It's just plain masizo!

We had a great week and I'm happy! Lots of improvements since last week's update haha. I swear we are just experiencing a tiny bit of what it's like to be bipolar or something...

I find it strange that we get sick after drinking too much milk here or my comp doesn’t feel well after eating too much lettuce or veggies in general...hmm. But we get super risky, decide to brave the streets of downtown Progreso and eat meat and tortillas on our way home from writing last P-day and don’t get any bit of a sick feeling! Crazy stuff...we're 100% Catrachas ;)

Some fun things about the week...An Elder got a package literally chock full of just applesauce this week so he was nice and shared with all us gringos :) It was like a bunch of two year olds and a piñata...We went to a sister's house this week with the other elders in the ward and our ZL Lucha made us pupusas, a very traditional Salvadoran dish! It was so cool to watch him make them! We helped in what we could, chopping and things like that. So it made me think of Dallin :) I only ate one but they were so yummy!!!

So now for the danger stories ;) We were headed to La F___ one hot afternoon when we were headed to cross a bridge. Then we saw the national police checking a few guys for drugs...and we had to sort of head towards another bridge and pass and smile. It was awkward but the policeman seemed nice as they waved and everything to us :) Let’s say the golden locks saved us from getting evil stares...Then I took one look at the other super sketchy bridge we would need to cross and I was like "Um no" to my comp so we walked the entire way back. I have so many bad dreams about bridges and I know that if I fell through the holes we would die :) So better safe than sorry ;)

Then we walked up to a house to talk with a sister and she was sitting talking with a man that was sitting in front of her with a newspaper laying on his lap. Then we saw he was taking care of his nice little pile of "weed"....and he was like "Oh, got caught with my hands in the maza!" which is basically the same phrase as saying "Got my hand caught in the cookie jar..." Only that they make tortillas out of flour called maza here so that’s why they say maza I'm guessing. And my comp was like "Yeah but that's a bad kind of maza" Then the wind started blowing and I was like "Yo creo que el viento vino de Dios...." He left pretty soon.

We're teaching a guy named F. that tells us horrible stories of things that are happening in our areas. Stories that I wouldn’t even share on here...But I love how open we can be with him, I straight up asked him if he was a gang member. He said no....mhm. But he said he smokes and after a while I realized he wouldn’t really listen to a full lesson so I took the "inspired questions" route and asked him things like "What's most important in your life?" So we helped him make some comparisons, like "If your daughter is the most important thing in your life, you should probably think about her and not smoke...kids are smart, they know what’s going on". So just little by little we're trying to help them out. One marero (gang member) at a time.

We were finishing a lesson when I looked down and my eyes rested on a tarantula near my feet. I also have had bad dreams about spiders at the base of my bed so I guess it’s just the week to have my bad dreams become reality! It scared me so bad! So I was like "Can we finish with a prayer??" and I said it but kept one eye open and the tarantula started crawling right towards my chair! We left right after that and then like one night later as we were walking back to our apartment, I stopped and grabbed my companions arm to stop her and pointed to another tarantula on the ground so she wouldn’t step on it. They’re just all over the place. So scary!

I was on divisions here in my area with a sister training leader standing outside the gate of where we eat lunch when a drunk guy came up to us and started to talk in English saying he was going to be the new president of Honduras so we just sort of went along with it and I was like pounding on the gate yelling "¡Buenas!" as loud as I could. I only started to get worried when he started to tell us we didn’t have the right to preach because we aren’t prophets and that we needed to get out of his country. But through all of this we were safe :) I was talking with my companion a few nights ago and she told me that when she saw my picture come up in the changes and realized I would be her companion she said she was honestly really scared because of how the area is. Very few hermanas have served in this area - before it was an area restricted to Elders...and that’s saying something but we've been kept safe!

We really do sweat right as we get out the shower here. I thought it was a joke. It’s not!

I've been getting along with my companion lately and it’s been great. We have our own little jokes and everything so it’s been nice.

During my personal study this week I had an "aha" moment where I realized that "sin" like "pecado" and "sin" like "without" in Spanish have a lot of connections! When we sin, we are without the Spirit, we are without guidance and we aren't with God you could say. We are without progress and without hope. It’s neat being here in P___ because it's definitely helped me remember that its all about progress. It's all about the future and it's all about faith. I met with my mission president for our typical 3 month interview and I learned so much. It's all about faith and trusting in the Lord and loving him first and putting Him first. He wants the best for us. He always has and always will. So why would we want to sin and be without any of that goodness? God, the Spirit, guidance, faith and hope? We shouldn’t want to be without that. So how about we don't sin?

