21 September 2009

Welp supposedly the 23rd of September is offically spring here!!! But you could have fooled me. It´s been more rainy and overcast and chilly than ever!!! Hopefully pretty soon though it´ll warm up. Other than the weather, things here are pretty good. We had our stake conference yesterday. It was a satelite broadcast like I think you guys told me you had? C. Scott Grow, Elder Holland, President uchtdorf and Sylvia Allred spoke to peru. It was good. I thought it would be in english, but C. Scott Grow spoke in spanish?! Then Elder Holland started in spanish and switched to english with an interpreter, he joked about how painful it would be if he spoke in spanish the whole time. President Uchtdorf obviously spoke english, but he said he wished he could speak german instead. It was a crack up. Anyway, it was good. Elder Grow talked about 5 missionaries he met that are from peru and serving in Mexico. He said he´d do a shout out for them in the conference so he read their names and where they´re from. It was good though. They talked a lot about missonary work and raising missionaries in our families.

We had the multizona this week and it was good. It´s always good to see president and sister davis.

Last week for pday we went to the scariest zoo possible. It shouldnt even really be allowed to be called a zoo. It´s more a crazy old man with all the wild animals he´s captured and thrown in his backyard. I made a startling realization while there-I am TERRIFIED of ostriches!!! There was a giant, LOOSE, ostrich, running around!! I was frozen stiff trying to avoid eye contact with the thing for like 20 minutes. All I kept thinking was, ¨I need a tostada to calm my nerves!!¨That´s for you Em. Really though, I was terrified!!! There were also random bunnies running around, turtles, monkeys, birds, owls, fish, etc. Dont worry, I got lots of pictures. I also got interviewed for peruvian public access!!! There was a camera crew there documenting the insanity and they asked to interview me!! So look for me on Channel 26. Im sure peru public access will somehow find it´s way to Gardnerville public access when they´ve run out of hours of that ¨Reel em in¨fly fishing show to run.

Hey, did my photo cd work?! I dont want to erase them until I know so let me know.

Anyway, I love you guys and miss you!! Changes are next week. Pray we dont have any!! Be safe!! Thanks for your emails!! Love you!!

14 September 2009

Welp, once again, thanks to the high quality internet here in peru, looks like Im going to have to cut this email short!!!! But anyway, we are alive and well here. I skimmed your email mom and Im so glad you guys got the package!!!!!!

Lets see, the news here in Tacna. Our investigator, Angela, who needs to get married to get baptized, and was also pregnant, had her baby this week!! She named her Christa!! Just kidding. That would be awesome, but she had a boy and named him Jesus. I guess thats almost as good. She did have her baby on my 11 month mark though so I think thats significant. She is so great. Shes probably the favorite investigator Ive ever had. The Relief Society ladies put together a big basket for her and her baby and we are going to deliver it tomorrow. I REALLY want to be here long enough to see her get married and baptized which will be in October so pray we dont have changes on Sept 27!!

Also, as we were leaving the hospital from visiting Angela. Peruvian hospitals STILL terrify me by the way. We ran into a lady in our ward who is like 70 years old. She was walking around by herself outside of the emergency entrance. I asked her what she was doing and she said an iron rod had fallen on her head??!! So we accompanied her inside and helped her fill our her papers and talk with the doctors. Turns out one of her doctors is a less active lady and the doctor listened to the missionaries and read the Book of Mormon when he was 17? I was kind of stressed out about missing appointments and spending 2 hours in the hospital with her, but I couldn’t leave her outside by herself either and I guess it just goes to show heavenly father knows what hes doing. We were able to talk to a few people about the church while helping her.

What else…I saw a cock fight this week!!! An honest to goodness cock fight. I thought people were gathered around in this park by our house just chatting or having a picnic or something and it turns out they were watching a cock fight. Oh peru.

Anyway, I hope youre all doing great. I still love you and Im still praying for you all. Everyday. Multiple times a day. Hope its having some kind of affect!!! Love you!!! Be safe!!! Talk to you soon!!!

7 September 2009

Hey HEy Hey!!!

And hows my family today? Im doing pretty good here in Tacna. Not too much has happened this week actually. It went by really fast...I guess thats a good thing right? Anyway, we are doing good here. And since I dont have too much exciting news from this week Ill share some stories Ive been saving up from weeks passed. hope I havent already shared these. Sorry if I have.

