Don't Die Mom

 

Wow my, don´t die, also do what the doctor says so you don´t get any worse.  I know you are stubborn and you don´t want to follow the doctors orders, but you might just have too!

 

So i got a surprise Friday at our meeting.  TWO packages!! i didn´t realize how happy that stuff would make me, ¨Freak yea! More soft tissues to use the bathroom, when there is no paper!¨¨Double freak yea!! Enough antibiotics for my whole mission! Maybe i won´t get another infection.¨ ¨Yes mopre garments tambien!!¨yea, dad you regifted me with that package, i did love that little study kit though, it was exactly what i wanted.  So i think a latina somewhere is having a party with the popcorn, christmas decorations and my camera cord that was in the other package, yea i think that´s long gone, sorry!! No Tengo!

 

Well, this morning i was in a bit of a war, we went PAINTBALLING!! I have some bruises.  I was the last one still in in my team, i had 23 bullets left, they all knew where i was though, then two from the sides, one in front, one in back just started pelting me!!! i couldn´t even shoot.  My LD hit my hand so i dropped my gun, i have a bruise and i don´t know if it is blood or paint on my hand, so i was out.  He cam up to me, ¨Lo Siento Hermana!¨ Ëlder es un guerra, esta bien,¨ He felt bad, but it´s war! We gotta do what we gotta do!

 

So we have been doing this project as a mission, each day we have a few verses to read and a question to think about.  They have all been about the Atonement.  In my patriarchal blessing it says i will have the ability to share this in my testimony from the bottom of my heart, it wil be unwavering, so i have decided that in each lesson to share about the Atonement.  My testimony has strengthened so much!! One inv. said he is all alone, he can´t see his kids and his parents are dead, i said, Christ walked alone to Calvary so you don´t ever have to be alone.  He said that God left Christ.  I said he had to so he will feel this ultimate pain so he will know EXACTLY how we aall feel.  He was crying by the end, i showed him that picture from the Sacred Gifts museaum.  We are never alone! The Atonement helps us with every aspect of our life! I don´t want to stand in front of Christ in the judgment day and have him say, ¨Why didn´t you ever use this gift that i gave you?¨I don´t want that for these people either.  The other day we explained repentence to Carlos and Noelia, they were amazed that God won´t remember them anymore.  They loved it! Carlos said that he wants to repent.  They just need to go to church! They have such strong testimonies and so many desires, they just can´t get to church! They Read too! Pray for them! They are our English friends from Virginia! 

 

So the other day we had two new invs. at church, they are friends with a teacher.  They are golden! We shared the JS movie with them! I have such a strong testimony of JS, and after that, Cintia, she said, there was no way that this story couldn´t be true.  Freak yea!! it was great! 

 

Evan and Daddy! Happy Birthday!! I meant to take a cute picture, but I didn´t so sorry! 

 

So Bradly keeps making fun of me cause one day I said, Jooves and Apointamentos, yea neither of those are words.  So Then i just speak in english to him hahaha.  He actuallñy speaks english really well! 

 

Yesterday was our last day to take the sacrament for three weeks . . . next week is stake conference, freak yea we are in the same stake as pres!, then there are elections and it´s against the law to hold public meetings, then general conference!!

 

Dad, like Jake´s people, everything here starts late.  There is no clock here, it´s by the sky and when you can eat again! it is hard at times, that´s why i am worried that i wont´be punctual when i get back! AHHHH!!!! 

 

The other day Jose decided to go back to the jungle to live with his parents.  Lioterally, Chapari is the jungle.  We are way sad. WE can´t visit him anymore.  Also there is no church in the jungle! He had just started opening up to us too! Freaking jungle! 

 

My new leader de zona, he´s pretty cute. . . uh ohhhhh. 

 

The other day we traveled almost two miles to a visita, yea it was in our area, whoops, but we didn´t know that because we were still in the cancha! It is huge!!!!! They need a map of it or something.  

 

Well, I am still alive, I did get a cold though so my mission mommy, my pension gave me medicine! all good now! 

Staying with Hermana Routsong!

