Honduras also has a Florida and a Las Vegas haha. The story
behind the name ¨Honduras¨ is that when Christopher Columbus landed here in
Honduras, he said, ¨thank God we´re out of those stormy depths¨ or something
like that, and the name ¨the depths¨ just stuck I guess. For that same reason,
the cape where he landed is called ¨Gracias a Dios,¨ or ¨thank God.¨
Our investigators are suddenly very sparse. haha. We just
had to drop every single investigator we had for one or more reasons, but we´re
basically starting over at ground zero. The good thing is, we still have a good
pool of less-actives that we´re visiting and we just found a bunch more.
Anyway, it´ll probably be a rough start getting back up with investigators, but
sometimes everybody just decides to be unprepared all at once. haha
I´m glad to hear that Nigil is doing well and is safely in
Columbia. Those first few weeks are super rough, cause you have no idea what
anyone´s saying and you have no idea how to respond, but tell him it will come
with time (even though it doesn´t feel like it right now). One day he´ll just
wake up and realize that he´s fluent. It´s incredible.
Sounds like all the family stuff was great. It´s small
little moments like those that you miss in the mision, not necessarily the big
moments. :) Take care and thanks so much for everything. Love you! (hey, by the
way, you´ve been in my dreams every single night for the past 2 or 3 weeks.
It´s nice to see you, even when I can´t see you. Also, Brian made a candid
appearance last night, so that was a fun little reunion).
You´re right about the admin bit, although I would say the
frustration is mostly that being the nurse for the mission really should be a
full-time calling (actually it IS a full time calling; Hna Tolliver´s mission
call was to be the nurse, but to also be a missionary... I´m just filling in
haha), which means that I can be a great nurse or I can be a great missionary
or I can give a great effort at doing the both, but it´s a little tricky.
hahaha. Add training a new missionary to that and you may as well just hand me
my red boots and my golden lasso and call me wanna-be-wonder-woman. hahahaha
Just kidding. If I had the super powers to do it all, then you I could earn my
stars, as it were. Although I must say, the things I have seen so far count for
about 20 years in medical practice, because I´ve already seen so many rare
diseases and treated so many every-day occurances. I´m trying to thing if PA
school will count all of these hours as Clinical hours.... That would be
SPECTACULAR and would make it possible for me to go right into PA school after
BYU. But that´s in the Happily Ever After part of this story, and we´ve not
quite vanquished the villain yet, so let´s not get ahead of ourselves.
The Primary President sounds awesome. I look forward to
meeting her in the Happily Ever After. The seminary also sounds awesome (the
biking one, not the boring bee-hum one). ;) I really miss riding my bike. I
think when the opportunity presents itself, I´ll just ride my bike everywhere.
Wow, I am so proud and excited for Josh. That is such happy
news. Man, I just am so happy for him. Tell him I couldn´t be more proud and I
know he´s made the right decision.
I loved the scripture and loved the message. Thanks so much
for everything, Pop-a-dooodle-doo. Love you!
I lurved the package, so thanks a bundle. It was really
great. I also loved the picture, although I can´t say i say the message of the
ants. I´ll have to look again. Another happy thing is that I got the package
from La-dee. It was awesome. I absolutely loved the pictures of the kids, but
the picture of Arie made me cry. She´s not a little girl anymore. Who gave her
permission to grow up so fast and turn out so gorgeous? Augh, I can´t believe
she´ll be in Young women´s when I get back. I just can´t handle that. Anyway,
loved the package so tell La-Deee thanks a million. :)
That reminds me, I just sent my first package to yáll. This
package is a test package of rubbage that weighed a fair amount so I can know
whether it´s safe to send other things that are not quite so rubbishy. I talked
to a bunch of other North Americans who say not to even bother because nothing
ever arrives, but I´m trying it anyway. So, if a random pepto bismol box (yep,
I sure am the nurse... we plow through that stuff in the mission) shows up
addressed to Mumsie and Pop-a-doodle-doo, it´s probably from Honduras.
Specifically me.
Changes of the week, Ana, who has been inactive for 14 years
finally came to church and loved it! Also, Joél is reading the book of mormon
and is working on finding a new job so he can come to church. :) Baby steps,
they may seem, but to me, they are 4 months of work finally paying off. I love
my less-active members. I always knew Visiting Teaching was important. Plug for
the relief society from Preach my Gospel: Harold B. Lee: ¨Missionary work is
but home teaching to those who are not now members of the Church, and home
teaching is nothing more or less than missionary work to Church members.¨
That is a cool and happy scripture. I love links between old
and new and everything.
Tell Sister Clayton and Gail I say OOOOOOOIIIIIIIIIY! (Hey!)
and I love them. Whenever people see the pictures of the family that I have, I
always just classify the picture of Gail and I at the temple as, ¨that´s me and
my aunt,¨or some other family description. I´m glad you get to talk to Kathryn
about church stuff. She´s such a nice and friendly lady. :)
Tell grandma and grandpa I say hey and I love them oodly
bunches. I pray for them all the time and hope everything is good with
them.
It blows my mind that it´s not still summer there. I just.
It´s still summer. Here. And will be. Forever. I just can´t quite understand
it. haha
Anyway, I hope you are all doing well and that you are
loving life. I´m going to sign off now-ish, but first I want to tell you one
little story.
We went to visit family Moncada (Eileen, Hna Romero, the one
I met in your house, was there, as were her sisters... the Moncadas are her
parents and they´re in my ward here in SPS). Brother Moncada has had very
serious health problems and had a very close call in dialysis this week. We sat
and talked ot him for a bit and listened as he wept that he wanted to enter the
temple one more time before he dies, and he still wants to serve a mission with
his wife, and he doesn´t want to leave his greatest treasure, his family
behind. I sat there and thought of the faith of this beautiful family,a dn the
joy in knowing that, even though when he eventually does leave his family
behind, it will only be for a moment because of the sealing promise of the
temple. After a bit of time listening and comforting him, we asked him if we
could sing a hymn. His wife told us for him, ¨he wants to sing his favorite.¨
We then turned to no. 137¨¨Tu me has dado muchas bendiciones Dios¨ and sang a hymn
of gratitud. He wept and wept and wept. I cannot fully understand the
unshakeable and determined faith of this dear and beloved family. They are
truly a part of my family here in Honduras, and I hope someday to be a little
more like them.
Know I love you all tons and wish you all a very happy
Columbus Day.
Love, The Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria,
*Allan and Julissa with Cathy and Sarah. :)
*Me and family Guzman (minus hna guzman) Hno Guzman wears a
periwinkle pooh bear backpack, which is perfect for him, because he reminds me
very much of Winnie the Pooh.
*I know it looks like my arm is around Allan, but no
worries... it´s not.
*Allan and the Hernandez family and Hno Guzman
*Sometimes I forget I´m not Latina. Then I see pictures of
me with other people and I think, ¨who is that huge white person?!¨
*Baptism
*In the church
*E´ Lui. He´s one of my best friends in the mission. He used
to be my district leader. Now he´s my zone leader with E´ Underwood
*Let´s just look at the a new planner and a planner after 6
weeks
*My halloween pumpkin is a mandarin orange with a face drawn
on in pen. That´s what´s up in Honduras
*My companion loves her bed. She was hiding from the camera
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