17 months!

March 2, 2014 (Mon)

Hey everybody. 

 

So, as the title indicates, I officially hit 17 months in the mission a few days ago, pretty legit. Starting to get pretty close to the end :O 

 

So, this week was pretty fun and interesting. It all started off I guess on Tuesday with the multizone conference. So, we all had to travel to Resistencia to get trained and all that fun stuff for a day. I got to see Elder Goodwin which was really cool. He looked kinda different with his super short hair. And, I was able to see elder Giles. He´s doing good now and it was good to see him. He pretty much hung with my companion and I all day which was cool. I also got a package from my parents that day that had peanut butter in it, yes I already ate it all. It was probably one of the best things I´ve had in awhile. I don´t know why it isn´t popular here. People think it´s like sour or something, so there´s only one store that sells it and they almost never have it. 

 

Then, apparently they had opened up a new subway in Resistencia. So, we went on over to check it out and see if they actually had a meatball sub. The line was super long, but we thought we had time, so we stayed. They did have meatball, although they jipped me on the amount of meatballs, didn´t have oregano or parmesan, and didn´t have buffalo sauce, but it was awesome none the less. But, we were almost out of time. Our bus left at 8 and we left subway at 7:34. So, we started going back to the church, and Elder Giles was with us since his companion didnt want to come, and we got lost. So, we start sprinting to find the church (the rest of our zone was already at the bus station by the way) and we got there, at the church, at 7:47. We dropped off Elder Giles, got our bags, and got in a taxi and told them to get to the bus station as quickly as possible. It normally takes 5-10 minutes to get there, and this fool took 15. We showed up at 8:02, ran to where the buses stop, and saw our bus with all the missionaries pulling away, so we start sprinting to the nearest stop light, it turned red, and we flagged down the bus and got in right before it turned green. Probably the most intense half hour of my mission. But, we made it. 

 

Oh, and in the zone conference we were allowed to watch Meet The Mormons, the new movie thats in theatres. It was in spanish so we didn´t hear their real voices, except for the people from Costa Rica which was cool. It was an awesome movie and it got everyone pumped up. Then, the next day I went on divisions with the zone leaders. I was with Elder Mendoza and Elder Marrin in a trio. Elder Marrin just came here for the week as a mini missionary. He´s only 16, but is a full time missionary til tomorrow, just to see how it´s all done, so it was cool to be with him for his first day as a missionary. He´s only 16 and has already read the Book of Mormon 6 times and read Jesus The Christ once...he goes hard. Then, on Friday we helped Amalia and her family with the water again, and then it rained pretty hard from 2-6, but we were allowed to stay inside til it stopped which was nice. La Familia Alvarenga came to church and basically became "reactivated" with us this week. When a less active member comes to church 3 times, we count them as activated, not coming to church for 2 months makes nthem less active again. So, that was cool to see. And, Julio and Patricia came to church. They were dressed super nice, payed really good attention, liked the classes, and I really think that they´ll be able to progress. We have a baptismal date with them right now for March 21st AKA My Birthday!!! :) So, hopefully I can get to that birthday present. So, it was a pretty good week overall. We had like 2 or 3 days that were hard and that we got rejected most the day, but the other days were pretty legit and we had some pretty good success. 

 

The only other thing I wanted to put in here was the quote which, once again, comes from Quentin L. Cook. He said, "Our daily conduct and choices should be consistent with our goals. We need to rise above rationalizations and distractions." So many of us have goals, but never reach them because we get in our own way. If our goal is a priority, then our life, the way we live, needs to reflect that. Thanks to everyone who wrote me this week and I hope to hear from you all soon...when one of these computers reads my camera, you´ll be getting like 20 pictures haha.

 

Les Quiero,

Elder Joshua Clarine