20 August 2018

So I have been moved to my new area. It is called Wallace, and it's this tiny little Southern town. There are only about 4,000 people who live here. We have no other missionaries close, and so we go to Wilmington (40 minutes away) for district council. Hey, at least it's close to the beach. Wilmington, that is. Wallace is still way far away. We're going to be having a zone activity sometime soon, so that should have some fun pictures. Also, every Monday here we have a family home evening with all of the Hispanics in the branch, and we're doing Gospel- themed human battleship. It'll be way fun. My new companion is called Elder Escobedo, and I'll have some pictures of him attached.

This week started out pretty interesting. So, Elder Hull and I were packing up so that we could both leave the area on Tuesday morning. Then, at 8:58 a.m., we got a text from the assistants. They asked us if Elder Hull could come and play piano for the new missionary meeting. At 9:30. The problem was, he was maybe halfway packed, if that. And we lived 25 minutes away from where we needed to be. Previous to that text, we had almost three hours left to pack and get ready. Now, we had 7 minutes. We told them we'd be there as soon as possible, shoved everything into bags and into the car, and left. We got there at 9:39, which was pretty good time. They were running late too, so we weren't even actually late. So I just spent the rest of the morning just waiting for all of the other missionaries to show up. It was pretty nice to be able to talk to all of the other missionaries again before my exile to Wallace. 

Once I got to Wallace, the first thing I noticed was how absolutely tiny it was. There's just not very much here. It's crazy. But we got working pretty soon, and we have already been knocking quite a few doors. We have some really good people here. One of them, J, is super great. We gave him a Book of Mormon on Saturday, and then we talked to him on Sunday after church. He had already read up to 1 Nephi 11! He is so great, and we just need to help him understand it a little bit more. We're going to teach him again tomorrow, and we're super pumped to help him. Unfortunately, he has to have a surgery soon, so if y'all could keep him in your prayers, that would be awesome. Other than him, we don't have a whole lot of people who are really progressing a ton. One is named William, and he seems to be a pretty good guy. He just has trouble waking up for church on Sundays. (It starts at 9 in the morning.) We got to help him out with his yard on Saturday, and that was pretty fun. First time I've ever used a machete. Apparently when your grass is too tall, a lawnmower just won't cut it. (Get it?) Unfortunately, I had neglected to wear jeans, and had opted for shorts instead. There were a lot of thorns out there, and so my legs got kind of cut up. Also, I'm way allergic to some kind of grass, and it turns out that it's in William's yard. I had bumps going up my wrists, my knees, and had a rash rapidly spreading across my body. It was insanely itchy. At the same time, I had some bug or another bite me in three places on my legs, which then started to swell. My comp was genuinely concerned that I would die. I took an allergy pill and hosed myself off, and then faked being okay for a while. He had wanted to take us out for tacos, and I'll stand being way itchy for a little way if it means that I get authentic tacos. They were some of the best I've ever had, and it was definitely worth the wait. After that, we went home and I took a shower. By that night, the rash was completely gone. No more emergency visits for me! Last time that happened, it was so much worse. But it wasn't too bad this time. 

I think that's about all of the news for the week, see ya!

 

Elder Escobar in a field

13 August 2018

As my mission president informed me Saturday night, I am leaving. In fact, this area is getting whitewashed. That was a surprise. I've been here for two transfers, and my comp has been here for 4. I thought I was staying and he was leaving for sure. I was half right. Unfortunately, I have no way to get my ~8 lbs. of frozen blueberries to my next area. So they're getting left behind. I'm going to be in Wallace, a little city about 40 minutes from Wilmington. I'm pretty excited, but every time I start to pack I always have to wonder how I got all of my stuff there in the first place. I have to leave stuff in every area, and I don't even remember picking up anything. I'll figure it all out.

