Monday, September 17, 2012

Hola everybody!!! This week has been good! Long, and a little tiring, but really good. We did have our baptism, we found a ton of new investigators, we went to Teguc, and it´s pday!!!

So, To answer your questions mom, no, i have not received your package yet. I probably won´t until next week. 

 

Good to hear that everyone is doing well in sports. Doesn´t surprise me that Erin is killing it in volleyball, she is going to keep doing freaking awesome. I wish I could be there to watch Cody and Mas and Erin play, I would love to watch any sport right now. and mas...whooooo buddy!!! sounds like your team is dominating! How is captaincy? Lead by example, and always give it everything. Same goes for the other two. And thanks for writing me more, Mas, I loved hearing about your week. Straight A´s, huh? I think we all knew that you had that in you. Keep it up! As for the other two, school and life only get more hectic from here, so get ready. In the real world, you don´t get breaks, you get more to do, and you get to find time in between to sort of rest. I hope that that Smith/Schmidt book goes well, sounds like a cool project! And dad, how´s work?? New doctor fitting in okay? Find a new hygienist yet?

 

Well, our week was good. It started with a phone call on Tuesday, letting us know that Nava and I, and all trainers and new missionaries from the last two transfers, had training in Teguc on Wednesday, starting at 9 in the morning. That means that we were on a bus at 4 that morning. And, to top it all off, I learned that I get really carsick if I can´t see out of the front of the bus. So, of course, I threw up. We got to Teguc, had training, ran some errands, and came back. The bus was supposed to leave at 430 in the afternoon, but it left promptly at 515. I threw up again on this trip. and then once more after getting off the bus in Choluteca. It was horrible. Elder Beesley and elder Peña stayed with us both Tuesday and Wednesday nights, because they live another hour outside the zone from everyone else.

 

Then Thursday I did splits with another elder Peña, our DL, who is super great. convert and everything, El Salvadorreño, 23. I learn a lot with him. 

 

Subsequently, I talked to him about some things that were frustrating me, and he talked me through some of it. Then Friday, I had an discussion with Nava about some stuff. It was frustrating because I can´t quite get my point across sometimes in Spanish, my argumentative Spanish just isn´t there. But we fixed everything and went out tracting in one of the more difficult parts of our area. We found two new families that we have goals to be be baptized the first weekend in October, so we will see how that goes.

 

Then Saturday was our baptism!! I have pictures of Nava, Amanda, and I, as well as the family that helped us find Amanda, Hermana Norde. She is the one on the left with the kid, Ariel, standing in front of her, and her sister, Dilegna, on the other side of Amanda. Hermana Norde feeds us everyday, and we pay her. Super cool. her son is nice, but crazy, and has the same problem as Cody when he was little, which is that he can´t speak at all. Take the bike outside in spanish is saque la bicicleta afuera, but for him it comes out ¨ta te ta ti ti te ta a tera.¨ Impossible to understand, and he needs a frenectomy on his tongue, He can´t use it at all and nobody here knows how to parent.  Everybody just bribes or hits their kids. She bribes him, or just keeps a belt around her to keep him scared, or tells him that she will tell his dad to get him to behave. Thanks for raising us the way you did!!!

The baptism was supposed to start at 5 on Saturday. We showed up to the church at 3:30 to start filling the pila, or font. We got there and realized that the doors were locked to the font, and we called the bishop. He said, well, they changed the locks, and no one has a key, so just jump the glass into the font. The font here doesn´t have a door in front of it, and the glass is like 7 feet tall. So we stacked some chairs and tables, and I jumped over and in to open the doors. The bishop showed up early, which was a surprise, at 450, but Amanda and Norde didn´t show up till 5:30. Everybody showed up at 5:30, so we baptized her then and it went well. We confirmed her the next day, yesterday, at church.

 

So, playing the piano, sucks. We sang because I have been given much at the speed you would sing like, called to serve. Nobody here can read music, knows the tempo, nothing. I think next week, I will talk to the bishop about taking a little time to go over with the ward tempos of songs, just to get them to sound a little better. and then they asked me next week to make up an arrangement of numbers 48 and 49 in the Spanish hymnbook, which are divina luz and te necessito si. Divine light, I don´t know what one that is in English.  All I know is that isn´t the name in English, and I need thee every hour. I sort of laughed, because It´s not like they can sing in anyways. oh well. It won´t be that hard at all. They are in the same key, and 49 starts on 3 of the 4 notes that 48 ends on. I just have to bs an interlude. 

 

This week, we also found a lady whose husband left her and her two year old son, who I think is autistic, or something, to live with another woman and wants a divorce. This lady, Brenda, told us that she told her husband that she would welcome him back, everything, forget it all, but he won´t. We have an appointment with her next week. Our other golden investigator, Pamela, wants to get baptized, but her mom won´t give her permission. She came to church with us yesterday, and told Nava that she is going to beg her mom this week, and we are going to pray for her. Nava asked her what her back up plan was if mom still said no. Pamela responded that she was going to do it anyways. Nava asked her if she was willing to make a sacrifice like that in her life, because she could end up getting kicked out or something. She looked at him and said, ¨Well, the church is true, isn´t it?¨ HOLY COW!!!! So we will see where this goes.

 

Because our week was crazy, we didn´t have a whole lot of time to teach. but I did go on splits with Elder Beesley on Tuesday, and as we were walking, it was super dark. We started walking quickly because we could see a gang of young adults walking behind us, so we were moving, and I was looking for a house to try and get into, but they were all dark. Then, one house of an old investigator was lit up, so we started walking that way.  We got to the door, and they let us in. The mom, Jeni, was the one we were teaching. Her son and daughter-in-law had twins last month, so it was super hard to catch her at home, and we didn´t feel like she was progressing, so we dropped her. We started talking to her that Tuesday, and she told us that she had a testimony of the Book of Mormon, that she was sharing it with her friends, everything. Her daughter-in-law asked us if we had an extra copy on us because Jeni had told her how much this book had changed her life, and she wanted to read it. Dang. Nava thinks they are a lost cause, but I beg to differ, so I will be taking the lead on this one. If it doesn´t work out, oh well, but I don´t want to neglect them, and then have to answer for why we didn´t try harder with them. Super cool experience.

 

Then, on Wednesday, while we were in Teguc, a couple of neighbors in our area got in an argument, and one ended up stabbing the other twice. There was no blood, so they took the 26 yr old mother of two to the hospital, and she died en route. So sad. Turns out her family are members, but they haven´t been to church in at least like four years. I stopped by with Peña on Thursday, and we talked with some of the family and some neighbors for a little bit. The lady who killed her is 8 months pregnant, and we learned that nobody that lives near them gets along with them. The police aren´t doing anything, and the girl has to be kept inside because some of the neighbors tried to hurt her, and they are vandalizing that house now. So sad.

Love you guys. I hope that everything goes well this week, and good luck with everything. Lemme know how the utes do.

Love ya all!!!

Zach

 

Elder Nava, Amanda and Zach