Week 76 - 12/10/12

Well this will be a pretty short email... you’ll see why soon.

Wednesday.  We had our district meeting and we ate with the zone after.  The sister missionaries were talking about rumors and said that the girl that my companion had dated before the mission was going to get married and propose over the Christmas holiday.  So that kind of freaked him out a little bit.  We went and I bought us ice cream and donuts haha.  Then we went out to work...

Thursday. We spent the whole day with a return missionary visiting and getting to know old investigators and everything.  We walked soooooo much.  Like a lot. More than normal.

Friday.  Well this is where the fun begins.  I woke up and I felt a little cold but I did exercise showered and we were studying.  I was really cold so I put on the winter jacket.  Hey, look at that, I actually used it haha. I started feeling a little worse and worse.  Then later we had an appointment so we went and I was just so dead in the lesson.  When i got home I took my temperature and it was at 100.  So I took some advil and went to sleep.  I slept the whole day with a fever...

Saturday.  Called the doctor.  He told me some medicine to take.  The truth is I like advil a lot more... my fever was up to like 101.  So dead.  I was in bed all day.

Sunday.  Well I was in bed until like 5.  Then in the afternoon we had a meeting with all the missionaries and I was feeling a little better so I went and I came back home and slept.

Now... I’m mostly better... yeah fun stuff...   don’t feel sorry more me, but for my comp since he had to have been so bored haha.

ok sorry for the short email.

Elder Curtis Wigington

Week 75 - 12/3/12

This is something really important.  With the changes of the time in the MTC (now it’s only 6 weeks for those learning a language), they had to adjust when the changes are, so basically my release date has changed.  President gave us 2 options.  For me it would be June 10th or July 22.  I’ve been thinking and praying about what I should do and I’ve come to this conclusion.  The reasons why I would want to go home on June 10th would be so that I could be there for Becca’s birthday, 4th of July, and work.  July 22, for my whole life I will be able to say I served 25 months,  I honestly wouldn’t be doing anything too productive if I went home earlier.  Probably just chasing down girls, but seeing as everyone is now going on a mission with the age change I don’t think there will be any around when I get home.  And I think I might just get more blessings.

Monday.   Well as you know we had changes.  I stayed up until 2 cleaning the house so that it was all super clean and awesome for the next missionaries to come. 

Tuesday. Well I woke up really early to be able to get to the bus station on time.  There was a lot of traffic so we got to the changes really late.  Well they told us our changes and....  we were going together to Huejotzingo.  We got to the house and there was a mountain of dirty dishes and the rest of the house was pretty bad.  Literally this is the second time I have come to an area after this particular missionary and it was super dirty. Anyways so we started to look in the area book to see what they had as far as investigators.... NOTHING… the last time they touched that thing must have been over 3 months ago.... so we didn’t  know what to do sooooo.... we called the bishop. We ate at his house and talked a bit.  Then we spent the rest of the day cleaning. We got it to be pretty good.  Let me tell you the fridge reeked.  Like nasty.  I sprayed that thing down with so much bleach.  But we actually had to go out and buy all of our cleaning supplies because there was nothing in the house.  I really don’t know how they could live there.

Well there are a few good things.  Elder Morga is my district leader!  Great missionary.  I got an awesome lego christmas calender.  That was probably the most exciting thing ever. I can’t believe how much I still love legos.  On a clear day from the top of our house you can see el pico de orizaba… the volcano that was in Serdan. 

Wednesday.  In the morning we woke up and it was cold, ssoo cold. We went with the bishop again. He was going to show us around more but he was busy so he just told us where another member lived.  Our area has like 4-5 pueblos in it so we have to take a lot of transport.  Anyways, we were with the bishop in Santa Ana.  And we went to look for another member.  We actually got really lucky because the address he gave us we never would have found, but the brother went to buy tortillas and saw us.  So that was cool.  From there they told us where the relief society president lived so we went to visit her, she took us to more members.  So basically we were just member jumping.  One left us with another.  And that’s how we started to get to know some people. 