The work here this last week kind of is suffering. We still haven't been able to get up with that one really cool family (Luz, Maria, Anthony...) but we've finally been able to make an appointment for tonight. Hopefully they'll be back on track for when the new missionaries come in. One of them is actually one of my old companions from Raeford, and he'll be training here. I'm excited for him to see how they're doing. Another family kind of told us that they want the mom to heal up from a broken leg before we go and see them again, but we'll have the other missionaries at least stop by soon to say hi and get to know them. They have a lot of potential, but they just need to get reading in the Book of Mormon. We've also been talking with another man named Nelson from Honduras. He really wants to learn more, but can't go to church right now because of work. We are going to try to get him a job with someone in the ward who owns their own construction business, which just happens to be what Nelson works in. So hopefully that'll help. He says that he already knows that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that the Book of Mormon is true, "I mean, just look at it! There's no way he could have written it!" (rough translation from Spanish.) So that's exciting. Hopefully he'll continue to progress. 

Not much has been going on in terms of just random area stuff. It's been kind of slow. My dog bite is almost completely healed, so that's good. Mostly just some bruising that's still hanging around. The dog's owners were also located by animal control and the dog is current on all of its vaccines, so I don't have to worry about getting rabies either. Nice way to end the transfer.

6 August 2018

So, to start it all off this week, I got bit by a dog on Saturday. This particular dog has the nickname of "The Tank," given to it by one of the previous missionaries who served here. It's actual name we found out is "Muñeco," which means "little doll" in Spanish. We think that The Tank is a much more accurate description. He's a big pit bull who is always chained up in the front yard of some trailer, and whenever we pass by him he runs to the end of his chain and barks like crazy. Well, on Saturday, they didn't have him on a chain. I don't know why, but they didn't. So we were walking by (we frequently visit this particular trailer park) and as we were turning his corner, he starts to run at us. I was used to this, but I thought he still had a chain on. He didn't'. I saw that and still wasn't too worried because he wasn't barking like normal. I thought he was being friendly. (We've tried to befriend this dog, but it wasn't happening.) Then, as he was right in front of me, he jumped at my arm. At that point, I realized, "Oh, he might not be so friendly right now." This is where I think that God intervened. I hadn't even really comprehended what was going on when he had jumped. I don't remember pulling my arm back at all, but apparently I did. And I'm pretty sure it spent a lot of time in his mouth, because I had slobber on my arm almost from elbow to pinky. I'm pretty sure that I can't move all of my lower arm past a dog's mouth before it has time to really bite down, but that's what happened. I did get bit a little, but it wasn't anything major. At the same time, I kneed it in the chest/side to get it away from me a little, and then the owner called it off and it walked away. I was bleeding a little bit, but if God hadn't intervened, I would have had a 75+ lb. pit bull hanging off my arm. So that's really my miracle of the week. I'll have a picture at the bottom, but it's not bad, almost just a scratch. With some minor swelling. But that's since gone down.

In terms of the work for this week, it was pretty good. We got to meet a family of 3 who seem way open to listening more, and they really want to learn. The dad is named Roberto, and he's a taxi driver, so he even has a pretty regular schedule, which is super uncommon out here. Like, ridiculously uncommon. I think he's only the second non-member Hispanic I've met out here whose schedule isn't just absolutely insane. We're really excited for them, and we're meeting with them again on Wednesday. And something very interesting happened in terms of less-actives: We found two that we didn't know existed. One is from the Dominican Republic and hasn't gone to church in over 15 years, and the other is a 16 year old girl from Hondorus who got baptized when she was 11 and just fell away. But she seemed super open to us, and she and her aunt live with another person we've been trying to teach. She said she wanted a Book of Mormon, so we're going to go by and read with her and everyone there in it, and hopefully they'll both start going back to church. That's it for this week, talk to y'all later!

