Week 8 in Mexico

I can't believe all the crazy things happening this summer.  Pretty soon both Hal and I  will be out in the mission field. I can't believe that everyone is getting so old. It kind of makes me sad because I remember all the times at Grandma Rain's house with all the cousins.

Also, Allie's cake was amazing! My companion didn't believe that she made it. She was confused because she thought that Hal and Audrey were the ones getting married. Sometimes we have a little difficulty comunicating :) I think that I figured out how to send pictures so I hope they send. 

Every week here seems to get harder and harder, but more and more rewarding. This week our goal in the zone was to have 20 baptisims, which was 4 baptisims for every companionship. This seemed pretty impossible because you need 4 assistances to church to be bapized and we had 2 investigators with one assistance. We decided to look htrough our carpeta for people with assistances and we found one girl and taught her. Although we didn't have any baptisims I learned that when you have a goal in mind and are constantly praying for inspiraion you are so much more productive. We had 3 new investigators come to church and 3 inactive members come to church with us. It was so amazing. 

I think my testimony of eternal families grew so much this week. We have an investigator, Angeles, that we contacted and all I said was somos representantes de Jesucrito y nosoros compartimos como es posible para su familia vivir junta por eternidad and she started crying after one sentence. It turns out that she has a little girl who is 2 and she is 7 months pregnant. About a month ago her parents and her husband were coming to pick her up and they were in a car crash and all three of them died. She is one of the most amazing people I have ever met and she came to church with us this week. Also we are teaching another familia. La familia Maya and they have 4 children. We have been teaching them for 2 weeks but this week their 6 year old boy was playing in the forest with his brothers and a tree fell over and smashed him. By the time his brothers got his parents, he was already dead. It was one of hte sadest experiences to talk to his parents aferward but at the same time I could tell them with all my heart that they could see their son again. 

My new town of El Oro is like the Bible Belt of the U.S.A.  There is every Christian religion I have ever heard of, and much more, and the people know their Bible so well. So that is one thing I think I have learned a lot of in this area is my Bible.  Especially the New Testament, I finishewd reading in two weeks. I never knew that I would have to find scriptures in the Bible saying that Jesus is Jehovah or anything like that. There are a ton of Jehovah's Witnesses here.  Even when we started talking to this 16 year old girl, she started whipping out Bible verses. Sometimes I don't think I would even be able to say anything in resonse in English, not to mention Spanish, so I am so happy my companion is a pro. 

This week was also hard because there are a lot of people here who are really against our religion. I was spit on for he first time in my life, there have been people who just say terrible things to us and make my companion cry. Luckily, the vocabulary I learned is nothing that they say, so I don't understand any of the bad things they say and my companion won't tell me what they say. People invite us into their houses, just so they can insult us. We had people let their dogs loose on us. All I can say is there have been some days this week that I wasnt exactly feeling great, but a scripture that I love so much is in Alma 26, which is a scripture that I have probably read a lot, but I have never read a scripture that has  helped me so much. I especially love verses 27 and 30. 

Despite all the hard things I have experienced, some of the most amazing things have happened here, too. There was a member of the church that when we walked into her house all the furniture she had was two folding chairs and a piece of wood on bricks for her kitchen table.  She had no lights in her house, and her walls were the side of the mountain with a dirt floor.  We talked to the Branch President about her situation, and he made an announcement, asking all the members if there was anyone who could donate any used furniture they didn't want because there were some members of the church without furniture.  I was in shock when after church, the woman came up and talked to the missionaries and Branch president to offer one of her two folding chairs because she felt so bad that someone didn't have any furniture. I seriously almost cried right then because she was someone who literally had nothing but she was willing to give more.