Thursday.  We went through the area book and organized all the former investigators and organized it by location.  So we can go looking for them in a very efficient manner.  We got to know a return missionary that apparently helps a lot with everything in the missionary work.  He got back from the mission 6 months ago so he has been helping us a bit. 

Saturday.  We spent more time looking for people to teach... I hate to say it but at times like this it might be nice to be able to contact... The sister had given us money and we bought Chinese food.  It was good something different. 

Sunday. So I was in my personal study and trying to think of how I could get the work going.  We have literally nothing.  So I was like well I got to do something.  I put together a calendar for the members to sign up for a day to receive the first lesson, and then a list that all the priesthood could fill out with their schedule so that we could call them and have them go with us on lessons.  Anyways we got to church there was sacrament meeting.  A man showed up that looked like an investigator.  I talked to him and he was a member that hadn’t gone to church in over 3 years and for some reason he just decided to go today. Let me tell you that was a little blessing right there.   So in priesthood I got the calendar and the list filled out.  I think it will help a lot. At least the members know that we will be working hard. After the service a brother came up to us and said, “Hey I think you elders are actually going to work.  Call me sometime, my brother is less active and I want you to work with him.”  So that’s good.  After, there was a baptism of a little girl.  Then we watched the Christmas devotional.  It was good, but just as Pres. Monson was talking the baby next to me threw up all over her mom, Ugh that just made me lose all my attention to the talk.  But it was really good.

Monday. Washed clothes.  But on the bright side we have a washing machine, I think Nephi may have used it, but at least it works some what.  I guess.  We cleaned and bought food.  But we didn’t have to buy too much because we brought all of our food with us to our area haha.  We still have 6 kilos of pancake mix. No sams club so sad...

Love you all

Elder Curtis Wigington

Week 74 - 11/26/12

You are not going to believe what happened.  I don’t even believe it yet.  I’m leaving Observatorio.  Me and my companion are both leaving.  I’m so confused, we haven’t finished the training yet, I don’t know why we would be changing areas, if we will be staying together or what’s up.

Wednesday. Well we had our district meeting in the morning.  Then pretty much normal day.  Few lesson here and there. Good stuff.

Thursday.  Well big day.  Thanksgiving!!  Yay.  The stake president’s wife is American and there are a bunch of interns that work at their school teaching English.  So they made thanksgiving dinner and all of us missionaries and the teachers ate turkey and mashed potatoes and rolls and yes I actually like gravy now weird huh.  Anywho, the funny thing is that it brought back old memories, not of thanksgiving, but of something else.  It reminded me of etiquette night when I was in the youth program. All the teachers are college girls from the US and then like half the missionaries are Americans, but all the missionaries were in their group talking and the girls on their side talking.  Seeing as we weren’t going to go over there and flirt... there was a separation that reminded me of all the good old youth activities haha.  But the food was really good. 

Friday. So we had our interviews with president and he the first thing he asked me is if I was writing my mom every week. Of course president.   Anyways. ..then just regular mission stuff.

Saturday.  Hey, guess what.  Baptism.  Yay.  It was in the Tehuacan ward.  Really good guy.  He quit smoking and everything.  I think I had told you a little bit about him in other emails.  My companion baptized him, it was the first time he had ever baptized anyone so that was really great.  I’m happy for him. 

Sunday. Another 7 hours of church... so long.  The Primary did the program in the sacrament meeting.  It reminded me of when mom used to do all that.  Haha.  Anyways so after church we ate then we went back and with some of the brothers to the church. We went over the list of the ward members and tried to update the whole thing.  Some people that had moved, died, or fell of the face of the earth you know.  Basically we spent 2 hours on it and we only covered about half...  SO we have to keep working on that.  Then we got the call in the night that we were going to have changes and I was just so confused.  It’s weird because when you’re training you are with your comp at least 3 months and we are only half way there, so strange.

Monday, today.  Well, packing in the morning and we have gone around saying goodbye to everyone.  Ugh i hate saying goodbye.  Even more in this area. I thought I was going to have a least another month and a half to work here.  There are so many things I wanted to finish.  So many people that were progressing and we will see what happens with them. 

