The split

Hey! So here's just a quick update about all the activity here in Santiago. We had the visit of our circuit overseer last week and the congregation officially split ! We now have the Villa Olga 

EnglishCongregation as well as the Imbert English Congreagtion. Everyone was so happy to see that we finally accomplished the goal we had set out to do earlier this year. We enjoyed out last week being together  and topped it off with a nice party on Saturday. We ate (sooooo much food ), we danced (not me ) and there were other activities like a pool, pool table and volleyball. This spot was completely secluded and BEAUTIFUL. We are excited to see some old friends returning , as well as some new ones we're meeting for the first time. For sure this will be an exciting next couple weeks!

Below you'll see pocket is alive and well! He just got a bath and he was eager to get back into the house. After that is a little snapshot of the area we had the party at. I'm telling you, this picture doesn't even do it justice! 

We hope you are all doing well and think of you often. 

Nos Vemos,

Aaron

We're baaaaack

Hello friends! We hope all is well with you and we're happy to say that we're back in Dominican Republic. We really really REALLY enjoyed our visit with all of you. Honestly, I thought I'd want to return to DR IMMEDIATELY upon returning to the states. But the love, hospitality and warmth we felt from all of you was just incredible. I wanted to stay even longer! I'll give you a little recap of our trip. 

Upon arriving Saturday , we were picked up by the Ingracias from the airport and they had us stay with them for 5 days. We enjoyed so much association and encouragement from seeing our friends again , as well as making new friends. We even met a brother who had been in DR when the English congregation was first starting here in Santiago. Wednesday morning we hopped on the ferry from Long Island and went over to Connecticut. From there on my mom went to Norwich to stay with her previous French congregation  and I went to Groton to stay with my previous English congregation. I stayed with a couple , Matt and Ella , as well as their 4 cats , Roxy, Ena, Scritz and Jake. I renamed the cats Fat Cat (Roxy), Other fat cat or That one(Ena ) , Yellow Foot( Scritz) and White Foot (Jake). These cats were sooooo.... Fuffy. And they were just adorable. When Ella would call them for food , it was a cat stampede! I felt like Simba  in the lion king when the buffalo stampede was coming at him. Scared. Alone. Begging for help. HAHA I was so grateful to Matt and Ella for letting me stay with them and we definitely had some great laughs. We had burrito babies together (see photo ) and really got to know each other better. The Groton congregation has truly grown over the last 9 months. I was so encouraged by the young ones who have grown spiritually ,as well as the 7 pioneers who are eagerly awaiting pioneer school this summer. The congregation had 36 who attended the pioneer meeting with the circuit overseer ! And in the past 9 months , 4 people were baptized. What I learned from this trip, or I should say what became more apparent, was that no matter where we are, no matter what capacity that we are serving in , no matter how much we are able to preach, WE ARE ALL SERVING WHERE THE NEED IS GREAT! 

Here we are at the photo section. You'll see Fat Cat and Yellow Foot , some of the friends and then some scenery from back home. 

Nos Vemos, 

Aaron

God's Word Is Truth District Convention 2013

FIRST ,THERE ARE NO SPOILERS HERE. I just wanted to make that very clear before I get started.

My little partner , Logan

Hello friends!! We just got back home today from our convention and I'm telling you, it was amazing! The speakers were had were so great and the information was so timely. On Thursday morning a group of 30 from our congregation packed into a small guagua (like a minibus) and drove down to Santo Domingo to help with the cleaning of the assembly hall. It was so great seeing all the help! Even the small ones from various congregations were there to support us. Friday was a big emotional day because of some of the experiences we had. One in particular I wanted to share with you.