1. One day we were walking along the street and a man in a car pulled over and offered us a ride. We told him no, but he kept insisting!!! He said he always sees us walking and wanted to be a good Samaritan that day. He had a nice car and didn’t look like the kidnapper ( missionarynapper) type AND he had his girlfriend or wife or something in the car with him so after like 5 minutes we finally got in. He said, Youre not headed too far right? Just up the street and around the corner? And he was right, we were on our way to visit a new member that lived up the street and around the corner. I was thinking, maybe hes an angel or something. How does he know where we´re going? So we got in and got to talking with him and the lady and we started to talk to them about the church. They said they weren’t members, but had friends that were members. Supposedly super active members. We were a little confused because we didn’t recognize their names, but we didn’t think much of it. So as we´re talking the car comes to a stop and I realize he´s waiting for us to get out. I thought it was kind of weird he never asked us what house we wanted to be dropped off at, and was just going to drop us off in the middle of the street instead of at the ladys house, but I didn t want to complain so we thanked him and got out. Well as the car pulled away my companion and I realized he had dropped us off at the Jehovas Witness chapel!!!!! I didn’t want him to feel bad for confusing us with the JWs so we pretended to walk into the chapel!!!! So, in case youre wondering, Im STILL getting myself into awkward situations. Thought youd enjoy.

2. We were knocking doors the other day and a man came out with a scythe. A SCYTHE!!!! Like for harvesting wheat. He was polishing it as I started to do our door approach, but I was so shocked, scared, that I didn’t get very far. He finally saw the fear in my eyes and said he is a worker at the house and was cutting weeds and didn’t have time to talk. We walked away laughing and so relieved.

3. About a month ago we found a really great investigator. She invited us in and gave us oranges and was interested and listened. She travels a lot so we haven’t been able to meet with her much, but when we do she always accepts what we teach and asks really good questions. So we went last week to teach her and we extended a baptismal invite and she told me she´d already been baptized (like pretty much everyone does) so I explained to her that she needed to be baptized like Jesus Christ and she said she had (which everyone does ) so I started to explain to her more….after 20 MINUTES it came out that she is a member!!! She got baptized like 10 years ago and doesn’t go to church now, but still has her FHEs, and pays tithing!!! I felt so dumb!!!! How had she not told us she was a member after talking with her so much-??!?!!! More importantly, how had she sat through our lessons and asked questions like an investigator?!! I have never been so confused as when we made the realization that our golden investigator is a baptized member of the church. So yeah, we´re going to keep visiting her hoping she´ll come back to church, but looks like we wont be planning her baptism anytime soon.

4. We started talking with a man the other day and he told us he believed in God, but not in a specific religion. We asked him why and he said it´s because he´s been abducted by aliens, seen the future, and visits daily with ghosts and no religion he´s investigated believe in those things. The practices we did in the MTC did NOT prepare me for that.

Anyway, I better wrap this novel up, but I love you and I miss you all!!!

31 August 2009

Happy ALMOST September!!!!

How are you guys? Im doing pretty good. We had a baptism Saturday so Im actually doing really good. Im pretty happy about that. Nury finally got baptized! It turned out really nice. We have a lot of good ward members who are always willing to help us so that’s been a big blessing. OH, also, my wildest Peruvian dream also came true this week!! I was serenaded by mariachi!!! I felt like I was right back in Sparks in Birtha Mirandas. We left our house after lunch yesterday and there was a mariachi band in the street right outside our door getting ready to perform for a neighbour. The lead singer has taught English for 30 years and accosted me and started talking and forced me (it didn’t take much forcing though) to put on a sombrero and take pictures with them! Then they played us a song and then we went on our merry way. Best surprise ever!! Things are alright with my companion. Shes a good teacher, but is pretty serious. For example, yesterday, while my dreams were coming true, she said in a stern voice, ¨Hna. Keele, but it´s the Sabbath, we cant let them play a song for us, we cant listen to their music on the Sabbath.¨ So as they were putting on their accordions and had placed the sombrero on my head she started to walk away!! Luckily they cranked out a quick number and I was able to give them back their sombrero politely before shed gotten too far. BUT we have an appointment to visit them and teach them this week so I feel justified in living out my fantasy yesterday. OH, I finally bought a CD player this week!! Theres a young couple in my ward who are so good to us. They are both dentists and don’t have any kids so they treat us very well!! So the husband reminds me a lot of Darren and last week they went with us to help me pick out a CD player. He, nestor, was asking a million questions about how many woofers, memory, mp3, dvd, etc. I didn’t understand any of it, but I do know that he helped me buy my adorable little CD player and after 10 months of silence we finally have music!! The only problem is I lent all the church CDs I had to ward members that went on vacations so we´re still in silence…but not for long! Oh, I heard the funniest story this week. One of our investigators, Jessica, is from the jungle in the north of peru but lives here now. She was telling me about the pet monkeys she used to have. Em, you NEED to move to the Peruvian jungle from the sounds of it. Anyway, she said one of her monkeys used to smoke! Hed light his cigarette and smoke it!! She also said another one would get mad if the family wouldn’t let him have his way and hed sneak into the kitchen and pee into the pots and pans with food that were cooking!! Im terrified of monkeys, but they sound pretty funny. Then my companion piped in and told us about the time she tried to share her ice cream with a turtle and he bit her and she still has a scar. Peru is interesting. But good.