Ok well that’s about it.  Just saying goodbye to everyone.  

 

Week 73 - 11/19/12

Tuesday.  We had to wake up bright and early at 5:30 so we could get to Puebla in time for the training meeting at 10. It was good, but just a little long.  We got back to Tehuacan at like 9:30. 

Wednesday.  We had our district meeting.  I had to give it because my district leader had to have surgery on his foot.  Anyways nothing too exciting except a bird flew into the church and we spent like 30 minutes trying to chase it out.  Then we taught Jonathan’s mom and we tried to set a baptismal date with her.  But she said she wouldn’t get baptized until January because she has to finish some of the promises that she has made with the virgin... What can you do, what can you do.

Friday.  The day before, a brother gave us a corn and shrimp soup.  It was pretty good, but in the morning my stomach was killing me.  I just felt stomach sick all day. On the bright side, the sister gave us money to buy food because she wasn’t going to be able to make it, so I just ate a piece of bread for lunch and by the end of the day it was gone.

Saturday.  Well I woke up and I had an awful cold.  So in the morning we went out to buy cold meds.  We bought some cold medicine that was 26 pesos for 25 pills.  That’s like 2 bucks for 25 pills.  I took them and they worked, but they made me so tired. In the lessons we taught after that I must have looked really drugged or something.  Anyways, then we went to the food and the medicine was wearing off.  It was super spicy.  My nose was already runny, but then it was running a ton. Also my eyes were dry so when I started to eat the spicy food, they started to water a ton.  So when you have your hands in the spicy food you shouldn’t wipe you face or it will burn, I know that from past experience.   So  basically I was there, crying, super runny nose and you probably would have thought I just had a very spiritually lesson or something haha. It was funny, not really in the moment, but think about it…it was funny. Then at night we had a ward talent show it was cool.  I did the cube. I think I got like 18 seconds, not bad.  It was fun.

Sunday.  We had our 7 hours of church again.  But good news, the stake president’s wife invited us to Thanksgiving and she is American. I guess I got lucky for both of my thanksgivings.  They don’t celebrate it here in the south of Mexico.  I heard that in the north some do, but no one here.  So that’s cool. 

Monday.  We had our zone activity and we went up to the cross again.  Ugh such a long hike, but it was a lot easier this time without 12 year olds.  After we ate tacos together it was a lot of fun.  Goodtimes.  Fun fun. 

Ok well that’s the week.  Hope you are all happy and everything.

Week 72 - 11/12/12

Obama, well, at least I have the privilege of not being in the same country as him for another 8 months...

Well we had a zone conference.  We were talking about some of the standards of the mission and the rules that we can complete better.  And then one of the sister missionaries complained about how when we get together as missionaries the Americans always talk in English and that’s rude...  hmm... so then it turned in to a heated battle.  Who knew that that would be such a touchy topic.  One of the American elders brought up the point that it’s a good opportunity for the Mexicans to listen and understand and learn English.  Then the Mexican zone leader said sometimes I do try to listen and then only understand a little so I get bored and leave.  Duhhhhhh, that’s how you learn, I learned by being bored trying to understand.  Even now that I speak good Spanish it feels good to speak English when I have a chance.  Anyways we stayed on that topic for like 30 minutes.  I actually didn’t have much to say, I just took out my popcorn and enjoyed the show, sadly I didn’t really have popcorn.

Wednesday.  Well we put a baptismal date with one of the investigators of the Tehuacan ward.  He needs to work on the word of wisdom, but I think we will be able to do it.  He is down to one cigarette a day. 

Thursday.  Really slow day.  Most of our appointments fell through.  We had just one lesson.  As much as I don’t enjoy contacting, it is a good fall back when things fall through; right now it’s sometimes hard to find things to do.

Friday.  So we had a lesson with a sister. She gave us scarfs.  Very nice lady.   Then in the night, we stopped by the bishop’s house because there were some things that we needed him to help us with.  When we showed up it was his daughter’s birthday!  yay, I think the spirit guided me to go there, mmm, cake. Haha. 

