Arizona weekend 1

About two months ago, more or less, I received a text message from a friend in the English congregation from the same hall I went to while in Lakeside. Bethany Jones is her name, and she invited me to go with her family to Arizona the last weekend of December to support the territory in a town with no English congregation. I told my parents about it, and promptly replied to her saying YES! Since that initial text message, I received more information from her father through emails, and we were also able to include my brother in the trip. We would both stay with the Jones' family from Friday morning until Monday afternoon. I also learned that we would focus on handing out invitations to the first English talk given in Gadsden the first Saturday of each month. I was really looking forward to it because it reminded me of the work we did in Mexico when we did search work. 

On Thursday of last week my brother and I got our luggages out and had to select clothing for the weekend of activity that awaited us. Since we had meeting that night, I had to continue after meeting and I went to bed slightly later than I wanted. On Friday morning my dad woke us up at 3 to load our things to the van and cross with him to the States. My dad leaves early to have enough time to warm up the motor of the van and get his coffee ready for the drive. It also is a good time to cross the border because one can avoid waiting too long in traffic at the border. So that is what we did with my dad that morning and once we crossed within 20 minutes, we drove to Lakeside. Once in Lakeside my dad parked at the Vons parking lot and slept until 6:15. He usually does this until he has to go into work, but since we were getting dropped off at the Jones' we did this earlier. Anyways, when we arrived at the Jones' place, Bethany's older brother Myin, opened up the door for us and we brought in our luggages and blankies. We were able to talk while he got his things out from his room and waited until the rest of the family was awake. Once Bethany was ready Ziv, Myin, Beth and I left to get breakfast and coffee at  a Mexican restaurant and at 7 Eleven. We took that back home and ate with their parents. About 20 minutes after we finished eating and had started to load things into the van, our first addition to the caravan arrived. Two sisters, S... and Marlena, mother and daughter, both from the Jones congregation and their niece and family friend arrived. I never got to learn their last name, but they were all friendly and the younger girls, eventually became more comfortable with us. Well, once the van was loaded we went to 7 Eleven again to fill the van with gas and we also met with vehicle number 3 joining our caravan. The Schneiders: Senta, Erika, and Andrew. Something that I had only used once before on a road trip was used in this mini road trip and it became a great tool of communication. Walkie Talkies. So, each car in our caravan had a walkie talkie and this is how we communicated the rest of the trip while on the road, each day. It was so fun. Once we all met and our cars were full, we headed onto Highway 8 and started our trip. 

We did two stops on the way, one at the Golden Acorn Casino to buy some tape or super glue, and the second was in El Centro to buy some dried grasshoppers, which we didn't find. But, both were practical since we were able to have bathroom breaks in each one. We arrived to Somerton, Arizona around 2:30pm and dropped off some Karaoke equipment at a sisters home, but then went to Jack in the Box for some food. This was our first picture with all the kids..oh, and one adult. 

LEFT TO RIGHT: Kayla, Andrew, Phoebe, Ziv, Bethany, Erika, Izmir(aka me) and Myin.

 After lunch we went back the Hoffs home (where we had left the Karaoke equipment) and did some testing on the mic and screen. The testing resulted in an afternoon of singing together, and we continued singing until about 7:30 pm  or later. I had fun during that time and some good laughs as we all tried to sing along to songs we either didn't know the melody to, or didn't like. The drive from Somerton to Yuma was of about 25 minutes and we got to our hotel about 8:30 and met in the lobby with a group of JW's. There were 3 of them, all with their cowboy hats on and vaquero boots and buckle. Interesting first impression, but accurate. The man who was signing us all into the hotel and who was giving us towels, turned out to be  brother too. It was awesome to hear that the majority of guests staying in the hotel that weekend were JW's, 50 brothers and sisters! Anyways, that evening the kids stayed together part of the evening talking until I decided to take a shower and go to bed. The following morning we all got up to have breakfast at 8 am in the lobby and this is a photo of our crew..








The service meeting was at 10, but the schedule we had all been emailed stated that the drive from Yuma to Gadsden was of about 50 minutes, so we had to leave by 9 am latest. We did and the drive to Gadsden was on the same road we had taken the previous night from Somerton. We actually drove past Somerton and continued another 20 minutes until we made it to Gadsden. On our way we saw a lot of fields filled with vegetables and we came up with a game of guessing the name of the produce. When we drove into the KH we saw that there were brothers cleaning the hall and some were working on the doors, these were all from the Spanish congregations. We also arrived 15 minutes before the service meeting, so I was able to take some pictures and meet the other witnesses I saw. Here is a photo of the KH before the service meeting.



 This is outside of the building. 5 Spanish congregations meet her, each with an average of about 100 publishers. It also is about 80 feet from the Mexican border, something I found surprising.