Something I love about the mission are the times I notice when I really just can’t take a picture. When someone smiles after staring at me or when I start to teach a lesson with my companion and without even saying a word, all the sudden there are 20 little Hondureñan eyes watching me so intently...or when we leave the house and start to walk down that hot, dusty, rocky road with the palm trees swaying in that blessed wind. Or when my companion and I decide to eat that meat cooked in the street because we’re starving and it smells so incredible. So then I go crossing the crazy dangerous streets of P___ and decide to barter with a lady selling pan de guineo and I end up getting them for less ;) Or when I’m teaching a lesson with my companion and find that two seconds later our investigator is in a tree like 15 feet off the ground trying to reach a mamón. Or when we're walking through sketchy areas and I keep my head tilted down a bit so we don't get assaulted for being noticed so much. It’s hard to capture the feeling when we realize the person we’re teaching is actually listening to us - like it’s the first time in our entire mission anyone has ever really listened to us. Or when my mission president leaves me stunned at the words he says and I feel like an apostle has just given me my very own conference talk. Those are the times I'll always remember, the times I just can’t take a picture and capture the moment. It's just plain masizo.

Con amor,
Hermana Despain

Declare Glad Tidings!

It's Such an Adventure!

Let me just warn you all....It was a rough week.

I've decided I will just never get used to the heat here. I always thought it was a joke that a person would start sweating after getting out of the shower.....but it's true. It's so true. It has been so hot here this week so that always puts a damper on our happiness. It's tough to try and smile when you have sweat running all over your face and your wearing ugly shoes and a shirt you've probably washed at least 150 times, and you’re craving something filled with sugar and manteca but you know you'll only get fatter if you eat it and your comp is doing something weird and you just want to scream and throw a machete. But that's enough venting for now :) I got some letters this week from my brother and from the mom of an Elder in my first zone and from my dad! I love getting letters, they help me so much!

I felt like we worked really hard this week and made a lot of improvements. We had a lot more lessons and taught with more members. Our challenge here is references and they count things differently in this zone so that’s been frustrating to try and adjust to.

I've gotten so much better at starting my personal study on time and it's been great! It's been nice to have a full hour and sometimes more to really get into it and learn! Idk why but I go to bed pretty early here. In S__ R___ no, but here we get home at like 8, plan and then I write in my journal or write a letter, or add a bit to a future letter, and I sack out! Now this week my goal is to get exercising again because not having mountains to climb here is not helping me! So looks like we'll be pulling out Jazzercise again! ;) Every little bit helps.

I've done lots of thinking lately and I've realized that sometimes, I don't just love love love love the mission 24/7, but that’s real life! And its something I've learned while being here, to still be here even if I don’t love it all the time. So I'm proud of myself! For doing hard things and sticking through it. It's not about loving it all the time, its about sometimes not loving it, but still doing this thing! To still listen to the people when they try and tell you that eating cucumbers will take away your freckles and stuff like that. To still go out in the heat and listen to more Spanish when I've just about had it with the language or when I'd just rather not talk to anyone. I've learned to pay attention to my companion, but I've also learned that if you pay too much attention, they'll drive you nuts. So there really is a balance in everything. No one is perfect, but I still have control over how I respond to things...(Like how I just offered a chair to a girl that was standing super close to me for like 20 minutes). So I've found that normally its just not worth it to get annoyed or frustrated or else I'll go crazy and have a horrible week :)

Since we don’t have a pila and our dueña's washer is pretty much off limits, we usually have to wash our clothes in our sink, and the door was horribly constructed and there's no light in the bathroom. So that's been fun. Did I mention our shower curtain rod is a broken stick with tape wrapped around the break and that our sink leaks water that smells like rotten eggs and that huge lizards live on our roof?! IT’S SUCH AN ADVENTURE!

One time in S___ R___ we were introducing ourselves to a new family and we were answering a few questions they had about baptism. Over time you start to get into a rhythm of answering questions because usually its all the same. So I started answering and I was like "Hermana, la verdad es que nos casamos a los ocho años..." ("Sister, the truth is that we get married when we're 8 years old.")When really I meant to say that we get baptized when we're eight years old :) So that was a good humbling experience!

