Chapter 38 A Long Week for a New Missionary

Chapter 38: A Long Week for a New Missionary

I was really thinking about what I wanted to share this week in my email, and I wasn´t quite sure. It´s been a long week. For starters, I spent a couple of days in Barcelona so I could pick up my new missionary trainee! I still couldn´t believe I was training again. I felt like I was at the meeting for trainers just a week ago. I can hardly believe it´s already been 3 months. Well, I was really nervous because I was told that I would be training a native. I don´t know why it made me more nervous, but it did. What´s really weird is my entire district is training. However, I had nothing to fear when I found out I would be training Hermana Portas. She was (let´s make sure I get this right) born in Venezuela, her mom is from the Dominican Republic, her dad is a Spaniard, she was raised for 10 years in New York, and then moved to Madrid. She is 23 years old, and her English just cracks me up. It´s perfect English, but a heavy New York accent haha but we are officially the youngest district in the mission. The district leader and I came in to the mission together, and we have the most time. It´s a little crazy. Anyway, we were told to pray for a miracle during our first week, and that we should also pray to see a baptism during our first month together. I felt like that was no problem since we were supposed to have three people getting baptized next week. That is, until one of them fell off the face of the earth, one of them had to reschedule, and one of them hasn´t come to church and so they can´t be baptized. It was definitely a bummer. Ok, so it was just down right depressing.  However, this is why I was debating what I should say in my weekly email. I feel like most missionaries try to make it sound as great as possible in their emails, and then all the other missionaries feel like they are the only ones suffering judging off the other emails. So, here is me being real this week. It was really hard. It was the first week in my mission where I haven´t had a whole lot of desire to work. After two out of our three baptismal candidates said they couldn´t meet with us this week, the distant Christmas decorations in the window started to haunt me. haha It was really hard not to think of the festivities that would soon be taking place at home. Not only that, but I´ve been sick for three weeks now, we were breaking cold temperature records, and it was the first week of training. During the first week of training, you always feel more pressure to be obedient, to be excited about the work, and show what the field is really like. Well, as you can probably tell, it was much easier said than done. Also, you don´t really appreciate your old companions until they are gone. I forgot how hard it is to be the only one who knows the area.  It´s funny because once your cita cancels, you kind of look at each other like, “what now?” and I was the only one who knew the area enough to decide where to go next. So I decided we would work with my Spanish Grandma this week. (The one that tried to teach me the Paso doble last week.) We had a three hour long cita and she said she would come to church! ( Yes, three hours). Normally, I wouldn´t try to work with an 80 year old woman so fervently, but then I heard this story from a Spaniard in our ward this week, and she told us that her grandma got baptized when she was 80 years old, and then her mom was baptized soon after. Obviously, I thought, this was a sign for me. She asked us to come back the next day, and after eating chocolate con churros (a Spanish winter favorite) she told us how she couldn´t come to church because she felt like she was betraying the Catholic Church, and it was too cold. I was so upset! However, there was one bright spot in our week. We have been trying to catch this family that we found contacting on the street for the last 2 months and they were never home! The mom´s name is Milagros (which translates to miracles in English), so it was obviously a sign! We went and started just teaching them a little, because they said they had received lessons before from the missionaries. The mom seemed a little less than enthusiastic, but reluctantly invited us back as she was cradling her crying two year old between her knees.  However, her 13 year old niece was also in the room, and when we talked about the Book of Mormon, we asked Milagros if she thought the Book of Mormon could be true, and the little 13 year old piped up from the corner and bursted out, “Yes! I believe it´s true!!” We were definitely taken back. She is just this tiny 13 year old that looks like she is 8. Oh well, I´ll take it. She said she wants to come to church (she didn´t show up though.) and that she wants me to teach her English, and she´ll read the Book of Mormon. It just makes me realize how strong the faith is of a young girl. I hope that if I wasn´t born in the church that I would be able to recognize the truth when I heard it and stand in front my entire family and tell them I know it was true before even reading it. It was really great, and I´ll be excited to meet with them this week. As for Ana (our progressing Peruvian investigator) she went out of town, but will be back this week, and Fernando. Oh Fernando...we tried to meet with him 3 times this week, and do you know what his excuse was?? He had to pick oranges and take a shower. If that´s not the worst excuse I have ever heard, I don´t know what is. Well, hopefully this next week we´ll see some more success and a little bit more cheer from the Scrooge. Haha  Aglaice called this morning very concerned about my health and gave me a care package to help me get better, so no fear. No forces are going to get me down.  Les Quiero!
Hermana Hopkins