September 6, 2010
To continue from last week, Last Friday morning was really crazy. I was on the phone all morning long. We had had 8 baptisms planned in the district for that last week of August, and during the week we had lost some and gained some. On Friday morning everything got complicated again. In Turrialba Vivianna decided she wasn’t ready for baptism yet, and although we made plans with Turrialba so that Rosillo, another woman ready for baptism in Turrialba, could be baptized as well, they were unable to find her at home so they ended up with 0 baptisms in the month. Paraiso had been planning to have 3 baptisms that weekend, but Marcela also decided she wasn’t ready yet. Randall and Marinet still wanted to be baptized, but there was a lot of confusion with the bishop about letting a recent convert named Jose baptize, and about the times of the baptisms. I went to Paraiso that day to do the baptismal interviews of Marinet and Randall. I was with Elder Urbina, while my companion went with the missionary Elder Urbina is training, Elder Palmer from Texas, to Cartago. Marinet’s interview went very well and she prepared herself to be baptized that night.
While in Pariaso we also taught Martinet’s and Suyen's friend Adriana for the first time and we put a baptismal goal with her for the 18 of September. She and her husband are now set to get married and baptized on that day. We also visited Ana and Family. Ana and Suyen are super good missionaries. Even before baptism, they would contact people in the street and give them pamphlets. Now they give references all the time, and they are good references as well. They are even going to give us some references. Ana talks with everyone about the gospel and Suyen is actually the one who put the baptismal date with Marinet. All of Ana’s friends are curious because they’ve seen such a big change in her and her family. Its crazy sweet! With them and the missionaries working together, they could baptize the whole neighborhood of Los Llanos. That place is a gold mine. All their baptisms have been from Los Llanos.
Anyway, that night it rained super hard, and we almost couldn’t make it to Marinets baptism, because all of Los Llanos was flooded. Like I've mentioned before, they are replacing all the under ground pipes in Los Llanos, so the whole place is full of holes and dirt. We were worried that Marinet wasn’t going to make it to her own baptism, so we went by her house to see if she needed help, but her mom told us she was already at the church. So we started to try to find a way out of Los Llanos without having to swim. While walking around we saw that a house was flooded, and some woman and kids were trying to scoop the water out with buckets. We stopped to help them and started scooping buckets of water out of the house as fast as we could. We did this for what seemed like an eternity, till most of the water was out of the house, and more men came to help so we took off to get to the baptism. We finally found a way out of Los Llanos and took a bus to Centro and ran to the church. We got there, soaking wet and covered in dirt, but the baptism hadn’t started yet because the bishop our companions hadn’t shown up yet. When they finally did, we had the baptism, and it was great. In the end Rafael, who was also supposed to be baptized that day as well, couldn’t because he had to work. He had agreed to meet us at the church after the baptism so he could have his baptismal interview, but he didn’t show up because he lives in los llanos and it was flooded, so we ended up having to go to him. It was late, so while Elder Urbina and I went to Los Llanos again and had to pass through all the mud and water to get to Rafael’s house, Elder Montoya and Elder Palmer went to Paraisos house to order pizza. In the end Rafael’s interview went well. Elder Urbina and I got to the Paraison house after 10 pm, so all four of us Elders stayed the night there. I slept on a big beanbag thing, and my comp slept on the floor. Rafael was baptized on Sunday morning.
On Saturday the Cartago Ward had a Mothers day activity (Finally). It was really nice. There was food and Hno. Posas and his students (he teaches violin, etc.) played music for the mothers. We helped serve the food, and helped eat it as well.
That night we had the interview with Jorge set. The Zl’s were supposed to meet us at the Cathedral at 8:30, but instead they met us at 9:30 because they had had a baptism/marriage that ran later than expected. We had to take money out and take a Taxi way up to Quircot because there were no buses at that time. The interview went well, and we went home and slept.
On Sunday morning, like I wrote last week, Jorge and the Hnas investigator Jason were baptized and confirmed. It was a great day at church. Our investigators Jessica, Isa, Jerson, and Yaritza came. In the end we passed our baptismal goal in the area, but we missed our goal as a district by one. But September should be a great month for the district.
I’m kinda behind, so I’ll tell you about this last week, next week.
Elder Tobler
