Our First week in the temple August 22nd through August 28th

Monday: We took an Uber into Quito to meet up with Elder and Sister Cameron for lunch.  It is about a 20 minute drive.  They are the mission office couple for President Winters.  Monday is the P-Day for all the missionaries, except the office missionaries.  Many of the missionaries that have P-Day on Monday drop by the office for supplies and to pickup things they need.  We ran into the grandson of one of our temple workers, Sister Amado, in Guatemala.  We took  a picture together  and he will send it to her with our "saludos".  The Camerons love their assignment and only have about 6 months left.  So we will go home about the same time.  We went to a Mexican resturant a few blocks from the mission office.  

                  Elder and Sister Cameron

      Elder Rojas is the grandson of Gloria Amado, a faithful member in Guatemala.

 Quito is on the other side of the ridge that the tall buildings are on.  None of these buildings were here 51 years ago when we were missionaries.

Coming back down into Cumbaya.  The city has spread out in all directions.

Tuesday through Friday we went to the temple from 8am to noon and then in the afternoon from 4pm to 8pm.  All the temple workers assigned to each shift were expected to come for training.  President Aguirre, his wife, and the Recorder, Brother Vallejo, trained in the morning and President Mino, his wife, and the assistant recorder, Brother Lema, trained in the afternoon.  President Perez and his wife did interviews all afternoon.  We maned the recommend desk and helped everyone who needed clothing and then find the dressing rooms.  We sat in on all the training.  The training this week was on the purpose of the temple, what was expected of the workers, the admistration of the temple, and how we should treat the patrons that come to the temple.  The church has produced about 10 short training videos that teach about the patron experience.  They are very heartfelt and touching.  Friday was a bit different because Elder Anderson from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came by the temple.  I was at the recommend desk when he came with Elder Zeballos and Elder Pino and a few other people I did not recognize. I got to shake his hand and welcome him to the temple.  Chris was in the "roperia", clothing issue and only saw them pass by.  He was here for leadership training.  Saturday:  We went to the temple at 6am and got done about noon.  President Aguirre went to the leadership training with all the stake presidents (37), mission presidents (6), and a few district presidents.  About 10am we got a call from the assistant recorder, Brother Lema, who is also a stake president from Otavalo, telling us that everyone in the leadership training would be coming to the temple in about 30 minutes.  I was at the recommend desk again and Chris was in the foyer in front of the recommend desk.  This was a huge group of men.  This time Elder Zeballos recognized me.  He gave me a big hug. He served in the area presidency in Guatemala for part of the time we were serving there.  One of the brothers from Salt Lake said, "You are in the same place as you were yesterday" and then he asked me if I had been a sealer in the Bountiful temple.  I said," Yes, until I became a missionary here in Quito".  He said that after their visit yesterday, his wife had commented that she thought I was a sealer in the Bountiful temple. He said he would tell her that she was right.  Such a small world in the church. As the group was leaving, I said to Elder Anderson,  "When I served here 51 years ago as a missionary, there were no chapels, no wards or stakes, and to see all these stake presidents today is for me a miracle." He replied, "Yes, the Lord performs many miracles, it just takes a few years".  What a tender mercy to be here for his visit to the temple two days in a row.  I was able to share the photos of Brother Tabango with two of his grandsons on Saturday. In the afternoon, we walked to a new grocery store.  The only problem is we had to walk on the edge of a highway.  It was only about a half a mile away, but we won't be walking that way again.

       Mom thought this plant was interesting.

  What do you think of the size of the cabbage?

              Carrots are an interesting shape.

            We cook with catus leaves all the time.

    Inca cola brought back a lot of memories because it was a favorite drink when we were young missionaries.  It is from Peru and has a very distinctive flavor.

This is the highway we walked along.  Looking east.

 This is looking west back towards Quito. 

Sunday: Gabriel Molina, the son-in-law of President Aguirre, picked us up for church. On Wednesday, the shift coordinator is Bryon Meza.  We were introduced to everyone on each shift during the training last week.  Brother Meza indicated to us that he grew up Ambato and was a child when Chris was serving there in 1972.  He now lives in the ward we will attend and we exchanged some pictures. 

The Meza family with the missionary who taught the family.  Bryon is the boy on the right with his hand on his hip.

