Week 4 & 5

Another beautiful sunset and the end of another wonderful week in Puerto Vallarta.

Donna couldn't.

Ok, so how in the world can you resist that little face?

I thought this little girl was cute carrying her little brother across the water to the other side.

Truly a man of many hats.

We saw some interesting things at this particular beach......and here is one of them!

And then I got my turn. Notice there is not a picture of Donna holding the lizards. She screamed so loud the first night here when she saw a little harmless gecko in the house that was probably 10 feet away from her that I knew better than to try and get her to hold these guys.

Ahhhhhh......Chastity just loves lizards.

We saw this guy putting his pet iguana on a girls head nearby and she about had a heartattack so when he was done and was walking our way I pointed to Chastity and said, "she would love to see your iguana!" As you can see in the picture, Chastity was REALLY excited about it!

Reuben was pretty crazy with the boat. He drove through two of these arches in the rocks. Pretty scary with the waves pushing you around, sure that your going to be smashed against the sides of the rocks.

You can see the fish jumping out of the water near me. They would actually let you touch them. There were several different kinds of really beautiful fish. We even saw some manta rays from the boat and oh yes, the other day we saw whales!! This is the time of year they come to the PV bay and mate. We have seen them twice so far from the beach. REALLY COOL!

Reuben threw a piece of bread in the water and up came the fish.

Look at those ROCK HARD.......mountains in the background. I had to make this pose as manly as possible since I was wearing Donna's surf shirt that was skin tight on me.

They call this turtle island because it looks like a turtle.

Headed to Los Arcos, one the more popular snorkeling and diving sites here in PV.

Reuben, our guide, took us around in the boat first and showed us some of the surroundings. This is a shot of the set from the 1964 film "Night of the Iguana" with Richard Burton. Richard Burton bought a house near the set and he and his 2nd wife Elizabeth Taylor lived there off and on for a few years. Now it's a tourist attraction.

We hired one of the locals to take us out in his panga for much cheaper than the typical snorkeling tours with a million other customers on board with you.

Since we didn't have a meeting on Sunday we decided to go snorkeling. Here we had just arrived at playa mismaloya and you can rent jetskis here, however it looks like to get them to go REALLY fast you have to paddle REALLY hard.

Donna and I were working an apartment building on Saturday when we came across a couple standing in the stairway. Donna asks, "Habla usted ingles?". Smiling he replies "a little, we are Jehovah's Witnesses too!" Come to find out, they are from Tepic and were here visiting family. His mother, Irma, invited us in to meet the family, the Corona's. We had a hard time communicating since none of them spoke english very well and we certainly don't speak spanish well. They were so friendly and excited to meet us and Irma even gave us their address in Tepic (about 2 hours to the north) and asked us to come visit while we are here. The two kids in the photo were so friendly. They knew how to say adios in english and so kept saying "bye!" and waving as we left the apartment. What a blessing it is to be part of Jehovah's organization!

Not shown in the photo is Irma's oldest son and her brother since they were taking the pictures.

Our public meeting and watchtower was changed this week. The spanish friends were using our kingdom hall to have their KM school for the ministerial servants on Sunday so we met on Saturday at 4pm with the Centro English congregation instead. The kingdom hall was packed. We probably had around 80 in attendance.

Saturday morning Chastity was feeling a little better and decided she could handle the morning in the ministry. Good thing because we had a wonderful time. Here is Janice and Amy at a door speaking with a woman who showed great interest. She wants Janice and her husband to come back to show her the free home bible study program!

A little later in the morning, Janice and I were looking for one house that she had left some literature at a few days prior. We were looking lost walking up and down this one street searching for the address when a man asks in perfect english, "what are you looking for, you look lost?" We show him the address we are looking for but he has no idea where it is either. So we begin witnessing to him instead. He lived in the states for quite awhile and that's how he learned to speak and read english. He said he has actually been praying to God a lot about helping him. He was really intrigued by the title of our tract, "Would you like to know the truth?". "Yes I would, I'm so confused, there are all these religions and they are all teaching different things. How am I suppose to know which one is teaching the truth?" he asked. We showed him John 17:17 which says "your word is truth" and explained he needed to look to the Bible to find the truth. We talked on many subjects and shared many scriptures with him. He said he liked how we showed him from the Bible the answers to his questions. Janice got his phone number and address and he and his wife asked them to stop by any time to discuss the bible further. We left him with a Bible Teach book and he said "I will read this and look forward to you and your husband coming to visit"!

