Today in Las Vegas

Well, it’s been an interesting week. Covering both areas in the Flamingo Ward was insane. We had basically zero time that wasn’t scheduled out and had lessons until 9:30 every night. I am so tired right now, and actually very sore (we went on a run for the first time in a long time yesterday, so my legs hurt, my knees aren’t doing great, and my back is killing me and is very close to completely going out, haha). Today, though, Elder Andrews and I both have new companions, so we’re back to our usual areas! Yeaaa! I’m with Elder Kakau, who was in the Fallon zone with me for a while. We know each other pretty well. He’s a solid missionary and a chill guy, so we're excited. He is actually full Tongan too. He lived in Utah for a couple years before the mission, but that’s it. The rest of his life he was in Tonga. So we speaks perfect Tongan and English and is getting better and better at Spanish, which is pretty sweet. We are excited to serve together.

Well this last week our main focus was on Elder Andrews' area because he has a baptism this weekend and next weekend, so we were focusing on them pretty strongly, but of course also doing other stuff. We got them prepared though, and now they are pretty good to go. We should be able to get a few investigators from my area to those baptisms this weekend, which I think will be a huge help. Oh ya, we have been working just a tiny bit with a friend of our recent converts named Crisia, but she is always in and out of town, so we never had a real strong opportunity to teach her. Well, we gave her a Book of Mormon and on her last trip out of town she read a little bit from it almost every night before she went to sleep. Then she came back and we taught part of lesson one and had her watch the restoration with our recent converts, and a few days ago we got a text saying she wants to be baptized! She came to church on Sunday and LOVED it. She said she felt such a strong feeling that she described as nervous and excited but more so indescribable; it was so cool. Unfortunately, we ran into a problem. She leaves again on Thursday for Belize for a week (for an international beauty pageant, haha, she is actually Miss Costa Rica...seriously, ya) and won’t be able to go to church, and then comes back for a week where she will be able to go, but then leaves again, so she won’t be able to get to church 3 times. She wants to be baptized so badly, but she just can't until she meets the requirements. Really this has worked exactly as member missionary work should. We just met her from visiting our recent converts, and then they talked to her about some stuff, and then we gave a Book of Mormon, they talked to her about more stuff, and then encouraged her to follow her feelings, and we are now teaching in their home. If we could get all members to work like this we would have tons of people joining the church here. This family is on fire though. I think Ive mentioned them before...Jonythan and Andriette. They told us that they are going to get every Costa Rican who ever goes to their house to get baptized, hahah! They are great and really want to share the things that have helped them out so much. Its great to have them.

July 18, 2011

Not much this week. I switched companions temporarily; I'm with Elder Andrews, who was with me in the Missionary Training Center. We're handling both areas in the Florida Ward, so there is a lot to do. The photo, taken last week, has (from your left): Elder Andrews, me, Elder Peters, Elder Zegarra (my old comp - I'll miss him!), and Elder Altamarion.

Meanwhile, check out one of my favorite videos.

July 11: Happy Birthday to me!

Well, I’m 21!!! and in Vegas, hahaha! Pues, what do people do when they turn 21? In Vegas, hit the Strip. Toss a few bucks into roulette or blackjack. Maybe hit a 21 and over club to finish out the night...oh the feeling of showing the bouncer that you actually are 21, how nice. That’s an interesting list considering I will be doing absolutely none of it. Even off my mission I wouldn’t do any of it...well maybe get into the club just to say I did, but I mean, I don’t drink, gambling is kind of just a ridiculous waste of money, and the Strip isn't that fantastic in the end. At some point I guess we all realize that there are more important things in life. At times like this I like to think about what on earth I’m doing in Nevada for 2 years. I think about it for about two seconds and then realize that I’m doing some of the most important work of my life. Why would I want to have a crazy 21st? The craziness would last a night and the next day would suck. What I’m doing instead is enjoying life, making it better every day if I can. I get to have some true joy in my life because I get to see other people changing theirs. The reversal from misery to happiness is fantastic but it’s even better to see the change from happiness to having a feeling of fulfillment in life and expanding joy. That’s pretty sweet. A solid way to spend a 21st I would say. Of course I’ll still hang out with my friends here, but I will be back to work tomorrow...without a hangover or regrets. Life’s solid. Thanks for all the birthday wishes I’ve gotten (mom and dad sent me the posts so far from Facebook)! Much love for everyone reading my blog.

