Lima Sweet Lima

I WENT TO LIMA THIS WEEK. which is the biggest deal ever - it was so fun, like a day of vacation!! i needed to go to get my peruvian ID card, and i went with another sister from my zone, hermana snyder. she is the chillest person ever. okay, so the day in lima was top 10 - definitely one of the best days of my life. steffensen (district leader) called us in the morning and said "wood is going to lima at 4"....WHAT. and with hermana snyder! snyder's comp, jackson (who's my sister leader), was in iquitos, so snyder was with our neighbors, willes and arteaga, and we were able to discuss everything that was happening - there was straight up excitement buzzing.

we picked up dinner from isabel, our pensionista, then said bye to mucha and were in a motokar to the airport. as soon as we left, snyder and i looked at each other and were like "YESSS, LET IT BEGIN." like hallelujah!!!! getting on that plane at sunset was incredible, and the plane snacks here are freaking bomb - so good.

we got there and waited at the lima airport forever, but we found a dunkin' donuts!!! i got this caramel-filled powdered sugar creation, and it was bliss. also, we found out there was a group of missionaries going to lima, and all four of them were in my district at the CCM!!

dinner was at the airport. papa john's had this deal - one pizza for 50 soles and the second one for ONE SOLE. so snyder and i bought these two huge pizzas, because obviously we're not going to pass that up. ate basically all of it.

our hotel…where do i begin, people. it was like the freaking marriott. they gave us free drinks when we got there, and we sat on COUCHES. they had a waterfall shower, big beds with big pillows, and soft blankets and air conditioning!!!! i took a hot shower that night and felt like a literal princess. and i haven't had a pillow for 4 weeks, so that was nice, too.

the next day, we had a breakfast buffet. okay. every type of fruit imaginable, eggs, toast, granola, yogurt - basically the celestial kingdom. hermana poma was really confused at snyder's and my excitement…the night before she said "i've never been anywhere like this before and i feel fine. why are you two so excited? i don’t understand." and we were like "uhh ha." we had to explain that being there was like being home and that was why we were happy - because it really felt like the states!

we got our ID cards, then we got footlongs at SUBWAY! this was all so dangerous because snyder and i were slowly feeling like we were at home, but we had to go back in a few hours…but so then, we went to the temple grounds! which is a big deal because we won't be able to go to the temple again until we're in the states. we couldn't do a session because snyder and i didn’t have our temple recommends with us. but we got to go to the distribution center there! it's in the basement of the temple sort of, below the cafeteria. i bought a bunch of posters for the house and some church DVDs.

from there we went to the TEMPLE STORE!!! dad and papa: i bought you BYU peruvian ties and they are sweet. :) also bought MEET THE MORMONS. who knows how many times i'll watch that movie - i love it. while we were there, we met a girl who has her [mission] call to the SLC visitors center! last name: mosquera. i told her to look for the wood family at christmas time. :)

we headed to the airport and we thought we were super late, so we sprinted through security. i walked through the metal detector literally holding an ice cream cone, and this explains my life in one sentence. :) we can do whatever we want in these airports! on the way to lima, i put a half-eaten mango through the conveyor belt and it passed.

on the plane ride (which was about an hour) and whenever else we had time, snyder and i talked and talked and talked. which doesn’t seem like a big deal, but to be able to say anything in english for a day and a half was insanely beautiful. on the way back we talked about how it'd been like a vacation and we were kind of sad to leave. like it was really hard - because it felt like being home!!

anyway, i love you all! word of the week is "pajara," because according to my dictionary it means "paper rooster" or "crafty female." hahah but really, i hope you guys have a great week! love you so much. you're all in my prayers!

hermana wood

Random Details (from this week's e-mails to family):

• life as a missionary has felt normal since week 3ish. :)
• we're not allowed to buy things from the streets!
• THANK YOU FOR THE PACKAGE [it arrived in less than a month via USPS]. literally it had everything i needed! i was going to ask you for those socks and the shoes are the most brilliant thing ever. when you send packages, you should throw in whatever's in the pantry at the time, haha. like trail mix or a nature valley granola bar! nothing big, like just one. :)
• sleeping underneath bug nets is good, but it's really hot. better than being covered in spiders! there was a huge cockroach in our house!! but i had to kill it so fast and then i threw it out the window, so i forgot to take a picture!!!!! hahah i'm sorry, goob - next time i'll take one for you.

zoo time