Update

Hello everyone! Hope your all good. We've been pretty busy here. Yesterday Ramon and Kali Budden from the New Amsterdam ASL group joined us in service. They just returned from visiting family in the states for 2 months. It was a really nice day working with them. They have been here for about 2 1/2 years and love it. At lunch Ramon went over some notes he has taken at past Gilead graduations. Very encouraging information! They went on all our studies with us and stopped to visit a few they hadn't seen in a long time. They also helped us find a couple of deaf ones in the area that we didn't have directions for. So now we have a few more studies to look forward to.
Last Tuesday when we were in Blackbush doing search we found a deaf woman that has never been contacted before! We were very excited. Its going to take a lot of work since the only signs she knows are ones her and her family have made up themselves. But with Jehovahs help I'm sure she will pick it up pretty fast:)
Faith is determined to destroy my feet. I don't know what it is about them but she can't make it through one whole day without stepping on them at least twice. She thinks that I planned this next experience as pay back. I didn't. But it's still kinda funny. Yesterday we were getting on a bus to come home and there were two guys sitting by each other with room for one more person. I have had my share of drunk friendly men so I made Faith get in first. As she got in they cleared a spot in between them both. So she sat there with a very drunk man to her right. He was chatty and asked for a tract. Which she didn't have, so I passed one back to her. It was the one on having a happy family. He told her his was a happy family and asked if she would want to be part of it. After asking repeatedly, Faith refused to tell him her name. Kali tried to help, but he kept going. He asked for a bible, even after telling us that the girls that were here before had already given him one. He wanted one from Faith. In the end it was decided that if he comes to meeting tomorrow Faith will give him a bible with "From: Faith" written in it. I doubt he will even remember once he sobers up. But it would be a funny experience if he did and later became a Brother. Imagine that on an assembly part!
This last week has been a little...annoying. The mosquitoes have been awful. Everyone in our village has been having fires and doing all they can to keep them away. Unfortunately, the mosquitoes don't realize that bug spray and smoke are supposed to keep them away. Our net covered beds have become our best friends. We are all covered in lovely bites. The other night we took a picture of all the dead ones we had swept up from the floor. It was pretty nasty. Today out in service it was really hot and the combo of heat and mosquitoes was not fun. Everyone probably thought we were insane because the whole time we were walking we were smacking each other and ourselves. But all the people we visited were having problems with them too, so it was a little comforting to know it wasn't just us lol. Apparently this is the worst it has been in years.
OH!! Today I got to hold a monkey. Abi and I had just left my bible study's house and saw a monkey tied up at her neighbors. I asked the woman there if we could take a picture since Abi hadn't seen one since she arrived. She had us come over and said we could hold him. His name is Jack. This is the second one named Jack that I've met. I guess that's a popular monkey name here. Anyways, this Jack was really sweet and still pretty small. He climbed all over our arms and kept laying like a baby. I wish I could have taken him with me. We got some good pictures. And then took a shower the second we got home:)
Tomorrow Todd and Barbara Hollenbeck are having a congregation party at their house after meeting. Everyone's bringing food, which will be delightful:) We somewhat jokingly said we'd make mac n' cheese and the Brothers and Sisters that heard got very excited about that. So that's what we are making! And rice crispy treats. Looking forward to being able to visit with the friends more. We also were told to bring our song books because we will be practicing some of the new songs. We are all very excited about this since usually at meeting we are following along with the old song DVDs and haven't been able to use the new book much.
3 weeks from tomorrow I will be home. Getting really excited to see my family but at the same time I am going to miss all the friends and bible studies I have here. The next couple weeks we have made plans with different friends for dinner. It's going to be hard to say goodbye!