Monday
Internet was pretty normal. Justin is pretty exciting to email because he's deep in the hood; he almost gets shot every once in a while. My dad had his office manager quit this week. I don't know what that means, but she was a good friend of his and that position sounds important, so I'm sure he's stressed and a little hurt. He's a great guy though; he'll get through it all right with God's help. We finished that up and then went to eat at a restaurant. They had tequeños, but they only had hot dog inside it. A tequeño without cheese is like getting baptized in the Evangelical church. It looks really good, but on the inside there's not any priesthood (or cheese in this case). Elder Petersen and I split a pint of Lucuma chips ice cream together; that was pretty tasty. I made a bunch of Asian jokes with him all the time, but he's cool with it. For P-day I basically just listened to 4 1/2 hours of talks. Good stuff. I listened to one called the 7 Theories by Bruce R McConkie. He roasted people so hard and so bad that after listening to it I felt like I had to go and repent in their behalf. The more I learn about the gospel, the more I realize it just makes sense; on paper and spiritually too. We went and had a cita with Jeannina tonight. I think we're slowly improving our ability to teach kids. We had her neighbor there (Drucila), so that was cool. Then after we had a NDH, at last, with Aylin and her mom Octavia. We've had so many citas with them cancelled. The lesson went decently well. Afterwards, Aylin followed us down and told us how the bishop told her that her mom told him that she wants to get baptized. 8 years of missionaries later. Dope. Now we've just got to have another cita with them.
Tuesday
We had a district meeting this morning. The zone leaders introduced us to 2 new enfoques (approaches) that the mission has. They weren't that exciting though. On the way home from the meeting, it was Elder Cabral and I as well as the Hermanas on the combi, as well as a bunch of other Peruvians of course. A drunk dude got on the bus. I was standing up and he was too, initially. He went to get off, so I sat in his chair, which was by the door. As he was getting off, he grabbed my shoulder and looked me in the eye for a moment. Then he let go and said, "Chaufa," (instead of Chau') and got off. But then he stood in front of my window and said something like, "Hasta luego. Cuidate choelo (See you later. Care cello)," and walked away. Everyone on the bus thought that was pretty funny. In addition to a companionship fast that we're going to do every Saturday, Elder Cabral decided for some reason that he wants to do a personal fast during the week too. I don't know why he wants to fast 2 times a week every week, but I'm not gonna stop him. YOLO I guess. We finally found Arlet. She ran away from home over the weekend and went to her aunt's house 4 hours away. Family problems I guess. She's doing ok though. Her entire family is concerned about her 14 year-old brother. She used to have a good relationship with him, but I guess they fight a lot now. That made me really sad to hear. It's like the opposite of what happened to me and Jaxon. Her brother is not home a lot because he's always with friends. I told her that she has to say I love you every time she sees him and mean it, even if it was just 5 minutes ago. I've got some good advice man. No one else was home the rest of the day though. At night, Jean Franco, Angii and Arlet all got interviews with the bishop for temple recommends. So that was pretty dope. At night we were contacting and I said to this lady, "¿ Le gustaria aprender mas sobre Jesucristo? (Would you like to learn more about Jesus Christ?)" "Si, pero soy catolica. (Yes, but I am Catholic)" "Catolica, mucho gusto. Me llamo Elder White. (Catholic, nice to meet you. My name is Elder White)." *Shakes head* Elder Cabral was with me when I said that and he had to walk away because he started to laugh. She was looking at me like "Darn gringo doesn't understand." Psych sucka! I know exactly what's going on: You haven't been to church in 7 years, but your grandparents were Catholic so you just say it for tradition even though you don't care at all.
