I had a pretty good past few days...just getting to know the area and my comp. One day we went to go visit a girl A. who has been coming to church and of course coming from Santa Rita I'm like "She came to church? Dude let’s baptize her right now?!" But when we were standing outside her house, we saw that her and her mom were sitting there trying to open cans with a huge machete, putting a bunch of junk into trash bags to sell so that they had food for the day. Talk about a jaw dropping, humbling experience...in those moments I’m just like, "um...we have a nice gospel message for you?" When I know they’re more concerned about their starving children and I just feel so helpless.
It's the poorest area I've worked in probably. It's not a very pretty area and there are no mountains! I'm totally bummed about that! But my word! One part is so so confusing, there are a ton of little alleys and back streets and I swear I will get so lost. But our areas are called "F___, La C___" and part of "S__ M___". We have to pass a big bridge to get to F___ and La C___. It's a pretty small river but the bridge only has like one safety rod on one side and apparently there are crocodiles in the river....but all I've seen is a HUGE snake a bunch of Honduran hoodlums were trying to kill it by throwing huge rocks at. It was horrible! I wanted to push the kids into the river and be like "How do you like that? Respect God's creations okay!?" But I didn’t. Apparently they’re always selling marijuana at that bridge though so looks like we'll have to pretend to be "friends" with the druggies so we don’t get jumped. So it’s a good area, super humble people but we'll find out how receptive they are little by little. 
So maybe we have air conditioning at night here, but we  |
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I read over Elder Neil L. Andersen's talk "Spiritual Whirlwinds" this week and really got a lot out of it. I really liked how he talked about how all the whirlwinds are there to help us grow and become better. I left my notes at home, otherwise I'd have some pretty profound things to share....but it’s a good talk :)
We visited a girl named J. this week who has a little boy. It’s always sad to ask them and hope and pray that its their little brother. Then it’s awkward cuz they’re like "No, es mi hijo..." and you’re like "oh.....and how old are you?" So she's 15, had him at 14. It’s just so heartbreaking to see how much their life has changed because of a few simple, dumb decisions. The boy is not all the way healthy and the dad is going to have another kid with another girl soon. It’s just all so messed up. She lives with her grandma and wishes she could study...is so sad but it’s the life she has chosen. It just makes me that much happier with the life I'm leading right now and just keeps me in check to remind me that everything in life has its time and place.
The ward is super small here but I really like it. There was still plenty of challenges just like in S___ R___ as they used the third hour to start selling tickets to go to some little resort to get money to go to the temple. So we felt horrible about that. But I like how the ward is small, it's like a little family. I played the piano and everyone was really grateful for that! The gospel principles class was taught by a few Elders here and they did a great job! It was fun and everyone participated. But the ward is really sweet and the people are very accepting. It’s been nice to sort of have a fresh start here after six months. But yeah the people are very nice here and the Bishop and his family are just great! The Bishop is a really kind person and very approachable. So that’s great! It’s nice having a small ward cuz within one Sunday you already know practically everyone! I saw the Familia Z.like twice since he's a member of the stake presidency so that was nice, it was like seeing family again :) They’re a great family. Two of the kids came and ran up to me and hugged me and were like "Hermana Despain!!!!" That felt great!Yesterday it rained a ton so we had to slosh through a ton of water, but you guys know that I love it! So much! Hahaha it was a ton of fun and made only having one lesson with a member the entire week not so bad. I felt so horrible writing only one in the little key indicators box. My numbers have never been that awful! But we'll kill it this week. We stopped by a recent convert’s house and he shared his birthday cake with us. idk why but it took them 45 minutes to finally cut the cake so we lost a lot of working time and that was frustrating but it was neat to share a birthday with someone. I realized as they were blasting "Las Mañanitas" that those were the times they would remember the sister missionaries. I’ll be one of those gringas that shows up in random pictures they keep forever...just something I realized.
Love,
Hermana Despain
