October 7, 2013

It sort of wasn't my fault this time..

But yeah, I don't have a great batting average for emails in the past little while...

Well anyway, let's start back a little bit. Last Sunday! We met a woman a while ago named Evita who has been doing great-she loves our visits and keeps her commitments.

Stupid English keyboards. More on that in a bit.

But anyway, we had a lesson scheduled with her for last Saturday, but she had a last minute thing and wasn't there. Which was a real bummer, because she had come to church the Sunday before, and one of the things that we were hoping to coordinate with her was to come to church again the next day (since she lives pretty far and doesn't drive). She didn't have a phone at that time, so we had no way of getting in touch with her other than showing up at her place, and it was already Saturday night. So we basically just said "well shucks" and focused on the other investigators we wanted to get to church.

But then, Sunday rolls around, church starts, and out of no where, Evita walks in! After sacrament meeting, when I asked her how she had gotten here, she said "Oh, well last week I loved church so much that I asked the sister that came to get me last time to come back and get me every week".

!!!

That is the first time that I have ever had an investigator get to church without us figuring out the specifics and inviting them during the week. So that was a great feeling. Another investigator that came to church last Sunday was Madame Joseph (have I already told you about her?). When we first knocked on our door she let us sit down to teach her. We gave her a restoration brochure and asked her to read it and pray about it. And when we came back, she told us that she knew that everything in the brochure was true. She's getting baptized this month.

Oh, and another one. Okay, so as a missionary, NO ONE calls you. I mean, other than missionaries and wrong numbers, I feel like we almost never receive calls, except for the occasional heads up to cancel a rendez-vous. But, last Monday, an old investigator sent us a message saying "hey, can you call me? I was wondering when you could come teach me". Her name was Saby, and we had sort of given up on her after about a month of failed rendez-vous and not being able to get in touch with her. So, yeah, that was unexpected. So I called her back, and she was like "Yeah, I want you to come over at these two times every week". Also unheard of. Little miracles all over the place!

So other than that, last Monday President Mehr came in to town. He taught us missionaries Tuesday morning, gave a member fireside Tuesday night, and then did personal interviews Wednesday morning. Oh, that's also why I didn't get to email last week. Monday I drove three hours to the border to pick up President from Suriname, and another three hours back. So we just didn't have time for emails. I would have done it another day, but we were just busy and then I didn't get around to it. Wednesday we did another three hours each way to drop him off, but this time I was the one that drove back. Which is big news, because it was in a manual van.

I now know how to drive manual. Sort of.

Well, I had to learn because, although since I've been here we've been driving an automatic truck, it didn't have enough spots for President, Sister Mehr, the assistants, my companion, and myself. Monday Elder Maoni drove there and President drove back. Tuesday, President took the truck, but I got like a 15 minute crash course on how to drive from the assistants. Then it was just me and Elder Fraley. The first time I started driving off, I pulled out to the main road, got ready to turn left...and then stalled. Like 5 times in a row. Elder Maoni ran out and made the turn for me. Then he left. I looked at Elder Fraley and said "Can we say a prayer?" So we said a prayer, I started the car, and we drove off. Yeah, I still stalled several times during the day, but we managed. In any case, I did the 250 kilometers back from Saint Laurent the next day without a problem.

But yeah. So that was exciting.

Then, Thursday of last week we went on an exchange-I was with Elder Maoni, and Elder Call and Elder Fraley stayed together (keep in mind that between the two of them they have less than three months of experience). Then, just to make it even more crazy, Friday at 3pm, the assistants called with the challenge of a lifetime-find some way to be in Suriname for a 6am flight the next day. That was followed by a lot of craziness and phone calls, which ended in our discovering that it wasn't possible for Friday...legally. So we ended up leaving early Saturday morning and, again, driving 3 hours to the border. This time though, Elder Maoni and I got to keep going. Crossed the river again (I wanted to take another picture, but my camera wouldn't turn on), and took another 2 hour taxi ride, showing up a half hour late for the first session of conference. Hah, we show up on the doorstep of the church building in Suriname, and all the elders but the zone leaders are like "Hey! What the heck are you doing here?"

Conference was great, by the way. I tried something new this time, inspired by a comment by President about taking notes-this past conference, I did my very best to not write anything down that was just an exact quote or an approximation of what the speakers had said. After all, we've always got the Liahona. But this time, I only wrote down thoughts or spiritual insights or applications that were not copy/pastes of what they were saying. It was great, and a much bigger learning experience. I found myself reflecting more, and learning things as I was writing them. Which, incidentally, someone later in the conference quoted as a way of knowing when they were speaking under the influence of the spirit. So that was a really new experience for me. One of the things I wrote down was that God was not really trying to be subtle with us this time. The focus is on missionary work and the family. I imagine Him watching us now and saying "Can you take a hint??"

And yes, we did watch priesthood session real time, which ended at 11pm here. Then, with missionary travel and all, we didn't end up getting to the host apartment until aftermidnight. Slept in my church pants and didn't undo my tie, because we had to get up at2:30 to go to the airport for our flight to Trinidad. Came to Trinidad, went to conference (this time I was SO TIRED), good stuff.

Also, that's the thing about the english keyboard from up above. I'm in Trinidad, so the keyboard is in English again. I had gotten used to the french one after leaving Martinique, because I could no longer change it to English. So now, all the numbers are weird and the "a" key is in the wrong place. But! I also got to play football with some of the Trinidad missionaries this morning for a p-day activity. It was great.

Hey, I'm told the Seahawks are doing awesome!

So yeah. I fly out Tuesday, spend the night in Guadeloupe, and then fly back to French Guianne Wednesday. Oh, I technically got my transfer calls, but nothing changed.

Come to think of it, it has been a pretty crazy couple weeks. Also, I'm way out of time.

Love you all!

-Elder Santos