Visitors From Apoera

This last month has presented us (and I personally) with some interesting new developments. For beginners, with our new boat (Kingdom Proclaimer VII, read all about it!) we've been able to extend not only our territory, but also our realm of visiting speakers. You may recall we have a village near us in Suriname named Apoera, where we're able to travel without visa or passport or any of that nonsense since it's another Amerindian village. Two years back I was able to deliver a public talk there (it being an English congregation) while visiting a nearby waterfall/generally cool place. However, this was a rather isolated event as doing this regularly would get very expensive and involve being away from my congregation for at least three days. Boat schedules and all...

However, with the Kingdom Proclaimer VII we've been able to institute a program of regular speaker exchanges between us and Apoera, which had its inaugural event just this last Sunday. We sent over our COBE McKenzie (along with his wife, plus the son and daughter of another couple and a fifth brother to pilot the boat) while Apoera sent to us their COBE Norah along with a need-greater from another part of Suriname and a need-greater couple visiting from the Netherlands.

Poor photo, sorry, I was confined to the sound booth for the meeting.
Our boat captain is also unfortunately our go-to sound guy, so I got to sub.

Had an awesome time with the four, and afterwards a large group stayed behind at the Kingdom Hall and provided a meal for the guests. They stayed around until after 3 PM, after which they piled back into their boat to return home to Apoera.

I'm unclear if their boat has an awesome name too, but seeing as they're Dutch it'd probably be something like "Ikbeneenverkondigervaneenkoninkrijk Berichtnaariedereennummerzeven".

Of course, the new meeting arrangement has been a huge change for us as well. The biggest concern for us was the matter of there being so many videos with each meeting. We've got a projector with which we've been watching the JW Broadcast videos each month with the whole congregation, but it takes a little while to set up, to tear down the whole stage arrangement to view the video on the back wall, etc etc etc. However, two of our brothers were able to work up a great way to make it all function smoothly and easily.

Brother Chacon, our boat captain, sound guy, and "Hey how do I make this
work oh never mind let me just call Chacon he'll know" guy.

By moving the year text up to the front of the stage, mounting the projector behind it in the ceiling (and upside down so we can reach the power switches) and permanently moving the speaker stand to one side, we're now able to activate the projector and get videos playing in just seconds. Way better than the ten minutes we were taking before.

Testing the video setup. Our two pioneer sisters in the front approve.

A personal change for me which I'm quite pleased with is a water arrangement I now have. I still don't have running water, but I do now have a 55-gallon drum to collect rainwater in!

Hey, for me this is the lap of luxury.

Of course my home has no running water (as most of the houses in the village), but someone had offered to get it for me before. I would involve a large 300+ gallon water tank to collect water and some piping, but all in all wouldn't be too expensive. I thought about this offer for a few moments but quickly declined. Here was my reasoning.

When I first moved to Guyana in 2010, I was in a home that had electricity but no running water. Nearly every day I thought to myself "Man, if only I had running water."

After that I moved into a home with running water but no electricity, and nearly every day I thought to myself "Man, if only I had electricity."

Then I moved to a house that had electricity and running water, and definitely every day I thought to myself "Man, if only I had internet."

Then I got that internet, and every day I thought to myself "Man, if only I had faster internet."

Then I moved into a home with no running water and electricity just four hours a day, and of course every single day I began thinking "Man, if only I had running water".

The lesson I learned: I am never satisfied. So might as well keep myself at the lowest living standard and just accept it.

But having a 55 gallon barrel of rainwater at the bottom of my stairs is very nice. Now instead of running to the river five times a day with buckets, I can just take it to the bottom of my steps. May sound like a small thing, but it's been a huge and fantastic change for me.


One final and random note. I really enjoy learning to live more like an Amerindian. Here's the latest thing I've tried. For a long time when I would mop my floors and steps, I would use some floor-cleaning liquid chemical cancer-causing (probably) thing that I'd buy from Skeldon. But while visiting with one of the families here, I noticed they picked a large amount of fruit called Burambi and smashed it into a bucket, and used the juice to clean the floor with. So, I decided to give it a try!

Burambi + bucket + water...

... + foot = SMASH!

I gave it a try, and was shocked to note that a few spots I'd been trying to remove for weeks came off with zero effort. You can also use these fruit things to polish woodwork with too, plus remove stains from clothes and fabric.