 

 

30 July 2018

Okay, this email has nothing to do with phones, but I needed something that rhymed with zones and that was the best I had. We started off this week with a zone activity, and that was pretty fun. Kind of like the Olympics with different events, but things like who can build the tallest/best looking tower out of spaghetti noodles and marshmallows and that kind of thing. It was way fun. Our district's name was the Faarsquad. Half of our district really loves Shrek, and so my comp was Lord Faarquad leading the Faarsquad into battle. There was pool noddle jousting, now that I think about it. And dueling. (Again with the pool noodles. No pools were involved.) My "event" was where we had to have someone reading out a proclamation to the people as Samuel the Lamanite with people shooting Nerf darts at you. I had to read some weird recipe and we were judged by the amount of passion we put into it. We had 5 people in the district who could help block the darts, and every hit you took was minus one point. I was awarded 15 points out of 10, because I was the last one and they had already given ten points to someone else, but said that mine was way better. However I got hit 18 times and therefore didn't do too well there. But we got five bonus points for one of district member's exhuberant blocking. If I can find a video, I'll definitely send it.

In terms of the work, we're still trying to work with the same family, but they might  have something going on that prevents any of them from being baptized, even though the kids really want to be. We'll have to see as time goes on. I'm not sure how much I can really put in an email. Still, they are progressing as much as they can and it makes me really happy to see them move on and change their lives. I love this chance that I have to be a missionary!

Sorry, I think that's all the big stuff this week, maybe more next week. Oh, and here's a random picture of my first time trying helote. (Elote?) Anyways, that stuff's way good.  

23 July 2018

My comp keeps on putting the week count on his email, and I wanted to do the same, but I don't know what week it is, which makes it way harder. Anyways, this was a pretty great week. I don't have much time right now because of a zone activity, but I'll talk about the big events of the week.

Well, the big event of the whole week was really just one of our investigators making it to church. This is the first time that someone has gone to church in this area in transfers. It was way good. Her name is Maria (same one from before) and the ward just absorbed her. We had to go to her house in the morning and knock on her door to make sure she was up and getting ready, but it all worked out. A family from the ward picked her up, and they're so great. They made her feel really welcome really fast, and already invited her to go to dinner with the rest of her family. Her family is on board as of last night, and she and her brother have baptismal dates. Their mom wants to go to church, but isn't as sure about being baptized. We had a great lesson where we taught the Word of Wisdom and what they have to do to be baptized, and they were super open to it all. They always have great questions and actually understand. Well, I will maybe send out a second one later, but I can't focus in here because it is way loud.

16 July 2018

So, tomorrow (as everyone around me keeps reminding me of) is my year left point. My official release date is to be 17 July, 2019. Everyone around me is very excited, probably because we have four missionaries in our district all going home on that day. Well, the halfway point for the Spanish misionaries going home that day is actually not until next week, and our year on a mission isn't until the week after that. English missionaries hit their halfway point last week. This is due to MTC time counting for the Spanish missionaries but not for the English ones, mostly because the Spanish ones had to spend twice as long in it.

The week itself wasn't super eventful, but I went on exchanges with someone in my district named Elder Barnes. He's pretty cool, and he's in the same group as me time-wise. It's nice to be able to work with a whole bunch of different people and see how others work, sometimes you can get stuck in a rut and not end up doing what the person really needs. Right after that exchange, we had district meeting and I went on exchange with one of my Zone Leaders, Elder Sannar. He's another really cool guy, and I learned a lot on how to work with the members from that exchange. We didn't get to tract much on that exchange, but I still think that it helped. We also got to help prepare one of the youth in our ward get ready for the mission and teach him a little bit on how to teach the Restoration. It's kind of funny, because he only speaks Spanish and is probably going to have to learn English on his mission. He struggles with that the most. It is also interesting to reflect back  on the beginning of my mission in the MTC and realize that I struggled as much as he did teaching. Actually, I struggled a lot more because my Spanish was truly terrible. Which also makes me think about how much I've improved there. In the MTC, if we diverted from the very carefully planned and written out lesson that we had, I would be completely lost and my companion (who, funnily enough, is also my companion out here right now) would take over thhe lesson entirely and I would sit there trying to keep up, and generally failing at even that. But yesterday, we were talking to the brother-in-law of one of our investigators and he was shocked to find out that I was even American. Apparantly, he had thought that I was from Spain. This is despite the fact that I don't have a Spanish accent at all, I've been told that mine resembles just a mix of people from Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Chile. Which all have very distinct forms of Spanish, so mostly if someone doesn't assume that I'm American, they're just way confused about where I might be from. It's just crazy to think that I've been able to reach this point with Spanish so fast, I know that it's only with the Lord's help that I've been able to do this. I took five years of German in school, and I wasn't ever even close to where I am in Spanish. It would always take me a second to switch between English and German mentally, but I can switch between English and Spanish literally without thinking. I sometimes find myself thinking in Spanish even! This is just so incredible to me because I don't even have the chance to be fully immersed, but the Lord gives us what we need to help the people we talk to. I'm excited to see what might happen in the next year. 