We Made It to Quito August 15th through August 21st

Monday morning at 9:00am, after posting the previous blog, I called the church travel department.  I explained that last Friday we had been told that we would be traveling to Phoenix today, Monday the 15th, for our consulate interview and from Phoenix on to Quito.  There had been a bit of miscommunication, but they went to work and she called me back about 9:15am and asked if we could make a 12:15pm flight.  That meant that we would need to leave for the airport by 10:30 am.  We, of course, said yes.  We went into warp speed and bathed, finished packing our carry on bags, and got dressed.  I called our daughter, Charlotte, and asked if she could be to our house by 10:20am and then take us to the airport.  I had our bags on the driveway as she pulled up.  We got everything loaded and were on our way to the airport at 10:32am.  We had to check bags at the counter, go through security, and then get to concourse B.  Concourse B is a long underground walk from concourse A.  When we got to the bottom of the escalator to start the 10 minute walk, there was an electric cart with only one person on it.  I waved to the driver about halfway down the escalator and indicated that we would like a ride.  She acknowledged she would wait.  That was just one of the many tender mercies we received on our way to Quito.  We arrived at our gate about 15 mintutes before they started boarding.  

            At the Salt Lake Airport "We're Leaving on a Jet Plane"

We arrived in Phoenix about 1:00pm (time change).  The consulate in Phoenix is only open till 3:00pm.  After waiting for our bags, we went and got a taxi.  Our hotel was right by the airport so we had the taxi take us there and I asked the front desk if we could leave our 4 bags and we would be back after our interviews at the consulate.  The consulate was about 20 minutes away.  We arrived and they took our papers and asked us to take a seat.  There was no one else in the cousulate.  We waited about 1 1/2 hours and we were getting nervous because it was after 3:00pm and we thought they would close before we got our visas. But they called us into an office in the back and we signed some papers and paid the $275.00 in cash each and a few minutes later we received an email with our electronic visa.  We forwarded it to our contact at the church visa department and called an Uber and headed back to our hotel.  It was about 5:00pm by the time we got back.  We were exhausted, so we ended up eating dinner at the hotel.  Our flight to Quito had a 6:00am departure.  We went to bed at 8:00pm and set an alarm for 3:30am.  Tuesday, I woke up at 2:00am thinking about a health declaration we needed to board our flight to Quito.  I had filled it out the night before, but I needed to get it printed.  I got dressed and went down to the office center.  I figured out how to email it to myself and then get my email open on their computer that was hooked up to the printer.  This took me about an hour.  When I got back to the room Mom was up getting showered and dressed.  We left for the airport right at 4:00am.  We had an easy check in at Delta and no issues with any of our documents. We got through security without any hiccups.  We had time for some breakfast and we left the gate right on time.  We arrived in Atlanta and made our way to a different terminal, found a quiet place, and connected to our start up committee meeting.  They were a bit suprised to see us.  After the meeting, we had lunch and then found our gate.  We left an half hour late.  We arrived in Quito and breezed through passport control and customs. Both Presidente Aguirre (Temple President) and his wife and Presidente Winters (Mission President) and his wife were there to welcome us to Quito.  The Winters just happened to be there to pickup up one of their daughters and her spouse, but it was fun to see them.  The Aguirres drove us to the temple, about a 40 minute drive.  We went to bed about 10:00pm.  

We got upgraded to Comfort + on our flight from Atlanta to Quito

President Aguirre told us to rest up and do some grocery shopping on Wednesday and that we would meet with him on Thursday morning. So that is what we did.  I had a headache most of the day.  I think the altitude was bothering me.  It takes a few days to get a accostomed to the 9000 feet altitude.  We got unpacked and the recorder, Brother Vallejo, drove us to a mall that also had a grocery store.  We told him we would take a taxi back and not to worry about us.  We tried to use the stove when we got back and couldn't figure out how to turn it on.  It is an induction stove and must be unlocked before you can choose a burner and it uses a single slide to choose a temperature.  We felt like true immigrants as one of managers tried to explain this to us in Spanish.

         We have a beautiful, brand new apartment in the patron housing building in front of the temple.

   The kitchen has everything one might need.

Our own washer and dryer

A cute little bathroom

A very nice bedroom.  They changed out our bed from a standard to a queen.

We met with President Aguirre Thursday morning and spent several hours talking about the training schedule they have planned for the ordinance workers and walking through the temple.  The temple is really beautiful.  There were many paintings of the Savior that we had not seen before.  He then set us apart as ordinances workers.  

          Wednesday morning was very sunny.

Taken from the steps of the temple looking at the patron housing building where we have our apartment.

Mountains on the north

Mountains on the South

Looking at the temple from the front doors of the patron housing building

Thursday afternoon we made another trip to the grocery store.  We needed lots of basic things we hadn't  thought of.  There aren't any restaurants within walking distance of the temple, so we will be cooking the majority of our meals.  We are about 20 minutes away from downtown Quito in an upscale residential area.

Friday: We went to the temple presidency meeting and met the two counselors and their wives,  President and Sister Mino and Presidente and Sister Perez.  Delightful people.  Then we had a training meeting.  In the afternoon, we helped greet members who had appointments to be interviewed to be temple workers.  They have called and set apart about 250 workers and have about another 120 interviews set up.  

