I'm in Xochimilco

MTC Photo

Well here I am in my new area and it’s called Xochimilco.  They have the best members here!  The members have done divisions with us everyday and we already know the area pretty decently for only having been here a week.  It’s a ward and it’s not as big as a USA ward, but it’s not as small as a branch either, so it’s pretty nice.

The area is pretty small and we didn’t have many investigators to start with.  The work is progressing and we already have a confirmation, so it’s pretty cool!  We   Tons of selections and even some American stuff like pop tarts!  You know you are a missionary when a grocery store excites you ha-ha.

have this grocery store called Chedraui here and it’s everything a missionary could ask for!

It’s hot here, but not as hot as Tonala was.  We sure do get a ton of rain though and I am going to need to buy some rubber boots if I don’t want my feet or pants to get wet up to my knees!  There is a volcano close by and its super cool; as well as the lightning strikes that are super duper close and way loud.  My house is way bigger than the last one and it has 2 stories.  We have actually rented the top floor to some pigeons...not this again ha-ha.  We also live 2 blocks from a gym so I can’t wait to start going there!

1. My companion Elder Reyes was in my first zone.

2. The members are so helpful; like Sara, Adolfo and David

3. Chedraui

4. PopTarts

5. Actually seeing some of the rain that I have been hearing about since before the mission

Editor’s note: Elder Gillingwater has been quite ill hooked up to an IV at the hospital for six days this week. Please include him in your prayers for a speedy recovery.

Transferred To Tapachula

Well beloved transfers have arrived once again, and just like always I am going to make you wait until the very end to enjoy them!

This week has been kind of a bummer.  Ok it didn’t start with a bummer because we had our activity in Puerto Arista and it was super great!  We ended up driving to the wrong place because the Assistants told our zone leaders wrong, so we didn’t end up going to an Island but it was still great!  The place we were having it at was right on the beach this time and it was super nice!  My mission president was super funny too!  We all decided to take a picture about calf deep in the water.  Not too long after we were all posing President George runs up to take a picture with his phone!  Right as he does a ginormous wave hits us from behind and almost takes us out! Then 2 seconds later another one hit us and took out Elder Ipabarri who is a ginormous Brazilian!  We laughed pretty hard and so did President George.  Then they decided to dig a big hole and Elder Johnson bent over right in front of President George in front of the hole and so the President kicked him in the rear straight into the hole!  Elder Johnson was mad until he saw who had done it and we were laughing so hard!

Digging the Hole

We got some great food and even played some Frisbee for a while but it was time to go back to work, that’s when the non fun stuff happened.  It’s always hard to come back after an activity but we ended up having to leave behind our two progressing investigators.  Lionell´s dad won’t allow him to go to church anymore and we asked Humberto if he was willing to go to church without us helping him get a ride and he said no.  We just have to trust that if he gets better and if Leo gets older, that missionaries will find them again or they will make the effort to come themselves.

After that we were pretty bummed and to top it off we had a ton of appointments fall through.  At the end of the day with 30 minutes till 9 we had no idea what to do so we just waited on a street corner thinking.  This guy comes up to us and starts waiting too.  He was dressed more dressy than your normal average joe, so we started having a little casual conversation (what you doing? waiting for a taxi?) anyways he ends up being a P.H.D.  Certified Lawyer and a Professor.  We had our hands full until he told us he believed in Christ and in God!  He has read the Book of Mormon before and has never been to our church because he has never been invited.  He didn’t come this Sunday, but we have hopes he will come in the future!

1. Doing divisions with Elder Hansen he decided to buy 1 kilo (like 2.5 pounds) of shrimp and we ate all of it that same night.

2. My mom’s birthday was on Wednesday and so was the sister of my Companion.  Elder Hansen’s mom’s birthday was on Friday!

3. I somehow managed to fit everything in my bags without needing to take my duffel bag out as a 4th!

4. My new area will have a ward and will possibly even have Wal-Mart nearby!

5. Ok so here are the transfers!  I am getting transferred to Tapachula, Mexico and will be serving with Elder Reyes.  Elder McDonald will probably be going to the same district as me too!  We have to leave at 1.30 for some reason today so we have been scrambling to get everything done.

Invasion of the Rats!

Zone Meeting

Well a lot has happened this week so I may just have to go day by day!

Monday, after I finished writing Elder McDonald and I went and got a root beer right next to this cyber cafe and did some service.  We were cutting logs into lengths and then using a hammer and chisels to split the bigger ones.  Grandpa they were cut poorly so they don’t stand by themselves; so we didn’t have much luck splitting with the axe.