But, that's all I've got for now. Upcoming we've got a few other things, each of which suddenly escape my memory. But until then, vergeef mijn slechte vertaling van nederlands.

A Surprisingly Moving Account of My Stove Running Out of Gas

Ever have one of those weeks (or several) where you feel as though you're forgetting something very important? You check your to-do list, you call everyone you typically have arrangements with, etc, and you're definitely up to date with everything. And yet, something eludes you.

Then you remember, "Oh yeah, I have that blog some people read. Oh, and I haven't added anything in a month and one day? Yikes."

Or maybe that's just me...

Anyway, apologies for the huge delay. Been really busy, yadda yadda. Here's a quick recap.

"One of these things is not like the other..."

After the departure of the Camachos, Charlie and I had another brother come and stay with us a little while, Shane (something) from Grenada. If you recall my mentioning Kojo several times (my former roommate and COBE in Orealla for a time) Shane had attended the final School for Single Brothers with him. He'd heard much about Orealla so decided it was finally time to come see for himself.

As you can see from the picture, he's quite tall. You could always tell when he was coming up the steps because the entire house would begin to rattle.

After a week with him, it came time for Charlie to depart back for Ohio, thus leaving Shane and I. A few days passed uneventfully until a group of my friends from Hopetown congregation (for more on my time in Hopetown, see any blog post written between 2011-2013) came for a visit. As much as I was looking forward to it, it did present a slight problem seeing as five of them were coming, and I have only a two bedroom house. Which already had two occupants.

The whole gang. L-R: Shane, Jehu, Kepler, Jared, Randy, and Aaron.

After some searching I was able to find a house that would take in three of them, then another two in my house. It would be crowded that way, but it would work.

Unfortunately (that word that always pops up when you're discussing well laid plans) when we were coming into Orealla the boat was having some issues, so we weren't even close to the village when the other hosting household was preparing for bed, so the decision was made to simply have all the guys crash in my house that night.

So instead of a tight squeeze of four people in there, we had an incredibly tight squeeze of seven. Two in each room, plus one on each couch and one in a hammock strung in whatever available spot we could find.

Don't get me wrong though, I'm not at all complaining. It was a ton of fun, especially since I hadn't seen these guys in about two years. Plus they were only there from Friday-Sunday (and wound up just all staying in my house the whole time) so it wasn't for long enough for the cramped space to get uncomfortable.

Finally Sunday came, and all five Hopetown boys left, along with Shane. And thus, for the first time since May, my household is just me. I've never experienced this much quiet before.

Hmmm... brief recap of guests in the 11 months I've had this place. Dustin, Chris and Fern, Dale, Neil, Jake, Gavin, Charlie, Michael, Jonatan, Shane, Aaron, Randy, Jared, Kepler, and Jehu.

16. Not bad.


The only downside to the last burst of guests is the gas for my stove ran out. Which isn't surprising at all, but is a major inconvenience in a place like Orealla where the closest place to replace it is an eight hour ride away. Plus also consider the boats only go twice a week, and that's assuming everything is going well.

So here's what happened with me. I know the man who owns Orealla's largest shop pretty well, and he has his own boat with which to ship in goods, so therefore he makes his own schedule when he goes out. I asked if he could take my empty gas cylinder out and replace it (since he'd offered several times before to do so). He agreed, but was unsure when he would be going out next. So this left me with the question of, where would I get food until then?

Around this same time, in my personal Bible reading I got to Romans 10:11 which says "No one who rests his faith on him will be disappointed." This struck me because almost immediately after, a brother from the congregation came by and said "We were making lunch but accidentally made too much. You want it?" and hands me a box full of already prepared food. I hadn't told them my gas had run out, since I'd just discovered it. But I took the food and was very happy.

Shortly after finishing I began thinking about dinner. What was I going to do about that, since Orealla hasn't got restaurants or anything of the sort. Either you cook on your own or you go hungry, and now I couldn't cook. As I'm thinking this I get a call from a family asking "We're making dinner right now, you want any?"

So I had a fully prepared, free dinner. But of course, I begin wondering about breakfast.

"Inside!!" I hear someone shouting at 5:30 AM, waking me from a peaceful (if perhaps excessive) slumber. I open my front door and see a brother on a bike holding up a box saying "Mom wanted me send this over for you. She made you breakfast."

