Thank you Presleys part 2

If I were smarter I would know how to fix this so it would all fit on one blog but we learn line upon line right? Three months ago I couldn't even make a blog so here is the end of our story-

This is us with Izador who is a Ngobie Indian who live in a house behind the Presleys with his family.  Elder Presley built the house almost alone since he has been on his mission. Izzy is planning on serving a mission but he has to finish high school first. He should be done by now but had to quit to help support his family. You can see what a nice home the Presleys live in and they are wonderful to do so much for this poor but wonderful family that live behind them.

Dad on a scary walking bridge. We actually crossed this bridge to visit some branch members that live across this bridge and up the hill behind it. It makes Home Teaching a little difficult especially after dark!

Dad from the bridge another day showing off the scenery  and the shrouded volcano in the distance.

Dad and I in Boquete at a beautiful golf course and resort called Villa Escondida. (Hidden Villa), It was gorgeous!

This was also at the golf course. We thought you would get a kick out of us hugging by the heart. I don't know why this picture is so deceptive. This hill is really steep and we just about fell over just trying to get a picture here.

We we are back home again with the aftermath of Carnaval. Here they were revamping some of the floats to re-parade them the next weekend for Canavalita. So glad it is all over, finally.

I told you there was trash everywhere. There were piles like this everywhere and you can imagine with heat like we have what these piles smelled like. There is still a lot of trash everywhere you go but at least they are getting the piles taken care of.

We love all of these unique, little blossoms that you would never see in North America. The other day we saw some red ones just like these. They are so gorgeous.

Ok Cassidy are your sunsets more beautiful than this?  Show us what you got!

Thank you Presleys Part 1

Since I last posted we took a bus to David for our Mission Conference with Elder Amado and then went on to Boquete to spend 5 nights with the Presleys. during carnaval. It was quite an adventure because we had all of this luggage for a week and we had to catch a bus from Las Tablas to Chitre, then from Chitre to Santiago then Stantiago to David. We got a taxi to a hotel in downtown David and spent the night there then the Presleys picked us up the next morning and took us to the mission conference. It was a good conference--(I think it was good, it was all in Spanish) Elder Amado spoke for 5 1/2 hours without any notes. The missionaries all around us were writing like crazy though. They have lots of notes. The Presleys took really good care of us and showed us around their mission world  which is really quite different than ours.

This was town square in David about 6 pm when all the high school kids get out of school. Everyone wears uniforms--sometimes different uniforms from different schools but they all know what they are going to wear each day. The elementary kids go to school in the early morning and get out at lunch time then the older kids go about 2 and get out at 6. It is a horrible schedule and they don't use the same schools so I have no idea why they do it. But once I can speak Spanish I am going to find out!

Here are some Ngobi Indians that are real prevalent in this area. They are not the San Blas Indians who are smaller but they are very easy to spot even if they don't have their bright dresses on because they all look a like--seriously.

I thought you would like this one. This panaderia is one and only one of places we found to have our Dare for the night.

This is Elder Carlos Amado who was so deferential to us because Dad had been his son's mission president. While he was teaching he asked Dad questions 2 or 3 times and even told a couple of stories his son had told him. about our mission.  Who knows if they were even true.

I had to add these for you crafty girls. This is the chapel you are looking at and there were 2 arrangements of these flowers on either side of the podium. They must have been some RS activity because they were made from 2 liter pop bottles. I tired to take a picture looking down into the bouquet because you can actually see the lids and the inside of the original bottles, but the picture doesn't show anything. They are kind of clever but seemed way out of place in the chapel. They reminded me a lot of something that would have been part of the set of Willy Wonka--but then they would have to be made out of chocolate I guess.

 

This is part of the open air market in Boquete. I never see any really great deals at these markets. They seem to have lots of little kids back packs, coloring books and underwear--tons of little girls panties--who knows why.

This is Dad and me in the Plaza in Boquete right next to the open air market. Can you tell we are North Americans?

Another Ngobi Indian family. in Boquete.  Even the little girls wear their native dresses out in public. I liked this picture because the father looked like a young man. So many times there will be very young girls married to very old men--yuk!

We saw these beautiful trees all over in this area. Some were pink and others were white. The weird thing about the tree is there is no other foliage on it. There is not 1 green leaf anywhere just great big blossoms. The Presleys said during the rainy season the blossoms go away and the tree is just green.

Here are some other flowering trees were thought were beautiful but the Presleys said they are noxious weeds that grow everywhere and you can't get rid of them. They have thorns all over them that are about 3xs longer than the thorns on a rose.  It's their way of saying, "Don't mess with me!"

