September 15, 2014

Hola!

So what happens when you and your companion both run out of money for the month and literally have no food? You make a deal with the missionary from Peru who wants American money. So really the dollar is worth 10 pesos but I'm getting a deal for 12 pesos for every dollar!  But wait! We just found out that we can sell the money to the bank and get 15 pesos for every dollar.  I'm selling $20 for 250 pesos! Thank you grandma Romeril for sending me money!

I love Sundays. For a couple reasons – because I really love going to church and also because it's almost P-day! Saturday we had a really busy day– We had members with us all day after lunch – one's name is Javier and he's awesome! He was with us for lessons from 3 o'clock to 8 o'clock. He was only scheduled to be with us for three hours but he wanted to stay with us longer. He is in his 20s. We had Julio with us for a while too. He's a recent convert and he was to come with us to a lesson with Luis, a new investigator, but Luis wasn't there and his daughter told us to come back another day. So we went back to the chapel and waited for our other member – Angel – the guy I talked about a while back and he was telling me about his worries with his kids and whatnot. Three members we had with us are awesome! We went to visit Marta and Renee but Marta is really sick and when we visited her, she didn't look good at all. She is so sick that she can't even walk and she has to stay in her bed all day. She is so awesome. She lives with her "pareja" Renee. I don't know the world word in English but it so when you live with without being married. Renee is hilarious – he owns a lottery place – which isn't like a lotto place that you'd think of. It's his little lotto – house place and he just kind of sits there all day doing whatever you do at those places! It's kind of a mutual understanding that he can't understand me and I can't understand him – but we try to understand each other anyways, it's good though! It's a little bit harder to understand him over other people because he doesn't have his four front teeth so his letters sound a bit different!

Funny experience in church! We were in church today and this girl who is 13 years older so she knocks on the bathroom stall I was in and I finished using it and open the door and she entered and close the door and opened it again and was being totally serious and said hola. She smiled kind of really creepily and kissed the air and kept smiling so I was like… A lot! And kissed the air back, thinking maybe that was a normal way here in Argentina because I don't know, they do random things here in Argentina but I guess it was weird she did that so Hermana Rivera was busting up as I was standing there a little freaked out.One day last week our power was out for a whole day because one of the hermana's in my pension forgot to pay the electricity bill… So that's been great :-) but we're not home too much during the day so it's okay – but we still need to pay the bill ha Ha. Last PDay we went on a hike as his own and when we all got to the top we had a testimony meeting and all of the missionaries bore their testimonies. It was really cool actually.

I only have one week left with my companion… It'll be weird having another companion. I never want to leave Catamarca. I'm going to be so sad when I have to leave. Next Sunday I will have been out on my mission for four months. It's kind of sad to think that when I hit my four-month mark I'll only have 14 more months left of my mission. It's crazy how fast time goes here. Four months doesn't seem like a long time, but when compared to 18 months it seems like I only have a short amount left. 

I've almost completed a whole journal. This is the journal that I have all of my experience since literally day one, May 21, 2014. When I end this journal I probably won't be a greenie anymore… I'll have finished my 12 weeks of training. Weird!   Why am I feeling all sentimental right now? Don't even know! Seriously though, I am loving my mission. My name badge has become a part of me and every day when I put it on, I think of who I'm representing – Jesus Christ and my family. My plaque doesn't say Kelby. It has the name of my family. The person I am, the actions I do and the words I say are all in respect to my family and Jesus Christ when my plaque is on. Really, I'm standing as a witness of God at all times, in all things, and in all places. Do I want to stand as a good witness or a bad one? I think I now know why am feeling all sentimental today!

We got a new investigator this week – Kinda. Her name is Lucy. I'm pretty sure she's not interested at all in our church – she told us various times that she's really Catholic and it she's not looking to change, but she excepts us for who we are and that she wanted to know more about our church. So we are going to visit her on Tuesday! We visited that girl Pilar  that I talked a little bit about… I know who she reminds me of. She is in Argentina version of fat Amy from pitch perfect!  She's the best! The only thing Pilar needs to do to be ready to be baptized is to move out of her boyfriends house. Or get married in a week… But I think that option is probably not going to work. I have faith though. We are going to be very busy this next week with our new investigators

Oh! I got to tell you something! I was in the bathroom when I first woke up and I blindly picked up my retainer case to put my retainers away… So I feel something crawling on me so I was like oh what's that? I looked down… It's a flipping cockroach! No, I didn't scream – just on the inside!

Okay that's all for this week I love you all!

Celebrating her 18th month mark!

               America and Peru!!