A sad ending for a wonderful day at the beach.

So while we were at the beach, Chastity got hungry and ordered some fish on a stick from one of the local venders that cooks food right on the beach. She was the only one who had any and on our way home she made the comment that she was feeling a little nauseated. We decided to stop in Bucerias at a Mexican restaurant that I had read about in my travel book and no sooner did we get inside that Chastity took off running to the ladies room. It happened to be right next to the kitchen so everyone who worked there heard her calling earl......"Eeeeeeaaaaaarrrrllll"! Donna and I had already been seated, had ordered our drinks and was drooling over the descriptions of their Mexican dishes (remember, Donna and I had not eaten at the beach). Chastity gets to the table and is feeling a little better, 'probably just got dehydrated or something' Donna and I are saying. Our waiter comes by and gives Chastity a glass of water and a packet of baking soda to calm her stomach...."it will make you feel better, trust me", he says. Nope! Within a couple of minutes she's off to the bathroom again. She comes back and this time he brings her a bottle of Pepto Bismol and a spoon....."take a teaspoon full, it will make your stomach all better, trust me I am a doctor" (not sure about the doctor part, but who knows, many of these people have to work many jobs to make a living). Didn't work, within minutes she's back to the bathroom throwing it all up. We realize that she's not going to be getting any better and that she must of gotten food poisoning so we pay for our drinks and leave. The ride home was not to pleasant to say the least. Chastity was throwing up ever couple of minutes, with nothing in her to come up. (sorry this is so graphic) By the time we get home she is dying, or at least wants to die. She took one of her migraine nausea pills to stop the dry heaves and after about an hour finally is able to fall asleep. Poor thing had a rough day!

Just some beautiful copper vases we saw while on our way to the beach on Friday.

We were invaded by these little wasps seen here on our front door. Supposedly they don't sting but they were still a nuisance.

Here is a scene you see a lot here in PV. Many of the locals ride their horses around instead of cars if they can't afford one.

This is Hema, one of Chastity's bible studies. Her and her two sisters are studying with Chastity. They know English better than Spanish since they were born in the states.

This mango tree is in my territory! I can't wait until they are ripe. We'll be taking a mango break every few minutes.

We saw these Spanish sisters while out in service. They work their territory about every week in Spanish. So if your looking to go where the need is greater in Spanish, it isn't in Puerto Vallarta.

When we were leaving the service group on Wednesday, I saw this lady cutting the grass across the street.....with hedge clippers!! They usually use weed eaters but I guess she didn't have one of those.

Ken and Tammy introduced us to this coffee shop. They get their coffee from all over Mexico, bring here to their store and roast it themselves. It's wonderful!

This was a really cool pottery shop we found downtown. The building was built back in the 1800's.

That's what I call riding in style.

Here's how they pick up the trash. A big truck with one guy on top and one guy on the ground throwing the bags up. Much of the trash gets ripped open by animals so at the end they pick a lot of it up and stuff it back into the bags. NO GLOVES!

Me and Ken stopping in on one of his return visits.

The kingdom hall just before the Monday meeting started. We had around 30 in attendance. I filled in for the #1 reading assignment while Chastity did a demo. They need lots of help here so any of you who are looking to relocate and serve where the need is great would be welcomed with open arms here.

These kids come around every so often selling baked goods. They carry the baskets on their heads as you can see the bun that helps him balance it. I decided on the sugar cookie.

I thought I did a pretty good job of making this bottle of Pepsi look like it's 6 feet tall.

We found this sweet beach past Bucerias. It's called Destiladeras and we love it. No rocks, clear water and good waves.

The damage!