Also we got tons of investigators from teaching piano lessons, which has probably been one of the most fun things I have ever done in my life. I also conduct choir and play the piano, which didn't sound like it was going to be much fun, but I have never had so much fun in my life. For some reason, in our tiny branch we have more youth than we do in our ward in Chicago and everyone in the choir is 25 and younger.  There are tons of little kids in it too.  It is so fun because they sing so loud and so badly, but you can still feel the spirit because they love what they are doing and they want to sing so badly. I think if I could make a list of decisions that changed my life it would definitely be going to BYU and going on a mission. I hope you guys are great and have a great week!

Love, Hermana Jones

Allie's latest cake creation for a Ward wedding reception!

Allie is perfecting her cake decorating skills.  She made this cake for a couple that just got married in our Ward.

Week 7 in Mexico

So this week has been probably one of the hardest weeks of my life but I feel like it has also been one of the most rewarding.  My testimony has probably grown more in a week than it has in the rest of my life.  When we started the week we did not have a single person to teach because the missionaries had dropped all the other investigators.  The investigators weren’t keeping their commitments.  It seemed that every person we talked to in the street didn’t want to listen to us because they all believed in their own religion.  The two most common religions here are Catholics and Jehovah Witnesses.  To make matters worse the family that my companion had baptized the week before called and said they didn’t want to see the missionaries again and weren’t coming to church for their confirmation.  Understandably my companion was in a pretty bad state that day and both of us were starting to give up hope. 

We decided that we were going to find a family to baptize this change.  So we started praying every night that we would find a family and decided we would contact every family we saw.  We started practicing how to contact families during companionship study and pretty much doing everything that we could possibly think of to find a family to teach.  Finally one day we were contacting a mom and her little boy who was about 7 years old.   We asked if she wanted to hear more and if we could come to her house one day to talk more about it.  She was about to say no but all of a sudden her little 7-year-old boy said,  “Momma, si!”  She looked at her little boy and said,   "OK, you can could come".  So we have been teaching her and she came to church this week!  It was a testament to me of why we need to be like little children.  The little boy could feel the spirit and it was because of him that we were able to teach this family.  

After this experience for some reason just everything started going right.  We visited the family that said they didn’t want to be confirmed and they said they were going through a hard time.  After the lesson they agreed that they needed to be confirmed.  We also found a man to teach who is a rock star at giving us other people to teach.  Every time we go over he gives us a new reference.  Of the 15 references he has given us we are now teaching 10 of these people.  This was also a testimony to me of how much we need references from the members, investigators, and less active members because it is so much more effective than contacting people on the street.  

This Sunday made everything worth it because we had 5 confirmations and 4 other people come to church with us.  We are only in a tiny branch so the ward mission leader is only 17.  There are two sets of missionaries in the branch so sometimes there are more investigators at church than members. 

They called me as the branch pianist...it was weird because they didn’t even ask if I played the piano.  Also now on Thursdays for an hour they have me teaching piano lessons at the branch.  So when I leave some people will at least know how to play the right hand to the hymns.  It is a little hard to teach though.  The people I teach didn’t even know that in the hymnbook you read the first line and then move to the second for the first verse.  So one word of advise for Hal before he leaves on his mission is to learn a few hymns.  It is a little hard to be the ward pianist and not have any time during the week to practice.  Anyway things are going great here.  

My companion wants to move to Idaho and go to BYU after her mission.   She wants to learn English really bad so all throughout the day she is asking me different words in English.  She also has me translate English songs into Spanish and they are so funny sounding.  After a few songs she said she preferred not to know what it was saying because it sounds better in English.  One of her first words was donkey because they are all over the place here.  She told me they were evil but I didn’t believe her.  Then one day we were walking and a donkey was loose.  I got too close and now I have donkey bites on my arm :(  It didn’t hurt that bad but I have big bruises on my arm.  When ward members asked what it was from, I told them they were donkey bites.  They just started laughing.  

Tell Tyler happy birthday for me!  We ate some Mexican food the other day that I think Tyler would love.  It is a ball of cheese that was wrapped in a slice of ham.  Then that was wrapped in another slice of cheese.  Then that was wrapped in a giant piece of chicken around it.  Then it was cooked and put it in spaghetti sauce.  It was so good but it just made me laugh because I was like my brother would love this food.

