IT RAINED FOR REAL!

SO! everyone got phone calls last monday night about cambios [changes, or transfers], and there were quite a few. i'm still here in pucallpa with hermana mucha, and i will survive!!! haha, but really, we had a pretty good talk that night, and at the end i straight up asked my companion (who has been extremely difficult to work with) if we could be friends. she didn’t turn me down, so that's a start. :) i feel most of the time like i'm training myself, though, which is why we haven’t seen a lot of progress in our area. basically, i have to get myself acquainted with everything and then learn how to help my companion. so, this will continue to be a challenge for sure, and it'll likely be the hardest cambio of my mission. but, i've got this - i'm up for anything this place throws at me!

IT RAINED FOR REAL! this is me knee deep. :)

 another one of me in the street. :)

this was my day with hermana jackson, btw - so we played a little. :)

anyway, hermana snyder was transferred, and i'm so sad!!! because we don't get despedidas [goodbyes] - they call at night, and you leave early the next morning! HOWEVER, there are seven new GRINGAS and two of them are in my zone - one is my new neighbor! they're both adorable, and i'm just so happy to not be the baby anymore. :)

so, after one cambio here, let me finally tell you about this mission! hmm, where to begin. contacting here is very easy - everyone literally just sits outside their houses because it's so hot. and obviously, they're all waiting for the gospel, right? yes. that’s how we've gotten most of our investigators, the rest are referrals. :) everyone is willing to listen - it's very rare that we get rejected, but only about 1 in 10 contacts will progress to baptism. remember luz, our investigator with a baptismal date? her mom was a contact. :) lots of the rest are bomba [dead ends].

 one of the families in our ward raises turtles?? 

we found a huge room full of chickens with no one around!

now we know where lunch came from. :)

the people here are very unique, very simple - because i mean, we are in the amazon jungle. so, we teach everything very simply and carefully. what's also interesting is that almost all of them are catholic or evangelico, but they know little to nothing about their religions or about bible stories. we usually ask them, before teaching about prophets, if they can remember any ancient prophets, like "who opened the sea?" or "who built the ark?" and more often than not they don't know! so. everything must be kept muy basico. :)

love you all so much! alma 56:46 says, "our god is with us, and he will not suffer that we should fall; then let us go forth." and verse 47 says, "they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, god would deliver them." so everyone, learn this week to be grateful to your mothers, because they are AMAZING! shout out to mine for being the best. ;)

hermana wood

More from this week's message to Hermana Wood's dad:

the food is FABULOUS. :) our pensionista is the best cook in pucallpa! we get salad, veggies, fruit, meat, quinoa, oatmeal, eggs, hot chocolate, pasta, WHEAT bread (which is a big deal), smoothies, and juice. :) i haven't come across anything i don't like!