1.25.10

This week was pretty crazy. We had a rough start to the week because we went to a small farming community a couple hours out of talara, called mira mar. Its like a 1hr car ride but it takes about 2 hours because the roads are covered with sand. Mira Mar was really cool because its straight up farming there. There probably is more donkeys than people there. We talked with a bunch of people that could be baptized but there’s only like 10 members there so its going to be really hard to teach and start up the church over there with out a lot of help from the members. We had some meeting until 9Ñ30 and i was way pumped to go home after a long day but found out we couldn`'t because the cars stop coming at 7 and so me and my comp had to stay the night in a members house and sleep together in the same bed, which really sucked. Then we had to wake up at 5 to go back to talara. The ride back sucked and the rest of our day did too, we were so tired and it made the rest of the week really hard to catch up because we didn`t talk with anybody until thursday afternoon, because we had p day monday, meetings in sullana and went to mira mar.

But yesterday day was sweet, which fixed the crapy week we had. I got my first baptism. We baptized Claudia and i got to do the baptism. It was a train wreck for the most part, but it was awesome too. It was way tight because We never did get her dad`s permission to baptize her, but we asked her if her dad would throw her out of her house and she said no. So we said you wanna go for it and she was like yeah of course. And as far as i know her dad has no clue what happened. But yeah, she was way pumped after the baptism and super happy to finally get baptized.

Its taken three months to experience this and it's been worth the wait to be a part of something like this. All the learning spanish, home sickness and culture shock, started to go away just a bit and a desire to work harder has started to grow. So yeah, it just feels good to have some success and watch somebody grow closer to the savior and feel his love for us.

1.18.10

This week was pretty awesome we had a ton of success and a big pay day for a

ll our work. We met some really cool people and committed 8 people to baptism. Sunday was sweet we had 11 investigators come to church and 8 come to

a baptism after church. A couple people got really excited about baptism and all their fears they had before left and now there ready to get baptized

and give up some things of the world they were having a hard time to get rid of. Next week we could baptize claudia if her dad gives permission and belce if she is in town. Then the next week we could baptize Juan (17) and his mom.

This other family who is really cool but has some issues that we think they

have but we aren`t positive so who knows what will happen with them. Kenny

(22) single mother, Carol(14) and Catey (18) all girls. Then we have Gustavo who doesn`t have a date yet but is way cool. He is definitely one of those people who have been prepared. He’s had a lot of experiences with bad things but never been addicted to drugs and alcohol. And was like i totally agree with the word of wisdom when we taught him about that. Last night we taught him the plan of salvation and he pretty much bore his testimony to us about the church with out even knowing it. Then in church he was telling us that he felt a peace that he'd been searching for and that he knows the church is true. So hopefully he`ll get baptized and even go on mission. We also have anther guy who has been trying to bring the church down for a while, kind of like alma but is starting to listen to us and read the bom. I didn`t think to much about teaching him and that we would go very far with him because he was so bitter. But the next day at church (he’s a chain smoker and heavy drinker by the way) said that he went to light up his first cigarette and choked on it and didn`t have a desire to smoke after that or today (sunday). So hopefully we can help him change and become a happy person again but who knows what will happen. If i have time time next week i’ll write about how we went to a house and cast out evil spirits and witch

craft and what not hahaha. (we actually did do it but i don`t think it was

all to real)

1.11.10

This week was really long and had some ups and downs. It was hard because we had p day monday and went to sullana because we had a zone conference there the next day so we stayed the night. So we didn`t really even start our week and untill wednesday and then on thursday we had a huge planning session for a Gran Noche de Cine where we`re going to watch the joseph smith movie and we are also planning on making our rama or branch into a ward because we got a 180 people out to church on sunday. Sunday was the highlight of the week because we got had 6 investigators come out to church. Carlos and his family, Claudia, Gustavo and 2 snakes haha. We were going to challenge Carlos to baptism because this is his 3rd week going to church and he knows the B.O.M. is true but when we did he said he wasn`t married and then we asked if he was planning on getting married and he said yeah but not with my girlfriend. This ticked me off cuz he has kids and thought what he was doing was cool. So were going to work that out. Gustavo is really cool he came to church pretty much without us doing anything and gave me a 2 ties and my comp a pair of nice shoes. That makes 5 pairs of shoes my comp has been given in three weeks. He wears some ugly shoes that look really old but aren`t and people think hes poor so members keep giving him shoes haha. And last but not least Claudia, she is solid and ready for baptism but her dad won`t give her permission so we`re fasting for her thursday and we have a baptismal date on the 23rd for her and anther girl so we`re hoping everything works out.

Last night we saw a moto taxi do a front flip when the front wheel hit a soccer ball. Nobody was seriously hurt but a big fight started to break out when nobody would pay for the damage so we got the heck out of there. That was pretty sweet though. And today for pday we went to a beach about 30 minutes away called negritos it was sweet but sucked cuz we couldn`t swim and we just got sun burnt. Well thats about all for now hopefully i have some more good news next week