Thought we’d share something of what it’s like to go witnessing in the English-speaking field in Ecuador.
Since we’ve moved up north to Otavalo, it means an earlier start for us. We were finding the buses a bit unpredictable, and decided we needed to start from home earlier to make sure we got to the meeting for field service on time. So now we leave home at 7.30 am for the 8.30 am meeting at Atuntaqui. If we catch the 7.30 bus, it goes express and we arrive at the Kingdom Hall at around 7.50 am, leaving a lot of time before the group. So I fill in some of the time by doing some street witnessing with Spanish tracts.
Previous to our deciding we needed to make a ridiculously early start, we would leave home at 7.45am and catch whichever bus was heading in the right direction. Mostly that worked okay, but one day we were waiting for a bus (the buses were coming, but for some reason they were not stopping to let anyone on) and by 8.10 am, we were still waiting at the bus stop.
The problem is that it takes at least 20 minutes to get there – longer if the bus goes into the terminal at Otavalo to pick up passengers (which most of them do), and the only reason we got to the group on time that day was that a brother with a car who lives near us, spotted us at the bus stop, pulled over and we jumped in and drove with him to the hall.
One of the nice things about being up here is that we get to see the countryside as we travel to field service and to the various towns in which we work. In Cuenca, we travelled through the city all the time, but we much prefer to see trees and grass to concrete and cars.
I wonder if this unsuspecting little porker thinks he’s just going for a nice country drive?
Since we’ve moved up here, we’ve had to start all over again in finding people who speak English who are interested in learning about the Bible.
For a few weeks, not much was happening, probably because a lot of the areas we were working in were made up mainly of houses and apartments, and just as in other countries, not many people are at home during the day.
When we started working in areas where there are lots of businesses and shops, then the fun begins! If you can actually find people to speak to, then the likelihood of meeting people who speak English increases. Quite a few Ecuadorians have learned English either at school or because of having lived in the United States or Canada etc for a few years.
One morning, we were working in the town of San Antonio (between the towns of Ibarra and Atuntaqui). We went into a small shop and asked if there were any English-speaking people there. The man and woman in the shop said that their son spoke English and would be back in an hour. So we said we would return then.
When we called back, we met the son and explained that we were looking for English-speaking people who were interested in studying the Bible. He asked if we were Jehovah’s Witnesses, and then said that he was already studying the Bible with Witnesses in Spanish.
The town of San Antonio is well known for its wood work and wood carvings. The man here has spent 1 month making this and another matching carved wood panel
It’s not unusual here to meet people who are already studying the Bible, as Ecuadorians generally have a great love and respect for the Bible. It’s not uncommon to go into a store and find the person who works there sitting reading their Bible.
And because that foundation is already there, it’s not difficult to build on it. As an example, a couple of weeks ago we were working the shops and businesses in Ibarra. I met a lady who runs a small clothing shop and after first chatting with her about where she had learned English etc (this is helpful to try to determine the level of understanding of English), I said that we were looking for people who were interested in knowing more about the Bible, and brought out some of our new tracts and asked her which interested her the most.
She chose one, and out on the footpath in front of her shop with people walking around us (she had been sweeping the path), we discussed together 2 or 3 of the scriptures mentioned in the tract, with her reading the scriptures in English. She didn’t want to commit to having a Bible study, but was happy for me to return and share some more scriptures with her.
It’s interesting discussing the Bible with people in their shops – generally they will go and get a couple of stools or chairs for us to sit on, and we have the discussion right there in the shop. When customers come in, they excuse themselves and go serve the customer and then come back and we pick up where we left off.
A little while after having spoken to the lady outside her shop, we met up with Brendan and the others, and he said that around the other side of the block he had also met a man in a shop who spoke English who wanted to study the Bible.
That was handy, as I now have a study with another lady (also with a shop) a block or two from there. So we can go visit them all at the same time. And the good thing with people who work in shops is that they are always there. They may be busy and the conversation may be interrupted when customers come in, but they are there.
Anyone for a little goat’s milk? If you want some, they milk the goat right there (the train only runs once a day – its a tourist train)
Last Saturday we were in field service in Otavalo, and I and the two sisters with me (if we have uneven numbers, we often go in three’s) went into a shop and found a Quichua man (one of the indigenous peoples of Ecuador) who spoke English and Spanish, and of course, Quichua. He’d lived in the United States for five years, so his English was pretty good. He got three stools for us, and we sat.
Part way into the discussion, a customer came in and bought a large quantity of his merchandise – an amazing variety of knitted hats – and when she left, we resumed the discussion.
(One of the good things about visiting people in shops is that you often get to sit and have a rest while they serve customers. We do a lot of walking here, so an opportunity to sit is quite welcome. And we get to check out the merchandise while waiting!)
The shop owner wanted to learn more, so I arranged to go back on Tuesday with Brendan.
This knitted alpaca finger puppet is among the many handicrafts available in Otavalo. It’s pretty cute, and cost me all of 50 cents!
It’s nice to have a study so close to home – it’s a 10 minute walk, whereas our other studies in Ibarra involve travel time (including a bus trip) of around an hour each way, so it’s good that we have 3 people there we can go visit at the one time.
There was no room for Brendan and Kirk in the car, so they rode in the back. By the time we got to San Antonio, they both had a pretty impressive hair style – a backwards comb-over!!
We are really enjoying field service here, being able to share many scriptures from the Bible every day, and seeing the appreciation the Ecuadorian people have for God’s word.
