week 28

Hey! It was awesome to be on divisions this week! It wasn't super productive because we had to stay in Secoc with our District Leader on Tuesday, and Wednesday we had to walk two hours to deliver some baptismal clothes. We stopped by Nueve Concepcion, but we didnt get to teach much. It was kind of a bummer. But it was really fun to be with Elder Helton again! We visited this family whose dad has a difficulty with the church he is attending now. They have a bunch of crazy girls, I think like five, who just giggle a lot and have a lot of energy. They are all teenagers or younger so that is probably why. I think there is a mom somewhere, but we don't see her too much. It can be hard to tell who is part of the family because a lot of people share houses here, so you never know who is who. I don't think anyone in the family reads, but we have a picture book that we use A LOT. They really like that. They live about 20 or 30 minutes away from the church. I just wish they would attend, it would be nice to baptize a family.

 

Here are some pictures taken while we were hiking up the mountain to deliver the clothes:

 

Divisions ended early Thursday morning, so I was back with Elder Quiroz. He is acting about the same, so... two more weeks! Once again, we had no investigators at church. We are going to have to go around and be a little firmer with them or something. We will see. We talked with Lydia, she isn't too sure about her baptism, and Maria is really hard to find. We haven't found any solid new investigators... so not a super successful week. We did have a really spicy caldo, so that was good! It was the one meal we had with members, we don't get fed too much. But thats ok, I'm trying to drop some weight. I've lost a lot of muscle mass so I am all flabby right now, trying to work on the building muscle thing.

 

I  think I am going on divisions with my District Leader this week, and we have Multi-Zone Conference on Friday, so it will be a good week. The Conference is in Senahu, about three hours of travel from here. It will be the two zones in the Polochic so I will see all my buddies. President Curtiss leads it. We won't know who is talking until we get there, I might even be called on to speak! 

 

For p-day today we are just chillin in El Estor. We had a standard Guatemalan breakfast of beans, eggs, and tortillas. It has grown on me, but we are going to eat lunch in a really good spot today. It is a nice restaurant called Gardanias. It has inside seating with a tv and everything. I always get tortillas de hernia, tortillas of flour. Flour tortillas are rare here so we get excited when we eat them. I order them with res inside. I mean beef! Res is beef, haha. Total cost for both meals today is about 60 qetz, which is 7 or 8 dollars. I am going to be so cheap when I get home if I think of everything in terms of qetz. I won't buy anything! Elder Quiroz and I will eat with Elders Helton, Estrada, Lanza, and Monsalve. I don't think I've told you about Lanza or Monslave, they are both nice, just never really with us that much. Elder Lanza has two or three more changes than me, and Elder Monsalve has like, two less than me maybe. We don't have anything else too exciting planned though. We just need to meet our Zone goals, but at the rate things are going... we are never going to do any cool outings.

I'm doing pretty well. Just keep plucking away, right? Next week I have eight months, so that's crazy!I am certainly more confident in my ability to do hard things now. I'm kind of in a tough spot in my mission, so it is a little hard to see the blessings. The language is always stressful, and the mountains - just the walking. But now that I think about it, they walk just as much as we do in the cities. And I would hate to be taken out of the mountains, I love the isolation. I guess mostly it is just stressful trying to meet the goals. The longer I have in the mission, the more responsible I feel. It helps that I am getting a little more comfortable in the language. Still far far from fluent, but doing good!

My spiritual thought this week is once again on the Atonement of Christ. We have been studying that a lot as a mission, and I just can't really comprehend the fullness of it to be honest. First, that Christ would be willing to suffer for the very people that were doing awful things to him, and second, that Heavenly Father let it happen...Their love for us is really something else. 

 

Tinkuy toj sa´ rosojik! I will endure to the end!

 

I love all of you, have a good week!

Love, Elder Toolson