In case you haven't gotten the gist of where this is heading, this happened for six days. In all that time there was exactly one meal that no one provided for me, but I was still content with the frankly ridiculous amounts of fresh fruit growing in my yard. But what really struck me in all this is that at no point did I tell anyone I was out of cooking gas until after I'd gotten it replaced. No one knew, there was just a sudden outpouring of support. And believe me, missing meals in this place is not a good thing. Considering how much walking is done in the ministry, and anytime in general, you simply cannot get by without three full meals. And at no point did I ever have to worry about if I would get it.

If I may digress briefly, the following verse after the one quoted above is "There is the same Lord over all, who is rich toward all those calling on him." This verse has stuck in my mind a long time, due to a conversation I heard between a missionary and a need-greater who was just starting out.

It went like this: the need-greater was only spending a short time in Guyana because he was concerned about losing his job back in the States. The missionary encouraged him to pretty much just quit and use his savings serving where the need was greater, since that's what the brother was hoping to do someday anyway. Most foreign brothers serving here will simply work in the States, save a bunch of money, then live here as long as they can until they run out of finances. Then they return to the US and find another job and repeat the process.

The need-greater expressed worry about doing that since he would then be unsure where he could find money and work when he returned, then sighed and said sarcastically "If only I just had a rich father I could beg money off of."

The missionary was silent for a moment then read that verse, Romans 10:12. "There is the same Lord over all, who is rich toward all those calling on him." Then after another pause, the missionary asks "So if you would feel confident trusting in a rich human father, then..."

And of course he didn't finish the sentence since he didn't need to. The point was made very well already, and that verse has ever since stuck with me.

Continuing on. After the departure of all my guests came the other thing that's eaten up my time. Our elders also left in order to attend Elder School all the way in the capital, Georgetown. This means that from last Thursday up to next Wednesday all will have to be handled by myself and our other ministerial servant, Mark Herman. So far all's going well and we haven't been horribly stressed out, though we definitely have no spare time to kill.

Which is why after a month and a day, when I finally had two hours with nothing left needing to be done (clean house, clean dishes, public talk prepared for Sunday, Watchtower studied, lunch eaten, dinner already prepared, no guests, no calls or studies scheduled for today) it suddenly dawned on me how long the blog had been neglected, and how I actually have time - and electricity! - with which to update it.

That's right, I said electricity too! The village generator has finally begun working again, as of last night!

I am waaaay more excited about having electricity than any American has been since 1893.

Kingdom Proclaimer VII

This last week I finally got to do something I've longed to do since October of last year: go on a trip with our new congregation boat, the Kingdom Proclaimer VII!

Brief diversion explaining the name: if you read the 2005 Yearbook (which I highly recommend) it tells the history of the preaching work in Guyana, and recounts how many of the territories in the country are only accessible by river. Due to this, a lot of congregations will purchase a boat solely for the purpose of covering these territories. The first of these boats was named Kingdom Proclaimer, which quickly became a thing, leading to nearly every one of these preaching boats getting named in following increments. Kingdom Proclaimer II, III IV, etc.

Which brings us to Orealla's Kingdom Proclaimer VII (I'll be totally honest here, since several congregations do this, we're not 100% sure whether this would VII or VIII, or even IX. So, uh, just roll with it). The attempt to acquire a boat of our own began in October of last year, but finally came to fruition in June. Unfortunately, we couldn't get our engine as well at the same time, so by time everything was set, I had already left to return to the US for a work trip. Therefore, I haven't been able to use this boat. Until now!

Many things can affect the trips, so scheduling can be difficult. navigating the river can be difficult (sand banks build and crumble quickly underneath the water), and so not only must the tide level be just right, you also need a skilled captain to drive.

(Do you drive a boat? Pilot? Steer? Dunno, let's say drive)

Which, again, makes scheduling difficult. Which is why one Thursday morning at 6:30, I get a phone call from our service overseer. "We're going to Siparuta and have space for two more. You and Charlie available?"

Therefore we get dressed and rush to the Kingdom Hall in order to catch the 7 AM meeting for field service. We stockpiled on literature, had a brief meeting, and shuffled down to the riverfront to pile on the boat.

L-R: Alyssa Camacho, Geno Chacon, Dowlan France, and Charlie Brohard.
Not pictured: myself and Jonatan Camacho in front row.