Pucha, Freaking Vina, I am stuck with Hermana Routsong for ANOTHER 6 weeks!!!

 

Haha no we are actually excited, and not at all that surprised.  Everyone else that we saw today in El Prado were like, ¨Wait you aren´t going to have a Latina?¨Nope apparently we need to be together still.  Maybe it is because of Noelia and Carlos who only like to speak in english. Which is actually hard for us, we can´t teach in english, but we can share our testimonies.  Maybe it is because of Barinia who still needs us, or maybe it´s because we need each other.  This morning we made goals, we need to better my spanish so maybe zero english for us from now on.  

 

So Theresa, who is like our mommy here.  She is the one who gave us Mordor of food.  Called us the other day, ¨Hijtas, come here it´s an emergency! Where are you?¨Ök Theresa, we will be there in a minute¨¨ Then we were walking, Öh crap hermana she is going to give us food. We go to her house, she made us Saltañas!!! She heard us talking about them and she got up early to make us them! They weren´t that good, but who cares!

 

So we are still visiting Dana, we can´t baptize her because she is only 11, she can´t even walk to the church by herself.  Man do we want to baptize her though.  WE gave her a lesson on fasting and tithing, she fasted the next day and gave us her tithing AND ofrenda money! We didn´t ask for that, she is 11 and not even baptized!! She knows so much.  Honestly she knows more than i did at 11.  We just told her to pray for her mom and help us work with her.  Then they can both recieve these blessings together.  The children here are so much closer to God.

 

Speaking of being clse to God.  I went to the temple Saturday! With Barinia!!!! Holy cow.  I did what President Eyring promised i would do.  Guys, i took a daughter of God to the temple and well, we were all crying.  It was beautiful.  The worker comes up to us, ¨What an amazing convert you have there¨.  Then we lost it again.  She was so happy.  She felt peace.  She doesn´t have to hurt herself anymore, or feel pain or unloved.  It was amazing.  That morning we were doing a project to feel the Atonement more in our lives and we read the story about the shepard who left 99 sheep to rescue one.  Even though this isn´t our only baptism, if she was the only one who i saw to the waters of baptism, i would be ok.  She will rescue those 99 other sheep.  She keeps talking about how she will go on a mission! I have no fear with her.  

 

So I read a story from that family history book, if I can, everyday.  It is amazing! I love it so much and I love learning about them.  They are all amazing examples to me, especially Joseph Hyurum Parry! I want to write one when I get back!

 

So the other day at lunch, we had pizza, Hermano Claros said he was going to drop Brandon off at Utah and not pick him back up.  I said it was ok he could live with Us! Brandon was like, yea lets do it and party! So we might be boarding Brandon, who reminds me of Isaac soooo much! His english is pretty good too.  I love that family.  We WILL visit them, well and they will visit us too.  Brandon is going to try and go to EFY in Utah.

 

After a crazy night of feeling like my ¨Mommy¨Would leave me, she´s not, so now we have to go back to everyne and say, just kidding she is still here.  Training done! Time to party!

 

Hermana Parry

Helms Deep

Guys I had an amazing experience this last week.  We were walking and walking, taking fig off trees and eating it.  In the street in front of my a car starts backing out of their garage, first I see a black tire, then comes a bright, shiny, red four door Jeep with a black top.  It kind of made me really happy.

 

So we had an interesting trip to the clinic.  We have both been having problems with stuff and after they did some tests on us we found out why.  Hermana Routsong is pregnant with a little parasite that we have dubbed Smeagol, I have the battle of Helms Deep in my stomach with bacteria problems.  All is well though, we will live, we had to buy medicine though and we can´t eat cheese, which is sad because everything I want has cheese.  It is just frustrating because we do EVERYTHING to get our stuff clean and some gringos eat apples without peeling them and they are fine.  

 

This morning we hiked up to the Christus with lots of Hermanas and had our study time up there! It was fun! We will do that when y'all come down!