Good to see old friends

Tuesday I don’t remember much about what happened that day other than that morning we were awoken by the following story.  I woke up to a noise in the kitchen.  I knew the drill so I decided to wait to wake my companion.  I saw evidence all throughout the kitchen, but no culprit so I kept looking.  I checked behind the wardrobe and kicked a few of the doors holding a broom in my hand and a flashlight in the other.  There was nothing in the kitchen or the bathroom, but I decided to check behind the door to the laundry room.  As I pulled it open a ginormous rat ran out from behind it and scared me so bad I let out what Elder McDonald now calls my war cry!  He comes running with another flashlight and his machete and we chase it for 15 minutes.  After breaking the broom and a few window panes, Elder McDonald smashed the broken broom while baseball sliding past the kitchen and killed the rat in one hit.  30 minutes later it was Elder McDonald's turn and it wasn’t long before I joined him in the hunt for rat number 2 of the week.  It managed to get outside and climbed over the fence before we could get the door unlocked so we went back to bed.

More friends

Wednesday, I was having a dream that I was shaking members hands as they were leaving church and one of them was my older brother Kyle when this Earthquake started in my dream!  The only problem was it wasn’t a part of my dream because I woke up not long after and there was an actual earthquake.  It wasn’t too bad at first but it hit phase two and was definitely the strongest one I have felt in my life.  The houses are all made of cement here, so I was in fear for my life.  I sat up and grabbed my companions arm because I thought he was still asleep, but he was awake and thought I was starting to freak out because he starts yelling Elder its ok!  I told him to be quiet and get under his bed and so did I until the Earthquake stopped.

Arriaga

Thursday, well we had more rat trouble and this one got away after about 2 minutes of chasing and its way sketchier when they get away, because you don’t know if they are still outside or long gone.  We ended up going to Tuxtla that same day to get a consult from a Specialist to see what’s going on with my stomach.  All went well and we made it back to the Offices and slept in the Assistant’s house for the night which was amazing because it was the first full night’s sleep we had had almost the whole week!  We also had air conditioner so it was awesome!

Friday we went to the bus station and they have a grocery store there called Soriano and they carry a ton of stuff from the United States that’s been imported, so I bought myself some Dr. Pepper and some A&W Cream Soda then headed home on the bus!

GEICO Gecko Stopped to Visit!

Sunday we only ended up having 1 investigator show up to church, Humberto.  It is one of the hardest things to do each week, because there are just areas where you could not pay investigators to come to church and it’s disappointing, but we just want to work even harder the next week.  Only the Hermanas and us in our district were able to have investigators, so at least we didn’t have that bad of luck; although the Hermanas had 6!

Well I got cut off in this email about 40 minutes ago because the power went off during the lightning storm we were having.  After waiting to see if it would go back on, we left and found that the next block over had power so we came to this cyber café and whala!  I am just going to say I included my 5 favorite things that happened this week in the previous emails!

So did some strange Butterflies!

The best part was my big email that I thought I was going to have to write all over again was saved up to 3 letters from where I was before the power went out, so I was pretty happy!

War of the Birds 2

Me and my companion

Well I forgot to write things down this week so I may leave something out.  Maybe I shouldn’t have told you that and you would never have known!  Anyways, this week we have been putting in some really hard work and trying to get some new investigators.  Here on the mission we have the goal of finding 7 investigators every week and our zone wants 14!  Its really just to get a bigger number to be narrowed down into possible members instead of only focusing on a few that you have high hopes for.  Humberto came to church this week and we were super glad!  He even stayed for Priesthood meeting and I think he enjoyed it!  Lionell did not make it because his family went to Tres Picos which was in my area in Tonalà but we only went 1 time in my 3 transfers there.  His parents aren’t giving us permission to get baptized, but he is a good kid so we are going to do it anyways! Ha-ha-ha-ha no no es cierto (that’s not true), but we talked to his dad yesterday afternoon and I feel like now he is going to give it a chance at least!

My District

Got him or her with the machette

We had our zone meeting on Friday (the first one this whole transfer! I know right! Ha-ha) and I got to see my old companion Elder Jarrett with Elder Cortez my replacement for Cabeza de Toro.  He told me how the area is doing and about some of my converts and what’s going on.  We are supposed to have the zone activity next week in Puerto Arista which is in my old area too, so I may get to see a bunch of members that were really good friends.  Right before the meeting started, Elder Valente walked in, he is the Elder serving in a place called Pijijiapan (Pea Hee Hiapan).  He actually stayed for 2 weeks with the zone leaders because there was nobody to be his companion, but they had Emergency transfers in Comitàn and his new companion is Elder Giles!  Elder Giles was my companion in the MTC for 3 weeks, so it was good to see him!  Now the only one from my district that I haven’t seen is Elder Weaver.

