A father asks if his 13 year old daughter could come to an English class

Today a very exciting thing happened, that could have a real impact on the work we do in Cahabon.  In the morning I was teaching an English class to the missionaries, through Google Meet, and a man came to the house to sell us some chocolate.  There are many cacao trees in this area (in fact, we have one in our back yard) and it is very possible that this man had harvested the cacao beans and ground them into a powder.  Anyway, while he was asking Bob if he would like to buy some chocolate powder, and a small brick of cocoa, he heard me teaching the English class.  (The house is very open on the front porch, and we had the doors open to let in some cooler air.)   About 2 hours later (after I had finished my classes) he returned.  Usually we have Gady here, who can interpret for us, but she had gone home to Coban for the weekend.  (She is very careful with social distancing and wearing a mask.)  So, I got out my phone, with Google Translate, and after about 15 minutes I understood that he wanted his 13 yr. old daughter to learn English.  He said he would come too, and would be here with her.  However, the last time I tried to have an English class in our home, no one showed up.  I wanted to have a class with more than one person.  So, I told him that I needed 10 students to start the class.  I asked if his daughter might have other friends that would also like to learn English.  He said she did.  I said it would be Sunday, at 3:00 pm.  He said "domingo?"  I finally figured out that he was saying Sunday, so I got a piece of paper and wrote "Domingo, 3:00 pm, this house" on it.  He seemed very happy to get the paper, and I asked again if he knew other people that might like to come.  He shook his head "yes" -- so I made 9 other papers with the information for the class.

The reason this is so special is because we have tried to figure out ways to build relationships of trust among the people.  They love it when I say some Kekchi words, and they are very friendly, but I am not doing anything with them to get to know them better.  Bob is working with the farmers, so he is building trust with them.

I know it will take time for them to trust us, and I'm willing to wait until we can do it right.  But I have a feeling that this little class could be the beginning of something very special for us, and them.  It really touched my heart that this father wanted his 13 year old daughter to have the opportunity to learn English.

We hope the day will come when they want to also visit our home to learn more about the gospel, but that's a long ways off, for now.  Maybe not as long as it seems.  ??

So -- stay tuned.  I'll report what happens -- on Monday.