This week has mostly been a lot of
knocking doors. So much knocking doors. I haven't done this much since
Raleigh, and that's saying something. Still it's bringing us in contact
with some great people who seem like they could be really ready to
accept the gospel. Our biggest problem is how huge our area is. In all
of my previous areas, I could ask "When would be a good time for us to
come back?" Now I have to ask "We'll be in the area on (insert day
here). Can we come back that day?" Still, we're working. The best places
to find people to teach are trailer parks. So we sat down with some
members and discussed the locations of every trailer park they could
think of. We have quite a few, but we're running through them pretty
quickly. Still, we're finding a lot of people and if they keep their
return appointments then we won't have to tract quite as much! And
tracting in trailer parks is pretty funny. You'll be knocking on
someone's door, and they'll say that they're not interested. We respond
by asking them if there's anyone in the area who speaks Spanish, because
we mostly teach in Spanish. Every time, they'll look you in the eye and
say something to the effect of, "Son, (or honey, sweetie, baby, or
however they feel like addressing us that time. Yup. I'm in the South.)
EVERYONE around here does." Which boosts your confidence about finding
someone in the area who does until 4 or 5 unopened doors later you
repeat the exact same experience. Which makes you begin to wonder about
how much people actually know their neighbors. Still, you get to see
some interesting stuff while tracting. Like stores out of the back of
trucks, weirdly friendly dogs, and burned out trailers. 
Some dogs that followed us around for a few minutes
Just a completely burned out trailer that looked like it had been sitting there for a long time.
And
then this dog that followed us around for about an hour that would come
up onto the doorstep with us. That got some interesting reactions. "Is
that your dog?" "Actually, we have no idea who's he is." "Well he looks
scary." It kind of made me sad to leave him, because as we were trying
to drive away, he kept on walking in front of the car so we couldn't. We
would stop, he would walk up to my door, I would start again, and he'd
be right back in front of the car. Eventually, I got away, but he ran
after the car for a while, then stopped. I don't think he's been given
some love for a long time. Makes me wish we didn't have a rule against
having pets out here.
Sunday was interesting. Our branch
president called us and asked if we could bear our testimonies the next
day. We said sure, but then I started worrying. Now, my last ward was
English with a Spanish translation. This branch is full Spanish like my
first one. Now, this was the first time I've had to speak in front of a
crowd since my farewell. Somehow I'd managed to avoid it up until almost
six months into my mission. So the time came around and I got up and
bore my testimony about member missionary work. I wish I could tell you
more about what I said, but I don't remember. I don't like speaking in
front of crowds, especially without having anything planned out. So, all
I remember is the topic vaguely. Afterwards, members were coming up to
me and congratulating me on my Spanish and testimony, and I was just
sitting there like, "Well, it's a good thing that they know what I said,
because I sure don't!" And then in third hour we had an English speaker
that I was translating for, but the topic (keeping the Sabbath day
holy) started to get really heated. You know how it's hard to keep up
with a whole bunch of people talking really fast over each other? I
invite you to try to translate that from a language you're still
learning. I got maybe half of it done well. Then after church we were
going to visit a member who's in the hospital to give her the sacrament
with a couple of members. Now, one of the members had a meeting that we
didn't know about, and so we waited until he was done an hour later. Our
church ends at 4, so it was already almost 5:30.
Then we had a very long travel time to the hospital, gave the
sacrament, and then the members drove us to their house for dinner. They
didn't tell us they were going to give us dinner until then, and so we
had no idea. All in all, we didn't even get back to our car at the
church until 8:30, so we couldn't really do that much.
This
morning we had a cool little moment with a Walmart greeter. She stopped
us and asked who we were, and so we got to explain a little about what
we do and why we do it. She seemed interested, but very devout in her
own faith. Maybe she'll feel that desire to keep learning. Who knows?
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