Oh another funny story involving Chastity: Sunday after the meeting we go out to dinner. It's me, Chastity, Donna, Ken and Tammy. Chastity is admiring Tammy's ring and asks if it is a real pearl. She tells Tammy that you can tell if it's real by scraping it across your teeth, which she does. "It's not real". In the meantime, Tammy notices that Chastity has scratched the fake pearl and when Chastity goes to look at the damage she's caused, she proceeds to break the pearl completely off it's setting! And somehow they still like us!

More orange ink spots in the center of the aisle.

Funny story: So Sunday at the meeting during the Watchtower study, Chastity's orange marker pen stops working. She comes up with the brilliant plan to fix it by slinging it back and forth to get the ink to come to the tip. Well it did! I'm staring at my Watchtower when all of sudden I see orange dots appear all across the page, I go to grab Chastity's hand, STOP!! I mouth, "your slinging ink everywhere!" Too late, it's already all over the floor from about 5 feet to the left of her to about 5 feet to the right. It also had splattered on Sister Dolo's dress in front of us. What a commotion! I'm running to the back to get some paper towels and trying to discreetly wipe up the ink off the floor before it dries, all the while trying not to disrupt the meeting. Sister Dolo goes to the the restroom to check out the damage. She says after the meeting not to worry, "it blends right in". Oh Chaz!

Miguel, Suzzane and David stopped by after their meeting on Sunday to meet Donna. They don't even speak any English, yet they took the time to drive over and do their best at trying to communicate with us and welcome Donna to their home.

Beat that Blake!

This jewelry shop had thousands of opals. Chastity and Donna were drooling over them.

Ummmmmm........I don't know.

Saturday we picked up Donna from the airport. Chastity was SO excited to see her!

This kid apparently couldn't wait to ride his motorcycle so he just rode on it in the back of the truck.

Here's a picture of our next door neighbors house. It's true that we live in "the hood" but not because it's a dangerous area, it's just really poor. All the neighbors are really nice. We've had a chance to meet some of them and try out our pathetic Spanish.

When you don't have a truck and you need to transport a bed frame home.....well you just have to make due. I hope Ken doesn't see what we are doing to his car!

Ken decided to try the chicken foot to make sure it was edible for us.

This is a sister from Centro English congregation. She wanted to give Ken and Tammy some free chicken and eggs from our families store so we stopped by after Chastity's study to pick up the goodies. They halved it with us....YES!!

Many of the pharmacies here blast loud POP music and SOME even have a doctor dancing out front to the music. I guess in some weird way it lures customers in. It didn't work with me, but it did make me grab my camera really quick.

Sorry I didn't get a closer picture, but here are a couple of the territories. They actually use Google Mags with the satellite picture setting for the maps. It seems to work pretty well.

Here is the group at Jared's apartment. We meet there every Wednesday at 12:30 to write letters for an hour. They leave the letters with a householder who doesn't speak English but says that someone in the household does.

My bologna has a first name, it's O S C A R, my bacon has a second name it's M A Y E R , I like to eat it everyday and if you ask me why I'll say, "cause Oscar Mayer has a way of causing heartattacks, OK"!

This picture was taken from a golf cart. Yep, that's a crocodile in the fairway of a golf course. We stopped while in service to take a closer look at it and one of the guards rode up in a golf cart and offered to take the girls right out to get a good close up shot. You have to REALLY like golf to use this course. I bet Mark & Rick would still golf it!

The pictures on this blog that are a little blurry such as this one was taken with my Touch, sorry. Here we are eating at one of our favorite Taco joints, Neto Taco, for our afternoon lunch with part of the field service group. The friends here really support the ministry, yesterday ( Jan. 27th) we had 23 meet for service!

This one's for Brandon. Yes, they have Transports here too. And yes, it was still running.

This picture I took while in the ministry on Tuesday. You see these images EVERYWHERE here. At first I thought it was an image of Mary but I later found out that it is the virgin of Guadalupe, the patron saint of Puerto Vallarta.

You will see many tops of walls lined like this, with broken glass bottles. It's the cheap way to keep criminals from climbing over.

Here is our phone service crew. They showed up on Monday to install our home phone. As you can see in the picture, they arrived in a VW beetle with a ladder rack on it. The other vehicle had a telephone pole strapped on top and they installed it in the ground with a post-hole digger and lots of labor. These guys work very hard here to make a living.