Primary in Guatemala 4-27-14

On Sunday the 27th of April, we visited a ward for our meetings.  We decided that because the Week of the Family is coming up soon in May we would visit the Primary and talk with the Primary President.  She is American of Spanish descent.  Her husband is an American and from Texas. They have 3 boys and they are all bilingual.  Just amazing.  We will return in two weeks and take more pictures of classrooms and children and yes, more sharing time.

 Sweet little Nina sleeping while her mama is directing the sharing time.

Notice the banner above the white board. Families are Eternal. On the white board it says in Spanish

"I can show love for each member of my family"

Children participating. On the table there are little sticks like we use in our Primary that have children s name on them. They are used to select participants in sharing time or singing.

April 26th trip to Mexco Viejo, More interesting ruins.

With fellow Senior Missionaries Elder and Hermana Bingham we traveled by car to the Mexco Viejo ruins about an hour and a half from Guatemala City.. These ruins are not as ancient as the Copan Ruins of Honduras. They have been restored to the original architecture as much as possible.

This is stair to a temple structure as was explained to us.

Cotton Tree that is very common here in Central America

Elder and Hermana Bingham sitting on top of the structure that suggested games were played.

 Elder Bingham

 A small town close by that on Saturdays had fresh vegetables, fruits and flowers. Women of the town wear 

their traditional dress every day year round.

Ruins of a game stadium as it was explained to us.

Hermana Bingham

There were school children playing on dirt that was on top of original structure. It was a school field day for them.

 The school children on their field day were really enjoying climbing on these stairs.

 Huge tree in the middle of the ruins city complex

Perspective of how big the tree is compared to human height

 A mother and child accompanying the school children on the field trip.

The market place is in a plaza and very busy with product and goods to purchase

Temple ruins

Elder Al and Elder Bingham scoping out the ruins

 More kids on top of ruins.  If its high kids will climb on it.

 Ruins from afar

Temple ruins we were told

 Women coming out of local Catholic Church in traditional dress.  We think a wedding took place here today.

 Several women dressed in Guatemalan traditional dress holding flowered ornamentation walking towards another building from the Church.

 Notice how small this woman is.

Temple ruin from afar

 This is a good perspective picture to show the size of this stadium to size of people. Al is in hat and yellow shirt.

Another side of stadium

 School children having a wonderful time climbing all over.

More pictures of school children on a field day

 Ruins in another part of the property

This was most intact of any other ruin structure.  Well maintained.

Good Picture of Al

Published an article in Sala de Prensa Guatemala

This is Hermana Tolaman and Hermana Nield and myself yesterday at the CCM.  This is the missionary training center in Guatemala where I take the Spanish language lessons in their computer lab.  The two sister I met almost two months ago when they first arrived and we make contact every one in awhile when I am there.  Today I published a news article that I first wrote in English and then had it translated here in the office by one of the bilingual secretaries.  My expertise is to put it in the Mormon Newsroom format which in some ways is similar to working a blog but closer to an online newspaper.  It is then published for the world to see. There is no place to put the author´s name (me) so I post my picture with these lovely new sister missionaries.  Love this job.

To get to the article put www.saladeprensamormona.gt and it is titled in Spansh SE PREPARAN PARA LA EXPERIENCIA DE SU VIDA.  

April 20th, Elder Burningham´s Birthday and visit to a Spanish ward for church.

This is Hermana Ingrid Barrera Ramirez of a Spanish speaking ward here in Guatemala.  She is bilingual and helped me understand all that was going on in Relief Society.  I was asked to give an opening prayer so I got my cell phone and went to google translate and put something in and then translated it to Spanish and read it.  It worked.  Hermana Ramirez is very nice and every so helpful.!!!

Made a Carrot Cake with cream cheese frosting.  I put it in the frig to set the frosting.  It was big hit as the dessert at the Senior Missionary Easter dinner. But would you believe I didn´t get a picture of it with Al.  tsk tsk

Missionary Experiences

 Yesterday the 17th of April, we went to lunch with two other missionary couples to a great Chinese Restaurant.  It was very modern in a very nice mall.  We had not seen it before.  Then the couples took us to an artisan shop that we didn't know existed and it was nice.  I bought a couple of items and the lady waiting on me spoke English.  I noticed as she was processing my credit card that she had her scriptures open and it looked like they were well read.  I told her that we as Mormons also believe that the Bible is the word of God and so is the Book of Mormon.  She was very pleased that I told her I would be back with a Book of Mormon.  I told Al of my experience and he said that there was a Book of Mormon in the car.  I wasn't aware of that so Al moved a little faster to our car and came back with the book.  I handed over my purchases to Al, grabbed the Book of Mormon and went back to the Artisan Shop and told her that the Bible and the Book of Mormon testify that Jesus is the Christ.  I handed it to her and she was most pleased and wanted to read it.  She gave me a hug and said she just loved the senior missionaries and expressed gratitude for all the service the missionaries render.  I really felt the spirit when I did that.  Great experience.

Copan trip April 15th 2014

 

 This is a stairway of thrones.  Interesting when this civilization was conquered the first thing the conquerors would do is lop of the heads of the statues.

 

We went with about 18 other senior missionaries on an excursion to Honduras to visit the Book of Mormon ruins of Copan.  We were led by a very knowledgeable guide who had led tours with an LDS archaeologist who had compared the ruins of Central American to the writings of the Book of Mormon.  We enjoyed our stay....but the van ride out there was challenging.  6 hours both ways on very turny roads. We did stay in a hotel there and it was nice. The trip came up and we didn't think we would get out there again due to the distance and travel time.

These photos were taken with my Canon camera that was given to me (Kathy) by a departing missionary that said he had a better one at home.  Trying my luck with this.  I will  add some of Al's as he gets them to me.

 

We stopped at museum on the way out and viewed some mammoth skeletons . They are huge.

 



 

Our LDS Guide telling us all about what each ruin was about. The round stone was used as a sacrificial stone.  Not Book of Mormon people but some time after.

 

 

Carved stone that reflects a tribe.

 



 

A Parrot with a squirrel, imagine that. The Macaws are all in the tree tops but they have some averys and feeding trays.  The squirrel takes his share of it as well.

 

 

 Stairway to top of temple

 



 

Another view of temple

 

Pagan God

Al looking up from a tomb area

 

Elder Burningham looking for photo opportunities

 

 

Looking down on what is assumed as living quarters for government officials.  ???

More ruins but look at the perspective of size from the man there and the size of the structure.  And it was made of really heavy stone. It has been assumed that the people then were small however their sculptures of people show them as very large much like a Polynesian type person.

 



Throne room

 



 

Some examples of architecture

 

This is a reconstructed temple as it was in ancient days in the museum nearby.

 

The building is red as it was found that red dye was on the stone and mortar.

 

 

 This is called an "Astela" which is a monolith of an individual and his life. The sides tell of his birth and marriage, children, death and other heroic things the individual did.

 

 

Another "Astela"

A relief map of the area of ruins

 

 

The following are Al's pictures

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This shows the tunnel that exits out of the museum



The tree is about 200 years old and look how small the people look.