June 27, 2011

Well this week’s story was all about dinners. The members of the Flamingo Ward looooove to feed us. We almost always get food from their countries; American is rare. We have gotten a lot of milanesa de argentina (Dad’s favorite from his mission), lots of peruvian food like papa de huanguaina (see the pic), and all kinds of things. Papa de juanguaina (o algo asi) is a yellow Peruvian sauce that goes on potatoes and arroz con pollo. It’s unbelievable. Soooo goood. Its one of my favorite foods now. We had papusas ( my brother Tim’s favorite from his mission) the other day too! Anyway, the other two elders have the calender and they kind of messed up a couple of times on dinners last week, so we ended up having 2 dinners 3 days this week, hahaha. It was crazy. It would have been ok if the first ones weren’t all really, really good, but they were! Soo I wanted to eat a lot at the first ones, but then the second ones were all even better! It was nuts. I ate soooo much food this week. It’s ridiculous. I definitely need to try to work some off today. Fortunately we got to play soccer a couple times this week, so that has helped work a little off. We got to play with the youth after English class, which turned out to be really good, because we are getting a lot closer to the youth now and a lot of them bring non-member friends to play soccer every week. Then on Friday we had our missionary activity, which was supposed to be a soccer tournament with the youth against the adults, but then the Mexico vs USA game for the final of the Gold Cup got scheduled at the exact same time, so like nobody came. That was pretty bad luck, but we still played some soccer with the youth that came. Hopefully it was still good. I think it was.

This week we had another really good lesson with Maria and Tilda. We were on bike that day, so we had the other elders drop us off at an appt we had before it and then biked to their house after. That was pretty harsh. We had to bike uphill the whole way and it was well over 100. The other elders’ car said 111, they told us later. It was ridiculously hot. When we got there we knocked, and nobody came to the door. I was like, you’ve got to be kidding me. We waited and then eventually turned around to walk away when finally the door handle rattled and they opened. That air conditioning was the best thing I have ever felt! They love everything, and came to church on Sunday. So we are very happy with that right now. Other than that every single investigator canceled on us at least once. We had some good recent convert and less active lessons though and we were on the phone almost constantly setting up stuff for this week. It looks like this week is going to be really good. We already have at least 6 lessons set up and I think we will have a lesson with a really legit referral, which will be awesome.

June 20

Well let’s see. Monday we picked up Elder Zegarra from the office and then went to our recent converts’ house for dinner. We had a good dinner and a lesson with them. They are really fun and strong. It’s exciting to see. They will be headed to the temple this Friday night for baptisms for the dead. Tuesday we had to do email and shopping and everything for Elder Zegarra since he couldn’t on Monday because he was in the car coming down here, and then we had to take the English elders back to the office for a bike, so that was most of Tuesday day. Tuesday evening we visited with another recent convert and her husband. Wednesday we visited a less active and had some appointments fall through, but then later we had a tiny bit of success “tracting” (going door-to-door). Our area is really bad for tracting (we have the upscale side of the ward which means there are like 20 English-speaking houses to every one Hispanic) we've come to realize, so finding people to teach through that isn’t really going to work. Unfortunately our area is also really bad for working with less actives too (they all also live in the other area), so now that we have a lower investigator pool, the area is really slowing down hard. Now we have to focus on getting referrals from members. So far that’s been going decently well. We have about 5 referrals we are working on contacting, and that was most of the daytime from Thursday through Saturday. We had no success until Saturday when we contacted a referral from a member who just saw these two ladies at church and asked if they wanted to meet with the missionaries. We had a first lesson with them and it was fantastic. They were cool with absolutely everything. After we taught about the first vision one of them said, "Que bonito." At the end we asked if they had any questions and Maria said she had heard we have a lot of rules about health and stuff, so we gave a brief overview of the word of wisdom planning on talking about it more later, but they were just like ok, we don’t do any of that anyway, except a coffee every once in a while, but we can give that up. Then we committed them to read and pray and were about to ask them to come to church too when they said "pues, nos vemos a la iglesia mañana tambien." So we have two new investigators that are super legit, which we really needed. They are great ladies too. Unfortunately it turned out they couldn’t come to church because Tilda (the other lady...Maria's mother in law…who’s about 75) fell on a walk they took that morning. We have an appointment with them on Wednesday though, so hopefully everything is ok. Sunday was good. Just church, things we had to do at church, an appt, dinner, and then we met with an investigator and another recent covert. We had a good lesson with them about prayer and obedience. It was pretty good for them, I think.