 

So two weeks ago we had our conference with presidente! I love that man.  He talked about how we can be more consecrated missionaries.  I have so many notes! After we watched Meet the Mormons, again, and ate popcorn and had homemade cookies.  Oh, it was wonderful!! 

 

Today I meant to buy one saltaña but they gave me two, that´s a blessing.  That is one thing we can eat haha.  Oh Hermana Routsong counts my sneezes.

 

So we found a way awesome investigator! Her name is Noelia and she is from Virginia, we speak in English with her! She has a lot of questions and loves to learn.  She keeps saying, wow they didn´t teach us this in the Catholic church.  Then on a whim I invited her older brother to join us for a movie.  After he bombarded us with questions, and was so interested.  Noelia said, I always want to tell you what they teach me and I try too but you never listen.  So that means she is interested! She just can´t read in Spanish that well and those elders haven´t given us our book in English yet.  

 

We are teaching our old pension family, the Familia Pary, and they don´t come to church for three hours because two of their kids never do.  So now we have to try and break all these family traditions they have.  They asked us to come back because they need help with their rent, yea the pensions don´t make money, all the money they get is for us, it´s a service.  That´s why we were eating so badly with them.  They were using all the money for themselves! Hermana Hansen always tells us when people ask us for money to say, I have something better to give.  Yes, I have used that!

 

So we have this less active, for years she was less active, and her visiting teacher came up to us, Ï can´t find her baptism date anywhere¨.  The other day when we had a lesson we asked to see pictures and she doesn´t have any.  So now she is an investigator?

 

Its always funny when we take members with us to lessons because they just give our people wasca, or discipline.  It makes it so we don´t have to be the bad cop so it's chill.  

 

Hermana Routsong is probably going to be leaving Mordor soon but it´s ok, she will always have Smegol to be with her! All missionaries get infection in the stomach so nothing to fret about, fret about me swallowing those giant pills!! 

 

Mom I just need those dresses and not even anytime soon. 

Bolivian Chickens

 

You have chickens now . . . you are one step closer to becoming a Bolivian like me!!!

 

Well the other day we were walking home and it was late, it was after consejo de barrio which never starts on time so it sucks.  Someone was washing their car, hermana RS said, ¨Who washes their car at 930 at night?¨ümmmmmm my dad does¨.  dad no one washes their car at night, I actually said you do more at 12 in the morning!! I thought it was funny.

 

So we had one of our golden investigators come to church! Her name is Eveline and she has sooo many questions, I always tell her just to read to find answers.  She prays and asks for a testimony like ours.  Yea she came to church with her two kids . . . and her dog!!! It followed her in.  They close the doors during the sacrament and well it was whining the entire time outside.  Then they opened the doors and well in comes running cliford! It jumped on her lap and she was so ashamed and embarassed that she left.  We tried to go by her house yesterday but she wasn´t home.  We have to try again.  Not only was the dog there but so many kids were running around and the speaker had her baby up with her, it was really hard to feel the spirit.  At least after church we had lessons, Sundays we usually don´t, they are really hard. It was like Dwight´s family on drugs or something.  

 

So i have maybe thought about being a child therapist.  I have decided that experiences on my mission have made me want that more.  Especially with Barinia, she i could see being one of my future cliants.  She has had a lot of awful stuff happen to her.  I just want to help people and children would be hard, but also easier.  Harder for me to hear but easier for me to talk to, I can play baseball with them too! 

 

So today as a zone we went to a beautiful place like 30 minutes away and we had a paint war!!! It was cold though and we got wet but it was a ton of fun! We played with another zone.  WE started out playing capture the flag but it took to long so me and everyone else in jail broke out and stole all the balloons and started the fight.  Everyone´s garments changed colors too.  I hope it comes out hahahaha.  It was a lot of fun! It´s been raining all day and i finally broke out my rain boots! Through this experience i learned that my zone is looked to as being the examples, we have the temple in our zone, the mission presidents house and the offices so that means we have the asistants and the hermana leaders.  I didn´t really realize before that different zones have their own characteristics.  I am glad I will be in this zone for another transfer though! I am sad to see RS leave though.  She was so sick this last weekend.  One day we couldn´t study because we were up all night.  All better now though! Our pension has been our mother.  Her son asked me if I have ever been to conference.  Yes many times.  When we come up and visit you can you take me and translate for me! That made me so excited! I want them to come and then I will be their tour guide in SLC! They are the best.  