The time it takes to reach Siparuta fluctuates due to a wide variety of factors (see aforementioned sand banks, tricky tides and whatnot), and this morning was a very slow ride with very bumpy waters. Fortunately, we had a cheerful crew who handled it with glee, and within 30-40 minutes reached our destination.

"Sip-aree-do-da, sip-aree yay...."

Considering the lack of territory maps and such, the easiest way to work this village, and keep track of progress, is by dividing it into three distinct areas. The uphill portion of the village, and then two halves of downhill. To the left of the stelling (pictured), and to the right.

Having six people, we divided into three pairs and set about preaching the downhill left portion. Well, two pairs did anyway. Jonatan volunteered to give up his day of door-to-door to accompany me on my studies all day. Which were...

Raymond: I honestly don't remember how much I've talked about Raymond before on this blog, and I enjoy the thought of just rewriting it all from the beginning instead of looking through old posts to find what I've already written. So to start fresh...

Raymond's family was first contacted by Tom Sanches and myself back in September of 2010 during my first ever visit to Orealla and Siparuta. In fact, his was the first house we went to, and he could plainly see we were suffering after the 3 1/2 hour hike though the hills, mud, sand, and whatever else. He and his wife invited us to sit, provided us with food, and listened to us talk at length (you know, once we'd recovered our breath).

Fast forward to Memorial season in 2014. We return to Siparuta, and to that specific house. Since neither of us had been there in so long, we'd quite frankly forgotten everybody we'd talked to before. So we return to Raymond's house, and after a substantial conversation, we suddenly remembered one another based solely off the sound of each other's laughs. After the conversation, Raymond said he had great difficulty understanding the Bible. We remind him that's what the Bible Teach book is for, but he says "No, I can't understand the words in it! My Bible makes no sense! Your gray one though, I understand everything! Can I get one?" He also specifies that his eyes aren't great and asks if there's one with large print. Considering this was mere months after the historic Annual Meeting, the large size Bibles were still a distant dream, especially somewhere as far off as Orealla. But we promised as soon as we came into possession of a large gray Bible, we'd deliver it.

Fast forward again to Memorial season 2015. Tom Sanches had finally gotten ahold of a large Bible (from the first shipment of them sent to Guyana) and had it delivered to Orealla so I could finally (finally!) take it to Raymond. This is pre-Kingdom Proclaimer VII, so our options are rent a boat or walk. Unfortunately, we only had one day's opportunity to go, since Memorial was in a few days and we still had lots to prepare. Therefore, we walked.

The intrepid, mostly barefoot senior citizens, crew!

We reached Siparuta and made a beeline for Raymond's house. Unfortunately, there was no one home. I honestly was incredibly disappointed. A year of waiting, three hours of walking (and trying to keep up with Amerindians, no matter that they were all old enough to be my grandparents, is no easy task), and here NO RAYMOND! Nonetheless, we still went ahead and preached to as much of Siparuta as possible, seeing as we had plenty of invitations. Finally, as we were preparing to begin the arduous walk back, I thought we really ought to check Raymond's house again.

As we approach, we see Raymond approaching from the opposite side! I rush up and begin excitedly talking to him and telling him we've brought his Bible. He stares at me, confusedly, and doesn't seem to remember me or our conversations at all. So I finally just pull out the Bible to show him, and when he sees the gray cover his eyes shoot open and he grabs it out of my hand, suddenly remembering everything. He holds it to his chest and says "Even when I forget what I've prayed for, Jehovah makes sure to remind me."

We talked for as long as we could until the time to leave was absolutely imminent (you do not want to get caught on the Siparuta trail after dark. Plenty safe in daytime, but many animals at night).

Fast forward once more to July of 2015. We visit Siparuta along with three of my friends from the US (Neil Rogenski, Jake Walsh, and Gavin Stallard). Neil goes along with me to Raymond, which we make the first stop of our day. As we approach the house, we see Raymond laying in a hammock, and we call out our greetings. When he sees us he invites us up and says "I was supposed to go out to the jungle to work today, but I told my wife I just really felt like I needed to stay home today. Now I know why!"

We converse at length about the Bible we left him and the features of it he's enjoying, as well as many other spiritual topics. Eventually he tells us "You need to come back and study the Bible with my son Gavin. He learns things very well." He goes on to relate that just the previous day, when church had finished, his son Gavin approached the pastor/minister/etc and asked if he could be permitted to speak before everyone. The pastor agreed, so Gavin goes up and begins explaining to everyone the meaning of Daniel's vision in Daniel chapter 2, and how we know that means God's Kingdom will be a government that will rule over Earth. After it's all finished, Raymond asks Gavin where he learned all of that, to which Gavin replied "In that yellow book the brothers gave you."