Made me think of Grandpa

1. We got congratulated on our numbers by the zone leaders this week.

2. I can’t wait for the zone activity next Tuesday!

Backside

3. We had a movie night on Thursday and we watched the Work and the Glory and everybody loved it even though it was only in English with subtitles in Spanish.

4. Our ward cleanup was on Saturday and the Zone Leaders tricked us into going (jokes on them, we love service) and our branch and the other branch actually bought a brand new lawn mower.  They had no idea how to use it so they asked my companion to do it and I was super jealous because I was using a hand lawn mower that you push and it spins a wheel (the type without a motor).

5. During a contact/lesson in the street my companion was teaching a gospel principle when a pigeon attacked him and then landed on his shoulder.  He said it scared the junk outta him and he didn’t react for a couple of seconds.  The rest of us were laughing pretty hard (hence war of the birds.002).

Pictures of my Area

We are seeing many blessings for the hard work we are putting in!

Well Tuesday morning we had some really great stuff happen.  One thing that seems to always work in our favor when opening an area is that we have the advantage to say, sorry, but we are new here!  The disadvantages are you don’t know anybody or where anything is, and neither does your companion.  Luckily, I was in this zone 2 transfers ago and know a tiny bit of Arriaga!  We found out that we had another investigator in church that already has come 2 other times!  His name is Lionell and is 10 years old.  He also showed up to church this past Sunday and has a baptismal date for next Saturday!

Humberto seems to be progressing some more and it is all thanks to our good friend Carlos.  Carlos is a guy who was baptized last transfer, one who always believed in the teachings of the missionaries, but wanted to be ready before he was baptized and now we are doing the exact same thing with him except for with the priesthood!  He always likes to share stories of himself, like how he wanted to find a church and said in Prayer that if he didn’t get a sign in 8 days that he was going to...well he was contacted that exact day by the missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (mas conocido como mormones).  He is an essential tool in our teachings with Humberto because he brings the spirit in better than a hymn does!

We have gotten a little bit of rain this week but nothing like what we should be getting.  In Chiapas they say its 6 months of pure rain and 6 months of, well not rain! (Ha-ha)  The problem is we only have 2 months of the rainy season left and have not seen more than 30 minutes of rain yet!  The good thing is with no rain it makes for good service for 2 boys that grew up around hard work!  This week Elder McDonald and I did about 8 hours of service and still got our goals completed!  We painted with Carlos twice, helped Hermano Versain (mas conocido como Papa Chin) cut wood into lengths with axes, and took on an entire Jungle!  We are seeing many blessings for the hard work we are putting in and the service is a great way to be examples of Christ to those who don’t listen but watch.

1. Ok this one isn’t good news but it ends with good news so that’s why it’s in my 5 favorite things that happened this week.  The owner of our house decided to take out all the furniture and so we have a less nice, but still very expensive missionary home! Luckily she left us with a car bench seat so we have a soft place to sit and drink our milk (mas conocido como leche pero sale mas feo)

2. There was a member baptism this week and Papa chin asked us to help out.  We watched the videos of Christ that I have off of LDS.org that are straight out of the bible and it was perfect while we were waiting for Papa Chin and the worlds newest church member Quemis (Kemish en Ingles y viene del Libro de Omni en el Libro de Mormon).

3. I got sunburned doing service but I put Calamine lotion on it (pienso que se llama asi pero no estoy seguro) and it turned into a tan so I no longer have a missionary tan line just a regular old farmers tan!

4. Our investigator Lionell that fell out of the sky!

5. Our service activity with the jungle was intense!  We showed up and it was like the Garden of Eden after all of these years.  We were told to cut down every tree that wasn’t big and tall and that was almost every single one. All we had to use was a bunch of Machetes and some Limeaide (pretty good actually).  It took us 4 hours and a few coconuts but we finished.  Oh a member helped us and his name is Ulisses so it was even cooler!  I think Elder Ipabari took pictures of before and after but it’s as bad as it sounds for sure.

Our Hard Work Paid Off!

Well this week has been pretty great.  Although we didn’t see much success until the end of the week, we had some good experiences and our hard work paid off!  We started out with doing divisions on Wednesday.  My companion for 24 hours was Elder Ipabari who was born in Brazil but lives in Bolivia.  He had to learn Spanish on the mission also and only has 10 months speaking it.  We worked in his area and had a really good time!  We ate with Hermana Violeta who may just bet the sweetest sister I have ever eaten with in the mission!  She brought us an appetizer and then a main course and dessert after all the while telling us to eat because missionaries shouldn’t work on an empty stomach.  She even had me sign her missionary book even though I may not ever see that place again, but I was pretty honored.