Also a scripture that I read this week that I really loved was Mormon 9:31.   I really liked this scripture because when we see faults in others either we can get annoyed, complain, get angry or we can use it as a blessing to make ourselves better.  Also the people we live with will be blessed.  If we point out something in a loving way and try to be an example of it ourselves, the other person is much less likely to get mad.  

My area is pretty fun.  It kind of feels like I'm mountain climbing every day.  There are some houses that are on top of hills that cars can’t even get up.  So sometimes we help people push their cars up to their house.  The best is when we get to the top of a hill, you can see so far and the entire city beneath you.  It is really beautiful.  There aren’t a lot of lights here either so you can always see the stars.  Also there is the biggest farmers market I have ever seen in my life!  It goes on forever!  Every Monday they sell in the streets anything you could think of to buy!  Also learned my new favorite food is guavas.  I don’t have a lot of time and I am going to try to send pictures so have a great day!

Love,

Hermana Jones

Week 6 in Mexico

Hey!

I have time to write!  Ok, I was so wrong about what my new area was going to be like.  I thought I wanted to stay in the city my whole mission but after coming here I never want to leave.   It is honestly one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen!  We live on the top of this mountain with flowers all over the place.  Our apartment is this cute little two story house.  There is a huge garden and then there are 5 little houses that surround it.  Three of the 5 houses have church members living in them.  There are grocery stores, a bank, a giant market right in the middle where they sell all kinds of food and fruit.  I was thinking that my area was going to be really different but it is so cute.  It reminds me a little of Vancouver except all the houses are small and super colorful.  There are cobble stone roads.  The only thing is everything is either steep uphill or steep downhill.

I think my Spanish is going to get pretty good this change because my companion doesn’t speak a word of English.  My last companion didn’t speak that much but she pretty much always understood what I was saying.  If I spoke English to her when I didn’t understand something, she could figure it out.  

I wish I could describe just how cute this place is.  I don’t think I will have to worry about safety very much because there is a police station just down the road.  The bus ride wasn’t bad at all because I didn’t go to bed until 1am.  I had to pack all my things and then we had to wake up at 4:30 to make it to the bus station.  So I just slept the entire 4 hour bus ride.

My companion is super nice though.  She has only been a member for 2 years and has been on her mission for one year.  So she is super excited about sharing the gospel because she joined the church just from a missionary street contacting her.  She is from Oaxaca, Mexico.  I am her first American companion.  She said before I got there she was super nervous that I wouldn’t be able to speak any Spanish but she says my Spanish is very good.  So I think that is a good sign :) 

Anyway I hope you guys have a great week and keep listening to the Hermanas in your ward haha!!!  Oh and I ate lizard tacos today without knowing it...that’s what happens when you don’t understand what the person is asking you.   My companion thought it was so funny though when she saw my face while I was eating them :) 

                                                                                  

les amo,

                                                                                    

Hermana Jones

Week 5 in Mexico City

-->

The computers here are all older.  So I don’t think I will be able to send pictures until my next area.  I don’t know if I’m transferring yet or not.  It isn’t easy to use a computer here.  We have to go to this one store where they have 10 computers.  People just come and pay to use them.  Very few people have computers in their homes here.  It is also funny because there are whole areas here where people just go to pay to play video games.  It actually looks more fun than playing in your home.  There are always tons of people to play with.  

Mom, I am very proud that you gave away a Book of Mormon. The first week or so contacting was definitely the scariest part of the mission.  