Here are Dad and I and Sister Presley at a vegetable market in Volcan near the base of the volcano. This huge bag of vegetables costs $5 and has everything in it from potatoes and carrots to beets and cabbage. We didn't try to climb the volcano. You can drive to the base but then it takes young Elders about 6 hours to get to the top. We probably would have died on the way.

Again, Dad and I in Volcan showing off the beautiful foliage.

Villa Escondida in Volcan, Panama. We were going to have lunch here but it was too expensive so we just used the bathrooms instead.

Again, Villa Escondida and some of their beautiful gardens. It is a total tourist trap and wouldn't you love to be trapped there.

Here we are with Don and Linda Presley from California. They were wonderful to take care of us for so long.We had a great trip  thanks to them.

Hotel Don Jesus

Here is some fruit our friend Carlo gave us from his place. The oranges around here are always this color. They are real juicy but they are impossible to peel and full of seeds. I call them amarillos because they are not orange. He also gave us grapefruit, limes, star fruit, guava and mangos. Not all of them were as good as you might think. No one really takes care of their fruit trees around here or tries to improve their production or anything. Once they produce something you just pick the ones that are ripe and sell them on the street.

This is our Chitre district. The Elders (Johnson and Espinosa) are actually the Zone leaders but since they are the only Elders in this district they are also the District Leaders. We took this picture because this week was transfers and we were afraid of losing of our District. Luckily All of the Las Tablas people remained in tact. I really like our  hermanas. I like them so much sometimes I even forget they don't speak a word of English. I will rattle off something in English and they will look at me like I am some sort of an alien. I guess I am. Ha!

I wanted to show you a little bit of our church. This was once the Primary room but lately we have been having investigators class and Relief Society in here. This picture really makes it look better than it is. I don't know how long the paintings have been on the walls but it is old and scratched up. The chairs all need to be scrubbed and the windows are those little slat windows that you wind open and closed with bars on the outside of them. If there was a fire and you needed to get out of this room but you couldn't use the door you would just die--unless someone could knock a hole through the wall. The walls are all pretty thin.

This is one of the 2 bathrooms in the church and this picture makes it look way better than it is. First of all the door doesn't lock and of course there is no hot water (that is a given) and the shower has never been used or cleaned since the church bought the building. I shouldn't complain because it does have water, soap, paper towels and toilet paper that flushes!

This is our chapel. Sorry I didn't get the picture before everyone put most of the chairs away but you get the idea, I'm sure. The room holds about 45 people and just above what you can see in the picture there are 3 oscillating fans on each side of the room. Also the door to the outside and the bus stop and the street are just in back of this man where I am standing taking the picture. Without the fans going and the door open it would be unbearable to be in the room with 45 people in attendance. With the door open it is pretty noisy with buses and taxis and cars and people coming and going.

You guessed it--this is where I sit for Sacrament and play this lovely keyboard. It kind of matches my piano skills. There is not room in the chapel room for this little table, keyboard and me so I am in a little adjacent room where extra people can sit if there is an overflow. You can actually see the speaker from here but not the congregation, This table you see in the left hand corner is the sacrament table.

This is the plaza in the center of town. I wish you could see the giant scaffolding they have put up all around 3 sides of the plaza getting ready for Carnaval. Dad is standing by stairs that go up about 3 stories. I do kind of wish I could be here to see all of the festivities but the closer it gets and the crazier the traffic and crowds and street closing and loud amps everywhere--I'm glad we are leaving in the morning.

More and more of the streets are beginning to look like this. Everyone is trying to sell their wares but most of it is a lot of junk. However I did buy a pair of sandals the other day I quite like. They charged me $10. If my skin had been a little darker I probably could have gotten them for $5. I am working on the darker skin but it is coming very slowly.

This is the small veranda outside of our hotel room at the Hotel Don Jesus. You can see a little of the pool down below. Unfortunately we never spent any time at all out here because it was just too uncomfortably hot and humid. Once we got home we were dieing for air conditioning. The hotels around here have no air conditioning in their lobbies or their common areas. They must think we are just crazy that we can't live without it. They also must wonder why no one uses their really nice common areas and verandas.

