Morichal - Week ten

This week we did some pretty cool things. I guess that the first is that Andrea, who I think I told you about last week, passed her baptism interview and will be baptized this Saturday. yay! She's progressing so fast, and since this week was Fast and Testimony Meeting, she got up and shared her testimony! It was really good. It almost made me cry, but I had to fight back the tears because I didn't want to look bad in front of the other investigators lol.

I honestly don't remember what I've told you about the Leiton family so I'll tell you again. We've been teaching the Leiton family since April. A lot of people live in their house, (two families of cousins) but we mostly teach just 3 people: Zoraida (the mom) and the 2 daughters, Laura, and Luisa. They're really cool! But they frustrate me sometimes. We've made serious progress with them (they're the family whose dad is in New York and is always reading anti-Mormon stuff on the internet and then calls them to tell them to read the anti-Mormon stuff too). The mom was able to convince the dad to let us send missionaries to him. So, hopefully it all works out over there. Also, they just barely started reading the Book of Mormon after 2 months. The thing that I don't really understand is that Laura, the older daughter, is pretty atheist. She doesn't really believe in everything and she's always like, "but it doesn't make sense because in science..." yeah. Except yesterday, she was the only one in the family who went to church and is the only one who reads the Book of Mormon actively, which I honestly don't really understand. But she's been to church twice now. I hope that they can progressing!

We did something new and cool this week. We're teaching this family, (mom, dad, and 4 small children ages 8 to 10) but the kids always get bored and leave. So instead of reading the Book of Mormon with them we kinda did a mini play. We assigned the 4 kids the roles of Laman, Lemuel, Sam, and Nephi. My companion was Laban, I was the narrator/angel, and the mom was Zoram. We kinda just acted it out and it was super awesome, the kids loved it, and the mom did too! So we were like, "yeah there's more stories like that in that book so keep reading!" I think it's something I'm probably gonna do more often now.

They took my ukulele away because apparently you have to ask permission to buy instruments. I didn't ask for permission because I didn't know and everyone I told about it didn't know that that rule existed either. Also, I wasn't washing my clothes when they got there, I just had washed them before they got there so they were still wet. I didn't do anything wrong. But I wouldn't say that I'm in the dog house. 

Eh, I know a ton of doctrine that's probably not important to know but i think i know more about the church than you now. HA! But yeah. I'm still learning. That's the spiritual stuff you've been asking for besides the typical "I know the church is true..." yeah. 

love you guys

Morichal - Week nine

This week was pretty good. We have one investigator who's going to be baptized next week. Her name is Andrea, she's a cousin of a member. They came up to us in church one day and said, "Hey baptize our cousin because we've been teaching her and she wants to be baptized." I had actually seen her at church several times but I just assumed that she was a member lol. Anyway, so we taught her and she's pretty excited to be baptized. So that was like a freebie. 

We couldn't really do much this week because on Tuesday we did divisions in another area, Wednesday we had to plan out the ward activity for like 5 hours, and on Saturday was the champions league finals so we couldn't do anything for a few hours because everyone was inside watching. This month it's only going to get worse because the Copa America starts and there's going to be games like everyday or something, and Colombia shuts down every time their national team plays. The worst part is that Colombia and the US are in the same group and are going to play each other on Friday. That can't go well for me, because if we win everyone is going to hate me and if we lose everyone is going to remind me of it for the rest of my mission, so, yay. go USA!

We were teaching a less active member yesterday and she said that she was scared to go to the temple because of the garments, and I mentioned (jokingly, because we're pretty good friends) that if she didn't get endowed she can't obtain exaltation. She said that she doesn't believe that because God is love and that he doesn't punish people. I kinda got mad and started yelling at her like, "Do you honestly believe that God has never punished anyone? He literally killed the whole world minus Noah and his family with the flood and made it rain fire from the heavens to kill Sodom and Gomorrah and also killed lots wife because she looked back. You think you can just do whatever you want and God won't punish you because God is love?" or something like that. I also mentioned that God even punished Joseph Smith when he lost the 116 pages. It was pretty funny (playful banter) but she literally wasn't convinced. FRUSTRATING Colombians are pretty lame like that. 

