Yogurt comes in giant bags, milk comes in unrefrigerated boxes, and we don´t have clothes dryers here.... OK, just had to get that off my chest.
Many strange things have happened this week:
Earlier in the week we went to something called El Universo Audiocisual de Los Pueblos Indigenos: Mirada de Mujer. With the approval of President we accompanied some investigators to this educational film about different Latin tribes in South America. It was great until the last part where a bunch of old naked men and women started dancing around and painting their bodies. We understood that it was educational, but still, we left a little early...
Last monday we cleaned the entire house. We swept, mopped, scrubbed, bleached, everything we possibly could to make our pension feel clean. Afterwards, it still looked the same...
There are Gypsys living all over the place here. You can always just tell if someone´s a gypsy or not just by the way they dress and walk. We accidentally knocked the door of an old gypsy woman the other day and she just looked at us and said PASEN in a really creepy and crackily old voice. We walked away really fast...
For about 5 minutes the other day, a couple of drunk guys told us how they used to be friends with the missionaries. When they shook our hands good bye it felt entirely wet. Their hands were covered in beer and our hands smelt like beer for the rest of the afternoon...
The other day someone asked Elder Okleberry where he was from and he replied with SI, MI MAMA TIENE ALERGIAS DE GATOS...
There is a man in our ward who totally reminds me of a Chilean version of Brother Phillips. His name is Hermano Olave and it´s just funny how they are so much alike...
On Sunday a little puppy of about 5 or 6 months managed to sneaky past all the people and both doors of the church and ran into the chapel. It was just before church started and he was runnin up and down the aisles, hiding under benches, and just goin nuts. Finally a 16 year old girl just grabbed him by his skin and carried him outside. Not gonna lie, it was quite entertaining. The best part is, he waited outside for three hours then managed to find his way back in at the end of church and I had to carry him out....
I don´t know if I aready told you this or not, but here in Chile everyone greets each other by kissing on the cheek. EVERYONE. Haha so it´s always weird when people are smoochin in the church or smoochin on street corners or whatever. As missionaries we´re not allowed to participate in this tradition. Occasionally people don´t understand this and force a kiss upon us. On thursday a crazy old lady grabbed my hand and started pulling me toward her saying ¡BESAME BESAME! Fighting with all my might I managed to escape....
Halloween was the other night. It was weird, cuz it just felt like every other day to me. The only thing different was that an investigator gave my comp and I a handful of candy. Also Halloween is practically the same here in Chile. Supposedly they just started celebrating it with in the last 3 years. My comp said last year kids ran around yelling ¡QUEREMOS DULCE QUEREMOS DULCE! at every door. This year they went around yelling ¡DULCE O TRESURA DULCE O TRESURA!
So this week has been pretty exciting, but the high point of the week occurred last night. Last night we had a Noche de Hogar with a recent convert named Paulina. Paulina is an extremely strong member now and is helping us out with the missionary work. She has two daughters in their 20´s and one of them, Macarena, has been joining us in a few lessons each week. She doesn´t believe in God necessarily and she definitely doesn´t feel that religion is necessary. She´s glad that religion helped her mom with loss of her husband (her father), but that's it. She thinks prayers only help people because people feel good when they talk to themselves. She´s very sincere about everything though and truly seems to be searching for answers. Unfortunately she hasn´t been progressing though. Well last night we had a Noche de Hogar with them and we ended up switching topics several times during the lesson to meet the needs of Macarena. We had a very spiritual lesson and answered many of her questions. That´s not at all the cool part though. The cool thing that happened was is that we all knelt down to pray together at the end of the lesson and Paulina asked Macarena to join us, but only if she wanted to. Macarena knelt down with us. Then Paulina told Macarena to offer the prayer. Macarena offered a short, sweet, and simple prayer using the basic steps we had written on her Book of Mormon. After we all said amen, then started eating and playing a game. Later that night Paulina pulled my companion to the side and told him that Macarena said she felt something during the prayer. She felt a sensation of some sort, something rico. A miracle occurred that night and it´s true, by small and simple things do great things come to pass. We have no idea what´s gonna happen with Macarena, but it´s amazing to see the progress she´s made thus far.
I love all of you so much. I miss you more then you can imagine and I hope all is going well. Thanks for all the letters, they help so much, no joke. Keep doing what you know is right. And most importantly, be consistent with the gospel.
Love,
Elder Mooney
No comments:
Post a Comment