24 August 2009

Hey guys!!! Happy pday!!! And happy birthday mom!! What are you guys going to do to celebrate?! Wear your seatbelts in the convertable is all I ask!!! And eat cake for me!!! Hope you guys are doing great!!! Im doing pretty good here. Well, surviving. I guess that´s pretty good.

My companion,Hna Cavero, got here at 1130 on Wednesday night from the mission home. She´s from Trujillo, Peru. She lives 2 blocks from where the new temple is being built!! I really like her. Shes a good missionary. 15 missionaries came into the mission this change so I figured tons of people must be training and president davis basically had a lack of options. Turns out 14 elders came and 1 sister!!!! I heard once that the missionaries that get assigned to train are the ones that need to be trained again and thats pretty much the only solution I can find for this change, but whatever. Shes nice, but has a sad life. Her mom was shot and killed in front of her 5 years ago!!! I swear, feature full length movies could be made about the lives of every one of my companions thus far and could win academy awards.

Oh, good news Andre called me this week!!! His aunt called me to tell me they closed Pachacutec and there arent missionaries there anymore. I was sad, but happy because now his aunt, Mirriam, can have her room back that shed been renting to us. Get this, Andre sang me Sweet Dreams Are Made of These in English!!! Hes been practicing and sang it perfectly!! I was cracking up!!!

Oh, sad news. Hna Sonya, the lady thatd had cancer, but was making a remarkable recovery, passed away this week. It was sad. We went to her funeral and they wanted ME to speak on the plan of salvation!! Luckily the high priests group leader showed up and got me off the hook. Im sad for her family, but happy I got to know her. She was a really neat lady.

Good news, our investigator Angela really wants to get baptized and we talked to the bishop this week and the church is going to help her pay for half the cost of getting married so she can get baptized! Hopefully in September thatll all be happening.

Oh, finally, the Herrera family will be coming to Utah in June 2010 now. Im trying to talk them into Gardnerville. They definitely want to visit Vegas though so at least theyll get some of Nevada.

Anyway, I hope youre all doing great. I miss you all and love you!!! Guess what, only 5 changes left in my mission!! 8 months sounds long, but 5 changes isnt too bad right?! Love you!!!!!!!!!

17 August 2009

Welp. The elders called at midnight, literally, last night and I am no longer with Hermana Arroyo. I found out last night that this change I will be training. WHaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa??????????!!!!!!!!!!!!! I thought the elder was joking with me. After 5 full minutes of me asking him who my real companion was going to be and telling him to stop joking he got annoyed and hung up. So yeah, I am going to train. And the poor new missionary that is going to be my companion is going to die!!! I cant train!! Talk about the blind leading the blind!!!!!! But, I have high hopes that she will be amazing and like all my other companions, take charge and be the real senior companion-trainer. So yeah, she gets here on Wednesday and since 5 am when I took Hermana Arroyo to the bus station Ive had to be with the elders. Theyre looking for a temporary companion for me until Wednesday. So what Im trying to say in the worlds longest paragraph Ive just written is pray. Harder. I dont know anything about her yet, but Im guessing by next week Ill have a LOT to report!!

Oh, I also finally used my ATM card last week and it worked! Dad knows me well. I bought my companion a coat because she didnt have one. Hope thats okay. But yeah, it is working and thank you for sending it!!

So this week we were walking to an appointment at night. Well we were walking along, not paying much attention and I realized I was right by a window of a house. So I glance over as Im walking by and have never done a bigger retake in my life. A CASKET with a BODY was in the living room of this house!!!!!!!!! Apparently its tradition here when somebody dies. For a full day the casket is in the house and they have the viewing there. Wow. Glad nobody ever warned me about that one. Good thing Ive got 23 years of funeral experience. My companion on the other hand refused to walk in that neighborhood for the rest of the week. Oh peru.