Saturday.  Surprisingly good day for how slow the past few days were. We had a good lesson with the investigator that is trying to quit smoking.  Then we went to the bishops house to eat.  Then part of the new program is that we are going to teach the active members the first lesson and invite them to invite a friend to hear it.  So we taught them and practiced with them how to invite a friend.  Haha so awkward.  Then a friend came over while we were there and they all wimped out... haha we had to introduce ourselves.  But it was good.  Then... at night we went with a member from a different ward to a referral they had for us.  It was a family that had recently lost an 11 year old daughter.  I’m not 100 percent sure if I heard right, but she was playing on a basketball court that was under an overpass and  a drunk driver fell off the over pass and the car landed on the girl.  Really sad story and probably one of the most tense lessons I have ever had.  Probably the hardest part was the member we were with didn’t know what to say, and my companion is new so he didn’t really know what to say, so I had to fly solo.  But I feel like I had all the right words to say, they looked much better after the lesson.  We taught a simple version of the plan of salvation.  I can image how awful that would be.  It was interesting, I was reading my journal from last year and there was a part where I was expressing frustration that we were teaching a mom who broke down to tears in the lesson.  I expressed frustration that I wasn’t able to express myself to say anything, and even if could speak well I wouldn’t have known what to say.  And now after this lesson it’s interesting to see how much I have progressed. 

Sunday.  Ugh... 7 hours of church nooooooo.  The first 3 hours of Tehuacan then 1 hour of ward counsel and then 3 hours of Observatorio.  The worst part was the classes were repeats. 

Monday.  Well we went to Sam Club.  Got my 5 kilos of pancake mix.  MMMM.  Then we went to the peñafiel factory.  They gave us a tour.  They didn’t let us take pictures.  But there was a staircase we took and the guide took the elevator so we quickly snapped a few pictures.  They had picture on the wall of the American line of products that they produce here.  They asked me if I knew them.  I only had heard of half of them.

Tomorrow we have training in Puebla that starts at 10 so I have to be leaving Tehuacan at 7 in the morning.  I think it’s going to be very long.   

 

 

 

Week 71 - 11/5/12

The Elder Ala comes from Ala in spanish which means wing.  So elder wing.

Well big news.  My area just doubled in size.  Now we are missionaries of Observatorio and Tehuacan wards.  Yay, two wards.  But the interesting thing about this is Tehuacan ward touches Serdan (one of my old areas.)  Weird huh.  It’s like 1-2 hours away, but they touch. 

Ok so this week was actually really, really slow.  Mostly because of the holiday.  Everyone went off to their pueblos, their home villages.  The Mission Manual totally lies when it says that you should work extra hard on holidays because you can find people in families.  At least in Mexico. Haha.

Tuesday.  At night we went with a member to plan a family home evening, and when we left it started raining.  But we had a really important appointment with someone, Luis Arturo, the guy who was going to be baptized this weekend... but didn’t.  Anyways.  It was on the other side of the area. And when we left it really wasn’t raining too hard, but the roads turned into a river, but seeing as it was a really important appointment we walked through a river of... what I’m pretty sure was poop water. I mean who knows, but I would guess so.  Yeah, turns out he wasn’t there.  Why do people not answer their cell phones?  It could have saved walking knee deep in sewer water.  I actually swam a 500 freestyle just to support Becca.  I got like 6:03, so I think I won.  Not true, but it really happened.

Wednesday.  Well we had a really interesting training.  We learned more about the new program that will be going into effect.  We are officially not allowed to knock doors or contact. Wow, I think there was a cheer for joy all across Mexico haha.  The wards will be giving us a list of 40-50 less active family that we will be visiting.  We had a couple lessons and then the other companionship got the news that they would be leaving so...  I did the only thing that could be done.  I went to their house and took all their food.  Gotta look on the bright side right?

Thursday.  We spent the whole day looking for people to teach and I think we found like one person.

Friday. We had our planner full of appointments and everything fell through.  Everyone was at the cemetery putting food out for their dead. Literally no one was home. 