So, uh, ripe student there.

Which brings us to this Siparuta visit with Jonatan. Unfortunately, Raymond wasn't home this time, but his wife Mavel was, and we had a great 1 1/2 conversation with her, mostly based on the November magazines. We discussed how religion was becoming full of hypocrisy, and the conversation ended with her asking why we don't start a Kingdom Hall in Siparuta.

Good idea! I think we should take that one to heart...

Wandering about.

The other call we got to was...

James: This was a man which Dustin Reynolds had started calling on during that Memorial 2015 visit, and he asked me to continue on with the interest. So after visiting Mavel, we headed over to James and talked for a good long while. During the visit with Neil I had left my personal Bible with James, so on this visit he had several questions about it. Particularly, the footnotes and cross references. I was astonished at how quick of a student he was. After showing him those two things and the Glossary, he used those with Matthew 28:19 (which was the Scripture we randomly chose to examine footnotes and cross references) and arrived at the conclusion, on his own, that the Holy Spirit is not a person, but rather God's active force. This conversation went on for an hour and a half as well. So therefore, Jonatan and I spent our entire morning on just two studies. A morning well spent.

Since the time had arrived, we arrived at the prearranged spot with the other two pairs to eat lunch. Jonatan and I actually arrived first, and as we were on a bench waiting for the others, I noticed a man standing nearby, who had the look of someone curious who we were, but a bit too shy to approach. Finally I call out to him and begin general conversation, until he finally asked why we were there. So, since we'd just had a meeting part about offering the Teach book, I opted for the direct approach. Right off the bat offered him a Bible study, which he accepted, so we began right there on the bench. He chose the chapter on Family Happiness, which we covered several subheadings until someone else called him away. First I made sure to find where he lives, so I can return next time. And finally, the rest of the group arrived and we had a lovely lunch break.

Time is an illusion. Lunch time doubly so.

We still had a few hours left (taking the boat allows for much more preaching time than walking) so Jonatan and I finally got to do some proper door-to-door. It went like typical Siparuta territory (i.e. half an hour at every single door) until we finally reached our last house. Living there was a woman named Yanet who had begun studying in Suriname and had nearly reached to baptism even, but then had lost contact with Witnesses. She also pleaded with us to start a Kingdom Hall in Siparuta (recurring theme here...) and asked for a wide variety of literature. We reminded her there is always the Kingdom Hall in Orealla, so anytime she can visit there there will also be a meeting she can attend.

She said she'd try that Sunday, and while she personally wasn't able to make it, she ensured her daughter was able to come. And who has made it to each weekend meeting since.

So all in all, I'm a huge fan of Kingdom Proclaimer VII.

More recently, an interesting piece of news is that an MTS grad from Granada will be coming and rooming with me for two weeks. Unfortunately at the same time Jonatan and Alyssa will be returning to New York, which will then also be followed by Charlie Brohard the following week.

Hmm, that's a bit of a bummer. I don't want to end my blog post on a down note.
Here's a pretty guitar!!

That's better. Stay tuned for news of the MTS Granada brother person guy!

Arrival of the Camachos

If you may recall (or not if we've only recently met) two years ago I took a break from Guyana in order to apply to work at Bethel. After a little while, I got accepted to do temporary work at Wallkill in the orchards, which was the absolute best job I've ever had.

While there, I met a brother and sister named Jonatan and Alyssa Camacho, whom I got on very well with. I learned that they had long wanted to serve in another country but lately had been so involved in Bethel work that they hadn't yet gotten an opportunity to travel much. Of course, I told them extensively about my time in Guyana and stories of what I'd experienced and what others had experienced. After I returned to Guyana, I kept in contact with them and told them they should come visit anytime they could.

Fast forward two years later...

After months of planning and preparation, they finally arrived for a one month stay. I met them at the airport with a brother who drives taxi for a living and we brought them down from Georgetown all the way to Corriverton (for visual aid, please see the Guyana map in last month's blog update), but not before showing them some of the nicer sights in the capital. For instance, you get an excellent view of the ocean from there...

