March 23, 2009
heeeeelllo.
I’m in Centro San Jose right now. I’m dirty and exhausted and in my normal clothes. We went to (or tried to go) to a national park that belongs to our area today. The park is ‘Braullio Corillo’ which is one of the biggest in Costa Rica I think. A little part of it is in our area way up past San Jeronimo. We, my district (Bonn, Tagliaferri, Nunez, and I) wanted to go to a more jungle place where supposedly there are waterfalls and cool stuff, so we wanted to explore and hunt some Jaguars. Ü We took our machetes and took a taxi and asked him to take us there. I think he went the wrong way because he drove us out on the highway that leads to Limon, and dropped us off on the side of the road after awhile. We were in the park, but I don’t think we were in the right part of the park because it was a mountain cliff going up on one side of the highway and a cliff going down on the other. We ended up walking down the highway forever trying to find a way down into the valley (without dying) where all the stuff to see in the park is. After walking up and down this jungle highway four hours without success, and after chopping things to bits with our machetes, and after running after and flagging down the few taxis that passed us and having them not stop, and after walking halfway back to our area (very far), and after having to run through a tunnel in the mountain (scared to death and trying to avoid being hit by cars and trucks) we finally were able to stop a bus and come to Centro San Jose. Once we made it back to civilization we walked to McDonalds and ate food. It was fun walking around with machetes sticking out of our backpacks. I have two machetes in my backpack so I feel like a ninja turtle (I think Leonardo). Ü Now I am typing an email.
This week has been another week. We visited Leo a couple times getting him ready for his baptism. Unfortunately he gave in the other night and smoked and drank. He talked to us the next day and he was really mad at himself. We told him how the devil was working hard because he doesn’t want him to be baptized. He said he felt the spirit telling him not to smoke and he is determined to quit and to be baptized. We still have his baptism set for this Saturday morning, but we have to visit him a few more times this week to make sure he is completely ready. We passed by Mario many times this week and he wasn’t home. We went to ‘La Isla’ on Friday night to try to visit again. When we got to his house we found him outside crying because his brother with epilepsy is pretty bad and the doctors don’t expect him to live. We gave his brother a blessing and talked to Mario awhile. His brother Marco has been stable since then so we hope he gets better. Good news is Mario and his brother have stopped drinking coffee. We passed by Laura (from English classes) this week and taught her the first lesson, and well pass by again. On Sunday both Leo and Mario made it to church. We had really good lessons and they have made some friends in the ward. Vera also brought her daughter Andrea. She had parts of most of the lessons because she is always there when we teach Vera, but she is often distracted by her 3 year old son Michael I tried to help keeping him quiet throughout Church so she could pay attention. He was fine at first but towards the end of Church, let’s just say he wasn’t very reverent. He is a really fun kid, but he needs to learn a few things. I think Andrea still likes Church. A couple days ago she told us that she was interested in having the lessons with her "husband", so we’ll try to teach him as well.
We passed by hermano Saenz a couple times and he is doing fine. He usually has people there with him. His two daughters and one of his daughters´ husband has been there the last times we’ve visited. Yesterday when we visited him he told us that he heard on the news that four people were killed at the Braullio Carillo National Park a couple days ago. (then...M♡M thinking...Why did you want to go the Park for? ; P ) We went to the Temple on Wednesday with our zone and it was a nice experience. The Temple here is a smaller one but its very beautiful. It was interesting in Spanish. Elder Bonn is going insane here in Moravia. He has been in this area since September and it’s only his second area. His first was in Buenos Aires in the South zone. He was only there for one change. He has been looking at maps and dreaming of going to a beach area like Quepos. The Ap’s told us we were super close to getting moved to Nicoya and opening the area there. But president decided not to send us there. Elder Bonn is sure he is getting moved out of here on changes (April 2), but you never know.
We’ve visited members this week. We had been to busy to eat at the 'China Restaurant' for like two weeks but we ate there the other night finally. There is a funny Texan guy who owns a pizza place in Moravia and he always says hello to us when he’s on his motorcycle delivering pizza or when we walk past his pizza shop. I want to eat there soon. There are a bunch of hobos who hang out on the benches by the Catholic Church in Moravia and they always say "hi" to us and "peace" and "Jesus rocks" and stuff like that. Contacting is still the same. Rejection after rejection. Last night Elder Bonn and I tried a new approach. We walked by the people standing in front of other churches and pretended to just be talking to each other about things like, "Yeah, it’s necessary to have authority from God to baptize," and "Its nice to know that the Church of Jesus Christ has been restored through the prophet Joseph Smith, isn’t it Elder Bonn? It’s pretty fun. I almost contacted a whole bus the other day but i chickened out. I'll do it one of these days.
