March 2012-Dengue Fever, Memorial Week & Beach Camping

Dear Friends 3-10-2012

These last 4 weeks have been both rewarding and difficult.

I caught a flu that was making the rounds and my immune system has taken a hard hit. My Hives are back and my allergies are making my face swell. At least this time I am able to eat food. The last time this hit me I was unable to eat without suffering even more. I have begun treatment so that I may resume my service here as quickly as my body will allow.

We are also trying to move from our current house from this very busy highway to a quieter location.

Fruit is everywhere here and quite cheap, vegetables are harder to find, especially green ones. I find I am craving GREENS!! Lettuce never used to be so exciting, but it is now!! I have started a small plant pot garden with zuchini and squash and can hardly wait for them to produce. I will even try to grow some spinach, but since it is warm here all the time it may go to seed before I can get anything decent from it..... any of you with green thumbs, I NEED GARDEN TIPS !!!

In 7 days we will have been in this house for 2 months. It does not seem possible that time has passed that quickly. AND in 7 days we will have moved. I find that I am unable to take the heat and pollution here in David. We found out recently that this town has 125 thousand people living here. There is no large industry, but there is no pollution emissions and no controls (for cars) in place either. The way the mountains and hills are placed here we surmise that much of the pollution (and the heat) builds up here.

With the winds that blow DOWN the mountains and the ocean breezes that blow UP from the shore, it bottles much of it here. That's just a guess, but I'm no meteorologist. (weather guy)

Pollution aside, the heat is too much for me. On an average day of late it is 90 to 95 degrees with the humidity that makes it hotter. So "real feel" temperature is around 102 to 109....... ALL OF THIS WITHOUT AIR CONDITIONING !!!!!

That’s right, no air. Almost no one here owns air. Any air conditioning is owed by gringos. Locals do not need it. They are completely adjusted to it. And I am completely amazed!! All of the heavy backbreaking labor as usual and the temp is 108. They do not take siesta's here. They work straight through. They hardly take a break all day. And what is more most of the workers I have seen are dressed in long sleeves and long pants and sweat bands that hang down in back covering much of their back, with hats on top of that. Their head wraps make them look like some kind of Arab Sheik. Except the colors are usually orange or some other bright tropical color. In all that clothing I would pass out immediately!! And they are digging ditches, shoveling asphalt, collecting garbage, doing mechanical work.... on and on. Very few wear short sleeve shirts and no one wears shorts.

HARD WORKING PEOPLE! I have great respect for this culture.

And their love for the Bible is equal to their work ethic. You mention Bible and you will have a conversation. I have met of course a great many Spanish people here. And when I explain what we are doing, "looking for people that want to study the bible in English, would you like to study the bible? (yes they always say.) ..... in English?" I have gotten some of the most downhearted looks you can imagine because they can not speak English and realize that they can not study in English. But if I could speak Spanish they would study immediately!! There are so many here that would study that we do not even make a list of interest to turn over to the Spanish congregation. The Spanish have more studies than they can handle!! Their congregations are busting at the seams!

At the recent Memorial the Alta Mar Congregation with only 80 publishers had to split there group into 2 meetings for the memorial, one at 6:30 and one at 8:30 to accommodate the nearly 250 people that came. There were too many interested ones and studies to fit all in one meeting!! (yes I'm trying to learn Spanish...and Jim is starting)

Our Memorial was rewarding in English too. We have a brand new bouncing baby.... congregation here, with 20 publishers and we had 38 in attendance. One of our own Bible studies came to this Memorial. Rudi speaks fluent English but his wife speaks only Spanish. She came too although she did not understand hardly a word. Rudi was very impressed and his comment was interesting. He said he would bring his sister back because it was so peaceful and calming in this congregation.

Here's the surprising part.... Rudi has studied only 5 times total. We met him shortly after we arrived in Panama!!

And he has just been diagnosed with cancer. Don't know how severe it is, but judging from his appearance (he is very thin and been unable to eat) it does not look good. He is receiving treatment at the local hospital.

We currently have a number of good calls and 2 studies.

Remember Maribel from my last letter? I lost track of her. She called to say that she could not study this week and she would call when she could as there was some sort of family "matter" (her choice of words) that she needed to deal with. So I let a few weeks lapse. I had the flu at the time anyway. This last week I went to look for her and tried to catch her home 3 different times. Finally this last Easter Sunday (figuring she would be home) I went again. She does not live there anymore!! We met the family that has moved in.

So... back to her Mothers house in downtown David. Her mother will know where she is and she may even be AT her mothers house. She has been on my mind for over 2 weeks now. So we will see.

At this writing we are also moving to a new location. Up the hill to cooler temperatures. The town of Boquete (pronounced Bo> ket' >tay). The average temp is closer to 75 and at night around 65. There is a nearly constant wind and now that the rainy season will be starting it will cloudy much of the time for the next 6 months. It is a much smaller town (around 8,000 we have heard) and a lot less cars and traffic. As soon as Jim fixes the seat in the car I may even drive again. --- The seat is pretty much stuck in the forward position (the wire underneath needs fixing) and I can barely get my long legs UNDER the steering wheel. When I am finally IN the drivers seat, and that requires VERY limber hip joints, I can not get the keys into the ignition and turn the key because my knee is in the way and there is no where else to move it !!! It is very comical. Jim finally has a car that was made just for him.....!!!

