Throwing down your weapons of war

So Elder Ward and I learned an important lesson this week that we would like to share with all of you. If you use dish soap instead of dish detergent in the dishwasher, it will NOT work, and it makes lots of unwanted bubbles on your floor. Just some advice we wanted to throw out there.

So we got a new investigator a lady named Maria. She has a husband and a son and daughter and her grandkids all living with her, but the first lesson was just with her. We just did a quick how to begin teaching type lesson planning to do the restoration with the rest of her family, which unfortunately still hasn’t happened yet. But she loves us probably more than anybody I have met in the mission. She is probably like 60, and before we left, she talked for like ten minutes about how much she loved the spirit we brought and our charisma, and good looks, and the way we dressed, and were educated, and professional. So we have this lady in love with us. She really wants us to come back for one reason or another; hopefully, we can get the rest of her family all together so they can get baptized together.

So, R- has been good. He came to church with us again on Sunday with his crazy son. We have taught him the plan of salvation and the word of wisdom this week. He has problems with everything in the word of wisdom except tea, so I guess you could call this a worst-case scenario. He was pretty surprised to find out we wanted him to quit smoking completely and not just slow down a little bit. He has already replaced coffee with soda, and honestly, I'll take it if that’s the best he can do, and he is down to a "little more" than five a day smoking so we need lots of prayers for him. Teaching him is the funniest thing. He prays in Spanish, but we talk in English. He invents his own adverbs and puts them at the beginning of every sentence. He has perfect English; so it’s not like he has an accent. He just uses his own, invented word choice. The only way to understand his English is just to listen to every other word and figure out what he’s saying. We are pretty happy to be teaching our first Ogdenite. Especially since our area borders J1:the Ogdenite capital. It is the only place in the mission where the English missionaries cover only one ward, and it’s the highest baptizing area in all of Utah. Ogdenites EVERYWHERE.

Life is Great Here

So this week has been great. Elder Ward is definitely my favorite companion of the mission. He is exactly like me...I love serving with me! Elder Ward is the most similar person to me I have ever met besides Dad. It still amazes us that we agree on every single thing..EVERYthing: how to work, obedience, what groceries to buy, never going out to eat, cleanliness. We even have the same weaknesses so we are pushing each other and our pride makes us competitive enough to want to beat each other. We are zone leaders over the Ogden East Zone. We haven't had to deal with anything really, yet as far as zone leader stuff except for a minor issue with a missionary not wanting to work very much anymore since he goes home soon, but that got worked out fine. We used the travelling trainers to take care of it. In our mission, they started doing something called travelling trainers. They are two missionaries that travel full time around the mission going on splits. They have their own car and phone and don't have any area. They don't have to be with a companion so they can drive alone which is kind of weird, but oh well. I'm glad I don't have to do it.

Elder Ward and I are working on charity together, and I am working on humility, too. But we especially need to work on charity with other missionaries and in our teaching. We have both always had good companions that showed love and held us back from being overbearing, but now we just encouraged each other. I couldn’t sleep the night before I got transferred, because I was so excited. Then we went to a lesson together the next day. It was a first lesson, and we pushed kind of too hard to set the date, and they weren’t having it. So we will set it next time, I guess, but we decided at that point we need to tone it down and not be too bold with people and make sure to show them love, too.

"Thank You"

And just like that, transfers are here again. The new 18 year-olds shifted the MTC schedule and made us have a five week transfer. It was of course a very stressful experience as usual leading up to it, but we have almost made it through. So I assumed only being with Elder Cabrera I wasn't going anywhere almost automatically. But we went to the office on Monday morning, and I bumped into Elder Ward. So elder gossip took me off to the side and said he looked into the transfer room and saw that there was a white guy Spanish next to him...which meant me or one other elder. So then the stress began. At 9:50 that night president called and told me that I would go to Jefferson 2nd to be a zone leader with Elder Ward. I am pretty excited. I have been wanting to serve with Elder Ward my whole mission! And I am going back to my greeny area except now I can speak Spanish. I also get the best apartment in the mission! In the bottom floor of our building, we have our own gym, and up the street, we are going to go to the high school everyday to workout. So my new zone leader meeting is tomorrow; then we are booked up with appointments the rest of the day so that is a good sign.

FYI- Elder Ward is a convert from North Carolina. He graduated college in three years, because his parents wouldn’t let him go on a mission until he got a degree. (He is a convert.) He is a fantastic missionary. He is the one who baptized the whole Rubio and Pena family. He was with Phil in the MTC and came out with me.

Hermano Rubio is the best!

trying out my new hat in the snow from tyson..it's so warm!

So the week started out with a fun shoveling snow experience. What do you get when you have two missionaries shoveling snow side by side with metal shovels? A split open pinky. It was just a bad angle, and then all of a sudden the metal blade went like a quarter inch into my pinky. So I haven't been able to bend my pinky all week, but we used some gauze, and it eventually stopped bleeding. So that was fun. I guess it's a good story maybe? I guess it’s not that cool.