Another funny but also sad little story I have is that Saturday morning we were trying to figure out who to visit while we were out working. The mornings are really difficult here because people are either not home, off doing a mandado, or making lunch or just plain "ocupados". So we decided to visit an hermana that has been a little sick when she asked us if we drink Pepsi. And I have just had it with all this Pepsi, so I was like "Hermana, por ahorita no...gracias..." Two minutes later she brings me, I swear half a liter of Pepsi in this super tall, huge glass and I'm just sitting there like "Excuse me?!" I tried to dump as much as I could in my water bottle but there wasn’t much room. So after I drank what I could I felt so sick like 2 minutes later. The things we do...but she is a sweet lady. So its like in life we say "Oh, more challenges? No thank you..." Oh here's half a liter....."Thank you...."

I also learned the value of surrounding myself with real people this week. There is a family of recent converts that we visit that is just a novela in and of itself. There is a lot of drama and fakeness and lying and I guess instead of getting frustrated about them, I just have to make sure that in the future I surround myself with good people who tell the truth, live the gospel, are kind because they want to be, and care more about what is on the inside, than the appearance. Heavenly Father looks on the heart...He always has and He always will. I was reminded of a quote from General Conference that reminds us that we should remember Heavenly Father when we want to get frustrated with people in our lives...He has so many imperfect people to deal with, so we should remember that and be patient.

I love when people ask us questions that come straight from pamphlets or are questions you practiced in Mutual to answer when your friends asked them. It's like, "Did someone tell you to ask us that questions?" We usually get questions like "Why are there so many churches?" and "Where do we go after this life?" or they’ll talk to us about how "all" the churches say they are the "true church". They also ask us why we're called Mormons. Just a few examples of what we get asked here.

So maybe everything in our apartment is falling apart in our apartment and our dueño would rather throw a party, but they bring us food like everyday, it's really sweet!

I've learned to not make excuses in life. I know I complain a lot, but excuses are being thrown out the door. If I didn’t do something, it's 100 percent my fault. I've had it with people's lies and excuses!

We're teaching an older man named they all call "N.". He is just a sweetheart. I've noticed a trend of the people I teach in my mission that progress. I tend to teach the older people and the younger people. I just have more of a love for them. My heart just goes out to this sweet grandpa! During our lessons he sort of zones out a little and stares off and is just so sweet but he came to church! He is always a little surprised to see us and is like "the cita wasn’t for tomorrow?" But he's reading the Book of Mormon and he has a fecha for the 2nd of August! It really is amazing the love a missionary can feel for an investigator.

There is a really old lady we visit here who has been a member for forever and she’s just so sweet. we basically have to yell to her when we teach her because she’s so deaf, but her and her daughter are just the best. I realized and told my comp this week that I just love to visit them. The daughter is so sweet and old too but she's hilarious! She's a little sarcastic in her humor so we get along pretty well ;)

Our investigator that had a fecha (a baptismal date) has been going to lots of different churches lately so her mom doesn’t want to let her get baptized. So that’s been really frustrating but we're trying to help her out. But something I like about her is that when we leave her things to read or we ask her to focus on not saying bad words her response is a simple, "Ok". It is just music to our ears! Even if she doesn’t read the folleto, or if she keeps saying bad words, at least her initial response is a very humble, child like, meek, "Ok". So I guess we just need to learn to say "Ok" more often when we're faced with challenges in our lives. I used to get really upset or frustrated if a companion wanted to do something that I didn’t want to do, but I've learned its just easier to say "Ok". Life is hard for everyone and we all have bad days or bad weeks but it's just easier to say "Ok" and only say a prayer of gratitude.

So glad to hear my family is doing so well! Looks like the recent cruise trip was a blast and that they were all safe! They look like they’re doing great and so so happy! Lots of fun trips :)

In the CCM I heard "Just make it to Sunday"....and in conference we heard "Sunday will come" but here "Monday will come" and you get to talk to your family because you're blessed with an incredible family that actually talks to you on P-day and they express their love and send you fun pictures and get you all motivated to give it your all in the week all over again :)

I'm grateful for the challenges I have in my life. I'm grateful for my family. I know this is the true Church and that Jesus Christ only established one true church. I know Heavenly Father loves us. I know we're His children and that He wants us to be happy. I'm grateful for the privilege I have to be here serving in Honduras. I wouldn’t have it any other way. I hope you all have a great week :) I love you guys!

Love,
Hermana Despain