Wednesday
We had to take an extra bit of time this morning to try and catch up on Elder Cabral's 12 semanas (weeks) book. We just seem to always have stuff going on in the morning that impedes us from doing it. Alfredo and Celia made us ceviche de pota this morning, which is the kind of ceviche we can it. It's good for the first couple of bites, but after that it's just alright. It's a decently good dish, but I feel like Peruvians over hype it a bit. We had a ataque de distrito (district attack) in our area today. They told me about it yesterday, so we didn't really have a whole lot of time to plan everything out super thoroughly. We had the hermanas at a table with a bunch of flyers and Book of Mormons and the rest of us went out to contact. We worked hard and I enjoyed it. We were on calle el Agusto (the name of the street we were on) the whole 1 1/2 hours of the attack. It was fun and we got some good work in, but there's only one problem with that road: Testigos (Jehovah Witnesses). I don't know why, but they always build their churches close to ours. It certainly doesn't help with the problem people have of confusing us and them. The Testigos congregate Wednesday-Sunday in the evening, so I try to avoid that street when they do. We tried contacting a few of them when there was no one else in the street. It didn't really work. I had almost forgotten how prideful they are of their false doctrines. They trigger me so much. I shouldn't be able to disprove half your belief system in 5 minutes with your own Bible. I'm screaming internally right now just thinking about it. The district attack was decent though. We got 1 or 2 really good references that we can work with hopefully. We had a cita with Jeannina tonight. It's kinda hard working with her family sometimes. There's just a lot of excuses when they don't do something. Our plans for the end of the night were kind of a toss up all day. At first we were going to go visit la familia Astuhuaman, but then Nelson called us was talking like he was organizing a last second NDH as the ward, but what we finally wound up doing is going to go visit Aylin and her mom, Octavia, since Aylin had called us and told us she can't tomorrow. we went there and Octivia wasn't there. When Aylin had called 15 minutes earlier, Octavia said she was busy. I was bothered, but doing my best to make another time to return. I even offered to go at 7 AM, but at that point God was like, "That's not necessary," and Octavia showed up. She said she only had 20 minutes. Due to that we had to teach a little faster than I would have liked. Due to that, we weren't really able to find her need for the gospel to fulfill and she said the infamous "mas adelante (later)". Aylin started to cry, probably due to that. I felt bad after.
Thursday
Elder Myers called us this morning. I answered and he said, "It is Thursday my dudes. AhhhhhHHH!!! I forget to do that when I called for indicators last night. I'm gonna call SF too. You should go stand by them so that you can hear it again," and then hung up. So I went and stood outside their door. I heard their phone ring and then the same thing happen. Find yourself a district leader like Elder Myers. Elder Cabral was wanted to buy some sunscreen a couple of days ago, so I just gave him mine because I never use it. That boy lathered himself up like I used to smother my mashed potatoes in gravy on a fast Sunday. He still had a bunch of it not rubbed in all over his face and for some reason refused to rub it in more. I don't know why he wanted sunscreen in the first place--Latinos have a natural sunscreen in their skin. But anyways, that lead to me making a lot of jokes today: "Hey have you been drinking enough water? You look kinda pale." "Where to next Elder Casper?" * After a kid leaves him hanging* "Don't worry about it. Kids can't see ghosts." "You've been around me so much that now you think you're a gringo too." There were a lot more I came up with. The first thing a first guy said today was, "The sun's strong today, no?" and looked at Elder Cabral. That was funny. We had a meeting with the seminary teachers today to see what we can do to help. Aylin is one of the teachers, so we got talking about her mom a bit. She told us that Octavia is for sure coming on Sunday to church and that even though she didn't accept a fecha, that's the most Aylin has seen her open up and be receptive and all. That was really good to hear because I felt really bad that Aylin was told her mom wanted to get baptized and then having her say no. We'll go back to see what else we can do. Afterwards we went to go visit a reference named Elizabeth. SF told us that she's been to church multiple times and that she told she wants to get baptized. We walked into her veterinarian clinic thing and started to talk. But then all the sudden people started bringing their dogs in and she went into the back with them. 45 minutes later I went back and said, "Hey, I'm sorry but we've got another cita. I'll call you later to set something up." From there we went to visit Juan Carlos, Nimrod's brother, since he's a PF and went to church on Sunday. Long story short, it's still not his time. Then we took Jherson Chagua to visit Elva Astuhuaman. We taught and then invited her to get baptized. She said she has to wait for Mario to do it juntos (together). She loves the church still and when I asked what she needs to be happier, she said baptism. Ahhh! Why wait?!
Friday
This morning we had what has come to be a weekly emergency meeting. I don't feel like it was the most productive meeting, but we had some cake to celebrate birthdays.
We went to go visit Daniel today. They other day we were walking by an internet where there were a bunch of kids playing video games, and there was 22 year old Daniel with his shirt off playing too. What a guy. We went to go visit Sara and Rossany, two Venezuelan references from the district attack. They talked a lot. We'll see if they come to church, but I don't know what'll happen with them. We finished the night off with correlations.
