Well, we worked hard this week, we found some people to teach, and they... didn't come to church. Weeks like this are kinda frustrating. We were there in the church waiting for people to come when someone came that I wasn't really ever expecting to come, came in. His name is Alonzo, is 20 years old and turns out is kinda cool. I'm pretty sure that he has a minor case of down's syndrome. He's always in the streets wandering around our area. So I always invite him to come, but he had never come before. But I always would invite him and ask why he hadn't come. My jaw just about dropped to the floor when he walked up to us. He said thanks for inviting him and I sat him with a member. I guess this kinda just goes to show that we need to do some follow up and not give up as President Ballard teaches us. If people can consistently feel the love that we, the missionaries, or other people have for them, eventually they'll come to open up to us more and we'll be able to serve them better. We just need to keep trying time and time again with a good attitude! Have a good week!
-Elder White
Monday
It would seem as though Satan has been putting in some overtime hours with me as of late. For example, I was doing great all day until a wave of nausea hit me out of the blue at 9:45. I never threw up, but I did feel crappy. I was praying hard yesterday that I wouldn't feel sick after my fast; and it worked. I told Elder Cordova that I wasn't feeling well and he just told me, "Well, I guess you should have prayed to not be sick today either." But really, it's really starting to weigh me down that we've only got one investigator and that we are not finding more. And it's not exactly like the people are super humble here. I mean, the ward has had 130 baptisms in the last two years. Elder Cordova and I have found a few people here that I thought for sure were going to get baptized, but most of them fell. I feel more spiritually in tune than I've ever been in my entire life. We are working hard and talking to everyone that we come across. But very few seem to even stop to talk. I'm not saying that we are perfect because there's a couple of touch up things we can do to be better. But like I said, I'm feeling kind discouraged and confused right now. God will get us through it though. We got up early and went to Cieneguilla for the zone pday. It's green kind a like how Chosica is green. The chapilla had a big grass field, so we play kickball there. Teaching Latinos to play that was kind of interesting, but we got through it. I'm not the athlete that I used to be. That was a depressing thought. We still had fun playing though. We went to the only bagel shop in Peru, which is owned by a Canadian from Montreal. We asked him, "Why are you here?" He just shrugged and in his Canadian accent said, "There weren't any bagels here." I'm not a bagel fanatic, otherwise that would have been super cool. Somehow we got permission from President to borrow a copy of Toy Story 4 from some members. It was high key pirated, but we only borrowed it so that makes it alright I suppose. It's hard to find a disk that is not pirated really. The movie was fun though. We were going to go and visit la familia Machicao, but they got into an argument and canceled on us again. We past by later and Hermana Trinidad was like, "Yeah, well, Jose Carlos just came home drunk and I'm supposed to go to Rome at 10:30 AM tomorrow but I don't have pasaje, so my husband and I are going to go see if our family can lend me s/900." Rough day, but hopefully she was able to get it worked out.
Tuesday
Well, I felt motivated enough by my performance yesterday and the constant jokes from the others in the room that I got up early to exercise. I got more than 20 minutes in arms, legs and abs-enough to make me sore all over. #GetYoked We had District Council this morning. It was pretty normal. Elder Leite came there. I was thinking that he was going to burn us since the numbers in the zone are a little low right now. He just motivated us though. Well, as you know, my birthday is this weekend. To celebrate, the zone leaders always buy cake. I didn't know that last year when my birthday rolled around. The whole zone breakfast thing was just a coincidence last year; no one in the zone wished me a happy birthday. I brushed it off at the time though because I figured that that was just something you do in the mission. But now I know how it is. I usually brush things off like this and I did. This morning there was no cake, and it felt like a sucker punch to the face. I didn't say anything or act in any way, but on the inside I was pretty hurt to be honest. I think I've convinced myself that they're just going to wait until next week to do a birthday cake so that they can split it between Elder Cordova (the 19th), Hermana Lester and I. So I'm hoping for that. Today was another day of almost pure contacting. But unlike the past few days, we were able to find three people in the streets that were pretty cool that we set citas up with. That really boosted my spirits. At night we went to a correlations meeting. Those were some pretty standard beans. I like Erick (the second counselor in elders quorum) because he shows more initiative than other ward mission leaders that I've worked with in the past, so we'll see how this goes. After that we went to go and try and visit a cool contact that Elder Cordova made last night. He said he was in Santa Anita when we called him before correlations and also that he'd be home in 40 minutes. His neighbor showed us his house. We went and knocked on the door and the teen told us that the contact wouldn't be home until late. We explained the situation and he said that he'd go ask someone else. A big 70-year-old came to the door and was like, "He doesn't live here, he lives on the other side of Lima." I said, "But we just talk to him." Then he said, "You calling me a liar?" It wasn't worth it so we walked away. The contact wouldn't answer his phone. We ran into Juana and asked if she was coming to the activity on Saturday. She said, "Of course. That day's your birthday too." I told her my birthday date months ago. I'm impressed. That really made my day.