Saturday: morning we again greeted members coming for interviews.  One young man's last name was De La Torre Tabongo.  De La Torrre is his father's last name and Tabongo is his mother's last name.  I asked him if he was related to the Brother Tabongo who was the patriarch.  He said that he was his grandson.  I then told him that 51 years ago I had the oppertunity to go to district meetings at his grandfather's home in Otavalo and that I have some pictures of his grandfather's children when they were very young.  He got very excited and wanted to see them.  When he came out of his interview, I asked if he was going to be an ordinance worker and if so, what shift he would be on.  He said yes, Saturday afternoons.  I told him I would bring the pictures.  Here are some of them.

Brother Tabongo and one of his sons.

These are some of his other children.

Outside Brother Tabongo's house with some of the missionaries.

District meeting in Brother Tabongo's house.

This is how we sold Book of Mormons on the street in 1971. I am the tall blonde behind the story board.  I could not resist including this one.

Sunday: President Aguirre and his wife picked us up for church and then invited us to their home for lunch.  We are so blessed and excited to be here.  Next week we have training sessions 9am to noon and 5pm to 8pm Tuesday through Saturday with the workers on each shift.

This is the Cumbaya chapel.

Dinner at President Aguirre's home

                 President and Sister Aguirre and Mom and I 

 

This is for Ted and Sharon Jackman.  Do you recognize your missionary, Elder Molina?

For the rest of you, Ted and Sharon Jackman had an Elder Molina from Ecuador in their mission in Peru.  He married Fernanda Aguirre, the daughter of the new temple president here.  We served with Ted and Sharon in the Cochabamba, Bolivia temple.  We had a wonderful dinner and afternoon visit with the Aguirre family.

 

Our Paperwork arrived!

Monday we contacted the Salt Lake office of Senators Mitt Romney and Mike Lee.  We asked for their help in finding out why we had not received the paperwork we need for our visas from the State Department.  They said they would look into it.  We tried to stay busy with small projects.  Chris made curtains for Xela and Willa's bedrooms.  I helped Sam make a roof over the stairwell to the new aprartment.  

Friday we took Badger and Moose to lunch for their August birthdays.  When we got home, I walked in and there on the counter were the envelopes from the State Department.  I called Chris on the phone and told her.  She said  "I am turning around."  She was on her way to fill up her car.  We changed our clothes and went into the visa department at the church.  They made copies of the paperwork from the State Department and then gave us back our passports and everything else we would need for our interviews at the Ecuadorian consulate in Phoenix.  They said someone in church travel was working on getting us our tickets to fly to Phoenix on Monday (today) and then we would go to the interviews and then straight to Quito.  We never heard anything from church travel. We will call into church travel later today.  We hope to be traveling in the next day or two.  Saturday night we took all our children and their spouses to dinner.  One last fling.

Still Waiting for our visas! August 1st throught 7th

 Monday: Since our paperwork for our visa did not arrive from the State Department, I decided to help our daughter, Genevieve, and her husband, Sam, with a problem at their new apartment.  The apartment passed final inspection and then they applied for a ADU (auxillary dwelling unit) which makes it legal to rent part of your house.  Well, the city required another inspection and the apartment door to the outside at the bottom of the stairwell to the basement did not pass code.  It needed to be 3 inches bigger.  So Monday, Sam and I tore out the brand new door we had installed and cut the concete foundation 4 inches on one side of the door.  Tuesday, we got the new 36" wide door installed and the casing and brickmold installed.  Wednesday,  I installed some concete patching and interior threshold to cover the space between the door and the flooring. It is ready for the inspector to come back.

 I got covered in mud from cutting the concrete.

                                       Concrete cut day one.

                              Door installed and brick mold on.

                             Casing installed and new threshold.

Thursday we had our Zoom meeting with the startup team for the Quito temple and they are going to start training temple coordinators on Saturday, August 13th.  We so hope to be there by then.  Friday we went to lunch with our good friends, Blake and Michell Rigby.  Then our good friends, Wally and Martha Cooper, picked us up and drove us to their farm in southern Idaho.  They have been working on their farm for more than 30 years.  They have completly redone the original  farm house and added an addition to it.  It is so cute.  Wally has promised to send me some pictures, I will post the pictures next week.  He has rebuilt an old granary and turned it in to a guest house.  They have added a new garage and also a new shop and tractor building.  They lease out the land to a rancher for his cows.  It rained all day Saturday, but it was so pretty and peaceful.  

We got home just in time to watch Stake Conference on Zoom.  Martha suggested that we contact our Senator and see if he can help us get the paperwork we need.  It just so happens that a staff member at the Salt Lake office for Senators Mike Lee and Mitt Romney lives in our ward.  Chris called her and she sent us a form to fill out and indicated that she would try and help us first thing Monday morning.  Everyone please pray that we get that last document we need so we can get to Ecuador in time to start the training on the 13th.