"You can taste the ocean! It tastes like... success!" - Direct quote from Jonatan.

We were able to spend a few days in Corriverton with the local congregations there (Skeldon and, naturally, Brighton). This provided both Camachos with an excellent introduction to Guyana, specifically field service. For their first morning, Alyssa spent the day doing territory and studies with a need-greater from Trinidad who's had several years of experience, while Jonatan and I spent the day with Michael Samwaru, a fairly recently baptized local brother who's made tremendous progress in the last four years.

I have to say, seeing new ones reaction to field service in Guyana is one of my favorite things to experience. For the morning, Jonatan started a doorstep study with every single person he talked to, and was able to show the "Why Study the Bible?" video at each home as well (including some of the ones where Michael or I were taking the door). After finishing door-to-door, he proclaimed "My goal was to be able to share the video once! Not at every single house! I think I may stay longer than one month...."

Also, an incredible amount of Caleb & Sophia videos were shown.

After the morning of door-to-door, we embarked on studies. I always enjoy watching how other people conduct studies because it's a remarkable learning experience. The first study was an entire family, including the children, going through the Listen To God and Live Forever brochure. We also visited a 20-something man who was far along in the Bible Teach book, two fleshly brothers in the Listen to God brochure, a teenager in the Keep Yourselves in God's Love book (and whose parents had studied before but gave it up, leaving him alone studying and attending meetings), along with many many others whom I'm quite frankly forgetting now. How on earth Michael keeps up with them all, I have no idea. Organization has never been my forte.

(If you'd like to know how Alyssa's day went, you'll just have to visit her blog: http://welcometotheadventurousadventure.blogspot.com/ )

That's pretty much how our three days in Corriverton went as we waited on the Orealla boat. Service, studies, meeting, and finally shopping in the Skeldon market for the ever-important hammocks. One simply cannot get by in Orealla (or Guyana at all!) without a hammock. We also met back up with Charlie Brohard, who had been on the coast as well for the last few days.

And took a final opportunity to Skype before heading to
 the interior. Also, Charlie is incapable of getting a
picture taken without mugging.

Which began our joint journey back into Orealla. We very quickly got them settled into life here, with washing in the river, hunting for food on a daily basis (not literally hunting for food. Looking for food. As in... oh never mind, you get the point), and developing calls and studies. And in true Orealla fashion, their first meeting in these parts Charlie had to prepare to substitute Talk 1 on the school, Alyssa talk 2, and Jonatan talk 3.

Welcome to Orealla!

Finally, they began incorporating themselves into the congregation as well. Janet, one of our regular pioneers, is especially good with this. She's had us over on numerous occasions already for meals and such...

Pictured above: A small piece of Janet's family.
Pictured below: Some of the best food you'll ever have. Ever.

So now, one week with these two has passed. Loads of new friends made, loads of amazing food tried, and plenty of studies started. Soon there'll be a trip to Siparuta as well, and maybe some river witnessing. So stay tuned!

And so far we're all still getting along fairly well!

Hmm. Perhaps that photo is slightly more frightening than I'd initially thought....

2015 Fall Circuit Assembly

If memory serves (which for someone like me, it most rarely does) I last left you all just before it was time for us to head out for our Circuit Assembly. It was an eventful week preceding, as the boat schedule had changed somewhat.

See, the Pioneer Meeting was to be a Friday afternoon. The boat leaving Orealla typically would depart Thursday night and arrive early Friday morning (we're talking 1-2 AM early), so everyone could simply sleep on the boat in their hammocks and awake with the sun and taxis ready to take us wherever we need to go from there.

This seemed such a convenient layout that for our previous circuit pioneer meeting, I left with the Thursday night boat, thinking we could land early Friday and I could go from the docks to a brother's home, shower, change, and continue on to the meeting. Except I forgot to account for public transportation being horribly irregular and unreliable, thus causing me to arrive to the pioneer meeting a mere two minutes prior to its start.

Not wanting a repeat of that, I this time determined I would take the earlier boat, one which left Sunday night instead, giving me a full five days to prepare myself for the meeting. Which is where the former tantalizing "boat schedule had changed" statement comes in to play.

As previously stated, the boat would arrive early and everyone would sleep on the boat. This particular night, however, the boat was carrying on to Suriname, meaning we landed at 2:30 AM and were told we were to disembark. Immediately. Since the boat was carrying on so fast, it didn't have time to... oh, how do you say... dock. So, an 18-inch wide plank was stretched out over the ten foot gap between us and the dock. With a (roughly) 25 foot drop to the water.

