Goodbye Palmira - Pictures

Capítulo 68 - Well... Back to the buckets

 Well... Back to the buckets. Most people say the adjustment from leaving the office to a normal area is really hard. Even though there are a lot of things I miss, Like the hot showers, I'm learning to love the bucket showers. It took me a few days to get my muscle memory back, but now I'm back to normal with the buckets showers haha.  

  This week we have been able to make a lot of progress in the ward. The bishop is really happy to see our different approach on things, and I'm teaching Elder Avendaño everything I know to help him out. This ward needs a lot of help, and we are starting to change things around here. We are making plans to start an english class in the church building, we are starting a weekly activity with the investigators and members of a spiritual thought with a soccer game right after, we also talked to President Chase about how all the leaders live in the hermanas half of the ward, and we got permission to leave our area and visit them to start a good relationship with them.

  We have also made the effort to show the members that we are here to work. As part of that effort, we had a baptism on Saturday. Ester, who had a lot of problems before finally got baptized. It was a really great moment.

Capítulo 67 - I feel like there is something waiting for me here

This week was full of all kinds of emotions. Officially leaving Palmira and coming into my new area La Era. My last day in Palmira, a bunch of members showed up and threw me a little surprise goodbye party. It was really awesome, but sad at the same time. The people there are like my family, and it was hard to say goodbye. 

  My new area is La Era, and it's a lot different than Palmira. The people say that this area is like the south, but here in the capital. It's really hot, and all the streets are dirt. I really do like this area, and I feel like there is something waiting for me here, so I'm going to find what that is. My new campanion is Elder Avendaño, he's 22 and from Guatemala. He's my first companion from Guatemala, and so it's really fun to learn about the culture over there and the difference in his spanish.

  This new ward is really strange. It's divided in half. One half is our area, and the other half is the area of Hermanas. They got the really rich half, and we got the really poor half, but I'm not complaining because it's going to be more of an adventure that way haha. Our half is all dirt roads and a lot of very humble people. It reminds me of the south a lot, so we'll see what adventures are waiting me here.

Capítulo 66 - I've always hated goodbyes

I've always hated goodbyes, and these members are making it even harder. I've been here for 6 months, and I've seen so much progress in this area, in the ward, and with the members. I don't want to leave this area and I don't want to leave these members, and so it's already difficult, but then it makes it worse when they hear that I'm leaving and they get sad too. I did all I could here, and we had a lot of success, hopefully I can bring that on to my next area.

  The family home evening with president and Hermana Chase was great, we ate so much chicken, pasta, corn on the cob, beans, and yes mom, we ate salad too haha Then to finish it off, we studied the scriptures and finished with a dessert of peanut butter fingers that president made. I almost died I was so full haha. 

  Also, last week I was talking to president asking him what we could do for Hermana Chase because her birthday was coming up, and we came to the conclusion that we would make her a surprise. Later we got a call saying that we were invited to their house to eat cake. So we brought the surprise. The 5 of us office elders all pitched in and we bought her a glass plack that has her name, and a few words of appreciation from us for everything that she does for us. It was really nice, and she really loved it. I'll have to ask for a picture of it, because none of us took a picture haha.

Capítulo 65 - Elder Cook will be coming to the mission

So this week, we don't have much time to write, we'll be leaving the office right now to have my last family home evening with President and Hermana Chase before I leave the office next week. I still have no idea where I'll be going to, but I'll for sure know by the next time I write.

  The strange thing is that I'm writing right now on a Monday. It's been a while since I've done this, and it feels really weird haha. Well a few weeks ago, we were told that Elder Cook will be coming to the mission, but President Chase told us to keep it a secret, and so he didn't want to write it to anyone until it had already happened. So two days ago (Saturday) Elder Cook of the twelve apostles, Elder Gong of the presidency of the 70, and Elder Ochoa President of the Area presidency all came at the same time to the mission, and we combined the two missions here, and got to here from them three and their wives.