Wednesday
Last night was one of those nights where I was determined to not fall asleep during my prayer at night. It was going well and I was wrapping up when I suddenly tuned back in 20 minutes later to Elder Pedrozo and Elder Leite (intercambios) talking. They've made fun of me for snoring, but oh well I guess. Last night we also found to burger places that are both respectably good-- 1 for s/5 and one for s/25. And I didn't get sick, so that means that they're safe. Tasty beans. We had a cita with a 16-year-old named Rebeca today. It wasn't that's overly exciting of a cita, but we extended her the baptismal invitation for the 7th and she accepted it. She's kind of a acting unsure about it though. We are hoping that it's just her personality, but were also exercising a lot of faith. We asked her, "What's your biggest fear?" "Like, other than insects?" That was a first. We got a reference from the Hermanas. They were like, "So and so is a single mom and wants to meet with the Elders. She doesn't know her address and doesn't have a phone. But she'll be at the Botica (drugstore) in front of the park at six." I got permission to call them and the only other piece of information I got was that she's about 51 years old. So basically we wander back and forth between the four boticas and front of the park in the busiest part of our area looking for a 51-year-old lady for half an hour. Naranjas (oranges). During lunch we were cracking jokes and stuff like normal. Elder Leite asked why the chicken crossed the road and everyone was pretty confused because Latinos don't make those jokes. They asked me and I explained that there is a lot of ways the joke can go. They were like, "Really?" "Yup. For example: Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the idiots house." *Everyone looks mildly confused* "Knock, knock." Elder Cordova: "Who's there?" "The chicken." It took a second but then everyone died laughing. We did a NDH with Elena and her family tonight. We told them to invite all their friends, but when we got there they said that they have been too busy to invite people. We brought Wilber to accompany us, but I don't think that they were to excited about that, possibly because I hear Angela and him like each other. I taught about temples and we had a lot of fun. Angela already has her recommend and Andree will get his on Saturday. We tried passing by Diego and Donatilda's, but they had been sleeping and weren't feeling it. Also, Dona said that Diego can't get baptized August 31 because "he won't be ready". It's frustrating because he's a hard core escogido. My charity will be tried. We've just gotta maintain that faith and hope though I guess.
Thursday
It's kinda funny because Elder Cordova says he knows how to cook. Then there's days where he fills a bowl with water, adds two spoonfuls of oatmeal. He went to microwave it an Elder Clark was like "Whatcha doing there?" "Oatmeal." "With only 2 spoonfuls and that much water?" "It's going to expand in the microwave." *Facepalm* But, he now knows how to make a bowl of oatmeal. Right now I love saying, "Prohibido el ingreso de maquinaria pesada (Prohibited the entry of heavy machinery)" with a thick gringo accent. It's pretty funny. You can adapt it into an exclamatory phrase too if you want. "¡Pucha Maquinaria Pesada, Batman!" The comleteness of the phrase depends on your emotional level of exclamatories. This morning marks three mornings in a row of doing exercises. I'm proud of myself. My body hurts. I didn't do legs felt this morning because we went and climbed Quinapata after studies. We hiked all the way there and only 30 minutes. It's not the greatest place to contact since there aren't too many people, but you got to know your area.
Elder Vasques came here with Elder Pedrozo on an intercambio today. It's interesting to see how people have changed in the year since I met them. There was a lot of contacting done today. We passed by an inactive's house to see if we couldn't get her excited to come back to church with her family. Then we went and visited Anabel. That girl's got a good strong testimony-- she read one or two chapters from the LDM every day! It's too bad that she can't leave on a mission. Diego lives right around the corner from her, so we paid him a surprise visit. I wish we could do more with him than just wait for Saturday and Sunday to see if he comes. We left him another chapter in the Book of Mormon to read and told him to watch Prophet of the Restoration. We continued contacting the rest of the night away. There's a hill we were walking down to get to the next part that we were going to contact. Right at the bottom, there was a 70-year-old lady and a 50-year-old lady with a baby talking in the street. Usually that situation is a no-go for me because it rarely works out. But I contacted them immediately. The younger of the two is named Carmen. I asked my usual starter question: "¿Usted tiene deseo para acercarse mas a Cristo? (Do you have a desire to get closer to Christ?)" She explained how they've been wanting to go to church for 15 days but they haven't been able to come due to a ton of stuff going down. For example, their son's car was stolen, her grandson (>1 year old) is going blind and the grandson's mom has problems with passing out and is a single mom. But they're coming to church on Sunday and we're gonna go visit them on Saturday. Pretty solid milagro.