Also this Tuesday I was studying the scriptures at like 8:30 and had just washed my clothes so they were wet hanging up outside. So I was studying in garments when there was a knock on the door, and, surprise! It was President Pricoli and his wife. Then they proceeded to make me feel like the worst human being lol. First because they saw that I was just barely putting a shirt on and said, "What, did you just wake up or something?" and I explained that all my clothes were wet, but they didn't really believe me. Also, we don't turn the fan off in our room so that really didn't help our case. They also yelled at us because the house was really dirty, and said that they were about to give me my ukulele back but if i didn't have time to clean the house then I really didn't have time to play the ukulele. Also, we didn't have mosquito nets that everyone needs and they said "You guys are gonna die. Not by the mosquitoes but because I'm gonna kill you!" So today we purified the house. 

love

Morichal - Week Eight

Yeah. The week was pretty good. We did have seven people go to church yesterday, which is the most I've ever had. Three of the seven were that family that has the dad working in the US, we finally were able to convince them to go! I don't know how. We went to go teach them Friday at like 8, but my companion suddenly got sick and was in the bathroom and got out at 9:45, (we have to be home by 9:30 by the latest) and we hadn't taught anything yet, and we were kinda like, "Well, they're already gonna yell at us for being late, so we might as well teach a lesson." So we taught a lesson and got home at 10:10 lol....but we called the mission president and explained to him what went down and he was pretty okay with it. And they went to church for it! Something funny that happened afterwords was that after church they like, went home and we stayed in the chapel talking to some other members waiting for ward council, and then one of the daughters came up to me and was like, "Hey, Elder Woodmansee do you want a cholado?" and I was like, "What, are you gonna give me one right now? You guys shouldn't buy things on Sundays!" And so everyone's giving us a hard time for not teaching them that...

Other lame thing, We started teaching this woman who goes to another church, I don't think I've ever heard of it before, but I guess they have like, home teachers also, because we were in the middle of a lesson and two women arrived with their Bibles while we were teaching the restoration, and the lady we were teaching is actually really receptive, but one of the women who showed up started saying a whole ton of nonsense about the church like "Joseph Smith was a good man who did a lot of things God told him to do but later he let the devil trick him and that's why they killed him, because he wasn't chosen by God anymore" and "Joseph Smith was actually a member of our church before he started his own." You could tell that she really just wanted to argue with us, but we were like, "Nah . . . we're just gonna share our testimony . . . it's chill." But this encounter made me realize that there's a lot of public confusion about the Book of Mormon, because everyone knows that were Mormons and they just think that the Book of Mormon is  "the book of us" which makes it seem like we just kind of wrote a book and named it after the religion, and now I understand why the general authorities don't want us to refer to ourselves as Mormons, do I make sense?

And one last thing, Saturday night at like 10:15 the bishop called me and was like, "Hey, Elder! You have to give a talk tomorrow in sacrament meeting. Thanks. Bye." And I was like, "Whaa?" so I had to stay up and write a talk all night....I talked about the vision of Lehi and the groups of people who were in the dream. I think it was pretty good. It was like 9 minutes long. I mean I guess if you want I can take pictures of it and send it to you if you want to read it but Zack would have to translate it, because it's in Spanish....

Hey, Blake can baptize people now!

Love you!

Morichal - Week Seven

This week was pretty good. We found 13 new people to teach, and one family of like 7 people who are really cool, the only bad thing is that they live in this sketch neighborhood that I don't like to go to that much lol. 

My companion is pretty cool. He's the most obedient companion that I've had but he's super quiet. Like, when we teach a lesson like the plan of salvation or something that's pretty much memorized he teaches pretty great, but other than that he just doesn't talk much. We went and visited a less active member this week and he literally didn't say a single word the whole lesson, and I occasionally looked at him for help and he just sat there....but whatever, I guess. lol 

I honestly don't remember if I've told you about the Family L__ who's like the sickest family ever but for whatever reason don't want to go to church, and I found out why they never wanted to go. The situation is kind of weird, because two families live there--it's like, one grandma, her 2 daughters, her son-in-law, and her 5 grandkids, but the grandkids are like 16 and stuff...but the husband of one of the moms works in the US and has heard a bunch of stuff about the church, and when he calls them every night he tells them "yeah those guys have several wives--don't go to church with them" and we explained to them that it's not true but they're still not really buying it...which stinks. I honestly don't know what to do because if the dad tells them not to do something they're not going to do it. 

And then today I had to go to the offices because President Pricoli wanted to ask me some questions about my other companion..but then afterwards he was like, "Elder your hair is way too long!" (It was way too long) and then I had to go with the assistants to get my hair cut, and before I could tell the barber how I wanted it the assistants were like, "Cut it super short," and now I have like the worst haircut ever. lol But you know I guess that's what I deserve for not cutting it earlier.  

