So we finally got an awesome referral from a member and her name is Roxana, she's so excited to listen us and I've honestly never felt better about an investigator. We have tons of investigators right now but they just never progress. It's nice to finally have found someone who wants to progress themself, we gave her a book of mormon and asked her if she had any questions at the end of the lesson and she told us,"First I'm gonna read this book and these pamphlets and then I'll come back with questions so you guys can help me." Elder Cabral and I were shocked because no one has ever said that here. We're working hard, we're not seeing success like everyone else in South America but it's different here, and it's awesome. I didn't come to the mission with baptism goals in mind or anything like that, the one thing I told myself before I left was that I want to help people, in whatever way possible. And we're accomplishing that a ton here.
We do service every moment possible. We just hope that one day a service oppurtunity will turn into a teaching opportunity. It's been nice to see both sides of Peru in 5 months, I've seen people living in huts to giant apartment buildings but all of them need help and need the gospel in their lives. Anyways, the mission is awesome, I'm learning so much and I'm getting fat for the first time in my life so that's sweet. Elder Cabral and I spend almost every P-day at the plaza de armas, we just sit down and talk and it's the most relaxing part of the week. Good week!!! Love you all. "Rise up like the sun, labor till the work is done" -The Killers
K so I'm at the point now where I think and dream in Spanish and it's actually not good, this lady asked me to give her a blessing but she wanted it in English and that was like the hardest thing I've done so far. I hope my next companion is a North American cause I'm legit scared to lose my English, I just don't use it at all.
This week flew by, nothing spectacular happened but I'm learning a lot. Not having a phone is probably the best thing ever, so many people are just looking down and not looking up at the world, like how are you supposed to meet awesome people if you have your head down. What if your future wife just walked by and you didn't even see her like cmon talk to people. Recently I've been frustrated because the people in Ttio are not friendly at all. You just say good morning to someone and they give you a dirty look, but we're staying positive, the bishop is the coolest dude ever, this last Sunday in the ward counsel meeting some people got upset and mad at us only because there aren't as many baptisms as there used to be, but the bishop told us not to ever ever worry, we are instruments in the Lord's work, we don't determine the amount of baptisms, the people have free agency, all we can do is work hard and invite people to come to Christ. I will never ever care about the amount of baptisms I have, you could work your butt off for 2 years and not have a single one, it just depends on the people. I hope to get called to every single area throughout my mission, transfers are this Monday! Our mission has Macchu Picchu, the jungles of Puerto Maldonaldo, tropical paradise of Quillabamba, the highest lake in the world Lago Titticaca and Puno, and the mountains of Cusco. Pretty sweet.
We found a guy named Gabriel Acunya while we were contacting, that day was insanely frustrating and I was just not loving the people of Ttio that day, but Gabriel is a very close friend now, we wants to learn more about the gospel and just wants to talk with us all the time, he's like 22 years old and probably the nicest guy in all of Cusco. Nobody ever just accepts us like he did, he doesn't hide anything and is super honest with us and told us he wants to change his life for good. We brought him to church this Sunday and he loved it, so we'll be visiting with him a lot this week.
I hope you all are doing well, just heard a bunch of people got called on missions so congrats!!! And if you're thinking about going just go!!! I doubt there is any program or university or anything that teaches what the mission teaches. For me, it's been insanely humbling, washing my clothes by hand every week, eating rice and chicken every dang meal, it's the best. I've met so many awesome people and learned so much its ridiculous, there's no words for it. Have a good week everyone!!!
It's been raining a ton lately I hope California is getting more sun than we are. This week was very good! We are teaching a 9 year old named Alfio and he will be getting baptized in two weeks by his dad which is super cool. Lots of part member families in Cusco so that's what we are going to start working with, we've been frustrated lately because we could contact all day and not find a single person, so we've decided to not waste time and work more effectively by really pushing members to help us out and give us references, we don't get a ton but it's way more effective than knocking doors when absolutely no one wants to hear anything.
Cusco is very successful but we work with very rich investigators (I went from the poorest part of the mission to the richest) and lots of people here think they have everything they need in life which is pretty hard. I'm not the type of person to care about numbers and stuff, I just work my hardest but when the numbers don't show it's kind of discouraging. There's an 80 year old man that has been going to church for like 15 years in our ward but hasn't been baptized yet and I was so confused about that so I went up to him and said that lots of people are being baptized the 18th of March and you should be one of them and he was like oh yah sure. I honestly think no one actually asked him if he wanted to be baptized hahaha. Pretty hilarious, he knows the bible from cover to cover and just loves to "bible agree" with us. We call him the Isrealite cause he was a giant white beard and a cane and speaks Quechua English and Spanish. Being able to speak English here is hilarious, the people love the language so everytime they see one of us white missionaries they have to practice and it's probably my favorite thing in the world.
People here are so accepting, the Cusco flag is a rainbow because this city literally has everyone and tons of languages and different cultures. "La Ciudad por Todos" We live with a family and one of the sons left for his mission in Chile this week and I have never seen parents so sad, Mom I hope you were all good cause oh my gosh that broke my heart. It was weird to see the parents point of view and I honestly think it's harder for them now to see their kids go to a different part of the world, but it's awesome:) Did splits with my homie zone leader Elder Haws on Thursday and we got to see the groundbreaking of the Arequipa Peru temple, Cusco next please:) Hope you all have an awesome week! p.s. we found a lion