Logan and his sister

Our brother has many years of faithful service to Jehovah and many years serving here in the Dominican Republic. He was actually sent to start the English congregation up in Puerto Plata. So as you can guess many people know him and cherish him. He revealed to the audience that he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer and that he's not expected to survive more than a year. At this point tears were in everyone's eyes. He began to speak of how great of a privilege it had been to serve here and how many friends he had made over the years. He reassured the audience that his short term goals were destroyed , but his long term goal is still the same. The speaker then said "it's been a privilege to work along side you " and with that the brother turned to the audience and waves goodbye as he walked off stage. The audience had to be quieted because our clapping went on so long. This no longer was an interview , it was a goodbye. Our hearts were saddened to hear this but if you saw this brother , he kept his smile on and a happy composure. It was a powerful experience.

Mom having an interview

On sunday , a sister was interview about a loss she had suffered in 2010. Her daughter passed away from cancer. As she began to tell the experience she broke down. The brother started to tell he experience and then she suddenly gained enough composure to tell the rest of her story about how the friends were there for her and how she managed to keep strong and focused. As she ended she was weeping again and said "I want to be there to see my Gina again ". A sister came to comfort her on stage and the audience once again thundered with applause. I thought about this situation and I knew the Holy Spirit helped her. She became calm enough to deliver most of her experience and then began to cry right at the end. It's like her tears were held back.

Well friends as you can tell just by these two experiences , this was an emotion packed weekend and it was so encouraging for us all to be together.

We hope you all are doing well and look forward to seeing you soon! We come back to the states to visit this SATURDAY!!!!! I can't wait to see you all and hear how everyone is doing. I'm so excited!!!

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Our convention is rapidly approaching!

Hello friends! So over the last 3 weeks, I had what we think was the flu. It was sorta awful which is why I didn't get to post much! I've been hibernating and sleeping the whole time. But now that I'm feeling MUCH better , it's time to get back to work. We're in the final days of our district convention campaign and we're all really looking forward to it! A guagua packed with 30 brothers and sisters from our congregation will leave Thursday morning at 6 am so that we can be in the capital by 8 am to help out with the assembly hall cleaning. I'm so excited for this convention because I'm sure it will provide much needed encouragement.

We have a guest coming in tonight named Taijee. There's a really awesome story behind this and I'll tell you about it on the next post. But you'll be surprised to hear how this all worked out!

Below are some of the pictures of our vacation that meant to upload weeks ago. But I hope you enjoy them!

Nos vemos,
Aaron

Table witnessing and more!

Hey friends! I have soooooo much to talk about so I think I'll split it up into a couple posts. This first post is about the Manhattan Project hitting Santiago!!! For the past month or two we've been doing table witnessing from Monday- Friday. It's been so exciting and the results have been incredible. So many bible studies have been started and many magazines are being placed. So what we have to do is put in an application which says our availability and so on. This right now is only available to pioneers. My partner for the table is usually my Mom. It's been really great for us to be able to use our Spanish. We have the watchtower and awake in English and Spanish , so we have to be ready to give a witness in either language. We've met some really nice people through this and it has been a real blessing to be able to try this form of witnessing out.

So John has still been so faithful in following us around as we preach! Alejandro and I wanted Herby to meet the dog and Herby HATED him! But John stayed by Herby's side. This dog is so faithful to us and we haven't even done anything for it. But I like him a lot. I feel as tho he would protect us if any bad dogs attacked at all.

We went on our vacation and it was so nice! I'll talk more about that in the next post and I'll post some pictures then as well.

Below you'll see Herby and his new best friend. Then Monica, my mom and I at the table. Lastly , pocket is alive and well! He just got a bath and needed to dry out !

I hope you friends are doing well and I'm so excited to see you soon!

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Vacation!!!

Hello friends! The special talk for this year was so great!!!! I know you all must've enjoyed it as well. I forget the exact count we had at our meeting , but I was so happy to see 4 of my bible students in attendance! I've seen something really special about the congregation and I know this exists everywhere, but maybe I just see it more now since we have so many bible students. In English there's the expression "it takes a village to raise a child ". It's the same way with the congregation! It takes effort from each member to make every student feel welcome. Whether its a friendly pat on the shoulder or sitting with the students during the meeting , I've noticed that it really does give a warm loving feeling to the congregation. We're seeing many different ones progress. Raymond has been studying with Adrean for some time now and he's just started preaching with us this week! It's so exciting to see the look on his face, the excitement ! Other students are doing so well too. It's really been such a privilege to watch them progress.