Love you! 

Morichal - Week Six

This week was alright, I talked to you yesterday so I'm not really feeling like I want to write a big long letter. I told you that the person were gonna baptize mysteriously disappeared. That's still a thing. 

The transfers were yesterday, and my disobedient companion who was with me got sent to be a district leader and be a trainer, and I'm still here.  Not gonna lie--I was kind of upset/jealous, but what can you do. My new companion is Elder C__, from Ecuador. He has only 6 or 7 months here and he seems really quiet, but I think for once I might have an obedient companion. 

That less active whose house I was in when I called you has a dad who lives with him, and I think were gonna try and baptize him. But he's like 90. He's reading the Book of Mormon and he says "It's a really beautiful book, it reminds me of the Bible" but he's like 90 so who knows if he remembers what he reads. He just sits on the couch and watches TV all day. 

And the phone call didn't really make me homesick, but I appreciate Cameron's intentions. LOL

It was good seeing/talking with you yesterday. Love you all!

Morichal - Week Five

So, what did I even do this week? 

There's this joke that we have in the mission that is were in "Mission Titanic" meaning we only baptize women and children.  I'm realizing its like 100% true because there are no men who live with their families and almost all of the people were teaching are women and kids...it's kinda sad...

But anyways, we have the baptisms scheduled for the 20th. The first is named A_V__. She's from Buenavenura, which is in the mission, and I guess all of her sisters in Buenaventura are members so because of that she's progressing real fast. She went to the conference and her first time going to the actual church was this Sunday, but the last class went way over time, and she left early (not really because she left like 15 minutes after when it was supposed to end), so I'm kind of worried about that... we're also teaching her granddaughter, but we don't have permission from her mom yet, so we cant really do anything with her.

The other two are named M_ L__ and her daughter C_T__. They're really good, but they couldn't go to church because the mom had work on Sunday, but they're really cool. We met them cuz M__ works at this hamburger place we always go to, and we contacted there. They're progressing, we just have to go with some members, so that they have friends in the church..

The last (kinda depressing) thing is that they shut down one of the wards in the mission, and I think that they're going to sell the chapel or something. A lot of the members from that ward came to my ward on Sunday and were crying because they closed the ward down. It's depressing because we have all these missionaries here to help the church grow, but it's actually shrinking. The mission baptizes a lot but for every baptism there's like three members who stop going to church....sad really. 

All the pictures I have are from today. We went to this thing called MIO cable, which is like a gondola thing, it cost 1.700 which is literally nothing.

So this Sunday I get to call home....so tell everyone and prepare yourselves! lol

Love you guys.

Morichal - Week Four

So there's this thing in the mission that's called the Captain Moroni award, It USED to be given out when you baptize 10 people in one transfer, but I guess a lot of people just convinced 10 little kids to get baptized just so that they could get the cool little pin they give out, so they changed the rule to four families in one transfer, and I guess nobody has gotten it since they changed the rule.

AND THEN I GOT HERE

lol jk

But seriously, we're teaching like five families, one of them is a family of seven (mom, dad, and five kids), that one family of gold I was talking about, and the others are families but of like two or three, but we found the majority of these people this week, and I was actually super stoked, and I was telling everybody this week, "Man we're gonna have like at least 10 people at church this week!" Like I was saying that literally all week, and when we went to go visit all the families Friday and Saturday to confirm that they were going to go to church they all said yes, and then when we called them Saturday night they all said yes, so I was super pumped. Can you tell what I'm leading into? 

Because nobody came to church, we literally had 0 investigadors in the chapel. so I'm kind of sad right now, and then the other elders in the ward were like, "Hey, Woodmansee, where's your 10 investigadors?" And even they had 3 which stinks because they literally don't do anything. So I was kinda sad. and yeah.

Besides that we had interviews with the President Pricoli, Hermana Pricoli and the assistants this week. They went pretty good. The only noteworthy thing is that with the assistants they're changing the whole way we have to plan for the week, and we did like a practice planning and they said that we were the best at it (we went second to last), so I guess that's a good thing. 

And today we made root beer floats. This is notable because root beer doesn't exist in Colombia. I'm not sure where we got it from. 

It wasn't a spider that bit me, but yeah that thing's gone now. I feel fine, I feel like I'm gaining weight again...nobody believes me when I tell them I weigh 90 kilos, but I weighed myself in front of my companion this week (there are public scales everywhere because it's not a household item here), so now I have a witness.

Yeah, That's kinda it. Hope this week goes better. Love you.