  It was amazing, and they have been fixing things in the church building here, painting, re-painting, sanding, re-sanding the walls, and literally bought new couches to put in the church building. Before the meeting, Elder Rodriguez and I had to do some last minute things in the office, and so we came a little late to the meeting. (the office is in the church building, so we just walked down a hall to the room. Anyways, the point is that everyone was sitting down, and Elder Rodríguez and I were about to walk in, but President Chase was explaining a few thing to all the missionaries before Elder Cook, Gong, and Ochoa came in, so we waited outside. Right when he finished, President Ochoa (area president) came up and caught us by surprise, but he just shook our hands and walked in(we were right outside the door to the sacrament room). Then my companion leans over and says "Elder Case, let's stay here because Elder Cook is coming up and we can greet him first. I looked at him like "are you sure?" and then I said "....okay" We stayed for like 2 minutes, and then like three people came running at us "Quítense! Quítense! Viene Elder Cook!" So yeah....We didn't get to shake his hand first... hahaha

  Also this week, we recieved the order of 65 beds that I made like 6 months ago. Lets just say that there are a million beds in the house, the house is big, and we are still teenagers. I'll just let your imaginations go wild there hahaha.

Capítulo 64 - San Lorenzo!

This week started off with a video conference for all of Central America, presided by Elder Cook, on Sunday. We had a lot of investigators at church that day, and they were all very impressed by the talks given by the general authorites. The sad part was that it wasn't in spanish until the very last 10 minutes. I mean the people giving talks that knew spanish, spoke in spanish like Elder Duncan, and President Ochoa. But Elder Cook was speaking in english, and there was no translator. Luckily we were right next to a family of investigators, and so I started translating for them. After a few minutes, everyone around me started leaning in closer and closer to hear what I was saying. Before I knew it, there were like 30 people trying to hear what I was translating.

  Then the next day Elder Rodriguez and I went down to the south. We decided to stay the night in San Lorenzo, right next to my old area "Obrera". The next day we cleaned up a house and headed down further to Choluteca with a bunch of house materials: 2 beds, 2 wardrobes, a mircowave,  a fridge, 2 fans, a stove, a table, 2 chairs, and an extra matress. The point is that is was really dark when we were driving, and the wind started picking up and all of the sudden we heard a super loud bang. I pulled over the truck, and we noticed that the rope we had used to tie everything down broke, and everything in the back of the truck went flying. Luckily, and I have no idea how, the truck was perfectly fine, nobody was behind us, and there was no damage done to the materials. I honestly have no idea how that happened because that stuff went flying all over the place. We put it all back in the truck, and headed the remaining 5 miles to choluteca.

  Well...It's official. I got called by President the day after we got back from the south, and he told me who my replacement is, and when he's coming. My replacement is going to be Elder Flood, and he comes tomorrow. So we'll see how that goes. Palmira has had a lot of progress since I came here, and it's really sad to think that after two weeks of training Elder Flood, I'll be leaving.

We found a statue of a dolphin in San Lorenzo!

Capítulo 63 - We did an area attack

This week we've slowing been progressing the entire atmosphere of missionary work in the ward. This Thursday, we did an area attack. We are 4 missionaries in the ward, and we all came together, paried up with someone and went out as 8 people in the area. 

  We've already been seeing results, and the stake president and bishop are very happy with us because a few months ago, the church attendance was around 60, and this last sunday we got it up to 129! At least that's what the ward secretary counted. I normally likie to count to see the progress, but I was translating everything for Hermana Chase who decided to come to the ward while President Chase was in a very big lider counsel by the Temple.

The coolest part about the divisions is that my companion for the divisions was Humberto, who was baptized 2 weeks ago, and last sunday I got to watch him bless the sacrament. It made all the hard work worth it being able to see him up there and seeing his wife so happy that he was there too.

  We've been finding a lot of very positive investigators this week, and we have a good future coming up for the work in this ward.

  So... a long time ago, we promised a few people that we would go to church with them if they went to church with us. Well the thing is that they showed up to church with us, and we completely forgot about the whole deal because it was before the mission shut down in december. the other day, we went to visit them, and they reminded us about the deal, and so we went with them on Friday. It was a very small group of people, but once they started the first prayer, it didn't seem like a small group. EVERY ONE OF THEM were screaming at the top of their lungs during the prayer, and everyone was saying different things. it was... interesting.

  This week I also had my interview with President Chase, and from what he was telling me, I'll be leaving my area this change, after completing 4 changes here (6 months). We'll see what happens.