HOLA MI MAMA!!!!
Oh boy there is so much to tell you and thank you for the letter on email because I won't receive my mail for a very long time. My address is P.O Box 33, Adjuntas PR 00601 PR.... it might be better for some time to write emails instead. I love your letters, but we we'll have to see how this email thing goes. But I'm so glad you wrote ………….And tell him to write me (talking about her brother) he told me he would. It is so so so so hard to write letters, I don't know how people do it because I honestly think P-days (preparation days) are more busy. They have a huge list of rules and things that need to be done first, so after you’re all done it’s time to go teach and no writing time. So tell everyone sorry, there just seriously is no time. Oh and I'm so glad that Hermana Miller enjoyed herself... she's an amazing person!!
OKay where do I begin I have no idea.... this has been an intense transfer so far, in good and crazy ways. First off, I am actually in an area called Adjuntas (total country) no ocean once again. We cover three cities Adjuntas, Jayuya, and Utuado... funny thing is it’s one of the areas that Hermana Miller served in. If I hit her third area then I've served in the same areas as her. It takes us like 30-1 hour to travel to these places... and its awful cuz we don't have very many miles to work within a month (car mileage), a heachache. My Companion is Hermana Angel.... oh my cuteness. She is adorable and an amazing teacher. We get along so well and we have a lot in common. She's tiny like me and everyone mentions that because her last companion was huge too. LOL.. She knows a tad bit of English and wants to learn more, so for our language studies we have this routine. We each pick 6 words and so 12 total. She learns them in English and me in Spanish. Then once we are somewhat familiar with the word we use them in the language in explaining or a story or whatever, making us both use them with grammar. Then we correct each other. It’s good cuz they are words that are everyday things. It’s a good exercise and yes we speak Spanish all the time. Apparently I make some sense because she knows what I'm talking about most of the time. It’s nice cuz we somewhat have similar teaching techniques a lot different than Hermana Miller and I. It's good. I have to drive because she can't and the roads here are a million times worse than driving in the canyons (Utah canyons – winding, curving mountain roads).... I am always worried about the car and have had some ayyyyy moments. Oh yeah and everyone here thinks I'm PRicuena (Puerto Rican) until I open my mouth.
DAY #1: My first day really serving in the area was insane. Oh my madre... so when I arrived there were 3 baptisms scheduled and so I was going to be a part of that, which was great. We met up with our district leader and his companion (Elder Crawley- Orem and Elder Perca-Peru no se) because the district leader needed to interview the investigators for baptism. We drove to a couple who just got married so they could be baptized, very humble setting and a cool couple. One thing I have noticed about here is age does not matter when you are dating someone (that's all I'm going to say, you can picture what I'm getting at). Their names are Natalie and Miguel. Anyways they are cool, but I feel awful cuz I never know what they are saying. (funny thing.... so this is proof that I'm not terrible awful at Spanish, cuz I will be so lost when people start talking to me and then I later find out that Hermana Angel doesn't really know either. LOL So that shows that the accents here are very hard to understand.... because I can understand Hermana Angel most of the time, but I have the hardest time understanding everyone here. And if she has a hard time and she's from El Salvador... I'm safe)... anyways... so we met with them, the road was extremely small, like really, really narrow. Then we had to travel to another investigator who is a warden at a prison. He's cool, but he talks tons. Hermana Angel was told that there was a shorter way which would take less miles and time to get to Juan's house. So we were like okay.... big mistake..... so we drove with the directions they gave us, which here people don't know what directions are (no one knows the address). I'm in serious trouble when Hermana Angel leaves and I need to find houses on my own. LOL. Way confusing. (This is especially funny because Jessie is TERRIBLE at finding places on her own. Even with Utah’s block system of north/south/east/west she couldn’t find her way. There’s no easier way either. She would call me at home to help her find her way to the simplest of addresses. When she inherits the car I have plans to buy her a GPS to go with it, even though no one really needs a GPS in Utah…..except the Jessie’s of the world. J) So we were driving and we hit two roads and didn't know where to go. The Elders are following us at this point. So we called the people and they didn't really know where we were, so we were like oh great what now. On the road there was a man walking so we asked him and he was kind of confusing.... so the elders were talking and trying to get info from him, Hermana Angel was on the phone, and I just watched everyone and ate my granola bar LOL..... Then the old man told us the best road to take so we turned there. We went down and picture this.... INDIANA JONES DISNEY RIDE yep I had to drive that..... room enough for one car and on a mountain. Of course I was careful, but I was just hoping there was no one coming from the other side. We finally made it through and then we hit a spot with three roads. At this point no one knew where we were, we were popping maps, calling people, we walked to the house screaming "por favor, necesitamos ayuda".... so no one answered and we were like well what now, and it was hot. We parked the cars in the small, narrow road, then Hermana Angel was like let's pray.... and this was good..... so we all went between our cars and we said a prayer, all of a sudden in the middle of the prayer we hear a car, she hurried and finished and we all went for it.(It reminded us of the movie the Best Two Years with the phone and investigator.) We asked for the directions and thank goodness the mom and her daughter knew and Hermana Angel knew what areas they were talking about. So the district leader was good and contacted the people and said this liner " like you have given us directions, here is something to spiritually direct you" We all were trying to hold our laughs. So we continued on our journey and lo and behold we run into a monton (ton) of turkeys in the middle of the road. We were like are you serious.... so I was honking and thank goodness the neighbor was helping us get the turkeys off the road. We finally found the house after a lot of craziness. We arrive and find out it was only guys so we had to walk around and try to contact people. The house that Juan was at was his GF's (girlfriend’s) mom's house. We ended up walking and went to the house of the mom's mom who is a Catholic. She was nice, but then explained how the missionaries in the past had done something that she did not like, so we tried explaining and helping to understand that past situation.
