Day #3 (November 1)

Feelin' kinda Sunday!

Yet another beautiful hot hot day, naturally, as we headed out to the Brighton Congregation's meeting. Caught a ride with Kayla to pick up her student, Ria (see Day #2 for details). So young but so eager to go! This put us all in quite a good mood. It took about 40 minutes to reach the Kingdom Hall via car, which with the general hilarity of the car group went by very quickly.

The public talk ended up being VERY well timed. It was given by an elder from the Mahaicony congregation named Steve Booth, geared specifically to the youth. I could see Ria paying full attention, eyes never leaving the speaker except to find the scriptures. She even got to comment a couple of times!

Privileged to have been present for Ria's first meeting

The Chans

Brighton Kingdom Hall

Don't worry, didn't forget Mark!!!

After associating with the congregation a tad, Kayla and I took Ria back home. No plans? No problem! We set out for Lena's house to hang out. Transportation, however, would prove to be...interesting. You see, the cars and busses do not run with any kind of regularity on Sundays. The two of us ended up finally catching a typical  overstuffed minibus to Lena's.

When we arrived, we found her and her daughter Nadia busy at work seeding baigan (see Nom-Noms of Guyana post for details). The process of seeding is a fascinating one. You take the veggie and roll it back and forth either with your shoe or bare foot (I opted for shoe because, well, shoe). This loosens the seeds inside, making it easier to start the next step. The baigan is then submerged in a large bucket of water and burst, releasing the seeds. The bad seeds, full of air and rot, will immediately rise to the surface, whereas the good seed will sink to the bottom. After bursting and seeding all the baigan, the top layer of bad seed gets skimmed and the rest of the water gets strained to catch the good seed. The remaining seed is then left out in the sun to dry and be used for the next planting season.

BAIGAN!!!

Naturally, upon seeing the process, Kayla and I set out to help them along. It was soooooooo fun. Our hard work was rewarded with more iguana, plantain chips, a bunch of local fruit and ice cream. This branched off into gaffing with the family and visiting friends who swung by. Among this group was a very progressive study named Tenisha. I will go into more details regarding her in the next post.

After spending a few good hours at Lena's, we headed back to Kayla's to meet up the boys. An extremely welcome gift in the form of our missing Guyana guy awaited there. Charlie Brohard, the second brother whom we had dropped off at the airport earlier in the month with Josh, had fallen ill and had to receive medical attention in Skeldon. Personally, I hadn't thought he'd been able to join us to go back to Orealla, but he recovered enough! The Guyana team was reunited! The night concluded with a rather engaging Skype call with one of the main contacts and helpers to our trip, Tom and Michelle Sanchez (see nutso42.blogspot.com post for the picture evidence).

Stay tuned for the next post!

Love,

The Adventurous A.