In less then two weeks a big group of us are going to lifestyles , a resort in Puerto Plata , for vacation! I am sooooooo excited! I realized that my Mom and I haven't had any down time since the last time we came to DR in 2012 ! So this will be nice to sit on the beach for a few days and soak up the rays. I'm gonna get so dark!!

Soon we have a new wave of visitors coming in. Graham returns as well as Mario! We're so excited to have them back with us because we need the help! Speaking on help, we just got a new couple in our hall and the husband is an elder! Also we had 4 new pioneers appointed so now we have 26 regular pioneers. But don't forget , we still need help! So please consider coming down to DR!

Below you'll see some pictures.

John

 Every Sunday, Alejandro, Herby and I go preaching in Villa Magesterial after the meeting. Each week, this dog follows us around as we walk all over for our studies. He's always happy and wagging his tail. So we decided our friend needed a name. We thought for a while and couldn't think of one. Suddenly a man was walking in front of us and the dog freaked out and started to bark! He howled and barked until I called him back to us. From then on we've called him John, one of the "sons of thunder".

This is some of the barrios we preached in just last night!

It was a very windy day and poor Loudy lost her umbrella! The wind ripped it right off ! Of course we needed a picture!

Below you'll see this little lizard and it was puffing its mouth out! I thought of my little friend Logan who is in the states now. If you're reading this buddy, I'm still on the look out for lizards !

We hope you friends are doing well!! We fly back May 25th and we'll be visiting until June 10th. This is a shorter trip then we expected , but we didn't want to be gone from our assignment for too long. So hopefully we'll be able to see you all very soon .

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Refining myself as a teacher

Erick is continuing to do so well in his studies! He continues to ask me every week if he can join me in the preaching work , so now we've really started taking steps in getting him ready to be a publisher. Through this whole process tho, I've seen many things in myself that I need to improve. One area is just being a friend , a better friend , for my students. I've seen that as you get closer to these ones , they reveal things to you that you would never even expect. Such as family problems or other things like this. I've seen that what I need to do is just make my self available WHENEVER I'm needed. I always thought that I was a good friend to my students , but now I've been trying to take a bigger interest in my student's personal lives. Not just being buddies, but now focusing on forming a brotherly relationship. I know this will help me especially as my students continue to progress.

This weekend is quite crazy! The ASL circuit has their circuit assembly , so we have 6 people staying in our house right now. No matter where I look as I type this up, there's someone there!!!! But it's nice getting to know these friends better.

It's crazy that's it's been 6 months since we left the states. Time has been flying and in just another month , we'll be back in the states for a short period of time. We look forward to seeing many of you and we hope we get to see you all!

I'm going to try to post more often! I apologize for the gaps. I've been trying to come up with new ideas so that the blog is more interesting! So bear with me during this transitioning phase.

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Hey friends!

Hello!!!! First, let me apologize for not posting for so long. I've been a little busy with my students and life in general. But I promise I'll have a new post up here by Saturday , if not earlier. Everything has been going great! I have some exciting experiences for you and a couple new pictures. Once again I'm so sorry!

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Memorial season!

Friends I apologizing for not posting for so long! The campaign work has keeping us super busy! We have been in new territories lately and we've found a new group of English speakers ! The area is called Santa María and it's very rural. The animals just roam wherever they want and there's so many types! There's dogs, cows, horses and peacocks! It's been a nice change of scenery from the city. The campaign work this year has been a little difficult tho. We didn't receive our invitations for the memorial this year so all our invitation work has been by word of mouth! We got an emergency shipment of invitations but only enough for each publisher to have one! All we could do is show the invitation. BUT I JUST GOT WORD AS I WAS TYPING THIS! We received our invitations tonight!!!! We'll get to enjoy the campaign work now !!! This is so exciting !

