Guatemala Quetzaltenango Mission

She had a waist-length black braid, kind eyes, and a constant smile. I never spoke more than a few words to her, since she did notspeak English, but I recall putting my head in her lap and feeling her fingers stroke my hair. I was six years old.

Dell and Margaret on a boat in Yucatan

I was eight when my family went to Yucatan. I learned one Mayan phrase (Tu-ush-ka-bi'im" ["How are you"] and two Spanish ones: "Como te llamas?" and "Donde esta tu casa?" When my would-be playmates answered my questions with more than one word, I'd run to Dad and ask "What does it mean if they say..."

Poor Dad was working on a doctoral dissertation, and I was a too-frequent distraction. Though he urged me to "figure it out," I simply couldn't manage. It was all too alien.

My memories of that particular summer are not unpleasant. I remember doing cartwheels for the Indians of Xocampich, which would make them laugh and applaud. I remember swimming underwater in a moss-lined pool and feeling the slimy tile of the pool's edge. I remember the excitement of watching an exotic red and black snake-a Coral-undulating onto our playground, where an Indian man whacked its head off with the lash of a willow. I remember getting sunburned so badly that my distraught mother railed,"Let's take her to the hospital right now and get her skin grafted!" I enjoyed the attention, though I was oblivious to Mom's frustration with the challenges and threats of a third world country and a relentless sun.

Margaret and her brother Dell [Blair] in Xocampich, Yucatan in front of a typical Mayan dwelling

Not long after my biggest blister bloated into a half-inch bubble on my right shoulder, all of us but Dad went back to the U.S. He remained in the jungle with one mission: to analyze the Yucatec Mayan dialect and write the definitive grammar. He was delvingdeeper and deeper into that difficult world while the rest of us were pulling away from it. He was setting an example I would eventually try to follow.

When Dad came home to Utah, he brought Indians with him. The presence of Mayans in our household became the norm for me. There would always be someone in the next room who had dark skin and spoke a language I could not comprehend.

We did not return with Dad to Mayan country until I was nineteen years old. This time, the country was Guatemala, and by then, I had managed to idealize it.

In my imagination, Guatemala was the sort of paradise hippies were trying to build in their communes. I pictured acres of cornfields, fragrant red blooms the size of dinner plates, huge trees with monkeys and parrots in their limbs, and beautiful, bronze-cheeked Indians who knew and loved the earth

In Patsun, Guatemala, my fantasy stayed idealized for about a week. Maybe just five days.

I had not included fleas or mosquitos in my fantasy. I had not included diarrhea and the absence of flushing toilets. I had not included the emaciated, mongrel dogs or the unsteady, drooling drunks. Most of all, I had not included or even considered the frustration of not being able to communicate with anyone but my own boring family.

In High School, I had been a champion debater, orator, and actor. I had trophies all over my Provo bedroom symbolizing my much touted gift: to communicate, persuade, or just plain win an argument. In a competitive world, I had competed and won, and my skills had earned gilded awards. And now here I was, reduced to the very phrases I had learned at age eight: "Donde esta tu casa?" and "Como te llamas?" I couldn't even pronounce someof the Mayan words, which seemed to thrust sound from the soft pallet.

The house Margaret lived in in Patzun, Guatemala which was later destroyed in the earthquake of 1976

I hated Patsun. Having known the glory of winning a judge's "superior" rating for my speech, I hated being shrunk to silence, being stripped of the things which had won me all those trophies of winged, golden women holding laurels above their heads. I saw nothing winged in Patsun but predatory birds-and buzzards were common, indelicately eating the carcasses of dogs who hadn't found enough scraps outside the butcher shop. Everything I was good at was useless here.

Dad, on the other hand, was in his element.

At age eleven, Dad had received a patriarchal blessing from his cousin, Alma Larsen, in which he was told that he had the gift of tongues and would be an "ambassador for the Lord in many nations." For years, that prophecy had been coming to fruition,and now was really showing its meaning.

We went to Church in a very American-looking white chapel a few miles from Patsun, and Dad gave a talk. He opened it in Spanish, then said (so I surmised), "And now, if you will permit me, I would like to continue my sermon in Cakchiquel" (the localMayan dialect).

Suddenly, the chapel was alive. Indian women who had been settling into sleep were startled from their dreams and began whispering. Indian men blinked and then stared at Dad like he had just announced the Second Coming. This was a miracle-a gringo speaking the language whose name literally means "our words." A gringo speaking our words!

Cakchiquel is a dying language, spoken mostly by women who will never venture into the deepest circles of commerce. Their sons, after a meal, will repeat the traditional Buen provecho to their brothers and father, and then use the dialect to say the same thing to their mother and sisters: Ti-osh-u-oh. As Indians seek greater economic stability, they will move toward the urban centers, Guatemala City in particular, and often abandon their language in favor of Spanish. Some will even start wearing western clothing.

Buthere was an educated Gringo who not only spoke Spanish but honored our words.

Dad was on sabbatical and on assignment. He was going to teach the Mormon missionaries Cakchiquel.