It’s been fun feeling the energy everyone in the ward has for CONCACAF right now. The Gold Cup is underway, so it’s all anybody talks about/does. It’s pretty fun. So I know everything that’s happening in that. I believe the US plays Panama Wednesday for redemption from their embarrassing loss in the beginning, so hopefully they can pull out a win there. They just beat Jamaica who was actually kind of streaking apparently, haha. Hispanics and their obsession with soccer is fun for me. The hardest part of the week was how hard a hit the area took with the loss of Elder Miller (possibly the most loved missionary here ever) and with just the natural lull. This week looks like it will be busier though...with appointments that will be a lot more solid. So that will be fun. We should have a good time. Elder Zegarra and I teach pretty well together. We both relax and just let it happen, which is how I feel teaching with the spirit should be.

June 13: Elder Zigarra -- from Peru!

This week is transfers. It is a sad day; my comp is leaving for The Mucc (Winnemucca). I get a new comp tonight. His name is Elder Zigarra and he was in Fallon while I was in Yerington, so I already know him. He is a cool guy and was the one that really kind of welcomed me into the zone there. He is getting close to finishing up...I think just 2 more transfers. Hopefully goes well! Should be fun. He’s Peruvian.

My companion as he was saying goodbye to everyone. They really love him here. There are at least 5 families that consider him family. It’s sad to see him have to leave.... It’s tough to see him go. Me and my new comp have big shoes to fill, but at least everybody is really happy to see me stay; guess I’ve made a good impression so far. They will be happy to meet my new comp and Elder Andrews's new comp this week though. Both are really cool guys. Elder Andrews's new comp is named Elder Marin and he came out with us to the field. Hopefully the 4 of us keep up the good work going in the ward.

So there are other missionaries here from Missouri: Elder Scheifferth (now in Sarah’s ward) from south St. Louis County; Elder Lane from Cape; Elder Farnsworth from St Charles; Elder Sorenson from Washington I think; Elder Josephson who is from Platte City but his family now lives in St Charles. There are some more but I don’t remember them. Missouri is represented in this mission pretty well!

June 7, 2011

We’re driving a truck! A 2011 Chevy Colorado! It’s pretty sweet. Under 1000 miles. Driving it is pretty fun. It’s pretty high off the ground, but it’s not a huge truck.

We are teaching …

· Lizette, Nicaraguan and the Mom of Karen who got baptized last week. She loves the gospel and goes to church every Sunday. Her commitment this week is to read and pray again.

· Mariana, from Mexico but living here with her member cousin and family right now. She is still learning English, but is getting better and better. She is more than ready to get baptized, couldn’t love church more. She goes back to Mexico at the end of the month and is waiting to get baptized until she gets down there so she can prep her parents and aunt to get baptized with her. They are taking the lessons now.

· Maria, a great lady from Mexico whose twin son and daughter are members. Just waiting for her son to turn 16 so he can baptize her.

· Hermana (Sister) Medina, another great lady whose kids are all members. She works on Sundays, so she has trouble getting to church. Shouldn’t be very long before she’s baptized, though.

· Oswaldo, a really nice guy from Peru. The Gospel is something he likes, but he is the type of person to take his time with it though, so it’s coming along slowly.

· Mili, an awesome Peruvian lady whose son is a member. She really likes the church and loves missionaries.

· Victor, a really nice like 40-yr-old single guy from Mexico. He disappeared for a while but showed up at church again on Sunday, which was good to see.

Many people have a hard time understanding how the Spirit works with them. So when we teach, we talk about how that’s kind of the key pretty often...finding somebody that the spirit works with similarly to you. That is one thing the new mormon.org helps do. There are all kinds of people from all walks of life. I think that people that have similar interests tend to have similar ways they understand the spirit. Mormon.org allows you to search for interests and age brackets to find someone who is like you. That means everyone has the chance to find somebody with similar spiritual experiences as them (even if people don’t even know they've had them yet). That is one cool thing that I learned about that website this week and I think the son of the family we were talking to will really connect with something on there.

I also have a new favorite video on there. It’s of a guy named Samuel Babin and his family. They are a tri-lingual household and he plays tennis, so naturally I love it. Its so funny. The kids get the languages all mixed together. Such a good video and great family. That entire website is just fun to play around on. If anyone really reads the testimonies of the people on there and pays attention to their feelings, they will find something there. Guaranteed.

Finally -- our mission president, President Black, always has a new joke for zone conference: His latest: "What’s the hardest thing for a missionary learning to ride a bike? The pavement." Haha. It got less funny because we (not me) had several bike accidents this week, one of which resulted in a broken hand. Ironic. He has really helped me understand loving people better. He’s kind of like dad and just loves everybody from the moment he meets them. No problem. He shows a lot of patience here, which is great. Hopefully I can gain the same kind of patience.