Over the last two months, we have been able to visit some of the other Caribbean islands while doing some training. We have brought our swimsuits for both trips, but have never put them on or even walked on a beach. Although the locales are gorgeous, we have been in meetings all day long from 8-6 and then gone out for dinner folks (which has been nice!) with the But not like a little beach R and R. We think that maybe when we’re all done, we’ll go on a Caribbean cruise to really see the islands from a tourist stand point!
I’ve divided them up by island. You may, or may not, want to read down through it all because there are a lot of photos and verbage. They are listed in order of the visit.
The Airlines
As you can see, the cheap airlines that hop between the Caribbean islands (as opposed to American or Jet Blue, for instance) are all small prop planes.
It was so interesting to just walk across the runway or take a bus in one case and then walk up the stairs to board the plane. I wasn’t really worried, but wondered what our flight would be like from the Dominican Republic to Antigua and St. Kitts last week as Tropical Storm Isaac was passing through. There was only a lot of rain, thank goodness…
Here we visited with the new West Indies Mission president and his wife, the Mehrs, who used to have our job in Public Affairs. We also visited with a number of the local Church employees to learn about how the Church is viewed in Trinidad and what we can do to help.
Us, Rafael Gutierrez (our "boss" - the fulltime Area Public Affairs Director for the Caribbean),
and the Mehrs at dinner
Guyana
A really amazing country – although it, like most of the West Indies, used to be a British colony, it is faced with so many issues. As we came in from the airport, we saw so many contrasts.
Homestretch Avenue, huh? We didn't see First Base Drive...
A Mosque
A Hindi Temple
Another Hindi worship building - this one, as well as the ones above are all in the front yards of people's homes. We saw dozens as we drove in from the airport.
Lovely water lilies filled the "ditches" on both sides of the road.
Isn't this beautiful?!
Senior Missionaries in Guyana - The Summers and the Cooks - with a local sister. Cooks, on the right, are in charge of the Church's Humanitarian projects (there are dozens of them) in all of the West Indies. Brother Cook jokes that it's not often a pirate brings "treasures" instead of taking them!
This is a clinic for mothers with AIDS. The Church had donated many things to them - that day, we helped deliver materials to help them learn to make crafts which they potentially sell.
This is a nearly completed chicken pen, one of around 80 that the Church is helping with throughout Guyana. We provide the materials, training, and 50 chicks with feed. In six weeks, the chicks are ready to sell. The idea is that the folks can then sell the chickens (maybe keeping some to eat), buy some more chicks, and repeat the process. This is enabling folks to being to be more self-sufficient without just giving them welfare handouts. (The Cooks told the family that they needed to add extra chicken wire-now we know where that phrase comes from-so that mongeese can't climb up the sides and eat the chickens...)
A beautiful island. Sweet people. Similar visit as in Trinidad. Just too fast!
Rafael training Cheryl Sinckler, our Public Affairs director in Barbados -
a neat woman!
And yes, we did get to go out to a lovely restaurant for dinner that night!
We have made two trips there now to do training. The second time was to help them develop a newsroom for the island. Very pretty place, and it was so nice to visit Sam’s Club and Walmart on our first time there and to stock up!
Here are the folks attending the training for the upcoming newsroom site. By the way, the one that we help with in the Dominican Republic is prensamormona.do.
Another lovely island. We went here without our “boss” Rafael because he didn’t have a visa yet. He was pretty trusting. The day we left, Tropical Storm Isaac was scurrying across our area, but we managed to miss him, both on the trip and then when we returned to the DR. Here we trained two great men in how to be spokesmen for the Church.
On the right are the Towers, Senior Missionaries from San Diego, with Brother Hanley and Brother Benjamin.
After training a similar pair as in St. Kitts, we actually were able to drive around part of the island with another Senior Missionary couple, the Towers, from San Diego. Not enough time to actually walk along the beaches, but, as you can see, they are pretty.
The view from our hotel room - such bright colors on the buildings!
I love this! An old phone booth, updated to use calling cards!
We tried Australian ice cream one night - good, but we couldn't tell any difference
from American icecream.
Rob a breakfast in our hotel.
The harbor view out the restaurant window. Big cruise ships come in and dock here.
A statue to V.C. Bird in the downtown market area.
He's considered the father of their country in the quest for independence.
Three incredibly beautiful beaches. We wish we had been able to stop.
Two really cute churches that we passed as drove around part of the island. I love the materials that they have used in the buildings..
Here we are with the Towers again training Pres. Roberts and Brother Peters.