Then we had Noche de Hogar (Family Home Evening) and ended up teaching about unity.  We had the Hermanas go first and they took a ton of time and left us with only about 10 minutes.  Elder Ipabari wanted to do an activity so I just gave my part of the lesson as homework for the branch to do.  After we ended up playing another game for some reason and the Hermanas voted us in to play too which may not have been a good idea.  We played musical chairs and were almost late getting home.  I got to experience air conditioning for a night, so I was happy even though their house was super dirty.

The next morning we woke up at 5:30 to go to the gym and I was so tired the whole day, but was glad to get back to my area to work.  Friday, we found a new investigator while we were exploring the area.  He is an old disabled man who really liked our company.  The next day we asked him if he wanted to come to church with us and he did!  Sunday morning we got to his house to help him climb the hill in front of his house to the main road and it took about 15 minutes.  After we got a taxi and got him to church with time to spare.  During Gospel Principles we taught him about prayer and then a recent convert named Carlos started explaining to him what he needs to do to get a testimony of our teachings.  The spirit was so strong and Humberto (the new old guy) even said he felt it right then and there.  We gave him a blessing with Melchizedec Priesthood authority and he wanted to go home afterwards.  As we were leaving the church he told us ¨My knee actually feels better! Its a miracle!¨  I had explained to him before that he shouldn’t think about the pain or the money for surgery or even how long he has had this problem, but to think about the savior and how he paid for our sins and knows everything we have been through and I honestly think he had enough faith to start to heal in that moment!

Ariaga

1. Having interviews come out of nowhere even though I called it.  The donuts weren’t very good though so I ate 3.

2. We ended up finding a ride for Humberto so hopefully he will be able to be baptized in 4 more weeks!

3. We found out this morning that we had another investigator in church yesterday and one that already has 3 assistances, so we might be able to get him in the waters of baptism this transfer!

4. The family from Texas we found last week is making plans to reactivate and it’s mostly thanks to the youngest daughter of 8 years old.  Every time we have been in their house she has asked her dad in English when she is going to be baptized and the last time she did her dad said on her birthday!  Well we aren’t sure when her birthday is, but at least they know they need to reactivate themselves before she can be baptized!

5. Whilst we were playing the off version of musical chairs, a woman and I body slammed a little bit and I found part of an eyelash and lipstick (makeup) on my shirt the next morning.  Let me explain a little better.  We were going in opposite directions and so when I saw her I stopped and moved to the right and then to the left but she did the same.  The only problem was she didn’t stop and ran right into me ha-ha hopefully it came out in the wash, but I forgot to look!

Opening a New Area and We Have a Couch!

Well I have some good news and some bad news.  My new area is in fact in my last zone and I am sharing a branch with the zone leaders.  Some more good news is my house is about 100 times better than the last one I had!  The semi bad news, but also cool news, is that I am opening another area and its just as difficult as it was last time.

There were so many missionaries getting transferred last week that my new companion’s luggage didn’t make it on time and neither did Elder Hansen’s, my new district leader. Elder McDonald is from Utah and lives on a ranch and loves motorcycles almost as much as I do; so we get along just fine!  Being back in my first zone, I have already seen about 5 people from my first area in the mission; so it’s pretty great!  Elder McDonald wants me to tell everyone that he is very handsome, has really pretty eyes and really big arms.  I don’t know why, but he is senior companion!

Arriaga

We had lunch on Wednesday with a guy named Hermano Campero and we ended up trying 5 different types of cheeses.  I haven’t liked the cheese down here, but one of the types was chili flavored and I loved it.  It really helped kill the flavor of the smoked sardine delight thingy that I forgot about and ate.  We have some really great members here and we have a member who lives close that owns a washing machine; so I will save my arms for another transfer ha-ha.  I didn’t end up writing all the great things down that happened during the week, so I may have forgotten a bunch, but I am doing the best I can!  I am really happy to be here in Arriaga and am really excited to have regular meetings with the Zone Leaders and also excited about all the success I have had in the mission.

1. Spicy cheese that isn’t spicy

2. Elder Poroj my new zone leader laughs a ton and seems to be pretty chill

3. My house has couches and a grilled cheese maker and also 2 working showers

4. I got to see Pahoran, Moroni, Jared, Hermano Manuel, Hermana Carmelita, their daughter, and Christian is emailing me now!

5. A girl that Elder Jarrett and I found in Puerto Arista got baptized last weekend!

My New Apartment