We had a lesson this week with a lady named Nelly here that does PR! IT was really fun to talk with her. Shes busy planning the anniversary of Tacna until September so we are going to go back to visit her then, but it was cool to talk to her about what pr people in peru do. Besides promote llamas of course. Since thats all I knew about peru before I came.

Oh, sometime could you guys send me a printout of the blog again? I havent seen it since January or so so if you could print off a little afteer that itd be fun to read. Next week Im finally going to send your package for you guys. Sorry it wont make it for your bday mom, but know Ill be thinking of you and looking for something good to eat in your honor!!

Anyway, I have to go, but I love you all and miss you all and hope youre doing great. Keep praying. Please. Love you!!! Be safe!!

July 7 - August 10, 2009

7 July 2009
So yeah, after just about 9 months in the mission Im finally going to have a companion for more than 6 weeks!! Im actually really happy about it. First of all because we had the best pday ever yesterday. Except for the fact we couldnt email of course. But anyway, since we didnt get changed and other people did and were traveling and waiting for their companions we had the day free!!! We didnt have our district meeting yesterday, we had it today instead. So yesterday we had a real pday!! We cleaned our room, organized our things, slept, wrote letters, walked to and from the center and in and out of every shop there, got treated to ice cream by a lady wo speaks chinese, spanish and english and struck up a conversation with us, developed photos, took pictures, and basically loved every minute of our freedom. So yeah, Im still with Hna. Arroyo and Im happy. I think we will have a good 6 more weeks together.

Our district leader has 2 investigators that are getting baptized and married this week except he got transferred to puno along with his companion so now my companion and I have to help with the wedding!! Shes going to be a witness and everything! Im sure Ill have stories next week.

I love you and miss you all!! Be safe and I hope that hot dog feed for 7-8-9 comes to fruition. And in the words of Bon Jovi (this song is playing in this internet right now and I think its a sign) Oh, oh were halfway there, oh oh livin on a prayer...pretty fitting I think. Love you!!!!

Love,
Christa

13 July 2009

Anyway, we had a good week. We´ve started to volunteer in a bakery one morning a week!!! We went Wednesday and peeled a mountain of apples and helped make empanadas and treats, that, get this, we ended up eating that night at the house of a member who had called and ordered them!! Small world. It was really fun, but volunteering in a bakery can´t be good for my health. Oh well. It feels like Im working in apple hill and Im a fan.

Oh, so we had a funny run in with 2 Jehova´s Witnesses this week. We were knocking doors and boy were they excited to see us!! They were like 2 80 year old little ladies who came out with their bibles in hand and were trying to get their glasses on and remember where to find scriptures. I couldnt even be roused into being contentious by the apostasy they were sharing because they were just too funny/pathetic. They asked me what our beliefs are about life after death and I explained to them a little about our beliefs about the spirit world and resurrection and 3 kingdoms of glory, at which point, one of them thoughtfully replied, ¨But we can´t live on the sun!!! It´s just too hot!!! Maybe on the moon, but then only astronauts would go to that kingdom. Explain that!¨ So we took their watchtower magazine, wished them a good day and laughed for like an hour about the conversation we´d had. Good times. Actually though, it was a really good experience. Ive never talked with Jehova´s Witnesses before and it made me SO grateful to be a member of this Church, that teaches that Heavenly Father listens to our prayers even if we dont really even know how to pray, and that there´s not a set number of people that will go to heaven, that He´s given us all the chance to return. Wow, thank you JEhova´s Witnesses.

27 July 2009

Hey guys!!!

Howd the week go? hope you all survived, had a great time, ate good, took lots of pictures and are now finally getting some sleep!! things are good here. im writing later than usual because we had a baptism today!! It was quite possibly the most hectic day of my mission. His name is willian. hes 13 years old and has been ready to get baptized for 3 weeks, but has been waiting for his mom to come who works in chile. Well she finally got here, but fell and had to go to the hospital today!! So the baptism that was going to be at 12 got changed to 3, then we couldnt find the member that was going to baptize him or the member that was going to speak or the keys to the chapel that had vanished!! i was sprinting a good portion of the day pulling my companion behind me!! To make matters worse we had bought 40 empanadas and were scared the baptim wasnt going to work out. luckily ive just come from the baptism and he got baptized and his mom came and it all worked out better than it would have anyway. So thats been my day.

