Rain, rain, rain...

Hola mi familia,

Hello again from the area Casablanca in Oaxaca Mexico.  Everything is going great here in the mission field for me.  The rain continues to come.  I think that it is better than the blasting sun, but one day in the week the rain really came down and it isn't very fun when the streets are brown rivers.  But if I can stay dry I prefer the rain.  Thank you so much for the pictures and things that you shared about your trip.  I really wish I could've gone, but send some more pictures next week if you can and tell me a little bit more.  I loved seeing the pictures.  Especially the Christus, I would love to see some of the statues of the Apostles if you have some pictures.  Anyway. thank you so much, and I'll get on to the questions for now.

 

(We noticed your hair is quite short!  Who has been cutting it?)

1.  When we lived with the other Elders, one of the Elders always cut Elder Pimentel's hair, and also the other Elders.  I refrained because one, I didn't really trust him and he did make one mistake with the other Elders hair, and I haven't really needed it until about 2 weeks ago.  But there is a member who has a haircut business, so we went there and she cut our hair.  It is shorter than I wanted, my ability to describe how I want my hair in Spanish is a little bit shaky... okay it was and still is terrible, but at least I didn't end up bald.  But its okay.

 

(How is the blister on your foot doing?)

2.  I don't think the blister is going to kill me.  It was pretty bad, but its all healing up and is almost gone.  Just a big circle of pink new skin is all that is there.

 

(Your package was delivered on July 8th.  Have the Elders gotten it to you yet?)

3.  The package arrived last Monday, the Zone Leaders gave it to me during the District Meeting.  And I just want to say thank you so much!  I think I have the best Mom out of all of the Elders here in Oaxaca.  Everything arrived safe and sound.  I had forgotten about those frosted animal crackers, mmmm... they are really good, and a few are melted together but it isn't a mess.  Elder Pimentel really loves caramel popcorn, and I do too.  He really enjoyed one of the cobs, but he still says that Grandma Bell's was better, but he gives you an enthusiastic two-thumbs up, gracias for the caramel popcorn.  haha, anyway, everything in the package arrived and everything is really amazing to have, I'm excited to be able to cook one of those stove popcorns tonight, haven't had normal popcorn for forever.  Anyway... the package was amazing, thank you.

 

(Did you find any new investigators this week?)

4.  We are having a hard time finding new investigators.  We keep finding some but they don't progress or just don't want to see us after one visit.  Although yesterday we may have found a potentially good investigator.  We were talking with the ward mission leader at the church yesterday when a man walked in the church and started talking with us.  He says that his mom was baptized in our church when he was a kid, but he grew up without learning too much or becoming a member.  But he remembers that his mom taught him not to drink coffee, alcohol and all of the word of wisdom, but that is about all he remembers.  Hopefully he will progress though.  We are also continuing with the family of Lorenzo ( my quick name is the basketball family).  They are going to progress slowly, but I think that they will be able to change their lives.  But Lorenzo just had a tough experience, we went to visit him at his taco stand just before heading home Saturday night.  We found him there with one of his sons (named Diego, if I remember he is 8).  He didn't have any customers there and he looked kind of depressed. So we started talking to him and his voice was all raspy and it was painful for him to talk.  But he started telling us his story and we ended up ordering some gringos (a type of taco) and talking with him.  But on Friday night he closed up shop and started to head home.  He didn't have any of his family at the stand with him because it was a slow night. He flagged down a taxi to take all the way up the mountainside to his house( he lives up in the steep crazy parts).  The taxi had another person in it (which is common in here), but the person attacked him after the taxi started driving into a less populated part.  The person got his arm around his neck and choked him until he was unconscious.  They stole his shoes, clothes, wallet and everything.  The most important was that they stole 1500 pesos that he was bringing home from his taqueria.  So he is having a tough time because he needs the money for his large family.  But he says that hes at least happy that they didn't threaten his life with a knife or gun or hurt him any worse than just choking him, but his neck is in bad shape.  So I'm really concerned for him and his family, but there isn't much we can do.  I hope that he decides to come closer to Christ through this tough time rather than the opposite.  Ive truly seen both sides of this in the mission while talking with people.  People have to decide if they will come closer to Christ or if they will turn their back on Him when they have trials in their lives.  But we will continue to support them and try to help them in whatever way we can.  The whole family came to church last week, but yesterday they didn't because of the incident.  But anyway... that is about all that we have going on investigator wise.

 

(Tell us any exciting news of the week.)

5.  It rained really hard on Saturday for an hour or so.  And we took shelter in one of the members stores that we were close to.  But we watched cars as they kept getting stuck and pummeled by water at one point at the road.  It reminded me of watching boats trying to get on the ramp at Bear Lake on a windy day.

Anyway, I'm out of time, so I will talk to you all again next week.  I love all of you so much. Thank you for the pictures and for the package!  I'm happy to hear pepper is all right.  I don't have time for pictures now, but next week i can send them, nothing exciting anyway, just some pics of my area.  But, I love you, hasta luego.

Love,

Jordan