Paraguayan Addresses - Thought you might enjoy.‏

Hello to all:

This evening I have been working on trying to clean up the membership records of the Horqueta Branch.  I am trying to identify in which neighborhood everyone lives, and then we will ask members in that neighborhood if they know any / all of the people.  We can visit the inactive members and decide how to proceed from there.   I have found that nearly 100 members live or lived in Paso Ita, about 20 km / 13 miles from here.  We used to have a group of the church there but not any longer.  We also have several memberships from the Tacuati group (40 km away) but we are missing a bunch.

As I was working on this project, I was reminded that here in this part of Paraguay there are no street addresses or house numbers.  So we have the member’s name, the neighborhood in which they live, sometimes the street on which they live, and then a description provided by the missionaries.   Here is a sample, and only a small sample, of these descriptions:

• 2 houses from Hermana Dorothy
• Next to the football field
• 3 blocks from the church
• The last house on the street
• 1/2 block from the Duarte’s carpenter shop
• In front of the Cemetery
• In front of the rented chapel
• 2 blocks east of the Cemetery
• “we are waiting for the address”
• The yellow house
• By the pool, 2 blocks down, 3rd house on the left
• At the side of the stream
• The white house of wood, 8 houses from the corner
• 1/2 block North of the Assembly of God Church

Fortunately, the missionaries who are assigned to these areas usually have some idea where to start looking, but for us???????

Love you all,

Jerry

pictures December 2015

1- Fruit from the farm - mangos, bananas, limones, and some sugar cane (not shown)

2- Cheryl picking mango - Big, sweet, Brasilian mango

3- Out in the country…..

December 28, 2015

Hello to all.

We hope and pray that you all had a wonderful Christmas and that you are all ready for another new year.  A few years ago I never would have thought that we would be entering the year 2016, especially in Paraguay!

We already shared some of our wonderful Christmas Eve experiences and we will always cherish the opportunity we had to give something for Christmas that most of these wonderful people had never received - Christmas Carolers.  We visited the house of some members where we had gone caroling and they said that their neighbors asked why we had not visited them also.  What a shame that we could only spend 5 hours out caroling.

On Christmas Day we visited the Cristaldo family, delivered a Christmas cake, and had a short lesson with them including the video “A Savior is Born”.  They really enjoyed it and we invited them to join us for church on Sunday.  Hmo Cristaldo seemed interested in coming back to church but he didn’t seem too sure about when he might return as he has been inactive for several years.  Yesterday morning about 10 minutes after the start of our meetings in walked Hno Cristaldo.  He decided that this was the day he was going to come back to church.  He stayed all three hours and seemed to enjoy seeing all of the members, he participated in the classes, and seemed pleased to be there.  We had an appointment last evening (already scheduled) to visit with the family again and when we got there we asked Bro Cristaldo how it felt to go back to church.  He said “estoy muy contento”, or in other words “I am very happy and content”.  He said it almost felt like he had never left.  We will continue to meet with them because the Hna Cristaldo hasn’t attended yet, but said she would start next year, which we reminded her is this coming Sunday!  It has been a wonderful and sweet experience to get to know and to help this good family.

We continue to have problems with our internet service and company.  A few weeks ago, in anticipation of all of the skyping from us and from the missionaries around Christmas, we doubled our data plan to 60gb…..we thought.  Today we have no internet because we have used up all of our data plan.  But, we didn't use all 60.  We have only used 35 which is what the internet provider set up in error.  So now I am on the phone all day trying to get this resolved.  Cheryl keeps reminding me - “You are in Paraguay”!

We really enjoyed visiting with everyone during the holidays.  It was great to be with family - even if only by phone or by Skype.  We had a chance to meet one our missionary’s family when he skyped with them from our house.  It was fun to meet the Mendoza family from Riverton, UT (formerly from Bolivia). 

We continue an unusually wet and cooler summer here.  Usually by this time we would have temperatures well over 100, sometimes over 115 degrees.  But we rarely have hit 100 and usually in the high 80s or mid 90s.  I have no complaints but things sure are muddy.  We also have to plan carefully when to wash our clothes as our clothesline is not covered and we can only dry clothes on a dry / sunny day. We are truly blessed to have a washing machine - I love it and I have the assignment to do all the laundry.  It is amazing how we are beginning to more fully appreciate some of the small things in life:  clean running water, hot running water,  a clothes dryer,  gasoline/ diesel at less than $4.00 per gallon, good ice cream, pizza hut, internet service that works, a true grocery store, etc.  But we are truly blessed here with all that we really need to eat, work and be safe. 

Thanks to all for your love, prayers, and support.  

Love,
Jerry and Cheryl

Merry Christmas 2015

Good morning and Merry Christmas to all!

It is hard to believe that we are here in faraway Paraguay for Christmas this year.  It is such a privilege to be here in the service of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  At times we seem to forget why we are here, being caught up in the challenges of living and working here in Paraguay.  

But Christmas Eve was a great reminder for us and for the missionaries serving here in Horqueta.  We decided some time ago to go caroling on Christmas Eve, visiting members and others whom we have come to know and to love.  We had already prepared little Christmas bags of goodies for the children and arranged to meet and begin at 3:00 pm on Christmas Eve. 