By the time is was 10, the KH was packed, and the total attendance turned out to be of 121 that morning. The brother who conducted the service meeting turned out to be the same brother working in our hotel the night before. He told us to be thorough in our search and to take our time. Try to speak to someone from each house and write down the information from each house, even if they spoke Spanish. If we found English speakers we only gave them the invitations to the special meeting the following weekend and tried to get a name. A demonstration was given by the cowboy brothers, whom we had also met the day before. The brother, his name Charles Banks, also mentioned several cities and told us to raise our hands if we came  from them. Our San Diego group was a mighty one! Then we were divided into groups, depending on where we came from. So, the Jones' group went with a local brother who would take us to the territory and give us instructions once we arrived. Br Banks continued to organize the groups and send them off with local brothers or sisters for another few minutes. After everyone had someone they were assigned to we had a prayer, but that wasn't it yet. We also took a group photo and that took another 15 minutes to organize and another 5 of purely photo taking. The brothers and sisters there were so kinds to us, they even had donuts and coffee for us outside. So after we used the bathroom, had our donut, and got the group together, we finally left the hall and headed to San Luis. 

Brothers and sisters from all ages and backgrounds came from Los Angeles, Long Beach, El Centro, San Diego California, Tucson, Phoenix, Yuma Arizona, Reno Nevada, Chicago Illinois, St Paul Minnesota, and San Luis, Tijuana Mexico. There might have been other cities represented, but I can't remember.  Im on the right in the second row, wearing green. Ziv is in the front row, third from right.

When we got to the territory, Beto Olaiz handed each couple a sheet which we would fill out with information from each number we preached to. I worked with Bethany in the morning until about 12:10 on the same street as her parents. Ziv went off with Beto (or Bethel as everyone ended up calling him) and then switched to be with Andrew a bit. Since we finished up our street pretty soon, we waited by the car and then headed out to lunch with our caravan to get some Mariscos(seafood)! I did get to talk to a younger woman, maybe in her mid 20s who speaks and reads English. She has a Bible at home and I read to her Acts 17:11 and told her that its important to make sure that our beliefs are in harmony with what the Bible says. She accepted the November magazines and the invitation with a very friendly attitude. I need to ask more questions though, I will try to work on that. 

After lunch! We had to rush back to the afternoon service meeting where we got an attendance of 92!!!!

So, the rest of the afternoon we preached and I worked with Isaac (Chief Jones) and with Erika, then I worked with Bethany for a while again. We had the same people work with us in the afternoon, but an additional 6 persons joined our group. We each spoke to someone again and this time I got to talk to a young teenager who actually was interested in knowing the answer to question number 3 on the Truth tract. We analyzed it together and also read the scriptures together. She told me that her mom also spoke English and that she would share the invitation with her. I hope she did and I also pray that she becomes someones return visit. I had to pass some information from my house to house record onto the sheet we gave back to the brothers, so I did that and we finished. One of the car groups left to the hotel, and so did the Jones' van with the guys, only Senta, Marcia, Erika, Beth and I stayed to go to Walmart. We needed some things and also some closed shoes for the bonfire that evening. It took us a while to drive back from San Luis to Yuma, so when we finally did everyone was waiting for us and ready to leave. We had to quickly change and drive back to the Somerton area for the bonfire. Although it was cold outside and dimly lit, we were able to dance a little bit and talk to others. I got to talk to the sub C.O. visiting from Minnesota. He graduated from MTS back in 1996 and has been in St Paul since. Here are some photos..

Senta, Erika, moi and Derrick Robertson or Robinson.. sub C.O.

 The adults all decided to leave before us kids, so the 6 of us stayed until the end. The 6 siblings!! I really enjoyed being with this group of young ones and so did Ziv. We all felt comfortable with each other, and their conduct was always very proper, so I didn't worry much. Myin drove us all back to Yuma, but we all were begging to get Ice Cream, so he took us to Cold Stone. I forgot my wallet, so Andrew payed for both Ziv and I...I owed him. Anyways, it was a nice additional stop and we took a picture there too, although that was taken on Erika's phone. Cold Stone was right across from the hotel, so we decided to head back to the lobby and finish it there. I printed out an application for the girls that I had received several years ago, and it made them laugh. A young brother who had joined us during the afternoon service was also in the lobby when we arrived, so he joined our table and we learned that he was from Tucson and a Regular Pioneer. Then we all were able to share our positive thoughts of RBC and we had good chit chat. We even talked about New York. We were only down at the lobby for 30 minutes, but it had gotten late by then.. 11:30 pm.


I will add part two to my blog soon. I had an awesome weekend and felt very encouraged afterwards.