April 29, 2012

Dear Family,                                                                    April 29, 2012

This week has been a “stay home week”.   I have been coughing and trying to get rid of the infection in the lungs.  In addition I have had a head cold so it really hasn’t been fun.  We missed going to the temple, which was all right because they only had one large day, Friday.  We stayed home Sunday because it was a coordinated Stake Conferences for all of the Stakes in Ecuador.  The Sunday morning session they had a special broadcast from SLC, which went to all of the Stakes in Ecuador.  Elder Christofferson spoke along with the Area Presidency and a couple of the General Board Women.  The saints enjoyed it.  I don’t feel too badly about missing it because they didn’t have the English translation set up.

        Fran has been the real trooper during this week.  She has been the nurse, Doctor, cook, etc.  She has been a real asset during this discouraging period.  We are going to try and get back to work on Tuesday.  We are in charge of the baptistery and on Tues.  We usually don’t have a lot of people.  We will arrange to work only half of a shift until we are back in full swing.

        We are grateful for the e-mail, calls, Skype, and other communications.  What a wonderful world we live in.  Conrad has been helping us with some computer problems we have been having.  Fran’s hard drive was all filled up.  It appears all of the e-mails we had ever received or sent just keep storing on the hard drive.  Conrad walked us through some technical steps and now the computer is deleting over 2000 messages.  We hope this will clear some space.

        Spanish is moving along slowly.  I think the Spanish we are learning is going to be temple Spanish, which doesn’t include a lot of common everyday conversation. We have to learn this on our own, which would be all right if we had enough time.  Working 5 days a week, going to Church on Sunday and one day to take care of our washing, ironing, etc. makes for a very busy week.

        I am sure this next week is going to be more productive. 

We love you,

Grandma/Grandpa, Dad/Mom

       

April 21, 2012

Dear family,                                                                     4/21/2012

Another week has passed.  We have now been in the field one month.  In one way it seems like a year and in another, like a week.  We are working on the veil trying to learn in Spanish.  It is difficult because we don’t know what the words mean so we are memorizing words only.  Fran is doing real well; I am trying to learn the whole thing because I will eventually have to work on both sides.

        This has been a rough week for me since Friday.  I have caught some kind of viral infection in my lungs and have been laid up.  It has been hard breathing and I have been coughing a lot.  I had my first experience with typical Latin medicine.  One of Temple workers from Peru is a retired Doctor.  He practiced medicine in Peru for 40 years. He specialized in Alternative Medicine.  He treated me using German acupuncture.  He had a small vial of a clear medicine, which is produced in Germany and with a small needle inserted small drops just under the skin all along the backbone, neck, chest, and forehead.  He wrote out a prescription, which was relatively cheap.  I have been sleeping and resting for the last 3 days and I am getting better.  I not sure what helped most, the Priesthood administration or the Doctor.  Fran has enjoyed the break and has given me the best TLC possible.  I have finally realized added exercise isn’t a cure for all sickness.

        The temple, like most temples during the weekend (Friday and Saturday), is the busiest. The last two Saturdays have been record breaking.  We had 12 buses several had traveled 9 hrs. Their were 400 plus youth—we only allow 5 names and sometimes 5 names or one sheet per two patrons (2 names for one and 3 names for the other).  Of course, this weekend I was in bed recuperating…so we part of the action.

        We enjoy the comforts of our little apartment and the friendship of the other workers.  They have been very concerned about Hermano Christensen.  We try to communicate with each family on different weeks using Skype and the Telephone.  We appreciate your prayers and our prayer is that your prayers will be answered on our behalf.

We love you all,

Dad and Fran

ASA  Grandpa and Grandma

       

Conference Weekend

Our calling

We just got called to be in charge of the baptistry. We are so excited. We only know a few phrases like:

• "Bienvenidos"(welcome)
• "Gracias por venir" (Thanks for coming)
• "Bautismos" (baptisms)

and a few other things, but we are learning! Please pray for us! We will update and add more later!!!! Love you all!

March 29, 2012

Dear Family and Friends,

We have been in Ecuador just over a week, just under two, and have comfortably settled into our lovely temple apartment. It has a lovely kitchen/ dining room combination with all of the amenities of home. The only thing we don’t have, that we had at home, is a dishwasher. The apartment is clean and recently painted. We have two air conditioners, one in the living room/kitchen and one in the bedroom. The bed is queen sized and comfortable. We have no bugs, ants, or little animals crawling around in the house. There is a gecko running around the walls in the outside corridor. (It is small and cute Fran says) and we only see it in the evening.

The attached picture shows the temple and some of the missionary couples we are working with. The other picture is with President and Sister Groberg. The picture was taken on a Sunday afternoon after a meeting in the temple for the missionary couples. The full time missionaries stabilize the temple work. We have 6 couple missionaries, one sister missionary and President and Sister Groberg. Brother (and Sister) Brimhall serve as a Counselor along with a local brother, Brother and Sister Bentencourt. We work Tuesday through Saturday. We have either the morning or the afternoon shift. The morning shift starts at 7:00 am and the afternoon shift starts at 5:00 pm. Evidently, the time between the two shifts makes it possible to wash the clothes and get ready, plus the patrons won’t show up. The biggest challenge the temple has now is the over crowding of the baptistery on Friday nights and Saturdays. The young people are very interested in coming to the temple and the Temple’s physical conditions will only take care of so many. Last Saturday it reached the point where they only allowed the last groups to be either confirmed or baptized.

We are suffering from culture shock as much as we are with the language difficulty. Everyone kisses everyone and shakes hands. MOST OF ALL, this is really a Spanish-speaking temple. There are very few English speakers in the whole country. Fortunately for us we have two couples that speak English and interpret for us. They speak very fast…but want so much to help us understand and speak their language. I helped in confirmations the other day and they spoke faster than any auctioneer I have ever heard in the USA. There was one blur of a sentence followed by another.

Looking at the schedule for the next 18 months the ideal time for any who would like to visit are the weeks we have off when the temple is under going maintenance. We are off Aug. 28, 2012 through Sept 8, 2012; Feb 28, 2013 through March 10, 2013; and August 29, 2013 through Sept 10, 2013. We are scheduled to be released sometime in Sept. There are many wonderful things to see in Ecuador and possibly more things to see in Peru, time permitting.

We are doing fine considering our limited ability to communicate effectively. We appreciate your prayers and enjoy reading your letters. The most effective time for us to Skype will be Sunday afternoons and Mondays. We have tried skyping most of the immediate family and made contact with most. Keep your computers on these two days and be prepared. In event of emergencies any time is good. Our Am schedule is from 6:00 am to 2:00pm and 4:00 pm to 11:00 pm (which is late!)


Hal and Fran