Saturday.  A little better. In the evening we went with a couple youth to visit some of the youth that are less active.  It was pretty fun.  We ate with a bishop. He is such a funny guy.  Our actual food appointment fell through, but they always give us and his wife cooks really good.

Sunday.  This week was kind of depressing until Sunday.  Sunday was a really good day, other than the fact I had to go to church for 7 hours. Ugh.  We had our new ward at 8 in the morning.  That went until 11. Then we had to go to the ward counsel right after.  Then we had our old ward at 12.  It was pretty great.  All of the converts that I have had came.  Jonathan brought his mom.  Hector blessed the sacrament with me, and barely made it through the prayer cause he was crying.  Then after the sacrament, two investigators came in that we had stopped teaching a couple weeks ago because they weren’t progressing.  I honestly thought they would never come to church.  The classes went really well as well.  Sadly Luis Arturo was not baptized, but it was one of those days were you felt like you are actually making a small difference in this little part of the world.  Good day, but I was struggling in the last hour to stay awake... tooooo muchhhhh churchhhhhh can’t hold on much longggeeerrrr.

Monday today. well..... We played soccer with the zone.  I have been extremely blessed in that I have not had to play much soccer up until now in my mission… so I will not complain too much.  So it gets pretty intense when its Americans vs Mexicans.  You see all the Mexicans are automatically good.  So their team was set.  As far as the Americans go, we had 3 really tall elders that had played a little soccer before the mission.  Then me and another.  He played hockey and was a pretty good goalie.  Then me.  Well I have absolutely no foot work.  But I can play defense at least somewhat ok.  I mean if you’re not afraid of getting hit by the ball you’re good at defense in soccer... Anyways, yeah, we actually beat them somehow... The advantage is that we had the 3 tall elders and it really doesn’t matter how fancy you can move the ball; with long legs they can steal it pretty easily.   Ohh soccer.... fun fun fun, Oh yeah, I also didn’t put on sun screen so I got pretty burned. 

Sorry no fun names this week.

Elder Curtis Wigingtonooon.

Week 70 - 10/29/12

Ok, another week. Ugh slow week for some reason everyone bailed on us.

Tuesday.  We had a couple lessons, nothing too exciting.  We have an investigator who wants to be baptized, but she made a promise with the virgin a long time ago and just wants to give it a little time to end things on good terms with the virgin.  ugh... Oh yeah, I got a really bad cold.  A sister gave me some mystery medicine, not exactly sure what it was but helped a lot.

Wednesday.  District meeting... if you can even call it that.  The other elders got there 30 minutes late and didn’t exactly have anything planned... Anyways, afterward we taught an investigator who has a baptismal date for this weekend. He has been going to institute and told us hey, I think I’m starting to feel that spirit thing you told me about.  So that’s always a good sign.  And we kept preparing Alan for his baptism.  and still sick.

Thursday.  Weekly planning, Ugh.  Felt a little better. We had one lesson in the morning then everything fell through.  We did some random contacting and walking all over the place trying to find someone to visit.

Friday.  Again, kind of a slow day.  Some contacting.  Just a couple lessons.   Alan had his baptismal interview and he passed. yay. 

Saturday.  Again everything fell through.  We spent a little bit of time getting the baptismal program ready and cleaning the font.  We taught Hector how to baptize.  

Sunday.  The hour changed, but we didn’t know. The other elders usually have their church at 8, but they showed up at 7 so they came over to our house until it actually started.  Yeah, so I guess we woke up at 5:30 haha.    Then after church we had the baptism.  Pretty good.  It was great that Hector was able to baptize his son.  Now we just need to work on the wife.  Might be the toughest one.  These last two baptism were... I guess you could say easy, didn’t really have any problems to overcome.  The one we have for next weekend might need a little work to make it happen..

