If you're a regular reader of this blog, you may have lately noticed something seems amiss. The complete and utter lack of updates for 2017 so far. I do apologize for this, but I have my reasons.
(pauses and looks back at older blog posts, and fully realizes how much has happened since last update)
Wow. This is worse than I thought.
Alright, let's start with February. Two brothers arrived to help out with Memorial this year, Tyrell and Kaleb Schuetz from Nebraska. They each have extensive Bethel service under their belt and were up for a new challenge, so through a variety of contacts they wound up with Guyana as an option and were assigned to Orealla by the branch.
And before you ask, no, I have no good pictures of them.
We had a few weeks of little activity, which allowed them to get settled and familiarize themselves with the routine of life in a place like this. However, the busyness level quickly upped its game. Since I (still) haven't much time to go into it, here's a brief rundown.
From March 5 to 12 we were preparing for Circuit Overseer visit (LOTS to do, especially when the labor is being split between just four brothers), then from 14th to 19th was the actual visit, which naturally included a Siparuta trip.
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| A tiny portion of the group that day. |
An interesting aspect of this visit was the support in field service. Wednesday we had 18 in ministry, Thursday (Siparuta day) was 20, Friday was 25, and Saturday was 34. Considering we have 33 publishers, I'd say the congregation is doing well. Particularly notable for me was that at pioneer meeting we had 15 people, which is more than we had at my first meeting in Orealla.
Finally, Sunday for the final talk, the attendance was 82, which is more than we've had for any meeting outside of Memorials.
As soon as overseer had left, we moved on to preparing for our Circuit Assembly, which is going to be held April 2. Considering how unreliable boats are in and out of the village (and the fact that they'll only go twice a week at best) many of us choose to leave an entire week in advance so as not to miss our opportunities to get out. This would've left us heading out exactly one week after the CO visit finished. Obviously this causes some stress as we must find a source of lodging for the whole week, on top of having money to get food and travel and all that, on top of getting all our Bible studies done early. So all this we're expecting. What we weren't expecting ...
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| Letters to Russia. |
This whole campaign presented a major problem for Guyana, as the cost of sending just one envelope to Russia is equivalent of $55 USD. On top of that, in order to get them delivered in time, we would have to send them out by Sunday. Yes, that same Sunday. So with very little time left, what would we do? Just write one letter and have the whole Kingdom Hall sign it on the back?
Our parent branch in Trinidad had a much better idea. If we could get all our letters to the literature depot in Guyana, they would mail everything in bulk, free of charge for us. As long as we got them there by Sunday (or at the very, very latest, Monday noon). This led to some very, very rapid work in writing, printing, sorting letters, and on and on. All told, Orealla congregation was able to piece together 92 letters to ship out. And all in time to catch the Sunday night boat and get our stuff to the branch by Monday at noon.
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| "Dear Russian People, why are your addresses such a pain to write?" |
As we were doing all this we heard the boats arriving, giving us less than one hour to reach home, pack up, and catch them out for the night. Needless to say, when we get back home, there's going to be an incredibly insane amount of house cleaning to do.
I am not looking forward to next Monday.
Anyway, we finally reached out this morning, and we're now preparing to sleep until our assembly on Sunday. I'm very happy to say that three of my studies are contemplating coming out for it, with one having made definite plans and arrangements to get out here for it. Will report back when we see how it goes.
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| His son Lucas, overjoyed that they get to come to the Assembly! |