Our little house rents for 175.00 a month and utilities run about 25 or so.

It has 2 bedrooms and one bath. So come and visit us if you have a desire to. It is a long term rental and we will renew it with the owner, after the lease is up from the Brother that currently has it (and is loaning it to us). That is of course hoping that the owner wants to do that. Whatever Jehovah wills.

And no letter would be complete without telling you about our trip to the Beach..... NO RESORTS FOR US. We went to the "free" beach, (there were 11 intrepid travelers in our group), and stayed overnight. (remember it's the beginning of the rainy season.) We choose the night of April 6th because of the nearly full moon. So the rain had to be put up with.

We left home around 1pm on Friday. It took about an hour and a half to get to the beach. The first part of the trip is on the Pan-American Hwy and is fairly quick. The last 2 miles is on a dirt/gravel/asphalt/pot holes road that takes longer.

It was partly sunny and the clouds were moving in.

We didn't set up immediately but began by going swimming. The waves were spectacular. With the effect of the full moon they were very high and we had arrived at mid tide with the tide coming in very strongly. After an hour of playing in the waves I was pretty tired out.

We had already collected quite a bit of wood for our fire, and we had covered it with a tarp. The thunder and lightning finally drove the rest of our group out of the water. The lightning show was spectacular, as we stood under our palm frond shelters. (no electric, no running water). We finally got a short break and decided that it might be a good time to set up camp ( 5:30 or so). Most of the tents were put up and the rain started coming heavier now.... and we found out that our brand new tent was not water proof AT ALL. It was soaking up the water at fast as it fell out of the sky!!!. So we put up a tarp over the tent to shed most of the water off to the back of the tent. Of course there was already a puddle of water inside the tent by now. But at least we had not laid out our sheets and bedding yet.

So much for palm fronds keeping the water out. The roofs needed fixing, the fronds were very thin up there compared to what I have observed.

But the tarp on the roof served to give us water to shower in!!! Who said there was no running water -- lol. I had wanted to wash the salt off from swimming so I stood under my "running water" and took a shower. It worked.

Of course we had not brought enough tarps for all our needs. So the wood, formerly covered, got uncovered to provide shelter for a tent. So now we had really really wet wood. Eventually one of our group discovered that if we moved our tents down the beach there were DRY shelters there. Too bad we didn't discover that before everything was soaked...oh well.

One of our group had brought 2 of those disposable grills that are supposed to cook your meal for you and then be thrown away. Anyone for raw chicken? It cooks hot dogs though.

We did, after much effort, get a fire going. I had my chicken after all. And...it was still sprinkling. But the clouds started to clear out and the sunset made it all worthwhile. It seems to take a full 45 minutes for it to reach its peak colors. Finally brilliant shades of reddish purple !! Don't think I have seen those colors before, as many sunsets as I have watched.

The sprinkles dropped to a drizzle and Jim and I decided the day had been a tiring one crawled into bed. A very damp one and fell asleep.

Around 3am it seemed we all woke up. The surf was so loud, that according to Jim he wished he could turn the volume down. Not me. I went right to sleep. But at 3am Jim nudged me and said, "I think you want to see this".

The clouds had cleared and the full moon had risen to directly overhead and as the waves approached the shore the moon was shining off the CURL of the wave before it broke. Imagine seeing long ribbons of silver necklaces stretched out across the ocean one after the other. And the moon had a full color rainbow halo around it to dress it up for the show. And at the far southern horizon we had a special treat. We saw for the first time the constellation "The southern Cross".

The constellation Southern Cross always points true south. So it does what the North Star does for the Northern Hemisphere. which always points to true north. But the Southern Cross can usually only be seen SOUTH of the equator. In Panama we are 8 degrees north of the equator and the SC sits almost flat on the horizon. Because we were at the ocean, and up at 3 am, we saw it. Now I want to go SOUTH !!! AND SEE MORE !! Imagine, constellations I have never seen!

So in spite of the rain, the damp bed, the wet wood, the slow cooked (nearly not cooked at all ) dinner and the crabs (oh yeah, the crabs. One crawled into Saree's pillow!!! At which point she gave it up ("Ok, well that does it!" she said, and crawled back into the car--lol).

Anyway in spite of all that I think I will gladly go NEXT MONTH. A bit better prepared though. More tarps for sure !!

We managed to make a fire and have breakfast burritos and banana pancakes and leftovers of this and that. Jim and I had to head home for 2 studies. Everyone else went swimming again and stayed till around noon.

