Ants and more

We have had several rain storms lately. Apparently here in Guatemala there is an ant that is called a Zompopo de Mayo or Sompopo de Mayo. It comes out after several rain storms from in the ground. The male ant does not have wings and the female does have wings. We saw people out on the street gathering these Zompopo's up and putting them in bags. They were either gathering them to sell them or to eat them. The Zompopo is considered a delicacy. To view how to eat them go to You Tube under asi se comea los Sumpopos de Mayo Saludos.  Here are some pictures of these "cute" ants.

The male Zompopo de Mayo

Last Monday we went to the Central Market place where we did a lot of looking and little bit of shopping.  The story goes that this whole market was once on level ground but then there was an earth quake and now there are two of the three levels under ground. There are many shops of a large variety of things, with the bottom half full of vegetables and fruits, some of which we have never seen nor heard of before. When the shop keeper sees you coming he/she will say "come in - what are you looking for". Here are some pictures, including us just before we went inside.

Getting around

We don't have a car here in Guatemala, so someone in the Temple Presidency takes us shopping every Monday. We are able to walk to the temple and to church. We can also walk to the CCM (MTC) if we want to go have lunch over there with the missionaries.  There are a couple of strip malls or shopping places what we can go to, but we can only get what we can carry home. There is also a medical center just the other side of the Temple that we can walk to. The church has built an overpass for people to cross over the busy street that we used to go to a Taco Time for lunch one day. The over pass is the way to go to the other side of the street because pedestrians don't have the right of way here. On the way to any place there are guards who will call ahead to let the next guard know that we are coming. We have been told to NEVER take a red bus! Every red bus has a shot gun guy hanging out the door. We missed getting a picture with the shot gun rider showing, however.

stairs of the cross over bridge

the other side of the street of this bridge

The bars on this bridge

the walk way above the street

the medical center

CCM (MTC)

The Red Bus

we wanted to get a picture of the heavy traffic, but just when we started taking pictures there were only a few cars.

One of the guards with his radio in one hand and his other hand on his gun 

 On our last P Day we had a BBQ with all the temple missionaries and the Temple Presidency at one of the casitas for the patrons to stay in when they come a far distance to go to the temple (patron housing). We had hamburgers and hot dogs and everyone brought salads and deserts. The celebration was for Mother's Day.

The temple missionary sisters including the Temple Matrons
(back row)
Hermana Murri, Hermana Zamora, Hermana Brinton, Hermana Olson, Hermana Cuellar, Hermana Viveros, Hermana Svenson, Hermana Harris, Hermana Barlow
(front row)
Hermana Southwick, Hermana Padilla, Hermana Lopez, Hermana Velasquez, Hermana Burk, Hermana Dick

President Southwick (1st Counselor) cooking the BBQ

Sister Padilla playing in the Jacks game

President Burk

On lookers watching the Jacks game (notice who that is in the red shirt) 

We went shopping on Monday and had so many groceries between the two couples that we had to use the shopping carts in the parking garage in the basement of our apartments. We just brought the groceries up on the elevator in the carts and then took the empty carts back down stairs.

 

The view from our bedroom of the city is pretty. Here is a pictures of that view.

After church we took a picture of a few of the couples that we work with in the temple five days a week.  They are great people.

 The Velasquez are from Guatemala. They were both temple workers and single, then one day on the bus he said to her, "I work in the temple, you work in the temple. We are both single. Why don't we get married". So they did. She has so much energy. On our tour of the ruins, she played basket ball with Blair. She thinks Blair is a star ball player. 

 The Olson's are from Rexburg, Idaho. This couple have eleven children. They lived in Texas for many years, where they joined the church, then moved to Rexburg, Idaho

 The Cuellars are from here in Guatemala. This couple live on the first floor of our apartment complex. She is a sweet heart. He is very nice also.

The Svenson's are from Canada. They were on their first mission in Santa Domingo with the Burks and just followed President and Sister Burk here to serve with them again. He serves as one of the temple recorders here in the Guatemala City Temple.

 

 

leaving church

full view of our church house

Front door of Temple

Full view of Temple

Our church house is just past the temple. In fact, we walk to the back of the temple through the family history library which is a separate building, down stairs to get to our church house.

Monastery

We spend five days a week in the temple. The first week at the temple we had the early schedule, which was seven in the morning to one in the afternoon. On Saturday we are at the temple from four thirty until noon. This week we had the late schedule. On the late schedule, we start at three in the afternoon and leave at nine in the evening and on Saturday we are in the temple from noon until eight in the evening. There are guards that are posted along the way. They call ahead on their walkie talkies if they see us come or go anywhere to let the next guard in the direction we are walking know that we are coming.



This Monastery is across the street from our apartment. We look out the window every day. In the mornings we can hear their bell. In the evenings we can see them sitting on the circular stairs reading, singing or just maybe visiting. They run the school that is on our same street, close to the MTC (CCM).