I've received some wonderful comments from you friends and I wanted to let you know how encouraging it is for my mom and I to read these! I'll be responding to you all very soon. Thank you so much for your wonderful comments friends!

Below are an assortment of pictures from our campaign work! I hope you enjoy.

We hope you friends are doing well and think about you often !

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

Mind. Blown.

Eric has been doing so well on his studies! He really gets the sense of what we are talking about and we've been using part of our study time to go over the watchtower so that he can have a comment prepared. This past Sunday, I invited Eric and a few others from the congregation over for lunch and a nice chance for Eric to get to know the congregation better. As we sat down Eric announced "I want to be a publisher!" My mind was blown! He told us all after that he wants to study the bible in English only and that he has begun preaching to his friends. I was in shock because I had no warning that any of this was gonna happen anytime soon! So we spent the rest of the lunch encouraging him to keep up his progress. Yesterday I had my mom accompany me on the study and we went over information about proper dress for the meetings and goals to set , such as joining the Theocratic Ministry School. We found out that Eric doesn't own any slacks or a suit, so we're working out a way to get a suit for him. I'm so excited for Eric because this is such an exciting time for him. Hopefully soon, he'll be able to identify himself with Jehovah's people and preach with us. I'm so grateful to Jehovah for letting me help Eric out and aid him in his progress.

On a sad note , many of the needgreaters who were visiting have left to go back home. This is my first time seeing a full "wave" of them come through. We got to know so many well and it hurt to see them go. But with Jehovah's help, they'll be back soon. On a happy note, our next wave of needgreaters are coming soon! And I'm ecstatic to be able to tell you that Graham is returning for a month and a half!!!! I'm so excited to have him back down here!

Below are some pictures of our friends who became more like family for us.

We hope you friends are doing well and think about you often. May is fast approaching so we'll be stateside in just a couple months. Can't wait to be able to talk with you in person!

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

You're my teacher!

We've had many friends who had stayed with us here in Santiago for up to 3 months and now they're returning back home. I feel really sad seeing them go because we've gotten so close to them and now we know we won't see them for about another year or so. So this week has been sad. Almost all the group supporting the Imbert English Group will be leaving and even some from the congregation. Last night we had a gathering for a few of them to say farewell. We ate , we gave experiences and played music. People talked about their favorite times preaching , whether it was with small children who truly understood about Jehovah or other scenarios where Jehovah helped us to find someone we were looking for. The night was filled with happiness and appreciation for the privilege to be here with our brothers in Dominican Republic.

On that note, the friends who have been leaving have studies and return visits that they need taken care of. So they've been handing them out to whoever is in need of studies or would be able to help their student. This is where my funny experience starts. So the other night I was on my way to a return visit and saw a young man named Eric who study with the Cornelius family. He was waiting outside the Spanish meeting and so I ran across the road to say hello. He's very shy so I always try to say hi to him. When I saw him his face lit up! He exclaimed "Cornelius is leaving! You are my teacher now !" You can imagine my shock at the statement because The Cornelius family never told me that they wanted me to study with Eric or anything about him. So I said "ok so I'll see you at our meeting tomorrow morning !" and let him go into the Spanish meeting that was about to start. The next morning he came to the meeting and sat with me. He even read a scripture during the watchtower study! After the meeting we got to talk more and Eric told me that he is studying in Spanish already but that he still wants more in English! So he told me that I should come by Wednesday at 9:30 for his study. He had set up this whole study on his own!!! It was so awesome. So I decided that instead of actually "studying" with him that we would consider the watchtower study for each Sunday and help him prepare a comment. That way I'm not getting in the way of his Spanish studies. Eric truly has the spark tho. He'll do Great things with what he's learning. I'm just looking forward to see him progress even more.

Below is a picture of the Cornelius family, mom and I. We were so sad to see them go.