Monday.  Well we helped the other elders move houses.  It was actually rather gross.  There were some dishes that looked like they haven’t been washed in years.  And there is a very good chance that they haven’t been washed in years.  And now I’m not one to talk about keeping things clean, but... I don’t let mold grow...  Hey I know you won’t believe it and there isn’t really any point it saying it, but since I started as secretary I have made my bed about 90% of the days. So we did that.  And it took up most of our morning.  Then we went to a Sea food restaurant.   It was a brother’s, so he gave us a pretty good discount.  It was catfish something, but they were like fish sticks/finger things.  Pretty good. 

Let’s see if you get this one, it’s what the brother in the fish restaurant had to say about my name

Elder Ala

and he also says it kind of like

Elder Wishooooooonnn like the moive castway Wilsoooooooon.

Week 69 - 10/22/12

Hey so today I complete 16 months, weird.

Tuesday. Well we left early in the morning on the bus to Puebla to go to the changes.  They told us our changes and I got my companion, Elder Uribe, who is from the state of Mexico.  That’s about 2 hours away from Puebla.  That’s like getting called to Illinois haha.  But he seems like a good guy.  Seems like a good missionary.  On the way back from the changes the movie on the bus  was Tron, but you know missionaries can’t watch movies, so I read my book of Mormon.  No that’s a lie, I just slept because well, gotta be a good example.

Wednesday.  Well we had our district meeting and it went well.  The other companionship actually showed up on time.  We had a good lesson with a man named Luis Arturo.  We put a baptismal date for  the 3rd of November.  I had forgotten how new, new missionaries are. haha, I guess that’s why it’s called training.

Thursday.  Ugh. weekly planning, And this time I had to do it like really really good.  We have one hour of personal study, 2 of comp, a one language.... 4 hours.  Let me tell you that gets a little old sometimes.    Haha So I asked my companion if he had set a goal for the amount of baptisms he wanted in his mission.  He said he set the goal of 120, so that about 30-40 would be active members... Wow.  He then asked me how many I had up until now.  I told him that I wasn’t going to tell him because I didn’t want to affect his goal... Haha maybe 120 LESSONS  in the mission.  Gotta love new missionaries. 

Friday.  One of our appointments fell through and so I was like shoot we have to contact now.  We usually have lots of lessons, but we had nothing so we started knocking doors.  I also forgot that knocking doors was something nerve- racking for new missionaries.  But anyways on our 3rd door they let us in.  That was pretty cool. 

Sunday.  We had a  baptism! Wow.  It was of an 18 year old named Saul.   I really didn’t talk about him much before.  I think it was because with him it was so easy, he literally accepted everything when we told it to him.  Like no problems with anything.

Monday.  Well... we were going to go to some water deposits or something like that.  Here in Tehuacan they make soda and it’s where they get the water to make the soda. But it was closed so we went  and hung out with the bishop as a district.  I got a haircut.  Cost me a whole 25 peso.  I don’t think I’ll be able to go back to the US where they charge more than 2 bucks for a haircut, and tips don’t exist here.  

That’s just about it.

Love you all

Week 68 - 10/15/12

Hey before everything, guess what, I’m going to train.  I’ll be getting a new missionary tomorrow. 

Tuesday.  We had zone conference from 10 in the morning until 4:30 ish.  They gave us some good tacos after.  Unfortunately, we forgot to cancel the food appointment, so we went and ate right after we were full.  So... we had to somehow manage more food in our stomach ugh.  The challenges you face in the mission.  But in the conference I found out that Dario from my last area got baptized!  I think he was an investigator for like 5 years.  

Wednesday.  Guess what? We had another zone conference.  Well we were teaching a guy and it was super awesome.  He just accepted baptism and then we were about to put a baptismal date and.... then one of his friends showed up out of nowhere and everything died...  But we will see him this week and we will be able to put the date I suppose. 

Thursday. Slow morning.  Weekly planning.  We now have mormon.org in spanish so we set up our accounts.  Kind of funny that I have a profile now in Spanish but not English... 

Friday.  A few lessons.  Normal stuff.  Elder Juarez in our district finished 6 months in the mission so we burned his tie.  That was fun.  Good stuff.