Here is Dad poking his head through a papaya tree as we walked back from a lesson we taught this afternoon. He thought he was so cool being in the picture but then he had to ask what they were. Still haven't tasted your Cherimoya Joel, but they do say they grow them here.   Tomorrow we are off to David for a mission conference with Elder Amado. He is the father of our Elder Andres Amado that came to our mission. I'm sure he will want to meet us for that very fact. Ha. Then we will go to Boquete with the Presleys who are the only other Sr. Proselyting Couple in the mission. We have never met them but they have been "assigned" to take care of us during Carnaval. We will be there 5 nights which is longer than we like to stay with our kids. Is should be interesting.  So long, love you all, Mom

 

Third week in Panama

This is the start of our third week in Panama. The work goes on even if we don't know the language and we don't currently have a place to live. We also don't have a car or the smart phone we have been promised. I have blisters on both of my feet. I keep rotating the shoes I wear so as to relieve areas as they heal. I am confident calluses will eventually grow--right Austin?

Another beautiful and unique blossom you have probably never seen before. I don't think I had.

Tonight when we went to visit a less active sister the Hermanas we were with kept yelling "Buena" outside of the house. Buena is short for Buenas Dias, but all you get is Buena_ everywhere you go. Anyway, they kept yelling and the lady kept yelling "Buena_"  I thought but she didn't come outside to let us in. I then notice this little guy in the tree. He was the one saying "Buena_" the little lady wasn't home.

This is one of our Hermanas, Sister Quispe from Peru. It was her birthday today. She turned 20 and the Sisters in RS made her a cake. I didn't know it was her birthday and I don't have a kitchen so I am really lame.

Here are the sweet Nelsons with us and 2 of our Hermanas (Molino and Quenteros). We are determined to get them to the temple. He has a darling Jamaican accent when he speaks English. Since he is 95 we have quite an urgency to make this happen.

This one is for you Joel. Maybe you could start a branch down here. But who would ever hire you when their house is wide open all of the time.

This is the bus terminal in Panama City. I wish this picture could do justice to the noise and confusion that abounds here. Million of people and buses and taxis all coming and going and honking horns, trying to get around each other. It is amazing there aren't accidents and deaths every day-but amazingly there aren't.

This is front of our church. It is right on the street and just happens to also be a bus stop. Sometimes it can be pretty noisy with cars, taxis and buses stopping. Of course the door is always open when anyone is there because there is no air conditioning. You can smell the diesel wafting into the sacrament meeting and of course everything is covered with dust from the street.

I thought you would get a kick out of this street display for shorts. It is summer here you know---all year long. Sorry they aren't modest!

This is our home: The Hotel Sol de Pacifica. It isn't that bad. The room was supposed to cost $50 a night but since we are retired we get a discount so we pay $35 a night. Thank goodness since we are going on our 2nd week here. We also get this discounts at restaurants but sometimes they ask Dad if I am "retired too" that's what happens when you marry a young wife.

This is taken on one of our early walks near the hotel, not far from the center of town. All of their cows have these droopy ears and look like they haven't eaten in months. Yuk! That's what we are eating!

Again taken on our morning walk. This is what so many of the houses look like around here and pink is one of the favorite colors. The 2 houses we were in tonight had cement floors and cement block walls. Luckily most people don't have 4 dogs like one family we visited did. We don't have that South American tradition here--thank goodness.

This is a beautiful flowering bush they have everywhere around here. It looks a lot like an azalea blossom but it has that cute little extra thing in the center. i will try to take more pictures this week. Until then Adio_.

Our First week in Panama

Our First week in Panama. Sorry the pictures are our of order. Maybe someone could email and tell me how to move them around. I put them in in the right order so it can't be my fault!

Here are the sisters we serve with here in Las Tablas- Hermana Quintero (El Salvador), Hermana Rondon (Columbia), Hermana Molina (Honduras), Hermana Quispe (Peru)

Here is the beach right outside of Las Tablas where we had our branch activity.

Dad in the water with two little boys from the branch.

These are some beautiful flowers on a tree on the temple lot. They are like a colored puff ball. Some of you girls with nie cameras would have a heyday with this one.

Dad again with his boys.

The Chinese pagoda in the cemetery next to the temple lot.

View of the temple from the cemetery.

The missionary grandma

I took a picture of this tree because it looks like it is just sitting on the ground and has no roots at all.

This is a remaining bunker from the World War I days on Ancon Mountain in Panama

On the temple ground in Panama City. Thanks for the shirt Melanie.

Again on the temple grounds in Panama City

Just so you can see how dense the foliage is here. Try to take a hike through that!

A large ship waiting its turn to go through the Panama Canal. Captain Phillips revisited!

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Panama City from the top of Ancon Hill

Two Old Gringos in Panama City

Got to go to the blessing of Ephriam the day before we left the USA

These are the men from the blessing circle. I really like these guys.

Hours before we left for Panama

These cranes are what are used to lifetthe huge containers off the ships that arrive in Panama

Outside of the Panama City temple

Outside of the Panama City temple