The Brochure Didn't Say Anything About Butchering!

***If you have a weak stomach, skip the pictures!***

I can't believe I've been out on my mission for almost 2 months!? It doesn't feel that way.

This week was AWESOME!

First off, we were called a few days ago.  "Come over, I need your help."  So we went over to the Tullies, Elder Lloyd and I, the other two Elders, and the Sisters.

Brother Tullie looks at us and says: "Well, it's time to butcher!"

As the following turn of events ensued, a lot of cutting, a lot of blood, and a lot of guts took place.

They first tied the sheeps legs together. Then as tradition requires, they rip some wool from its hind and wet it with the sheep's saliva. They say "may you be reborn" in Navajo and then put down the wool.

Then they hold it down and cut off it's head!  It kicks and screams and the blood starts GUSHING out.  One of the men holds a bowl under the neck to catch the blood so they can cook Blood Sausage with it. Yum.  After the sheep is done kicking and all the blood is emptied, they snap the neck and cut it off all the way. Right after the head is removed, the head is cast into the fire!  The sisters were given the bowl of blood and immediately had to begin "kneading it".  Sister Herrah almost cried I think.  It was all warm and thick and chunky and steamy! They had to knead it to get out the blood clots, they said it felt like warm jello.

 "We eat ALL of the sheep, besides the eyes!", said Brother Tullie.

"Why?" -Elders

"The eyes are gross!!", he said.

We all laughed because the rest of it looked pretty disgusting too.

The best part of this whole experience was that the old shi'amas came out and were ALL OVER this sheep. They pulled out sharp knives and started to saw away at the fur, and various body parts, preparing it for butchering.  They hung up the sheep once it was skinned, and started to cut into it's insides.

This is when the shi'ama wrapped me into helping her. She told me to stop taking pictures and get involved. My first job was to pinch the open bladder shut, so she could keep pulling out its intestines.....my arm was inside the sheep's stomach, and the bladder was still warm. When I didn't pinch hard enough, urine got all over us! And a lot of poo from the intestines was everywhere! It smelled...great.

They took out the chaa' (poo) bag and started turning it inside out to clean. It was the worst smell in the world, my hands still stink! Apparently they cook their blood for the blood sausage in the chaa' bag.

Next, they had Elder Tucker and I begin cleaning out the intestines. They were slippery and long, and our job was to put water inside of them and squeeze it all the way through to get all the chaa' out! We wouldn't want any chaa' in our ach'ii! (that is sheep fat wrapped in intestine and grilled).

So we began squeezing away at the mile-long tubes. It was pretty gross at first but once the smell of chaa' fills your nose and you can't even smell it anymore, then it's pretty fun.

The weirdest was when Brother Tullie cooked some of the sheep while we were doing this, and he came around giving us all pieces. I had a hot piece of sheep meat in my mouth WHILE I was cleaning out its WARM intestines, right next to its body that was STILL BEING CHOPPED INTO.

While I was munching away at the piece of meat, I heard the old woman say, "oh dear, it had two babies" as she casually pulled out the fetus. That's when the taste was too much for me.

Overall, an awesome experience.
I'll give it a 9/10 on rez culture experience, a 2/10 for the smell, and a 10/10 for "That was WAY cool, but, I could go without doing that again".

Still smell like chaa'. That's the word of the week.

In other news, this last week has been really weird, but successful in Fort Defiance.

ALL of our investigators except 2 have dropped us, or we have decided to drop. They don't show any interest, and we realized that none of them even really cared if we came over. They would listen to us, maybe even with moderate interest, but they had no desire to learn and progress on their own. We were essentially wasting a lot of time on them.  So we decided to stop looking for investigators and spending our time there, and have been working with our inactive members, and our recent converts (most of whom are already inactive).  Inactivity on the Rez is a BIG problem! Tons of people just stop showing up! Lot's of people don't have cars. Some ladies hitchhike miles and miles on Sunday to get to church.  But Elder Lloyd and I don't think that there will be much progression with investigators until the ward itself is stronger.  We are working with the ward missionaries and the ward mission leader to get the work rolling.

Initially, all of these leaders didn't know what to do, they were new and busy, and the missionaries were kind of left out to dry. But we've been working a lot with them, and things are starting to flow more smoothly.

The Harveys are allowing us to have less actives and investigators over for family nights!  We are really working on fellowshipping people here. 

Through a less active woman, we got a new investigator a few days ago!  Her name is Hashke, she is almost 10, and she LOVES the bible.  She knows all the stories, and she answers our questions very intelligently.  We started teaching her the lessons and gave her family a goal to help prepare Hashke for baptism by December 21st. They accepted! So we are working hard with her!

One crazy experience. Hashke's house is built on an old battlefield, and people are very wary there. Her mother told us how people in the neighborhood see a little boy running around at night. He is a spirit, she says.  She said that there was a dark man who was in the back corner of the home sometimes, he was tall and wore a big hat. She said they are scary, but they don't harm them, and they always pray for them to leave, and they do.

When she said that, I got the goosebumps and the front door swung open.

She yelled "ha'ii!" and jumped.

We all looked at eachother, and then Elder Lloyd and I just finished the lesson and at the end we had a prayer with them.  It is really common to ask for a blessing on homes to only allow good spirits to enter.  We left a blessing on the family and the home, and the spirit was immediately present! Hashke was really excited about the lesson, and we said goodbye.

We told her mother and grandmother that baptism is a BIG commitment and that they needed to be at church if they wanted to help her meet the goal.  So incredibly enough, we saw them all at church on Sunday! They hadn't been in over a year!  It was really rewarding to see them there!

Anyways, I miss you all a TON.

If you write me a letter, I usually get it 6 days after you write it, because the post office on the Rez is so wacko. But write me!  I love to hear from you all!

Jesus Christ is our savior, and God loves us all so much.  Life gets hard, but just push through it all, and have trust in the Lord, and most of all, just have fun!!  I'll see you all next week!

Diyin nihil holo doo.

 

NOTE FROM MOM:  If you know Davis well, you will appreciate how far out of his comfort zone this all was!  He HATES dirty work and anything disgusting!  Missions are SO awesome!  >:D

 

My favorite Shi'ama <3

She doesn't speak English and she is the nicest, most INTENSE lady EVER.  She got down on the sheep, sawing and hacking away at the guts, it was so awesome.

 

They put the head in the fire RIGHT after it's chopped off!

 

 

The sisters had to knead the warm blood to get all those jello-y clots out.  It was all hot and steamy and thick :D  Traditionally, it's the females job.  So was cleaning the intestines apparently....

 

  Here's me eating some cooked sheep as I'm still cleaning out the chaa' (poo) from inside it's warm intestines <3  It's kind of fun, you grab the intestines and put some water in the tube, then squeeze it down the tube until it pours out the end. It takes like 10 minutes because the intestines are so long. At least they are warm and slippery so the job is easier.

  Selfie with my dead sheepie.

  TOLD YOU she's intense!