 

All is well here.  My training is almost over, thank goodness.  No one told me about this, I don´t like it hahaha.

 

Mom i believe i have two dresses, one purple and the other pale pink in the backof my closet, for my birthday or 4 of july you should send those haha.  I deserve presents on the fourth because its one of my favotire holidays and i am sad to miss it. 

Carnaval

Oh mom I know how you feel.  We spent two days locked in our apartment.  There is only so much you can do!! Yesterday morning we went on a spider hunt and killed maybe 12 spiders in our house.  Then we watched movies in our beds, wrote in our journals, wrote poems, ate and well not much else.  Have you seen previews for the movie the Purge? I kept imagining we were in that preview, although not nearly as bad.  We just kept hearing fireworks go off.  Well we did that for the last couple of days.  We are also going to have conference tomorrow and we have been given the talk to read, Becoming a Consecrated Missionary.  So we have made goals for ourselves to do better and to become more like that.  Oh we also had pancakes for lunch yesterday.  That was good.

The Bishop did it again.  Sunday he took us into his office, ¨This girl wants to be baptized, let's do it Friday¨.  Uhhhhh bishop, still have the same rules as before.  Apparently she has been in seminaries for awhile.  We are meeting with her today to figure out what she knows and get this all situated.  Three baptisms in one transfer maybe and all have just been placed in our laps.

Honestly not much to report.  We´ve also had to be in our houses earlier because of Carnaval.  Apparently Jude Law has been in Oruro for it, we have been tempted a couple times to go and visit him.

We did go to the temple last Tuesday! Finally! It was the best day ever.  I love the temple and it is soooo pretty!

You asked last week if I needed money, dad should be able to see in my card report if I need more or not.  I don´t know.  Aslo can someone send me Madeline Davis´s email, I wanted to send her a letter but then decided that no, that´s too far and too expensive. Transfers are on the 8th or 9th.  We don´t see president a lot but I love him, he is the best! I am so excited to hear from him tomorrow!!

After School Snacks

Familia!!!

GDawg I got your package.  No worries!! and Before I forget next week I am going to be writing Wednesday not Monday!

 

So the other day we helped with a service project.  We were selling Jello shots to little school children.  I don´t think there was alcohol but you never know, they sold quickly.  What child wants jello as an after school snack? Heck I always wanted ice cream and coke. Way better.  We are going back wednesday to help.  

 

So Hna Routsong´s mom watched a documentary on the Cancha.  I don´t suggest that, you can always talk to her about how worried you guys are about us! We always talk about it.  I will send you her number hahaha maybe.  

 

So the other day we were going to a visit.  We got a call from a Natali.  We don´t know a Natali.  She was telling us how we had a visit with her.  We searched our planners for ten minutes.  No Natali! So we tried to find her.  Her house doesn´t exist.  She doesn´t exist.  We called her 15 more times in the next two days.  No Hay Natalie!!! Well i guess we weren´t supposed to be in that street at that time. 

 

The next day we conntacted this man named David.  He lived in Florida for 30 years.  He came back because the economy was bad.  We asked him if he was going to go back, he said, ¨Well duh, I hate it here.  It´s dirty, lawless, and the people are mean.  My house is very american then when I go outside it´s culture shock and I just want to go back inside.¨ We were laughing about that for days, we still are.

 

I went on intercambios! I got to stay in my area and I was happy.  It was with Hermana Webb.  She is from Hurrican.  She is so sweet and it was amazing.  She said that my Spanish is far better than it should be, I am a wonderful teacher, and I have wonderful examples.  Apparently I am just rocking it here. haha, no I wouldn´t have ever said that about myself.  She was just being nice.

