you know".  It seems that a common habit is to end your sentence with you know.  'Its hot you know', 'I already did that you know'.  Little Pheobe in Orealla is 3yrs old and would give us pretend food and tell us, "its hot you know."  So cute.  Or in my case, "I need a toilet you know."

Love,
G&J