Naturally, we were all very careful. We went one at a time as well. Seemed wisest.

Happily though, a brother who lived nearby took us in for the night (morning) and when the sun finally came we breakfasted and moved on to the house where we were to spend the week up until the Assembly.

Time passed well. Field service Tuesday and Wednesday, Thursday a trip to New Amsterdam (if you're not familiar with Guyanese geography, it's the closest place to us to visit an International Bank, and do some good shopping!)

Brief diversion into geography: The red dot on the map is Orealla where we had begun our journey. The boat goes from the red dot (Orealla) up to Corriverton. From there we took a bus to New Amsterdam to visit the bank and all. The home where we were staying, and the location of the Circuit Assembly, were both in between New Amsterdam and Corriverton. Our Circuit is mostly in the region between those two villages as well, but there are at least five congregations over the Berbice river (the one you see next to New Amsterdam).

Continuing on brings us to Friday, day of the Pioneer Meeting. It was beautiful and excellent as usual, though there was a slight impediment to our enjoyment of it. The Assembly was the following day, Saturday, but unfortunately there was a huge school event going on in the same venue Friday, and the volunteers for cleaning couldn't get in until 5 PM. Which meant a whole lot of work in a very short period of time. Thus, immediately upon the pioneer day concluding, most of the pioneers who lived on this side of the river hightailed it over to the Assembly site to begin cleaning as well. Work lasted well into the night, until many people were being employed to do nothing but hold a flashlight so others could see their work. And the amount of garbage we collected and disposed of was astounding!!

There was actually more. We nearly doubled this after.

By about 11 I'd left, though apparently work was done up until midnight. The late night panic, however, was not readily obvious the next morning. Everything looked perfect (even though there was still some paint on the stage drying out).

There were many good interviews, including three from Orealla (seen in the heading image), plus a grand total of nine baptized, out of a total attendance of 1,130.

I must now take this opportunity to apologize on account of not having any good pictures from the assembly itself. I was much too busy. And by "busy" I of course mean "forgetful to remember to take pictures for all those nice people who read this blog and enjoy seeing the pictures of what all is going on".

Suffice it to say, it was a great day, and we continued to enjoy another two days on the coast with more field service and related joviality before we began the journey back to Orealla.

Where I shall be remaining for the next 12 days until I head out again for... a thing. You'll see soon enough.

Update on Orealla

It's been interesting for me to watch the progression of the Orealla congregation. I first ever visited in early September 2010, after I'd been in Guyana only two weeks. I would periodically visit for the following two years, and by October 2013 I was assigned there by the branch. Now that I'm spending all my time there, I decided to sit back and reflect on what had changed since my earliest visit. And I was frankly blown away by it...

For starters, I first attended one of their meetings shortly after the unexpected death of their sole elder, which left the congregation entirely on the shoulders of one ministerial servant, with only one other baptized brother to assist him. Now, we have two elders (one of whom was the aforementioned ministerial servant), plus two ministerial servants and four more qualified baptized brothers.

As for meeting attendance, well.... here's the attendance record from my first meeting there.

Yes. Five. And that 20 that you see represented the best attendance they'd had in months. However in present day, last Sunday we had 63! That's proven to be the average for Sunday meetings, and the lowest we've had for a midweek meeting recently was 30.

The congregation is now up to 31 publishers with 5 regular pioneers and one continuous auxiliary. On top of that, in the month of August we had 16 who participated in auxiliary pioneering.

One obstacle Orealla was facing on my first visit was having a limited territory. The territory itself is huge, but only a small amount is accessible. The rest of it is homes and farms that can be reached by boat on the river, or there is a large population in a village (Siparuta) which can be reached via a 3 hour walk through the jungle. But now, both those problems have been solved with the purchase of...

In case you can't see, that's a small JW ORG printed on each green bench.

This allows us to reach the village of Siparuta easily, and allows access to most of our river territory (we're still at this point testing the boundaries of the boat).

A huge plus of this is that now, instead of visiting the village once a year like we used to, we're visiting twice a month. Not only that, we've received approval from both the Circuit Overseer and the village itself to hold a meeting there once per month. We have yet to implement that due to our upcoming Circuit Assembly (this Saturday!) but stay tuned for updates in the coming weeks.