 

Barinia was baptized! Oh my gosh everything here is so disorganized.  We started an hour late because the bishop is always late.  But it was good I think, not a baptism like in the states.  Oh also the water heater was broken, poor girl.  Her mom came which is way good.  They don´t have a good relationship.  She actually had a ton of family there, which for a baptizm is a little werird.  Imagine that!! I have never seen her more happy though!! 

 

Yesterday we had missionary day in the church or something! We made a list of people that needed to be visited by the ward.  Then we all went out in companionships and taught for an hour! Yea someone stole my family and I am still a little bummed.  

 

I met a guy today who served in Ogden.  We were talking about Utah.  I miss Utah.

 

All is well here! 

 

I haven´t died nor am I in a Bolivian Prison.  Also GDawg sent her package express, mom maybe yours wasn´t express.  It will come soon.  

 

Hermana Carol Parry

Figs and Dreaming of Italy

 

Family!!!

 

Well I  have done some thinking.  Maybe to get people to stop stealing credit cards they should have thumbprint ones, when you buy something you just give them your thumbprint and the money goes through! Life would be so much easier, just thought of the week.

 

Hermana Routsong and I decided that if we met at BYU we probably wouldn´t have become friends.  Her plans for after the mission are to come back to SA and go backpacking and get dreadlocks.  My plans are to go to a study abroad in London and eat at Zupas and Starbucks.  Hahaha.  We actually laugh about that a lot.  I told her I was in fencing and she looked at me and said, you are too classy for me.  We get along great! 

 

So being in a foreign country makes me really miss our trip to Italy.  I think about it more than I think about my Jeep, haha, which is a lot.  That was a fun trip, next summer we are going to Spain.

 

So I bought some DVDs at the temple store so I don´t need a ton, but the ones you have send them! Also maybe send a flashdrive or two for my pictures.  The ward member has a washing machine and she washes my garments.  I pay her because then they can actually get clean.  We get 30bs for laundry but I still have to pay with my money sometimes.

 

We have a new zone leader! I can´t remember his name, he´s really funny.  He looks like a Latino version of Raymond from Everybody Loves Raymond.  We were laughing so hard in our zone meeting.  

 

We eat fig! A lot of it too.  Oh it is so good! While we are walking we find them, take them off trees and then eat them, a lot.  Hermana Lola has a fig tree and she gives us buckets of them.  We have decided if there is no fig in Utah we aren´t coming back.  Just kidding we miss Zupas too much.  The probably is they make our hands really sticky, so then when we shake people´s hands they are probably thinking, Crazy Gringas! Because that is what everyone thinks here.  People rip us off too.  

 

We were visitng the Colqay family this week and talking about Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy.  We had a member with us and she was giving them wasca, that´s quechua for discipline, for watchinkg soccer on Sundays.  I wasn´t really paying attention, I was actually thinking about you dad.  Then it was my turn to share. I started talking about the importance then I said, I love sundays with my family we do a lot together like watching baseball games. Hermana Routsong almost started laughing in the lesson.  I had no idea until later what the crap was going on.  Whoops.

 

We got to visit Presidente Hansen and the temple this last Saturday! Barinia had an interview with him so then we walked around the temple grounds.  Her baptism is Saturday! She is 15 years old and had enough faith to go with us to a complete strangers house and she tole him everything! More than she had told us, and when we heard the new stuff it broke our hearts.  There wasn´t a doubt in anyones minds that her baptism would be changed, so it is still Saturday.  She even invited the President to it! She invites everyone! It is so amazing.  

 

Alejandra bore her testimony yesterday in church.  Her mom actually came by herself 10 minutes late, we thought she had to work.  So I told Ale to care her testimony and she did.  It was amazing.  She asked me when her baptism could be so after church we all talked.  Blanca supports her decision but we all agree that she is too young to be baptized without her mom being firm in the church.  I know someday she will be! Her and Barinia have become close friends so I am sure she will help her!!

 

All is well here.  Nothing to exciting or crazy.  I might be hunted down by the police because at the bank I had to use Hermana Routsongs id number.  So i might end up in a Bolivian Prison.  That would be fun right!! 

 

Hermana Parry