Jol Tulija Part 5 – El Tumbo

El Tumbo: Not sure how far away this is...but is takes 4 hours to walk to Diamante from here and Jol Tulija is 1 hr driving from Diamante. There is one baptized brother and his family living in El Tumbo and yes, they walk 4 hrs to the meeting in Diamante where there is a primitive Kingdom Hall and group. This day we decided to give convention invitations in El Tumbo so that we could begin by visiting this brother and encouraging him and his family. He and two of his daughter who are publishers joined us this day and were so happy to see us, 14 of us, half from Jol Tulija and half from Diamante group.
We drove the beast again, Grants huge truck that has the crazy wrap on it. Well, the night before I was wondering what one would do should one’s vehicle break down? There are no tow trucks, the only mechanics are in the larger cities hours away...what to do? Little did we know we would find out the very next day.
As Grant arrived in Jol Tulija to pick us up that morning he commented on the battery light coming on, Hmmmm?
Seven of us pile into the truck, we drive to Diamante, pick up 7 more passengers into the bed of the truck, drive to El Tumbo...now 2 hrs later. We walk up a tall hill and are told that the brother lives at the bottom of the other side, down a very wet, muddy path. The first 3 photos are of us on the hill and paths. Another rubber boot day!
As mentioned the family was so happy to see us, the teenage girls immediately got dressed to join us and one of them went to get Dad from the fields. In no time he too had joined us.





Here we are, some of us anyway, our isolated brother is next to Mike at the far right end.
So back to the story, we had a late start so we worked into the lunch hour and were very hungry, by 2 pm we had found everyone and were all back at the beginning to eat lunch. Grant had just moved the truck to a better location to park it and informed us that now it won’t start again. The men in the group begin putting their heads together to assess the problem. A helpful local man pulls up in his tractor and offers to help. We decide to eat lunch in the back of the truck since we were starving and obviously not going anywhere for the time being.
Starving and not going anywhere...the girls pick up some WIFI. Who knew?
After much deliberation and passersby stopping to offer their opinions...Oh, did I mention we don’t have jumper cables? Sorry, you were probably wondering why we didn’t just use them….we don’t have them, and neither does anyone in all of El Tumbo. But the brother quickly goes home, up and down the muddy hill, to cut some electrical wire from his house for us to try instead of cables. Yikes!

Here you see Mike and Felix helping to charge the battery with fake cables and rocks to press on the connections. We all prayed of course for this to work. Grant and Maritza say that real cable never could jump this truck for some reason, so the fake ones were a long shot. After about 5 minutes or so, they gave it a shot and it started right up! Grant saved the wire for future use. He said real cable would just get stolen, but maybe not this wire.
All good? We thought so ! We say our good byes to the brother, pile into the truck, all 14 of us and head down the road. Less than a 1/2 mile later, POP! Yep, we blow a tire, and would you like to know something else? It was the spare. So there is no spare!
So Grant tries to turn around and with no 4 wheel drive (it’s broke too) and no good front wheel, we get stuck. So we send two girls back on foot to find the helpful local man with the tractor and wait about 20 minutes for him to come help us. We also sent the 7 Diamante friends ahead on foot to find other transportation and continue with some nearby Bible studies. So now we are 7 again, it is getting late and we are cold. Tractor guy is amazing and literally pulls us out of our rut with one graceful move hooking his bucket to the hitch. Another Yikes! But it worked!

 
So we decide to park the truck back in town and take a Combi home, a large public van. Well, everything happens extremely slowly here for some reason and suddenly it is 5pm and no more Combis...however we are waiting right out front of the home of a Combi driver who has parked his van for the night. Maritza decides to go plead with him to take us home. Now remember we are almost 2 hrs from home...a lot to ask of a man who is home for the night.
Guess what? He says sure! He agreed to take all 7 of us for 300 pesos, a bargain for our request. ($24 dollars)
Well, 30 minutes out of town he pulls over and asks us to all get out and change into a pick up truck to take us the rest of the way, something he had evidently radioed ahead to arrange for us. We get moved over to the pick up now driven by a young fellow accompanied by his 3 little brothers, and 10 minutes later find all 7 of the Diamante friends just finishing their studies and waiting for a ride that was never coming. So they pile in the back, Mike said it looked like a circus car in reverse as they all climbed in.
We eventually get to Diamante and let off the 7, continue on to Jol Tulija, picking up a few random passengers and a couple of chickens along the way. By the way, Mike emptied his witnessing bag on the passengers and the drivers 3 little brothers. He asked the youngest, named Fred, if he enjoyed reading his Bible. Fred replied that he only gets to read it at church because he did not have one at home. So Mike offered to give him his copy from his bag if Fred would promise to read one chapter every day. He happily agreed and was so pleased to have his own Bible.
Finally we arrive and after all the extra passengers and the vehicle change we still only paid 300 pesos. Tired, cold, and ready for a hot bucket shower, we were never so happy to see our sad little shack. Yes, somewhere around week 3 this place and all of its quirks has started to grow on us. If you would like to plan a visit, we recommend at least 3 weeks to get you over the initial shock and to start enjoying it all.
We attend the Tzeltal District Convention this weekend, 6-8th in Chancala and return to Merida on or before Monday the 16th. I will try to write again before that. Sending our love to you all!