Of course, not all is perfect. We still deal with apathy from our territory on occasion, we still struggle to find our Bible students at home sometimes... we still have a Hello Kitty clock hanging in our Kingdom Hall...

You thought I was joking, didn't you??

But things are looking up. All in all, it has been an excellent reminder to me of how far the congregation has come, and how much further it can go if we keep putting forth the necessary effort. So, uh, back to work I guess.

Trinidad Branch Tour

Brief history: I started coming to Guyana five years ago (July 2010 being my first time), and for the most part have been making these trips ever since (excluding the time I applied for Bethel and worked there for a little while). Typically my trips ranged from 6-9 months, and each time I ran out of money I would return to Ohio and work to save more money for another trip. This would usually take between 3-4 months depending on how long I intended to stay, and how well I budgeted my money upon arrival.

However, in preparation for this trip back to Guyana, I decided early on to apply Malachi 3:10. "Test me out, please, and see whether I will open to you the floodgates of the heavens" (paraphrasing). So I determined I was going to plan on my longest trip yet. 18 months. And on top of that, I wanted to keep my work trip as short as possible so that I could return to Guyana in enough time to attend our upcoming Circuit Assembly. Therefore, I would need to earn 18 months worth of money in just two months. Now it is worth noting that this would require a larger sum of money than I've ever earned before, and in the shortest work trip I've ever had. Absolutely impossible to do on my own (trust me, I've tried), but I decided to test Jehovah out and see if this was something he would allow to happen for me.

Before I had even left Guyana to begin my work trip, a brother from the United States asked a group of other Americans "Do any of you guys know someone in the U.S who's a painter and is available for a two-week job?"

"Don't tell me," I replied "This job begins at the beginning of August."

"Yeah," he says back "How'd you know?"

"Because I'm a painter and I'm looking for work at that time."

So long story short, between that job (which did in fact pan out very well) and other jobs I picked up in my time back, I earned all the necessary money for an 18-month stay. Along the way, also learned that Charlie Brohard, who'd come down last year, was hoping to return as well for a 3 month stay (don't remember him? Read all about him here!)

Of course, before returning to Guyana I got to make a quick side trip...

If you've ever heard me talk about my time spent at Wallkill Bethel, you've without doubt heard the names Jon and Alyssa Camacho. I'd worked with them and spent pretty much all my spare time with them as well. So it seemed an excellent idea to see them again, seeing as I was going to be flying out of JFK. Therefore, Charlie and I arrived two days early. Sunday morning they picked us up and took us to the Pine Bush NY congregation, which was having the Fiji Branch coordinator as their visiting speaker. I must say, after being so long in Guyana I truly have a difficult time understanding Americans when they speak, so hearing someone from Fiji speaking was a huge improvement in my understanding levels...

After the meeting the Camachos took us along on a hike to a place known as "Breakneck". Terrifying name, awesome hike.

And then, after two days of goofing off, the time came to fly out. Our flight left at 1:50 AM from New York, and by 6:30 AM we were in Trinidad. The awesome part of this is that there was an 8 hour layover there. Okay, that doesn't sound terrific, but I had been wanting to tour the branch there since 2011, so an 8-hour break seemed like the perfect time to finally go do that!

Shortly after 8 AM one of the Bethel workers drove out to the airport and picked us up, took us somewhere for breakfast and showed us around the city, and got us to the branch by 11 in time for our scheduled tour. Not only did we get to meet literally every Bethelite who works there (including visit the offices of each of the branch committee members), we also got invited to eat lunch with them!

How about an onslaught of pictures from Trinidad and the Bethel tour accompanied by brief descriptions and/or snarky quips??

Trinidad, just outside the airport.

Front door/entrance area.

Front desk. And Charlie. Charlie's the one with the mustache.

Kingdom Hall which is built into the branch building. Serves two
congregations, and Monday night Watchtower study for
the Bethel family.

Lunch with the family! It looks empty due to us getting
there early. About a dozen more showed up immediately after.

All in all, an excellent day spent. Finally, by 1 PM, time came for us to go back to the airport and board our final flight, straight from Trinidad to Georgetown Guyana. A brother was waiting to pick us up there as well and drove us (despite having to stop to repair a flat. A minor setback) to the home where we'll be staying until tomorrow when we head into Orealla.

Nearly home. So close.