For other random things in the week, we had interviews on Wednesday for the first time with President Holland. He assured us that they were very different this time than what they were normally going to be, and then proceeded to talk to us for the whole time about our families. It was a get to know you type thing, but it was still kind of strange. It'll take  while until I'm as comfortable with him as I was with President James. Still, I look forwards to the opportunity. And another random cool thing, we got to talk with one of our investigators for the 4th time today. That's pretty rare out here, they're very rarely there for their return appointments. We're just trying to get him ready and willing to go to church. We know he likes having us around, partly because we don't badmouth the other churches. We can tell he likes having us around because he made us carne asada and hot dogs, and tried to get us to eat a lot of it. And then invited us to go fishing with him and his brother in law (same one as before) so that he could make us catfish. We had to politely decline, we're pretty sure it's not allowed. We're not 100% sure, but it doesn't hurt not going just to be safe. 

Well, I think that's about it for the week. I know that I'll remember something huge soon, but for now that's all.

9 July 2018

So, this week has been kind of crazy. It's felt like two weeks in one, and just absolutely flown by. So not too much happened in the first few days of the week, just that those teenagers Maria and Antonio we had been teaching weren't there for their return appointments and they weren't responding to texts.  So, on Thursday, we declared a temporary drop on them and made plans to contact them next Thursday. But Wednesday was really the big day of this week. That was when we had our first meeting with the new mission president, President Holland. Wow, it was intense! He is definitely a different sort of mission president than President James was. The big quote from the meeting that people keep on quoting is, "If you are disobedient and aren't going to change, I will not hesitate to send you home." That's a big change from before. Personally, I think it's for the better. But we also got to meet his family, and that was pretty cool. No, we didn't get to meet his dad. And yes, that is how he refers to him. It's kind of funny. But it was a really great meeting and we're all super pumped to be able to work with them.

The big thing of this week happened yesterday. So, we were trying to go to a few appointments last night, but they were all falling through. We were heading to the last one where the miracle happened. We were in the same trailer park that Maria and Antonio lived in, and we were walking down this one street a pretty good distance away from their house. So imagine our surprise when they were pulling away from a house and driving towards us! So Maria stopped the car and we started talking to them. They invited us to come by to talk with them more that night, and we said we'd be able to go soon. We tried our last appointment at about 8:00, but they weren't there either. So we walked down to Maria and Antonio and got to teach them the Plan of Salvation! It was way cool. They had a lot of really great questions and were getting involved. Now there's a few things involved in what made last night so crazy. 1: We had decided to park in a nearby parking lot and walk to this trailer park, rather than park in front of the trailers that we had planned on visiting. If we hadn't done that, the timing would have been off. 2. There was a set of sisters that were driving by at the time and stopped us to ask us if this was our area. Basically, the boundaries in that part are really weird and so there's a few streets that are kind of a gray area. Again, the timing would have been off if that didn't happen. And 3. All of the appointments fell through. If they had been there, we wouldn't have been walking down the right street at the right time. So basically, everything lined up perfectly to allow us to talk with them again. We are going to invite them to be baptized after we get the chance to talk with their mom again, which should be happening tomorrow. So yeah, we're getting excited over here. I think that's about it for this week, bye!