Week 22 in Hopiland

February 2, 2015

Polacca, AZ

I can't believe that it's here already! February!!! Wow this year has gone by so fast already. It seems like it was just yesterday that I was eating turkey at Thanksgiving.

Well this week has been warm. We've stayed in the 60's most of the week and that means rain not snow which is bad. The Hopi are known for their dry-farming and without a good snow it will be a horrible growing season. Last year was a slow year and they had a lot more moisture then. So nothing has changed from being at home and praying for moisture for the coming growing season. So this supposed early spring is not a good sign. It feels like it has been monsoon season already (which is supposed to be July and August). We had another 48 straight hours of rain this week, which of course means mud and lots of it, we have seen so many people getting stuck this week. We saw one road which had ruts so deep that people were high centering their trucks and getting stuck when it was dry (well mostly dry).

Everything here is slowing down because of all of the ceremonies that are starting up. Now is when the Kachina dances begin, the first one will be the Bean Dance and that's in a couple of weeks. After that there will be a Kachina Dance nearly every weekend until August. So weekends are going to be even slower than normal with everyone going to Flagstaff. Now these are dances that non-natives are not allowed to go to because of the Kachinas but we know a few people and we have been invited to their houses on the Mesa for the Bean Dance. One of them even lives in Walpi (an extremely traditional village which we can't usually even set foot in). We are so excited for this extremely rare opportunity to attend this usually forbidden cultural event.

A week ago we spent our boing P-Day smashing stuff in slow motion. It awesome. Never give 2 bored missionaries a bunch of old cabbage, grapefruits, axes, bats and slow motion cameras. That's all I have to say on the subject.

We came home last night and found a kitten underneath our trailer. It was meowing like crazy and really making us mad so I took care of it... I took it to an abandoned, broken-down trailer by the church and put it down on some insulation. I think it's happy now with all of the mice there and when we came back from the gym this morning we saw it sunbathing on the roof of that old trailer. I feel better than I would have because I know it's alive.

Well that's truly all that really happened this week it just flew by.

Love,

Elder Warnick