Somemissionaries had already learned a few words on their own, but not enough to understand the talks in Church-such as one in which a meek Indian man bore witness to the truthfulness of the gospel, to the joy of living all the commandments, and also to the importance of not eating turkeys, lest we turn into turkeys, and of not eating iguanas lest we turn into iguanas. When Dad asked one of the missionaries how much he had understood, the reply was, "I caught a little."

Dad translated, and the need was clear. The missionaries had to move deeper into the Cakchiquel world. The linguistic and cultural divide had to be filled in with common ground. That middle partition had to be torn down.

Dad hired a nineteen-year old Cakchiquel Indian named Daniel Choc to help him.

I can picture Daniel perfectly. He was joy personified-short, squat, and perpetually grinning. He laughed at the missionaries' attempts to speak his language, but never mocked. And halfway through the training, Daniel received a call to serve as full time missionary. He would be the first Cakchiquel Mormon missionary. A new day had arrived, a day when the gospel would come not just from white Americans, but from one who knew the Cakchiquel people because he was one of them.

I went to Daniel's farewell in that big white chapel where Dad had awakened the congregation. Though the chapel was the largest building after the Catholic cathedral, it could not contain all who had come to witness the event.

Margaret and her friends in Patsun, 1975

The event that would bind me to Guatemala and knit my heart to the hearts of the Cakchiqueles was still ahead.

It began one evening when only my brother and I were at home. A missionary stopped by to ask if we would like to visit the home of the first Mormon convert in Patsun: Tomas Kuku. Hermano Tomas had joined the Church some fifteen years before. He was an old man now, and he was dying.

My brother and I walked down the dirt road, up the main street's cobblestone, then down another dirt path to a bamboo gate which led to Tomas Kuku's adobe dwelling. That unlatched gate wouldinvite me to a new life, though I certainly didn't know it then.

By the time we arrived, it was dark. There was no electricity in that part of town, but the hut was full of Cakchiquel Mormons holding candles. Inside smelled of bamboo mats, wet mud, and melting wax. The women all wore similar clothing-hand-woven, red huipiles to which they had added their own embroidery. They all had long, braided hair. Some wrapped their braids aroundtheir heads and some wore them down. Some braids were black; some were silver. The men, including the one who was dying, were dressed in white.

Hermano Tomas, wearing a knitted cap, lay on a bed which took up nearly half the space in the hut. His skin looked sallow even by candlelight. There was no question that he was dying. Weakly, he requested hymns, and the Indians sang. My brother and I used hymn books. Spanish was not native for anyone in that hut, but we all sang the words.

Cantemos, gritemos
Con huestes del cielo
Hosanna, hosanna a Dios y Jesus
A ellos sea dado loor en lo alto
De hoy para siempre, amen y amen...

In Utah, I had had voice lessons, and could have made my music soar. But that simply would've been wrong in this setting, and I knew it. This was not the time for any one voice to stand out. Though the Indians sang off-key and mispronounced the words nearly as much as I did, unity was what mattered. We were together, all poor and afflicted in some ways, all rich and blessed in others.

Using a battery-powered projector, the missionaries showed a filmstrip of "Man's Search for Happiness" above Tomas Kuku's deathbed. The pictures were grainy against the adobe. I had seen the film (where the images actually moved) many times at TempleSquare, but had never felt the reverence I felt that night. Then the missionaries asked Hermano Tomas if he would like to bear his testimony. He answered in Cakchiquel: "Ha." Yes.

I did not understand a word he said, but felt a swell of love and awe. Who was this man who lay dying before me? In a rush of revelation, I became aware that God knew him intimately. I could feel God's love for him, for it permeated the hut. It must've permeated all of Patsun; surely it was too strong to be contained within one room. I knew there were angels in that poor, adobe hut where Indians, missionaries, and two red-headed gringos sang hymns by candlelight.

Tomas's conversion, I later learned, had resulted in many Cakchiquel families listening to the missionaries, for he had been the town mayor when he joined the Church. The night before the elders first visited him, he had dreamt of two messengers who would bring him words he must heed. I learned that he and his wife had saved up money for a year so they could take a bus to Mesa, Arizona and be sealed in the temple. I learned that in his last testimony, which I heard but did not understand,he had said, "I know I will go directly to my Lord Jesus Christ."

My brother and I left the hut a few hours before Hermano Tomas died. Because of the twenty-four hours burial laws in Guatemala, funeral arrangements were hasty. Of most urgency was getting temple clothes from Guatemala City to Patsun so that Tomas could be appropriately robed in his coffin.

The missionaries invited me to play the organ at his funeral, the organ being a plug-in keyboard which wouldn't make a sound without electricity. But when I walked into the chapel ahead of the funeral procession, there was no electricity. No light. No luz.

I ran to the office which controlled Patsun's power. The door was locked. I ran back to the chapel. I prayed. "Father, please let there be light. Let there be light in this chapel so I can play music for your son, Tomas Kuku."

I waited.

Nothing happened.

