The convention has come and gone, and far too quickly. It has been wonderful to wake up and simply walk a few hundred feet to the auditorium. No commute, and plenty of time for association with all the friends. All three days were eventful, and I'll try to hit on the highlights without ruining anything for those that haven't yet gone.

Friday was a great program with plenty of heartwarming experiences and even a few new releases (no more on that, wait your turn!). Right about when the musical intermission was to start after the noon break, the smoke evacuation system fired up, which meant that all loading bay doors flew open and dozens of giant fans in the ceiling roared on and off again (normally designed to suck all the smoke out of the building). We had no idea what was going on, but after a couple of minutes a brother got up on stage and told us to just sit still and wait a while. After about ten minutes of insanely loud noise (imagine a jet engine firing up in the auditorium) they got things back to normal. At the next song, a special announcement was made, "Dear parents, please watch your children at all times!" Apparently a rogue toddler couldn't resist the temptation to pull the fire alarm. We all laughed and thought we'd have one more story to tell about our Irish experience :) The most special part of the day was the final talk: Brother Morriss of the Governing Body was there, and we found out he would be giving the final talk all three days. What a privelege! He was a no-nonsense speaker, and it was wonderful to see how down-to-earth he was. These brothers in the lead are loving and kind.

Saturday went just as well, with another excellent talk by Brother Morriss (and many others of course). We had dinner with a couple from the German bethel. Every single German I've met so far has spoken perfect english. I wish we started learning other languages at such a young age and with such commitment as they! It would be an incredible thing to have those kinds of skills. It sure would make my life a lot easier with the whole french thing :) After dinner we headed to the hotel pub and joined at least two hundred others. We found a small table with an older couple, and had a great conversation. The brother was born is Scotland and the sister was born in England. They moved to the States many years ago and had plenty of stories to share, they even had my Uncle as heir travelling overseer! The world is smaller than I thought. The sister was the stereotypical grandmother. She had bright rosy-red cheeks and a smile that instantly melted your heart. I'd call her grandma any day!

Today, our final day of the convention, was (and is) the most eventful. It started with breakfast. We sat with bethelites from Walkill and the British branch. The couple from Walkill are spending a year there working on the new construction projects (the brother is a welder) and they spent a lot of time telling me how desperately my electrical skills could be used. I think the application sitting at my house has been blank far too long; I'll be taking a look at that when I get home... The first session flew by, thanks to an eight part symposium. We were again serenaded by the sweet sound of the smoke evacuation system, and again received an announcement encouraging parents to WATCH THEIR CHILDREN! We snuck a nap in at lunch (as we have every day actually) and headed back for the afternoon session ready to go. All we had left was the drama and one final talk. At the end of the day, the final attendance was announced: 9,341! This is an absolutely astonishing figure considering the number of publishers in all of Ireland (thousands less). Brother Morriss made it clear that we were a part of history. This was by far the largest gathering of Jehovah's people on the Island, ever. All of the foreign delegates were asked to stand, and the local brothers waved and cheered for us. We were then asked to sit down, and the local brothers were asked to stand so were able to return the favor! The numbers weren't far from what we'd experience back in Florida during a typical english convention, but it was obvious that the local friends were absolutely ecstatic to see so many witnesses in one place. We sat next to some special pioneers who had come to the country a little over thirty years ago. They looked around the packed auditorium and told us how absolutely unbelievable it was for them to see so many. There truly was an interchange of encouragement! We ate dinner with a couple of younger brothers and sisters. One was Irish, one was German, and two were British. They were really curious about life in Florida. They asked about sharks, alligators, and snakes. They looked at us with awe when we described all the poisonous or dangerous creepy-crawlies we have. I felt pretty manly until we started talking about Australia. Just about anything that moves over there can kill you. So I guess we aren't that manly after all haha! We talked about what the territory is like in each of our countries, and the British sisters told us their congregation covers their ENTIRE territory every three weeks. Can you imagine that? I thought once every six months was a lot. We also met a very nice couple from Guadeloupe. They had moved here to serve where the need is greater. Apparently Guadeloupe has one publisher for every 53 people, so the need just wasn't there. When we handed the brother a little postcard with our names and contact info, he immediately started speaking french to us. It was a lot of fun talking with him! He's the first french speaker we've met on the trip. It's so nice to actually feel comfortable speaking the language. It has taken a very long time to get to this point, and we still have a very long ways to go, but at least we can see that progress is there. We've actually had quite a few people ask us what language was on our lapel cards, which was kind of surprising. There are a lot of other language groups meeting here as well. We were surprised to hear that there were about 700 just in the Polish group, so the foreign language field is definitely well-represented.

When we finally walked out of the auditorium, we were met by half a dozen little kids, all eager to give us souvenir bookmarks, post cards, and notes with their names and addresses on it. They all told us to have a safe trip home, and that they love us. We've never seen them before, and will probably never see them again, but we love them so much! This whole experience really impresses upon you the enormity and incredible magnitude of our brotherhood. We can't wait to have the opportunity to do it again! We look around and see so many Gilead graduates and special pioneers, it's like, "How in the world did I get accepted?" I don't have a clue but I sure am glad we did! It's about 11PM now, and the sun just went down. It lights up around 5AM, and the sun stays up a long time, which is actually really nice. Downstairs in the lobby there were over 100 friends all singing Kingdom songs at the top of their lungs (there's still alot down there). There was no music, just loud, happy voices! It was finally getting late enough that we had to quiet down, so there was a loud chant, "One more song! One more song!" So we sang one more, and at the end we all clapped and cheered. Can you imagine the witness this is giving to the hotel staff? I would love to know who shows up at a meeting sometime just because of what they've seen over the past few days.

Loads of brothers are flying out tomorrow, but we still have a few days here. Tomorrow we're going on the Theocratic Trail tour to trace the history of Witnesses in Dublin. In the afternoon I'll be golfing with my Dad and some other Brothers, and then we'll get ready to do it all again the following day (Guinness in hand, of course). My parents ended up sitting next to a couple form the British branch at breakfast, and they have very kindly arranged for us to take a tour of the branch and even have lunch with the Bethel family next Monday. This just gets better and better!