DAY #2: This was the day for Juan to be baptized.... the night before we felt good and ready. We wake up and hear the phone, we received a text from his gf that says Juan no va a ser bautizado.... which you can probably guess what that says. He wasn't going to be baptized we were like what... are you kidding me. So after prayer we called and no answer. Then we called the gf and she was a wreck saying that they had a bad argument the night before and he left the house saying he wasn't going to be baptized. After talking a little bit with her.... (the gf and her mom are huge supporters of him) we tried calling Juan again. This time he picked up and said he wasn't going to be baptized. We talked and talked with him. We shared scriptures, prayed, testified and asked him to pray and ask Heavenly Father if he was ready. Hermana Angel said this was the one time she really felt like he was ready. We called the gf and explained our situation. Then Juan called us back like 5 minutes later (fast answer) and said he had the desire to be baptized for himself and he knows it’s the right thing. We were rejoicing and so happy. The day went by and we were getting somewhat ready for the baptism then we received another text from his gf again saying they were not going to attend the baptism, we were like seriously, you’re his support. They also were supposed to talk, so we had to find someone else. Then later we received another text from someone else saying there will be no baptism. This was like 2 hours beforish. We could not believe it... at this point the Rama (branch) presidente knew about some of the information. We prayed and prayed then Hermana Angel felt that we should go to the house where the mom and gf lived and where Juan usually was.
So we called the president and told him about our situation and how we were going to drive 35 minutes up to try to find Juan. This was 1 hour before the service. So we drove up not knowing if anyone would be there... and we found the mom and daughter at the house bawling.... we talked to them, the situation or fight was bad and they all were very hurt. The fight was a three party thing too....we taught them a lesson and the president had cancelled the service. Also we found out from them that we had 2 earthquakes that day and we didn't even feel them. They were 5.5 and 6. I have had 4 earthquakes on my mission and they are rare for these places. Anyways Juan called and we told him that we will help him so he can still be baptized and feel prepared. SO we are still working with him. I was like no one wants to get baptized when I am around how sad, cuz our other baptism dropped too.
DAY # 3: This day was the baptism for the married couple, Miguel and Natalie.... all was well and normal and their marriage had finally been legalized. We called to verify the baptisms and they had explained that their car broke down and someone else’s car too making it very challenging for them to come. We were like seriously ahhhhhhh...... to make the story short, they found a ride, and we met them at the chapel. The chapel is one of the first buildings in PR. Cool eh..... they ended up having a nice baptism and I will try to load the pictures for you... but it was cool my first 2 baptisms, even though I did nothing, and hopefully we will have another one soon for Juan. We ate interesting food and funny thing, I've been the least picky eater out of my companions LOL (for those who really know Jessie, you know she’s been a lifelong picky eater…..one of the worst…..until she graduated from high school and began living in other places. Hawaii and Key West REALLY helped her eat a wider variety of foods. Hallelujah! says the mother who had to make her spaghetti on Thanksgiving!!!).... They got confirmed and are now members of the church.
The rest of the week went well and very, very tiring. Yesterday was stressful though cuz we are over miles (mileage on the car per mission rules) and they make a huge deal about it and of course I have to worry when I really don't have much to do with it. Oy and I have to get my license (driver’s), but in order to do that we need to travel a long distance to get it. I had serious headaches yesterday. We also moved furniture for someone who was moving to a different house. LOL. So I'm sore and today is Hermana Angel's birthday..... and I've learned all this through Spanish. LOL.
(I asked if she’d taken pictures of the turkeys in the road) No turkey pictures sorry.... i was driving... that’s the problem. This stuff is hard to take pictures cuz its fast and I'm driving all the time.....
Intense week eh..... today makes it one week.... (since the transfer)
They made us make preparation kits because it’s not common. We put food in 2 liter bottles.
(I asked how it was going with the new district leaders) I don't have connections yet with the district leader, but the Polynesian Hawaii missionary said that he had something for me, but that was when i was leaving so i don't know if he still has it and if so what it is.... maybe a picture of someone LOL....
(I asked about Hermana Angel) She has 2 sisters and so 5 in the family....she's the oldest and she has been on her mission for 6 months. President told her she has a big project coming up, I hope he didn't mean me. LOL.... this is her first area. She does love chocolate and I have a photo but the camera isn't working right now with the computer, so next week. She has always wanted to serve a mission maybe before I knew… LOL…(Jessie has planned on serving a mission her whole life)… and her family has always been members. She is studying accounting.
(about the Polynesian missionary from Hawaii) We don't know each other he just recognizes me from the PCC. (Polynesian Cultural Center…….Jessie danced there for a semester and then worked as a photographer there for several months. She has the most remarkable connections of anyone I’ve ever met. No matter where she goes people she meets are connected to other people she knows in the most remote places of the world. Apparently this missionary from Hawaii is one of them!)
Jacob 6:5.... I love reading the BOM (Book of Mormon) now, just to let you know. LOL
I LOVE YOU SO MUCHO AND TALK TO YOU NEXT WEEK!!!!! XOXOXOXOOOXOXOXOXOXOXXOXOXOXOXXOXOXOXOXOX......
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