What does a white senior missionary couple do in Kansas? (continued)

A strange arrangement in this mission assignment is the way home teaching is assigned in the Garden City Ward. They have assigned the missionaries to visit most of the active members in the ward, and the local members are assigned only to the less-active or new members. This gives these struggling families permanent friendships instead of transient ones. Good Idea! When we missionaries leave it won’t seriously impact a needed relationship. It also makes it easier for those of us missionaries to contact our families and complete our assignment. Our assignment is eight families, and we’ve never had a problem arranging for our visits.

Here we had a Birthday cake for Elder Lewis given to him at a dinner where Sister Deanne Peat and her daughter prepared a great dinner for all the missionaries. Shown from left to right in the picture, standing: Tracy Peat, Elder Lewis and Sister Peat. Seated: Elder Howlett and Elder Viehweg.

During the first weeks we had dinner invitations almost every night so we could get acquainted with the active members. That was a good idea, and we got to know some of the best people in town. Some have been in this area all their lives. Some are transplants from other parts of the U.S. Of these, most are from the Midwest or further west. Several are from Utah, Idaho, California, or Colorado. It is extremely easy for us to find something in common with each individual. They are amazing people. Many have told us stories of the influences that brought them here, and it is obvious they aren’t here by accident. Their spiritual commitments are really deep, and that is what makes for the special Missionary success they are having. The active church members are eager and dedicated. It is a pleasure to get to know them.

Believe it or not, we even get to speak German once in a while. One of the ward members, Brigitta Martinez was growing up in Heidelberg Germany while I was there as a missionary. Her husband, Gary Martinez also speaks German, so he qualifies as a “bilingual” on the police force in his town, even though he doesn’t speak Spanish. They get quite a laugh out of that.

Gary and Brigitta Martinez are a great asset to the Garden City Ward, and the Garden City Stake. Brother Martinez is the Stake Executive Secretary and Sister Martinez is the Ward Relief Society secretary. They are also called to work as the ward YSA adult advisors.

Spanish is the mother-tongue, or at least a well-known second language, for a lot of the people in this part of Kansas. The number of really skillful bilinguals here is amazing. Actually, what is really amazing is that there are so many Mexicans here and so few who cannot understand some English.

A bit of Kansas trivia: The most popular color for cars and trucks here in Garden City, Kansas is ___. To get the answer find the color word in the title of this posting, or see below.

Here is a shot of some of the common colored vehicles in Kansas.

We thought it might have been just frost on all the vehicles during those first few days when there was an ice storm, but after warming up we find that there is still a greater proportion of white vehicles on the road than we have ever seen anywhere else.

We also want to mention the GC dinosaur. We haven’t actually seen him (or her).

A close-up of the GC Dinosaur's work.

But we have seen at least three of the street lights that he (she) has been eating. He (she) always takes a bite out of the top left corner. These two pictures show the two that are closest to us, but there are also others throughout town that he (she) has bitten into. He (she) must be awfully tall.

Notice the GC Dinosaur came close to the Garden City Ward Chapel.

He (she) always eats the same part of each one, and his (her) teeth marks are always on the top indicating that he (she) is reaching down and not up. Some say his (her) name is “Mariah.”

Another bit of GC trivia: If you don’t like the weather here, just wait a few hours. It will change, and it usually does!