Friday
Today is my last day of being a teenager. That's a depressing thought. Tomorrow I'm going to be an old fart. Oh well I guess. I think that doing sit-ups gives me back problems. There's a pop in my back every time that I go back down. And now my back hurts but as they say: a deformed back < six pack abs. While the other Elders went to Almuerzo de Ingles with President Amato and his family since they finished their English study books, we stayed back and did some good 'ole weekly planning. Nothing too exciting or new there. The citas that we originally had scheduled for today didn't wind up happening. Rebeca was a no show, so that was kinda unfortunate. We went and visited Nora and Jose Gabriel. We were making small talk and stuff, but you could tell that things weren't 100% back to normal yet. After a bit I just said, "How's the family?" Things got kinda quiet and uncomfortable. We talked indirectly about what happened for a bit. We also set things up with them so that we could take them to the temple. The rest of the day was spent contacting. I felt better about my contacts today, so that was nice. We were wrapping the night when that same drunk from July 29th named Julio went up to Elder Cordova and started contacting him. Other than not giving him a lot of personal space and using a lot of hand motions, nothing really happened. It was taking a while though, so I went in to try and rescue Elder Cordova. I was ignored though no matter how many times I tried to cut him off. His other drunk friend noticed that we were trying to escape and came to try and hep. The other drunk was a chill dude. He was like, "They gotta get back to work, let 'em go." Then Julio was like, "They're in my territory, they're on my streets." But the other drunk responded, "The streets are everybody's; only your house is yours." So then they were arguing about that and Julio was trying to draw lines and stuff. They were using a bunch of slang and swearing. I didn't understand every swear word though, so it was pretty funny to me. Amidst the confusion, I tried to sneak away with Elder Cordova. Julio noticed though and ran after us and put his arm around Elder Cordova's shoulder. To me he said, "He come down here," and put his arm around me too. I tried to escape and he wouldn't let me. I finally convinced him that we had to go, so he turned to my comp and said, "Hey, take care of him. Please." Then he cupped my hand in both of his and said, "You are good. So very very good. Have a good night."
Saturday
Welp. I am an old fart now. I just feel like there's a huge difference between 19 and 20. This morning we went to go play soccer against the office bright and early. That 5:20 AM alarm went off and the other elders immediately started singing happy birthday to me we went to take combi down the curva, but it was really full. The others got on, but there wasn't room for me. The bus started driving away, so I hurried and hopped on. So the combi flew down the mountain with me hanging halfway out. That was exciting. There were rumors flying around that Pres. Amato was going to play with us, but he wasn't there. I scored a goal so that was some highlight where the beans. We, (well, the gringos at least) had fun. The Latinos always get a little too into it.
On the way back, Elder Clark sang "Happy birthday to you. You live in a zoo. You smell like a monkey and your comp's one too." We're pretty Savage about the monkey jokes with him, but she handles teasing extremely well. We came back, showered and studied and then I left to call my family. I went to the Internet café and had been talking with them for all of 20 seconds when the zone leaders called us and said, "So we just talked to the assistance and we are actually only allowed to call on our parents birthdays, so you got to come back to the house right now." I was mad. Not because I couldn't talk to them, but rather the zone leaders waited until the last second to ask if I actually could. I had made it very clear sense Monday that I was going to call. But oh well I guess what can you do? We had a CCM attack today. Elder Free came with me. He was a good dude. We went and had a cita with Carmen today. Turns out that an an active member that I've contacted in the street a handful of times is Hermes. It also turns out that Carmen is a real chatterbox. So much so that we only had time to invite her daughter to get baptized (Wendy), because when we did she told us Wendy's whole life story and every concern she's ever had about her. It took 20 minutes and I couldn't cut on her off no matter how much I tried. Then we have the award activity: Hakuna Matata. We were each in charge of a NDH game. I may or may not have wing it on the spot. The whole activity had a great turn out. The ward to sang me happy birthday, so that was hype. The members were all super cool. Francisco sent me a treat. Wanda called and later gave me real nice box of chocolates with some refrigerator magnets. Hermana Ana made some tasty chicken sandwiches and out homemade 3 leches cake. all in all, a great day! Birthdays are like a box of chocolates-- you never know what you're gonna get.
Pictures from the ward activity:
Birthday celebrations:
Sunday
Yesterday after lunch, we stopped by the house real quick like normal to use the baño. We were taking care of business and all the CCM dudes walked over to my desk and started looking at my "velocity of Satan's fall from heaven overtime with respect to air resistance" equations. They had all just graduated and we're still a little traumatized from their calc classes. There was one Elder, Elder Sanches, who went to Lone Peak. It was kind of cool to talk to him about people I knew back home. Well, no one that we thought or were planning on seeing came to church. Not a single investigator or any converts that have been baptized in my area since I arrived (except Victor) were there today. But there was one dude that came today that I had never planned on seeing their: Alonzo. He's kind of a little bit more special, but not overly so. He's always over wandering around Portada 3. Every time I see him, I tell him to come to church with us. I'll also ask why he didn't come the last week. I never thought he'd actually come though. Turns out that he's also 20 years old and is a cool dude. When he walked in, he said, "Thanks for inviting me hermano Elder." The missionaries all talked about ministration second hour. Alonzo said that he liked church, so we took out a cita with him. When we got to his house, I remembered I had tried visiting him before but it didn't work out. He wasn't there, so I called and he said he was in the park on his way up. We waited around 5, 10, 15, 20 minutes. He wouldn't answer his phone either so we left. We went around to go visit a bunch of CR's and inactives to see why they didn't come.
Pictures from a hike we took this morning for pday:
The war wounds from the hike.
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