Wednesday - Malaria Tablet Day - yuk!

Hello!!

SO we told you all to watch this space for the end of the 'back to school experience' but sadly we weren't able to be part of it! We were told by Kevin that even by us going into the school and just helping the kids with their English this could be constituted as 'teaching' and therefore 'working' and as tourists we're obviously not allowed to work, :( :( :( so 3 from the group went that are allowed to work so at least we got to hear what happened! They said it was really good, even though it was a beginner class, they just covered simple things like 'whats your name, where do you live etc.' and they invited them all to the meeting on Sunday, where Brett will be giving his first public talk! Not just once but twice! There is an English meeting at 1pm and at 3pm so we'll be hot footing it once he's done his first one, to the next Kingdom Hall. I'm feeling so nervous for him, but I know he'll be great. The school has also invited them back Thursday morning at 7am to talk to the advanced English students.

SO what have we been up to... well last week Brett was really ill - we think it was a mild case of Dengue fever which you get from infected mosquitos - he was very bored of being ill and I, the dedicated nurse was sat by his bedside... well more likely skyping by his bed side keeping him awake! No, joking aside I was quite worried, although we bought pain killers with us and lemsip (hooray for lemsip) it is a bit of a worry when your in a foreign country - especially as I've heard so many mixed reports on the doctors here. Fortunately he is feeling much better now and is up and about as normal. PHEW!

Worringly one of the bros from the cong said it may be a good idea to take a couple of generic anti biotics with us to Belize as you can get them over the counter here and in Belize may not be as easy to get... so far we've been told lots of negatives about Belize - its expensive, we'll just be eating rice and beans, the sand isn't as soft as along the Mexican coast, the local bird is the mosquito, and they have flies that literally bite chunks out of your skin... so as you can imagine we can't wait to get there and spend the remaining 5 months of our trip in fear of our lives! ha ha. Nah, we're just trying to keep positive and remember we're young and everything is an adventure! (Anyone thats coming to visit, please don't let this pout you off, its lies, all lies!!)

To be honest i do find times where I get a bit bored, like when Brett was ill and I couldn't get anywhere, and like this morning Brett is doing his talk and noone could pick me up for ministry - i guess its just so different from home where you feel like your chasing your tail the whole time, I'm just not used to having nothing to do. But this afternoon we're going to Zara which we have finally found, so a nice air conditioned walk through the mall will be nice!!! When we are out though, we're out the door by 8 and not back til 6.30 so I should probably be happy for a break especially as the heat is tiring.

For those asking about temperature its been about 32 C - but thanks to my Mum and Dad I now have a hat again as I left mine on the bus when we arrived in Cancun, so they sent me the exact same one over with some friends that arrived in Cancun on Sunday - they also sent Dairy Milk and Twinnings tea (essentials for living), oh and very importantly inspect spray with 95% DEET which apparently the shop assistant said we shouldn't spray on our skin directly and that mosquitos instantly burn as soon as they land on you when your wearing it - clearly he has never been outside of England as both notions are entirely ridiculous!!!!

Anyway we've had a couple of long days on the ministry, in fact yesterday there was 6 of us in a car party and we went down to the Hotel Zone (aka. where the Americans have ruined the beach with their hotels) as one of the girls had a call to do, and so as she was doing it the rest of us went and sat by this pool which overlooked a lagoon with the Hotels in the distance (far enough away that it was quite a nice view) and we sat with our legs in the water chatting, it was relaxing half an hour while she started a Bible study. Its a hard life!

Oh we had a nice experience a couple of days ago, one of the Sisters was doing a Bible study in McDonalds with a really nice guy who is half Lebanese, half Mexican (and his family owns a Lebanese restaurant which we are definitely going to visit!) and as they were studying, (he is a story in himself) and we were drinking McD's coffee (!) 2 girls got up from their table came over and asked Miguel if he spoke Spanish, which he said he did and they asked him if we were Testigos de Jeova - which he said we were, and they said 'we want to become witnesses, where is the Kingdom Hall' ... to which the Sister gave them an invitation with a map and went about explaining. Brett and I at this point were about to spit our coffee out as we realised what had just happened... I'm sorry, run that passed me again...
But these things happen here, the growth in Mexico is huge, the Witnesses are the 2nd biggest religion after Catholicism. The guy studying told us after the girls had left that people are really searching for satisfying answers from the Bible, not just the Priests opinion, and when they study with the Witnesses they realise the difference. It was nice to hear that from him.

Its funny when I started this entry I thought, mmm this is going to be short we've not really done that much, but I've managed to witter on for quite a while haven't i!

We leave for Belize on 20th where we will be joined by Mallika to do a bit more travelling down the coast and then we'll be off to Ladyville in Belize to hopefully do some pre convention work (District Convention we had in Aug) ready for our convention 1-3 Jan and then we'll arrive at our final destination Placencia (south of Belize) about 4th Jan.

Talk to you all soon, miss you
Mrs M xxx