November 02, 2009
My first week in ‘Heredia’ went pretty well. Heredia's a pretty big, loud city. It’s a lot different than being out in the campo. We don’t have that many investigators here becasue the Elder before me was dying (ending his mission) and I guess he was really trunky (missing home). We did have a few appoitments with investigators ,Ma...., and RC every day but we also had to knock doors every single day this week. In Cariari our days were usually filled with appointments or people to visit but here it’s harder for people to listen to you so, it’s different. Should be interesting though.
We put a baptismal fecha (date) with a 10 year old boy of a family we’re teaching for this Saturday. His parents want to be baptized but they aren’t married to each other. The father is married, but to another woman so we have to solve that little problem before they can be baptized.
There are a lot of Colombians here. Our cocinera (cook) and her family are from Cali, so we eat Colombian food every day. It’s pretty sweet. We are also teaching a fifteen year old who just moved from Cali, Colombia as well.
We don’t have a telephone line in our apartment so we were going to have to move, but after talking with the dueño, he agreed to put one in. Its good news because now we don’t have to use the public or member phones every night to call in. Plus I like our apartment. It’s big and in a good location. I also get to take warm showers for the first time in months.
It was Halloween on Saturday. For some reason my comp and I thought it was on Friday, so we wore orange ties all day, and then found out it wasn’t Halloween yet. Halloween doesn’t really exist here. There were a few freaks running around dressed up in costumes but not many. I think they thought we were just dressed up as Mormons for Halloween. I’ts seems to be a scary costume for a lot of the people here who don’t want to talk to us.
I forgot to tell you that before I left Cariari, we went Iguana hunting. Every one had been promising to cook me some Iguana, for months, but no one ever did. Before I left, we went to hunt them with some of the jovenes in the rama. The Iguanas live way up high in the trees, so you have to climb the trees and when you find one, you try to knock it of the tree with a long stick (actually like three big sticks, you tie together). When you knock it down, the people waiting on the ground have to jump on the Iguana without getting bitten. Unfortunately, it rained a lot the day we went hunting. That made the trees slippery and the Iguanas were hiding. Jesua, one of the jovenes, climbed way up high into the trees and spotted an Iguana, but the stick wasn’t long enough and he wasn’t able to ever reach it.
Anyway, supposedly iguana tastes like chicken (everything tastes like chicken), but hopefully I can eat some Iguana before I leave the country. One of the basic tico foods is Gallo Pinto, which is rice and beans mixed together, sometimes with egg, meat, bread, and natiya (some white sauce like cream cheese and mayonnaise mixed). In Limon they have something called Rice n Bean, which is, you’ll never guess it, rice and beans mixed together, with coco flavoring. *Ü*
No spiritual experiences to share here yet. Sorry. ARC did cry the other night, but it was because she is having a hard time leaving coffee. She says she gets really sick and feels unbelievable pain and feels like passing out when she goes a few days without coffee. We didn’t know she still had that problem. We found out because she told me she had been reading Doctrine and Covenants and realized some of the pages were missing. When I looked in her book the section missing was Doctrine and Covenants 89, which is the Word of Wisdom. We decided to read the section and talk about the word of wisdom. It wasn’t until the end that she told us she still had problems with coffee. We talked about it with her but she became a little angry and started to cry, saying she had tried and tried but she can’t stand the pain and that God understood her. “Addiction has the capacity to disconnect the human will and nullify moral agency. It can rob one of the power to decide" “We should avoid any behavior that is addictive. Whatever is addictive compromises our will. Subjecting our will to the overbearing impulses imposed by any form of addiction serves Satan’s purposes and subverts our Heavenly Father’s. This applies to addictions to drugs (such as narcotics, alcohol, nicotine, or caffeine), addiction to practices such as gambling, and any other addictive behavior” (Free Agency and Freedom) ~ Dallin H. Oaks
We CAN overcome our addictions through the Atonement of Jesus Christ by being humble and honest and calling upon God and others for help. “I do not boast in my own strength, nor in my own wisdom; but behold, my joy is full, yea, my heart is brim with joy, and I will rejoice in my God. “Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things” (Alma 26:11–12).
Yesterday we taught a dual lesson while we were knocking doors. The only one who let us in was a drunken man and his really old grandfather. My comp and Juan Carlos (a Colombian guy about to go on a mission) were trying to teach the drunken guy. I tried to teach the old man but he couldn’t hear me so I just ended up listening to him talk the whole time.
We are right now on divisions with DL Elder Martinez who dies in a month. And we are Going to play soccer with the zone today. Nothing else to report. How’s life? Goodbye, I guess.