We went grocery shopping today and laughed about how easy us Utah missionaries have it. We had unlimited sushi earlier this week, chicken salad the next day, and then grilled chicken. I am just talking about lunch-time, not even at dinner. Elder Shaw leaves in a week, and we cook together...everyday… until he leaves. We are having Santa Fe steak, couscous, and grilled tuna sandwiches. Life is pretty hard for us. We are going to President Reyna’s for dinner today at five, so that will be good, too. 

We went to a fireside last week on Saturday, because we needed to help clean up, and I was playing the piano for the Spanish number. It was put on by a lady named Janice Kapp Perry. (I think?) She wrote, “Army of Helaman,” “I Love to See the Temple,” and like a thousand other things. My favorite part was when she just had us all sing primary songs together. There was lunch after, so that was good. We brought enough leftovers home to feed like forty people. Then when the women ate, we went outside (there was a snow storm) and cleaned off the snow off their cars…I should have brought a jacket. It took an hour to clean up all the chairs. 

More!

Elder Cabrera

So I'll tell you about Elder Cabrera now. He is Elder Martinez’s cousin. He was born in Guatemala and grew up in LA. His dad is living in San Francisco now, and that is where he has been for a long time. His dad is less active, and he hopes his mission will help his dad go back to church. His mom is in Guatemala and is on dialysis, and he may or may not see her again. It has been a couple years since he saw her last. He is 25 years old and said he is really the only kid to serve a mission in his ward. He wasn’t ever active in the church growing up. He said he kind of just went back and forth. He is the second most prideful person in the world (me being the first) which means we do butt heads a lot on stuff...the most amazing thing happened. He told me I need to be more serious! I never thought I would hear that from a companion, but he gets mad if I laugh while we are out proselyting. So I guess I will teach him what Elder Martinez did for me. I really couldn't have fun or joke around at all until Elder Martinez kind of changed me and showed me how to be obedient and enjoy your mission, too. I am not sure how Elder Martinez did it, but I will figure it out. 

He is a great teacher. He asks good questions and is very good at connecting with people. He sincerely cares about people and has a desire to help them better their lives. He is a really good missionary, and I am going to learn a lot from him and him from me. I just don't know how to teach him without doing it in a prideful way. Another thing is that he REALLY can't handle my sarcasm. I didn't even realize how much I joke around with Elder Martinez and Elder Shaw, but it really offends him. I just found that out last night, so I need to work on that. However, in comp inventory, he did say I need to smile more in the mornings when I wake up so I am still getting that feedback, ha-ha. 

BTW-Elder Martinez is a Utah Ogden version of Elder Endemano, Elder Hamilton, Elder Mackie etc...there aren't any other missionaries like him at all...there are some good ones..but not even CLOSE to Elder Martinez. I can't say the best missionary I have ever seen, because I have seen some great ones, but he is up there. It's one of those things that really just makes me wonder why he isn't one the missionaries leading us and the disobedient ones with big numbers of baptisms are the ones leading us. He is too humble to ever say that, but I notice it.

Look at those lips!

Pues, this week has felt pretty long actually. Having three different companions in one week is quite a change! People have asked me if I will be homesick about Emma...nah. I will be fine. Keep sending the pictures; I can take it. I was sad on p-day, but it didn’t last longer than that…. Sorry to the rest of the family; she and Jessica, I feel like, are the only ones in the family I ever pray for anymore. 

So I did end up getting those Costco pictures from Mom. It was kind of funny. We were at Costco shopping, and I knew they might be coming. Then our ride showed up at 3:00 so we had to leave. I went to the picture place, and they said they wouldn’t be ready until 3:30. So I had to leave without the pictures. We got home, and I was just going crazy and couldn’t take it. I called president to ask him permission to drive to Costco to get the pictures. He said, “I am at Costco right now! I will just get them for you!” So he picked them up, and it did cost money which was ok. I just paid him back. Then I went and picked them up in the office the next day and walked around showing them to all the office staff. Not an effective use of time, I guess, but I was excited. I carry a couple in my scriptures to show people when it comes up in conversation...with me, it pretty much does come up in every conversation. I'm sure it drives my companions crazy.

I am an uncle!

I am an uncle...I don't even want to write this email. I just want to look at more pictures. I am sure everyone will feel the same way about reading it, ha-ha.

Well, this week was good. We have a new companion. His name is Elder Shaw from Salt Lake City. He is waiting for his visa to go to Monterrey, México. OK, so the story on that is Saturday they called and said our area was splitting. Ten visa waiters are coming into the mission on Monday. They will split our area so we can each train one. We got there on Monday (yesterday) and then we realized they had 12 trainers there. So there are ten visa waiters here, but next week two missionaries are coming that are permanent (non-visa waiters). They didn’t get here on the transfer, because of the new MTC schedule being next up.

Elder Martinez, Elder Shaw, Elder Bassett

But anyway, I am training one of them so I will get my son next week...mom and dad will be grandparents, again! I am excited. One of them is Elder Martinez's cousin so that would be cool. Me and Elder Martinez weren’t very happy about not being companions anymore, but I guess its ok. I am sure training will be good.

Elder Shaw is awesome. He has pretty good Spanish for not knowing anything beforehand. He only has a day here, so I am sure he will get more used to the hang of things, and how obnoxious I am. We introduced him to Faye, so that was fun for him.

I really can't even concentrate. I keep minimizing this window to go look at pictures of Emma again.