That is really sad that Lisa’s niece had to go home from her mission in Mexico City.  At least she was well enough to go state side.  I guess it's a really big problem here with American missionaries that their stomachs start bleeding.  My mouth started bleeding the other day because I accidentally bit my cheek.  My companion started crying.  I guess that the food here sometimes messes with Americans stomachs so badly that they start throwing up blood.  My companion makes me eat yogurt every morning though.  The yogurt is supposed to help.  I guess one of her companions already went home for that.  So she doesn’t want it to happen again.  This week I have been great health wise.  I think it was because a lot of people were out of town this week for Dia de Los Ninos, 5 de Mayo, and they had spring break for two weeks.  So the bishop’s wife fed us every day this week.  She would just give us peanut butter and jelly or frozen pizza.   She was sorry about it but it was honestly the best thing ever because you start missing things like that on your mission.  

Anyway the second counselor has face time.  Since we are eating with them on Sunday, they said we can call you guys after we eat.  So church is over at three for us.  Then we will eat so I will probably be calling around 5:15pm.  I just have to figure out how to call you guys by face time.  

The second counselor’s family is one of my favorite families to go to because they are so funny. The wife loves to sing English songs.  She sang one for me and she was saying, “a won da won, a won da won.”   It took me awhile but I realized she was singing, “How Great Thou Art, How Great Thou Art.”  It was the funniest thing ever :)

Oh I got the letters this week from Grandpa and the kids from their family home evening. They were very funny.  My district leader was reading Tyler’s letter and he said, “awe, is this your littlest brother?”  Nope that’s my 16 year old brother.  He just started laughing so hard.

A bad story from this week was that I accidentally blew up a pigeon!  So we left the window open one day because it was super hot and there isn’t any air conditioning.  Then the next morning I went to turn on the furnace.  You have to hold down the gas and use a lighter to light the inside.  Then it kind of explodes with fire inside. When I did it though, all of a sudden tons of burnt feathers flew out.  Then a pigeon fell out the bottom....It was definitely one of the grossest things that I have ever seen.  So sad.

Oh another funny thing that happened this week involved my companion. One of the things that brings my companion more joy than anything else is confiscating investigator’s cigarettes, coffee, tea or anything else they have against the word of wisdom.  So on any given day she will have tons of things in her backpack.  We were at a member’s house though and everything fell out of her backpack.  It was so funny because all she could think to say was, “uhhh… this isn’t what it looks like.”

She taught me a great way to help sunburns though.  I got a really bad sunburn the other day.  That coffee isn’t good for drinking but if you make a paste out of coffee grounds it helps sunburns a lot.  The other day I got blisters on my face from the sun.  It was super annoying because I put sunscreen on three times a day!  But my companion put the coffee on my face before I went to bed.  When I woke up all the blisters were gone and it was just a little pink.  She is a miracle woman J 

One of my favorite things about México is the panderias.  They have them all over the place.  It is fresh bread stores that are super super cheap.  At first I was amazed at how expensive it was because we bought 2 cinnamon rolls, a loaf of bread, 15 rolls, and then 4 of these pieces of bread with caramelize sugar all over  them(they are the best).  When we bought it, it was 40 pesos.  I was like $40 dollars just for that!  Then I realized that was about equal to $4 in the US.  Also I have grown addicted to chili here in México.  They put it on pretty much everything.  At the beginning I hated it but now that’s the first thing I buy in the stores.  The best is when you buy a mango.  They will cut it down the middle with their machete and then they put chili powder in the middle.  Also pretty much every succor here has chili covering it.  My favorite is cucumber with chili on top.  

I have become a little addicted to the tiendas here too.  There is a tienda every 10 feet. They don’t have a front you just walk in, choose something, pay and walk right back out.  To buy a ice cream bar you just walk in give them 2 pesos which is about 20 cents and walk right back out.  

Oh another crazy thing I learned this week.  Last year in the mission there were only 18 hermanas.  As of right now there are 74 hermanas in the mission!  Anyway I am going to see if I can get the front person to send pictures for me.   I will see if it works!

Love,

Hermana Jones

Hermanas in our zone

Our whole zone.  The Elder on far right is from Peru.