Saturday.  Ok so I had to go to Puebla to have the conference for all those who were going to train.  We got to presidents house really early so I went to visit some people in my first area.  Sad news.  All the people that have been baptized in that ward in the past year and a half don’t go to church anymore...  I tried to visit my first convert, but she wasn’t home. 

Sunday.  The other son of Hector wants to get baptized now.  So hopefully he will be baptized soon. 

Monday.  Wow what a p-day.  So a brother told us about some ruins that were in our area.  So we went with him really early in the morning.  We got to the place where they were supposed to be, but there were archaeologists there and there was a police officer guarding the entrance.  So we paid him 25 pesos to talk to the archaeologist to let us in. He got permission and this lady gave us a little tour.  Really interesting.  Cool pictures.  Then after we went to the church because the stake president bought us all food because our zone broke a baptism record in Tehuacan this month.  Cool stuff. Yeah bout it. 

Elder Curtis Wigington

Week 67 - 10/8/2012

Well what did I think when they changed the missionary age to 18? Umm... Hey.. I would be home by now if I left at 18! But really it’s not that weird for me because lots of Mexicans come in at 18.

Tuesday. Well we were getting ready in the morning and my comp decided to clean the ice out of the fridge. Went at with a knife. I was doing other stuff... but told him it probably wasn’t the best idea... A few minutes later he hit a spot with the knife and gas came out. Ugh... I think he killed the fridge. But don’t worry, we found a member that said he can fix it. So… we will see. It was a very awful day. Like the worst day since I left the office. Literally ever appointment and backup plan few through... we walked all over our area and no one was home. Even knocking doors we couldn’t find anyone. What can you do? haha.

Wednesday. Well we had our district meeting and Elder Scoville asked me to give it. So I got there right at 9:30 but everyone else was late. The zone leaders and assistants to the president also showed up. Normally it would freak me out to have to teach a district meeting with a zone leader and assistant, but after being secretary... they really don’t seem too high and mighty anymore. Haha. Good missionaries, but nothing more. So yeah it went well. Overall, it was another very slow day. Not much more.

Thursday. Well we taught an investigator. Last time he had brought a friend and it seemed like she was just fighting us the whole time. But she came to the lesson this time and was really nice and it was very strange. A mighty change of heart you could say… haha. After that we went to teach another lady. She was heading to a birthday party so she invited us to go. So we went. They gave us cake and then we taught the whole family the restoration. Wow, that would not make me happy if two missionaries crashed my birthday and taught a lesson. Well you know they were just so fascinated by my green eyes that the transition from the topic green eyes and white skin to gospel went fairly smooth and before they knew it they were listening to a lesson Haha. Gotta watch out for those white guys.

Friday. Pretty slow day as well. But the bishop bought us tacos. That was cool. One or two lesson with less actives. About it.

Saturday. So we went to the morning general conference session. We Americans had our private English viewing room. VIP. Haha. But there was something strange in this room, foreign, very unexpected, American girls. Where the heck did they come from? I guess they are students from a non-profit organization founded by BYU to teach English in elementary school. Talking to Americans is normal because you’re always taking with missionaries, but American girls?... just weird. They are so white. Haha. From what they said I think they get more street shout outs that we do! Which kind of makes me sad, I’m a little jealous. Ok anyways back to conference. It was good. None of our investigators showed up. After the second session we had the baptism of Jonathan. I baptized him. Well you know. When I was there I was there about to dunk him in the water I was scared I wasn’t going to be able to lift the big guy out of the water.  Actually it wasn’t that hard. I guess it’s just cause I’m so strong or it was like one of those effects that when you pull an air filled ball underwater it pops right up. Haha. ok ill shut up now. Yeah priesthood was good, too.

Sunday. Good conference as well. I don’t remember who said what, but it was feeling pretty good. Usually as a missionary you don’t get pressured too much. They tell all the young men to go on missions... well I’m already on the mission and they tell all the returned missionaries to get married, so I can’t do that now. So… I was feeling pretty good, no pressure. And then they had that talk. "If you want this Ask the Missionaries, if you want that, Ask the Missionaries." Shooooooooot. Haha. Not really, they do that anyways. 