Saturday
We had studies this morning. We also did a part of weekly planning. Being a trainer is interesting. Even though Elder Cabral is way ahead of where I and most missionaries were at in that point of time, I still have to be patient. We have different ideas sometimes. He interprets the rule of always stay with your comp as I'm not allowed to cross the street to contact if he's already talking to someone. The way he wants it, I feel like I'm holding his hand. If he had problems contacting or something I'd understand. But he doesn't. As I see it, he's perfectly capable. I want to contact 2 people at once (so contacting separately) like everyone else in the mission does since it's so much more sufficient. It drives me crazy to contact together, especially when I've already started a contact and he awkwardly stands behind me without contacting other people, or when he'll butt in on my contact too. But like I said, he's a great guy and we've all got our own little things. We left to go work today and like 15 minutes later he asked me if we could go back to the room. I asked why and he told me it was because he forgot his engagement ring. I was just kinda like, "You really think that's worth our time?" But he made us go all the way back for it. The first week he was always talking about his comprometida (committed). I figured he just had a girl waiting back in Recife or something. But then I saw the ring and put two and two together. She's on a mission too right now I guess. He says that they're gonna get married their first week back home together. He's kinda a trunky dude. We contacted a good part of the day today. We went to go and visit Jeannina. She's a lot less quiet now when we're with her, so that's good. She's progressing well. Her family is changing for the better as well. We went to go pick up our clothes and they were like, "Pasen (Pass)" I knew what was about to go down though, so I tried to deny it. They insisted though, so we went up. When we walked in they had 2 think slices of chocolate cake and Inca Cola waiting. Satan is a real jerk sometimes. It was a very sad moment when we had to tell them that we were fasting. We went to go visit Juan tonight and teach Johan at the same time. Elder Cabral isn't very good at teaching really simply yet, and that's a problem if you're teaching Juan. He'll have questions no matter how simply he's taught. But when Elder Cabral answered his questions, he'd only cause him to have more questions. Juan is a good guy and he's great about reading the Book of Mormon, but he's a very logical guy and has some questions and doubts still due to that. I see a lot of myself in him really. We gave Nicolas a blessing before leaving. One time Juan had Nicolas on his lap and in the other hand had a Sprite. He took a sip and then said, "Want some?" and gave Nicolas a sip. He's barely a year old. There are some dad goals right there.
Sunday
We went to go pick up Arlet and her family this morning. I was disappointed yet surprised because Arlet came with only her mom and her sister. When we passed by yesterday, Henry was super gun hoe and it seemed like he was going to fight with his wife (Jessica) to get the family to go to church. I didn't really do my best effort to interact with her though--even though I should have--since she doesn't really show interest in the church. Church as pretty good today. In sacrament meeting, I was standing in the back looking for a CR or non member to sit with. After a minute or two I realized I just needed to find an open chair to sit in. The room was jam packed; there literally wasn't an open seat. What a great problem to have! Mafer came to church! After weeks of being MIA, it was good to see her again. As I was standing there looking at everyone, it hit me that I've helped this ward more than I thought. I looked at Robin and Jherson Chagua, Ricardo el Chino, and others I've gotten to come back to church, as well as all my converts there. It was good for me because I was feeling a bit embarrassed that we still only have 1 with fecha right now. There were a lot of potentials there today too. President Hurtado made a surprise visit to us and pulled us out of sacrament meeting to talk to us about the ward a bit. We talked to Mafer a bit after. It's been so long that she forgot she can't kiss us. She's gonna quit her job at Tambo at last, so that'll be good for her spiritually . We were talking to some people after church and it sounds like the records of some are missing. So that means we might be getting a free baptism soon. Alfredo called us and told us that we'd have to find somewhere else to eat dinner since the dude literally accidentally cut the power cable to his house. Sometimes I almost feel bad for Satan and him being the devil and all the suffering he has, but then he'll do something like this to 2 elders that are finishing up a fast and I say that he deserves all that and then some. We ate with the familia Villafuerte for lunch. From there, we went to an zone attack in San Fransisco. I got paired up with Elder Rodriguez, who's a missionary from Elder Cabral's group. It was an attack on the PFs so we had two dudes from their ward to help us out. We made some good progress for them. I actually went inside a house for the first time on one of these attacks. When we got back to area we just contacted the whole rest of the day. I don't think the bishop likes us very much. He never seems super willing to help us. We called him and a couple of other dudes to see if they could maybe give us dinner and they said no. Elder Cabral came in clutch though and shared his breakfast for the next day with me when it came time to eat.
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