Rain, rain and more rain

Monday morning we got up bright and early to get Leana to immigration to finish up the paper work for her visa extension. Her visa runs out at the end of Sept. and she hasn't got her call yet so Church headquarters can't issue a call to leave from here. She would need to go back to Guyana where she was born. We brought all the documents the agent said we needed but then she said we would need to get another medical exam in order for her to get the extension and to come back Weds. That was fine because she had just had an exam for her mission and we could take the forms to the doctor to be filled out and signed and all would be well. We dropped the forms off to the dr. that afternoon and then picked them back up on Tues. We got up bright and early Weds. morning and were the first people in line, talked with the agent, paid the fee, got the stamp extension for 6 more weeks and we were out the door within an hour. Now we hope the call gets here and she can leave within that time. It will work out!
We did a few visits with Irma and Rocky and Angie this week. All of them are having some pretty big trials right now. We told them that is to be expected with them just getting baptized. Satan doesn't like people to change and do good things so he brings out the big guns to get them discouraged and make them want to give up on the changes they are trying to make in their lives by making and keeping covenants to follow our Savior. They are standing firm and will get through it all much stronger than they were before. We really love these folks and wants so much for them to succeed in their desires to do good and be good.

Our Thursday "mission" night was a bust again. We feel like we were inspired to do this mostly to give the members a place to invite others to hear the message of the restored Church but it isn't taking off like we had hoped. So, we will try something else. We are going to do Friday "Movie Nights" with free popcorn! Hopefully, this will be something the members will come to and hopefully bring other friends and family. We are also looking at starting a Self Reliance group with one of the members leading out. We will be there to support but it needs to be run by a local member so it still functions after we leave. We'll let that be our Thursday gathering. We saw a lot of great things happen in Linden because of the Self Reliance program there.

We made up a flyer for the Movie night and started to pass them out Saturday around the island to the members we don't see often. We only got 7 delivered because we had a heavy rain storm in the morning and then another one in the afternoon. We were planning on giving a lot of them out on Sunday to the members that come to church but this morning we were awakened by the loud pounding of rain on the roof. We were in the middle of Tropical storm Karen and man was it wicked. Forecast of 8 inches of rain in 24 hrs. Pres. George canceled church because of how bad it was. We drove to the church to assess the damage because this building has had flooding before. It does have some flooding but it's not too bad. It's supposed to still be raining tomorrow so we'll wait until it stops to go mop it up. It's actually on the ground floor and on the second floor, which surprised we but there are many gaps in the walls for the water to get through when the wind is blowing.
We'll get the rest of the flyers for Movie Night passed out this next week too after the rain stops for awhile.

 Leana and I sitting at immigration....3rd time's the charm 

 Flooding at it's peak

 mountainside sloughing off

 Creating waterfalls and rocks on the road

 This is usually a grassy area

 This is the boardwalk in downtown Scarborough which is 1.5 feet up higher than the road.
Here you can see the high water mark 2.5 feet beyond that.
Total of 4 feet of water down main street next to the ferry terminal 

 Water seeping out of the main floor wall in the chapel

 water spreading through the upstairs rooms

 Dave felt it necessary to wear his snorkel mask........

this was a staged photo for just for fun.
(he didn't drive this way)

 The ocean has turned into chocolate with all the island mud draining into it. 

 all the debris on the beach from the flooding

 We are the blue dot you can see with the storm moving west soon to be into the red, notice the time.

 The effect of the storm on the whole mission. 

The ABC islands on the far left from the blue dot and
Guyana and Suriname lower right. 

I wanted to see what the storm did to the mangrove forest. 

The water level is much higher of course but it gave us a feeling of "fall" which you don't get here.