Monday. Well we went to our district leaders' house in the morning. But first we did exercise. This week was the rest week and was pretty easy. We went to a place called puerto de aire: the port of air. It gets really foggy in the morning; kind of a cool affect.

Ok well that's about it. Good bye for now.

Elder Warrington. That’s a new one Hector calls me.

Week 66 - 10/1/2012

I’m writing a little late just because we have been running around a lot today. I bought some protein so you don’t have to worry about that.

Hey interesting note… did I tell you Elder J. is a zone leader now?? Moved up when I left the office…

Tuesday. Well we had divisions the whole day. I went with my district leader. He only has one more change after this. He is a little bit dead... Haha. But I made him work. It was funny we went to the food and it was in a Pueblo like 30 minutes away. When we got there we just asked the first person we saw where this sister lived and they knew. I asked her how everyone knows her in the Pueblo. She said, “Well you know I’m just really gossipy.” Haha. I think it is one of those Dean Wigington type of affects in a small town.

Wednesday. Well... district meeting. We had a few lessons and nothing too exciting. We taught the law of chastity. That was interesting; this person asked a lot of specific questions... gotta love it.

Thursday. Well the morning was normal work out and study. Haha. We were teaching a less active sister and she went off talking about some dream. I don’t even remember what happened in it but it is so funny.  People here always seem to have crazy dreams and take them 100% seriously. They learn some random lessons from it. Interesting…

Friday. Hey I got to 9 chin ups in the work out. I know it’s not that impressive, but its improvement for me. We taught Jonathan, the big guy. We’re getting him ready for baptism.

Saturday. We went to visit a less active and she needed help with her computer. She said it has been slow and thought it had a virus. So I was looking at it and it didn’t seem to have a virus. Then I looked at it’s system info: it had 0.5 GB of ram and a 800 mega HZ cpu. I think it’s just old.... I mean there are cell phones that have more horse power than that!. Haha. We went to eat with Hectors family. All was peaceful, but then the son came down and was going to go do something, who knows then the dad, Hector chew him out and it was like a half hour of him swearing at his son. Then the son left and Hector told us, oh Elders please share me something that will fix all our problems and want to know why God abandoned him even though he got the spirit confirmed. I shared the scripture about cleaning the inward vessel first. Maybe I was a little harsh... but you gotta do what you gotta do. Then after we left we were going to clean the font for the baptism, but we got a call from Jonathan saying he wasn’t going to be baptized. So we ran over there and had to fix a whole bunch of misunderstandings. Basically his uncle, who is on the high council talked to him and made him feel unworthy to get baptized.  Ugh… two steps forward one step back. We made him feel better and we put a new date for next week end. Our district leader did the interview. But bad news, he want me to baptize him. I have no idea how I will do it. I’ve been working out, but that’s like baptizing Dale (he’s huge!).

That was one stressful day. I had to listen to everyone’s problems. ugh.

Sunday. Church. There was a 30 min talk on not dating before 16. Let me let you. To have to listen to in Spanish is the most boring topic in the world. Then for the 3rd hour, it was an hour of how the church started in Mexico. Fun, fun, fun... Well then we went to the food. It was an old man who told us his life story for an hour. But it was all good. I was really hot and sweaty and needed a little break. Then we had a quick lesson and that was about it. We had 27 lesson this week. That’s like a mission record for me. Haha.

Today, Monday. Well we were going to go to this cool place with our district . We left early in the morning and turns out... we wait for like an hour and the bus that was going to take us there never showed. So we just went and had breakfast with a member. Then we went to Sams Club to buy food. I got my huge thing of pancake mix. 100 peso for a month of breakfast and dinner. Good stuff. I also grabbed some protein, it was like 600 pesos, but it should last a long time. I had some money that was left over from last month so I had to use it up. It didn’t hurt me at all. Let me tell you, if there is one thing I do right in the mission, its money management. I have no idea how I survived in the office with all the buses we took. Haha.

Ok that’s all. It’s past time and I got to go hope you all have a great week.

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