To Vegas and Back!

Salutations to all! Once again, I have done a terrible job about keeping my blog updated! Sorry to those who have been anxiously awaiting this new blog!

Let me see.... Where do I start? Ah, yes! Well, for starters Merry belated Christmas and a Happy belated New Year to all! I can't believe that that much time has already elapsed! Goodness gracious! I hope all of you had a great Christmas and New Year! I know I did! I was able to see most of my family again! Woohoo!

Since my last blog I have managed and have had the opportunity to be able to go down to Vegas twice! Once at the beginning of December for my paid vacation I had to use (darn it! ;)). Then just two weekends ago! The first time I unfortunately traveled by myself. :( However, this last time I had four companions to accompany me on the journey! But not just any four companions! Oh no, siree! They happened to be Q'eqchis from my mission, whom I knew from the mission! They were brought up here to the states to work by a returned missionary of 5 or 6 years about 1.5 to 2 years ago. Now they live about 5 to 10 minutes from where I live! It's great!

Anywho, my wonderful father and step-mother were kind enough to offer us a place to stay for the weekend. We had a blast! Thank you Dad and Loralie for all your help that weekend!

You're awesome and I love you! And the Q'eqchis (Arnoldo, Juan, Hector, and Francisco) share their appreciation for your hospitality! We mostly roamed around the Strip, went bowling, visited a mission companion, and stopped by the temple and walked around on the grounds taking pictures as you very well see. But I believe the most memorable part of the trip was when we attended a spanish branch that I am familiar with from when I was living in Las Vegas.

It is at this branch that the branch president served his mission in the Guatemala Quetzaltenango Mission about 20+ years ago. At that time Polochic (the area that I spent most my mission and learned Q'eqchi) was part of that mission. What I already knew was that he, Raul Herrera, also served in Polochic and learned Q'eqchi! But what I didn't know until after we arrived at the chapel was that he knew the family of the Q'eqchis that were there with me! Even one of them (Arnoldo) Raul remembered from when he was 10 or 12 years old! Now Arnoldo is 30+ years old with a faithful family of his own! It turned out to be a great reunion for the two of them!

After the block of church, Raul and his wife invited us to join them for dinner with their family. So we over to their house after church and sat and talked and shared stories and looked at Raul's mission photos! It was so much fun! The food was great! Sadly, after dinner it came time for us to hit the road and head back to Salt Lake. But before leaving we were able to take a few photos of all of us Polochic-ers and exchanged contact info. Then we were off!

All in all, it was a great adventure with a couple surprises!