And yes, I found Maribel. She and her husband and 2 children have moved back in with her mother and father. They lost there house as they did not have enough income to afford it. Maribel will soon be going to work full time teaching English in a school nearly 1 1/2 hours away from David in Puerto Armuelles (on the Pacific coast) leaving her 3 month old baby with her mother. She will have to get up at 4am to be able to go to work and will not get home till 3:30 or later each day.

In spite of all that she has said she wants to study again. Yesterday she and the baby had the flu and she ached all over so we have rescheduled for Sat. afternoon at 3pm.

And only yesterday morning (Wednesday) I went with a brother on his call because he said that often the young man's sister is there also and he was hoping she might respond as well.

It wasn't his sister, it was (this time) his mother. She pulled up a chair and sat about 3 feet behind me (I was on the couch). Paul talked awhile and he looked up several scriptures and I followed along with him and Mom was paying attention. So I motioned to her to scoot up and share with me in my bible. She did. When I showed her where Paul was reading she began reading it to herself out-loud, just loud enough that it would have been distracting to Paul. So after 2 or 3 scriptures I said, Hey why don't we move over to the table (dining) and have our own discussion, and I got up. She quickly cleared the table and we had our own bible study!!

She is Jamaican by birth. Very lively and spirited as I have always found that culture to be. I just love their openness and talkativeness. And as a rule they are very friendly and easy to talk to. She is no exception. We had a lively discussion about whether the bible was really from God.

Her initial response had me wondering if she believed it was or not, because her comment was, "you hear so many things you don't know what to believe. Pastors say a lot about the bible being written by man, translated by man, and having all kind of errors. And you go to church and it all about business..... that's all they preach.....business, business, business!!"

So I showed her the prophesy in Gen 3:15 and explained that this was the very FIRST prophesy in the Bible and it was not clearly answered until Revelation.

She began reading Genesis 3:15 out-loud and stopped in the middle and asked....."who is this woman?".......

She is going to be a GREAT study!!

How do you answer that one "briefly"? Well I gave it a shot. By explaining that the serpent was a "spirit" and the prophesy said that he would be bruised or crushed in the head it clearly could not be a "human" woman since what can humans do to spirit creatures that could harm them? She got that. Then told her that this was a long long discussion for another time, but I would show her one scripture that spoke about this woman showing that she was was heavenly.... Gal 4:26 "Jerusalem above is our mother".

She wrote everything down with the announcement that she would be looking them up and reading them again in their context.... This study promises to be a challenging one.

And as though one study started on a Wednesday is not enough, Terri was given a name of a woman that works at the Nissan dealer- Estar- (pronounced Ess- tar). A brother was there for business and met her and turned her name over to be followed up on with the note that she had a one hour lunch break and could talk then.

We went to find her. That took several minutes since we did not at first say her name right and the language barrier got in the way. But our efforts did find her. She cleared her desk in the back and we all sat in her "work space cubicle", more or less out of the way. We pretty much sat in each others laps, with a few of the other office workers popping in and out and reaching over Terri's head for papers and documents..... But we managed to go through the first 3 pages of the Bible teach book with the pictures and the introduction. Terri then asked her did she have a bible?

Estar apologized for not having her bible with her at work since she knew that we were coming, but she had forgot it. ( Oh Jehovah, what a good heart !) She also explained that her bible was old and hard to understand (we assume it is a King James) but she would bring both her Spanish and English Bible next time. Terri asked her if she would like a modern English Bible? Yes. And I handed her one. "FOR ME?" "For you." And she hugged the bible to her chest up under her chin, with an expression of delight, appreciation and a gleam in her eye....... I think she might have been near tears....

When did she want to study again? What would be a good time for her? Next week? "OH NO!! I could study every day if that would be OK"......

We settled for Friday at lunch time. So thus far she will study on Wednesday and Friday, but that could change for sure.

So this study is well under way.

Well, this is it for now. We could go on and on with all kinds of stuff, like the time Jim went to find a replacement bulb for the brake light in the Nissan. He went to the Do-It Center, and the salesman (who spoke some English said "Bulb? In the Electricity Department." Then he asked, "Auto?" Jim said "Si." He said, "In Automotive." Jim said, "I looked there." He said "Go to the Electricity Department." So Jim went there, knowing that it was only home light bulbs, no auto stuff there. So nothing at the Do-It center. So on the way down the Pan-American Highway, he decided to stop by the Auto Centro - he had heard that it was an auto parts supply. So he walked in and sure enough, it was. It took him 20 minutes to catch the attention of the counter guy. Then he waved the bulb in front of him and said "Dos, por favor." (Two, please). The man went to a box behind the counter and got two bulbs, gave them to Jim and pointed, "over there." So Jim took his two bulbs to the cashier. Two double-filament bulbs - $.75. So Jim paid and was about to go, when the cashier said, "No - over there." So Jim took his two bulbs and now 2 invoices and went to the next counter, where the man took the 2 invoices, stamped them, initialed them, and put the 2 bulbs in a plastic bag. Total time to purchase 2 bulbs - 45 minutes. Welcome to Panama.

Take care friends, and we will be in touch soon. May this letter find you all hard at work in Jehovah's service.