this week one of our investigators had a picantada to raise money so she can get married and baptized so we helped her. Picante is a poular dish in peru and especially in Tacna. it is basically a stew of red hot chili peppers, not the band, tripe and potatoes served with a rustic bread they make here. we peeled potatoes for hours!! She Angela, was cooking it all in a huge pot outside over a little fire. well they only had like 3 little pieces of wood and needed more so they started pulling wood off the log cabin they live in to burn!!! my companion and I were horrified so we ran to a farm tha has a bunch of branches and dead trees and started hauling wood from there. of course at the end of the day they served us heaping bowls of picante to thankus. i tried to talk them out of it, bt when people have burnt their house to give you this food you cant say no!! So remember how i think toothpaste is spicy??? OH. MY. GOSH. This is THE hottest thing Ive ever eaten!!! I couldnt feel my lips for 3 full hours. Even my companion was sweating trying to eat it!! but somehow we finished off our bowls. thats quite possibly the biggest miracle of my mission to date. my companion told me shes never been more proud. She said I just kept shoveling spoonful after spoonful into my mouth and she cant believe I did it. Neither can I. Neither can I. but yeah, hopefully Angela will be able to get married and baptized soon.

Tomorrow is Perus 4th of July so happy 4th of July in peru to all of you! wednesday we have a stake activity with native dances and food that we are going to take investigators to so it should be fun. ill be sure to take lots of pictures.

Love,

Christa

3 August 2009

Hey Hey Hey Family,

Happy August!!! How are you guys?! Im doing pretty good. Not too much to report here this week. The week has actually gone by really fast.

We had that stake activity on Wednesday and it was really good. Peru knows how to have an activity. Every ward presented a typical dance from Peru and they all had traditional dress and every ward had built a booth, display of a different department in peru and had food and drinks and pictures and animals and clothes and music and all kinds of crazy stuff from that area. We ended up having like 14 investigators there. Funny how we´ve never had more than 7 in the chapel for church on sunday, but for an activity where they have food and candy and clowns and music and dancing, the whole world is able to show up! It was really fun though. They judged the booths to see which ward did the best job and part of the criteria was how much cheering the ward could do when the judges came by. Lets just say the mission hasnt made me any less competitive. No less than 3 people told me their ear drums had been damaged by my screaming. It was like Darrens graduation all over again-when Britt and Em and I screamed and everyone stopped and stared. They told me we had to cheer to win so I cheered!! How was I supposed to know I was going to hurt peoples ear drums?! Anyway, we won!! And yesterday in church a member bore his testimony and in it mentioned how good it was to see the missionaries involved in the activity screaming their lungs out. How embarassing. But we won so I dont regret it.

So picante is haunting me! We ate it AGAIN yesterday in our pension and we have to help a sister in our ward clean out peppers to make it for the primary kids on saturday!! The good news is I think my stomach has finally adjusted to peru because now nothing, not even picante with hot peppers and cow stomach, affects me.

Today we are going to the beach. Again. The members in the ward of the elders have a combie and they are going to take us there to eat lunch. Hopefully itll be fun. Im sure itll at least be good for stories.


10 August 2009
Hey Fam!!

Whats going on?! Things are pretty good here in Tacna. Transfers are next week and sadly I think my time with Hermana Arroyo is coming to an end, but Im pretty sure Ill still be in Tacna next monday. Anyway, we had zone conference this week and it was good. IT was nice to see the Davis´. Sister Davis is actually in oregon right now. She left sunday and will be there for 2 weeks because 2 of her daughters are getting married. In my interview with president davis he said the stake president had said some very nice things about me so basically i feel like I owe that man my life!! He, Pres. Herrera, and his wife are the nicest people ever. They are planning a trip to go to general conference in Oct. 2010 and I told them I would be there to drive them, feed them, show them around, so yeah, hopefully Ill be able to make it up to him for the lies hes been telling to president davis.

Oh, yeah, so we ended up going to the beach last monday. It was actually pretty fun. The bech we went to this time had a bunch of rocks so my companion and I spent our time playing around on those. We started out attempting to catch these crabs we spotted, but after 20 unsuccessful minutes we switched to catching starfish. You know, something a little more stationary. We ended up finding like 20 and my companion brought one home as a pet!! She tried to talk me into it otoo, but thanks to some unknown childhood trauma, I had visions of waking up in the middle of the night with my pet starfish stuck to my face smothering me. What was I allowed to watch when I was little??!1But anyway, it was fun. Anyway, my time is up, but I will write more next week!! Love, Christa