Wow!! There is so much to write about. Hopefully I can write it all! So I have been in the mission for a whole Cambio (or exchange) now. Last week was our Cambios and our old District Leader, Elder Castellanos went back home to Honduras. It is weird not having him here anymore. So because he went home he and Elder Gutierrez went to San Jose to wait for a new companion. Hermana Romero and I were very curious who our new district leader would be. We expected them to probably be home late the next day so we called to welcome the new elder, but there was no answer. We called again later and still no answer. We figured Elder Gutierrez was going to be a trainer? This is because only trainers receive there companions a day later. That same day we went to a member’s house and on our way out to work we passed by the bus station where people were arriving from San Jose. Normally we do not pass this bus during the day. Hermana Romero said as we were a ways off from the bus stop oh I wish there was a bus and the elders were on it and we would get to see the new elder! As we got closer to the bus stop we saw a white shirt, black pants and a tie. We both looked at each other and said there was no way there could only be one elder getting off that bus, it must be some other random person! As we walked closer we could see that this person is on the phone with his back to us. Finally he turned and we saw the telltale of a missionary plaque on his shirt pocket!! But where is Elder Gutierrez?!! We welcomed the new elder to Perez and then asked, ‘Where is your companion?!!?’ It turns out there was a miscommunication and Elder Gutierrez was still in San Jose. It was quite funny, but I felt really bad for him, because being without your companion is sort of breaking a cardinal rule. The new elder is Elder Smoot from California. He has been on his mission for over a year now. (He is not related to the Smoots in Lindon as far as he knows). He played volleyball in college!! He is our new district leader.
Our investigators Carlos and Zulai, who had a baptism date, are no longer progressing. They live in a poorer part and they started to ask if the church could help them with money. After we told them that the church doesn´t just give money to people we have basically lost all contact with them. They aren´t answering our phone calls, they aren´t home when we visit them. It is looking like they only attended church because they wanted money. This has been really sad for us, but we are now looking to other investigators. We are really working on giving good lessons and challenging people to be baptized. We have a girl we met last Sunday who is really good. We have taught her twice and the spirit has been so strong with us both times. She says she wants to read the Book of Mormon... so we will see what happens.
We haven´t had any problems with bugs trying to sleep with us thank goodness. But we have had a little visitor in our house the past couple of days... We came home one night and we were getting ready to start our planning session. I was in the other room when I heard Hermana Romero start freaking out. I rushed in because Hermana Romero normally doesn´t freak out. She said ‘there´s una rata in the house!!’ I looked and I didn´t see anything and I asked which way it had gone. She pointed at the window where we keep all our clean plates. I checked it out, moved some plates around and I still didn’t see anything. I guess it ran out the window, so I closed the window. We finished planning and I went in and heard scratching over by our plates. When I moved the plates I saw a little tiny black mouse hiding under the plates. I opened up the window and scared the mouse out then shut it again. Whew, that settles that mouse problem – yea right. The next day I heard some scratching noise again and I looked at our door that goes out to our back patio. Our back door doesn´t have a knob or latch and is just open. In that knob opening I saw that little mouse staring at me. I told Hermana Romero we needed to find something to cover the hole in the door. She looked at me a little confused and asked why. So I told her pointing at the mouse that it could enter through it and she started freaking out again. During her freak out she got the brilliant idea to take my broken umbrella and put it in the hole in the door. So we now have an umbrella in the door blocking out the mice :).
There have been questions about whether or not there is any technology here. Almost everyone has cell phones. I have seen many smart phones and a couple of tablets. As far as transportation we use the bus all the time here! Fortunately it is normally not too expensive. :)
The hard thing here is that a lot of people will listen to us the first lesson and will agree that we are sent from god, but they won’t do anything about it, or they don´t want to change. These people are not opposed to hearing the word of God otherwise. They really contradict themselves a lot which is really frustrating and they don´t seem to realize it or maybe not care. So we often can give the first lesson but we have very few who accept the invitation for the second lesson. Many times we will set up an appointment to return and they pretend to be interested, but they are not there when we come calling... or they won’t answer the door. Such is the life of a missionary here.
Well I love you all,
Hermana Anneliese Jenkinson
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