We all drove together to visit, starting with places that were nearly impossible to reach by car.  The Elders and Sisters are used to walking everywhere, and so we had some challenges with the roads, trails, and mud.  But we were led to where we needed to go.

We visited 9 or 10 families and there was such a special feeling as we, as missionaries, sang several Christmas Carols - always ending with a pretty darn good rendition of Silent Night in Spanish and in harmony.   Many hearts were touches, many tears were shed as we visited members and then three of our favorite neighbors and friends…all non-members of the church.

We then had a Christmas Eve activity here in our house with the missionaries who had received permission to be out until 11:00 pm - which we took advantage of.  We enjoyed good food, good church videos, and good company.

We are so grateful for the mission of our Savior, Jesus Christ, that he willingly fulfilled the Father’s plan to redeem us all.  There is no message more important that this.

We love you all.

Jerry and Cheryl

Chicken

I couldn’t wait to send this to you all. 

We were in Tacuati this morning and the Hermana Deliah has a laying chicken under her outside sink.  I looked and here is the layout:

• There is a barbecue grill under the sink
• There is an empty “carbon” or charcoal bag in the grill
• There is a chicken sitting on top of them both.
• Luckily for the chicken, the grill wasn’t lit.

Just thought it was kind of funny.

Love you all,

Jerry

December 21, 2015

Hello to everyone. I hope that everyone has enjoyed your preparations for Christmas, which is just around the corner.  We plan to celebrate little but try and focus on the Savior this Christmas.  As we have explained earlier, there is not much happening here for Christmas.  We might have the Elders and Sisters here for dinner on Christmas day, but it is basically another day for missionary work.

Last Tuesday was Changes for the missionaries in our Mission, and 5 from our Zone got transferred.  It was a shock to some of them who have only been here for 1 change (6 weeks).  We received some new and pretty enthusiastic missionaries, including 2 new zone leaders and one new District Leader.  The work had been going very slowly, so it must have been time for a change.

I spend quite a bit of time this week preparing materials for our Branch Presidency Training meeting scheduled for this Sunday.  We are discussing year end activities and the Area Plan for 2016.  This plan covers the South America South Area, including Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and Paraguay.  There are 4 main areas of focus:  The Work of Salvation / Missionary Work, The Sabbath Day, Being Self Sufficient, and Focus on the Temple.  Elder and Sister Guterres, the other senior missionary couple from Brasil joined us and it went quite well.  It lasted 3 hours (at least an hour too long) but we will do better next time.

On Friday we drove with two of the missionaries to Tacuati to “reopen” the area.  The missionaries were pulled out about 4 months ago due to a kidnapping in the area, and have not been back since.  Cheryl and I go visit about once a month just to stay in touch with the members there.  We had been told that the road was impassable due to flooding.  A few days earlier the roads had turned into rivers and the only way to get to Tacuati was by boat.  Fortunately for us, the water had dropped about 15 feet and we could pass.  We had a good day, visiting with members and the Elders worked with about 6 investigators that the members had found and prepared.  It was a very good day.

Yesterday we went to the Rama 2 in Concepcion for Church.  I was asked to lead the discussion in Sunday School about the Book of Mormon, and I also spoke in Sacrament Meeting.  Cheryl played the piano and kept me in line during our classes.  All of the members in the South America South area have been challenged to read the Book of Mormon prior to General Conference in April.  It will be a challenge but we are working hard to help everyone to complete this challenge.  We had a wonderful dinner at the District President’s house - Chupin de Pollo = a type of very flavorful chicken stew and baked chicken. 

We had a good visit also with Alex and Hilda - Alex’ dad was visiting from Brasil and he is a very good person.  We enjoyed our visit.  He told us about a bean dish that has meat in it - pigs ears, pigs tail, and pigs feet.  Cheryl wasn't too sure about that.   They then told us that we should eat more fish, but I told them that Cheryl didn’t like fish that had a moustache (catfish) which is what they eat here.  They all laughed about that also. 

We are really concerned about our branch here.   The President is not functioning well, but he is the only active Priesthood holder at this time.  Attendance is declining slightly, and the missionary work is slow.  We are trying to determine what is needed and how we can best help.  One of the hardest things to do is to NOT jump in and do it all for them.  That will not help them grow or prepare for the day when the Cranneys leave the mission.  We love these people, but at times they an be really frustrating (almost like our children). 

We love you all and thank you for your love, support, and prayers. 

Cheryl and Jerry

Below is a scripture that goes with the attached photo.

DyC 42:6 And ye shall go forth in the power of my Spirit, preaching my gospel, two by two, in my name, lifting up your voices as with the sound of a trump, declaring my word like unto angels of God.

pictures

Not sure what kind of plant this is, but we planted it when it was about 12 inches high.  Now about 6 1/2 feet high.   It regularly blossoms with beautiful red flowers.

 2- Cheryl teaching an investigator in Tacuati how to do bracelets made of thread.  They were a big hit there, with about 15 people working on them at the same time.