We hope you friends are doing well. I know winter is killing you but know you always have an island getaway if you need a break.

Nos Vemos,
Aaron

A "Loud" shout of praise

Hey friends ! Sunday was such an amazing day! 6 of my bible students came to the meeting. I was in such shock. Right now I'm conducting about 12 bible studies and it's been truly crazy. I can't handle it by myself so Herby has been willing to come and help me out with studies every Sunday. Just yesterday we conducted studies with 8 different people after the meeting. So today is my day to sleep in and relax. After a day of students like that , you need to just chill out. I don't have many pictures to share right now but I'll try to take some soon.

We've had such a large group at the meetings because of the group of Americans that came to support us. After the meeting, it was so loud I could barely hear myself think! I couldn't help but think what a LOUD shout of praise that was.

Hope you friends are doing well and we think of you often.

Nos Vemos ,
Aaron

Dominican Republic Zone Visit 2013

Hello friends! Our preaching activity here in Santiago has increased even more! Why? Because we have a group of almost 20 people from the states all coming here to help support the Imbert English Group. It's been SO encouraging meeting these different ones. You have single ones, single parent families , and many other large families! All here to help us! We begged the master to send more workers and as always , Jehovah has provided for us.

Yesterday was the zone visit and I seriously was in spiritual overload! The way they delivered the zone visit to all of DR was interesting. Because we have so many language groups ranging from creole to Russian to Italian and so on, they needed to use a way for all these groups could have their own translations. By using the Internet , the transmission from Santo Domingo was sent simultaneously to all these groups! It was also recorded so that other congregations could see it later on that night. We were able to watch it live in our own Kingdom Hall! The attendance at that time went as followed :
Spanish : 4,400 +
Creole : 1478
ASL: 821
English : 358
Now these aren't the final numbers. We were told they'd be available soon. I was so happy that Rodnee and Leogan (another study of mine ) were in attendance with me! It was such an amazing event.

We were given some facts about Dominican Republic and the progress we've made so far. For example, five years ago there were only 28,000 publishers here in DR. But as of October 2012 we now have 35,535. An increase of over 7,000 people ! There have been 70 new congregations formed and 20 new salón del reinos built! Next, we talked about four goals the branch has for Dominican Republic.
1. Preaching in places of greater need. We were told that 30% of our territory on the island isn't reached regularly or at all! The call has one again gone out for help reaching these smaller communities in the campo.
2. In march the branch would like to have 20,000 auxiliary pioneers. This would mean that 6 out of every 10 people would be pioneers. Also we set a new goal for 7,000 regular pioneers.
3. Learning a new language to speak to foreigners. We were reminded of Haitian , Chinese , Russians and Japanese. There are so many types of people we can find here and we want to know their language to be able to preach effectively. In Acts 2:4 it talks about the anointed ones speaking in tongues. It was pointed out to us that most of these people could have spoken Greek , yet Jehovah wanted these people to hear the message in their own tongue. So it's up to us here in DR to learn these new languages and find these ones so that they can learn of god.
4. Conducting progressive bible studies. Right now there are over 70,000 bible studies being conducted. But the increase has been slow. So we were given four reminders. 1 Thessalonians 2:8 tells us that we need to impart our souls. So are we truly becoming friends to our students? Are they like children to us? Second, direct attention to Jehovah, Jesus and the organization using the new brochure. Also we could do this by binging experienced ones like elders with us. Third, help them understand the seriousness of the study. Our students must be prepared and we should be aware of when they need to be terminated if they aren't making progress. Last, finish both books and help them maintain their Christian course.

Below you'll see Adrean and Blake riding in the back of Mag's truck. Gotta get to these studies somehow. Haha next are picture of the zone visit ! The last one is Joseph(brother with the Chinese congregation ), myself, Leogan and Rodnee.

Take care friends and keep strong. I'm hearing scary reports about snow. We've been thinking about you all.

Nos Vemos,
Aaron