I prayed again. Once more, I ran to the power office. It was still locked. I ran back to the chapel and touched the organkeys to see if God might grant me a miracle of sound without the electricity to power it.

Nothing.

Then the chapel doors opened. Six men were holding Tomas Kuku's coffin on their shoulders. They stepped into the chapel. Instantly, the lights came on. I closed my eyes, said a quick, "Thank you" to God, and sat down at the organ. I began playing "Behold the Lamb of God."

Behold the Lamb of God
Behold the Lamb of God
That taketh away
The sins of the world

Surely, I was one of the sinners dependent on the Lamb's grace, sinful in my pride and in my selfishness. But I was also one of the blessed-so blessed to be able to play Handel's music at the funeral of this great man. As the chapel filled, I realized I was surrounded on all sides by greatness.

The Indian men wept freely; they have not been taught to conceal their emotions. The women groaned in grief. The swell of love and recognition which had begun the night before continued. I loved them completely, and recognized that I was the least of them. I thanked God for their mercy. I thanked Him for their patience with me, an arrogant American teenager who had mangled their language and had refused to open her heart fully to them.

That was 1975. My family returned to Utah in May, moving from the mists and canyons and adobe huts of Guatemala to the mountains and well-wired condominiums of Provo.

The next February, around midnight, Guatemala was hit by an earthquake, the epicenter only a fifty miles from Patsun. Twenty-two thousand people-mostly Cakchiquel Indians-perished as their adobe collapsed around and on top of them. Daniel Choc's pregnant mother was among the fatalities.

A month after the quake, Daniel and other Mormon missionaries were helping with the reconstruction of Patsun. An aftershock began thundering through the ground, and then in a roar of new upheaval, a heavy doorframe fell on Daniel's head. He died instantly.

I received that news while living in Denver. The next year, I returned to Guatemala and visited the ruins of Patsun, as well as Daniel's gravesite.

The Indians bury their dead in colorful crypts like thin mountains. The coffins are placed and cemented, one grave on top of another. It's a highrise of death.

Daniel's grave, however, was not a part of the mountain. His was set apart. The missionaries had all donated money for this particular memorial. His grave, the size and shape of a refrigerator, was painted white and bore a headstone engraved with a gold-leafed Angel Moroni and a scripture: "Cuando os hallááis al servicio de vuestros semejantes, sóólo estais al
servicio de vuestro Dios." When ye are in the service of your fellow beings, ye are only in the service of your God.

I returned to Guatemala twice more, and witnessed the destruction an earthquake can unleash. Piles of rubble had replaced the house my family had lived in. Even the Catholic cathedral was reduced to boulders and pebbles. But the Cakchiqueles were continuing their lives in quiet dignity. Both times I returned to Guatemala, I lived with Indians in new-built huts. I slept on a mat, made tortillas on a comal, sang Cakchiquel lullabies to children, and eventually adjusted to the fleas and mosquitos. Following in my father's footsteps, I always enjoyed going to the market and surprising a vendor by asking a Cakchiquel question. I continued to be amazed by the easy joy the Indians showed, by their meek and noble lives, and by their gracious customs. I recall one night being awakened by a knock on the door. A cousin of the family I was staying with had brought bad news. Tia Josefina was ill and wanted the family around her. That was all the invitation required. Everyone was up and ready to go to Tia Josefina. Little did I know she lived a mountain away. That was simply how they did things in Patsun. They constantly allowed themselves to be happily inconvenienced for the sake of a loved one. I walked five miles to a birthday party once, along with my Cakchiquel brothers and sisters. Nobody considered the trip anything extraordinary. Just as "Cakchiquel" means our words, these common acts of grace meant our ways.

Twenty years have passed since I've been back. I understand Patsun is completely rebuilt now. But my husband and children have never seen the places I love so much, or the people so dear to me. I did have the pleasure of visiting the Church Museum in Salt Lake City and seeing a woven blanket from Guatemala, and then reading the name of the artisan: Vidalmino Zarate. I had lived with his family. I have also had the joy of looking at the translations of the Book of Mormon on display at Temple Square, and noting the one titled Ri Wuj Rich'in Ri Mormon-Cakchiquel for The Book of Mormon. I know who translated it: several returned missionaries my dad trained, one of whom (David Frischnect) later returned to Guatemala as a mission president.

I recall the words of another missionary who served in Hermana Yalibot's hometown: "You know, the missionaries come here to save the Indians. But before long, they realize they're the ones being saved."

How I would love to celebrate Christmas by taking my family to Patsun! Undoubtedly, the time would be too short for them to grasp the magnificence of their brothers and sisters who speak a language foreign to them, and who look different than they do. Would that my children could be in a candlelit room with Indians singing hymns to a dying man, and feel the wonder of unencumbered love and clock-free devotion. Would that we all could feel that love and then serve as the Lord would have us serve-using whatever gifts He has given us, and openly receiving the gifts which others provide. That's the whole design. The pattern is set, and the loom belongs to God. We simply add our own embroidery and accept the thread and flowers offered by others, seeking-in all our ways-to acknowledge Him.