Another week (week 15)

Hey fam and friends!  Well as for this week it was kinda typical…not much super exciting happened.  Its mango season and that’s honestly really exciting…no joke.  Soo many mangos literally every tree has mangos and I’ve been eating like 10 mangos a day.  As for my investigators they are progressing little by little.  Getting them to go to church is the biggest hassle i swear.  Still love my comp though he’s the freaking man…super funny and hardworking guy. It’s getting more and more fun with him as i start picking up more spanish.  So this week we’ve had the first big couple days of rain.  Holy freekin cow,  never in my life have i experienced rain like this. Literally it rains so hard and the drops are as big as one of your fingers i swear.  Literal rivers form in the streets and that’s not a joke either.  It’s so crazy, and the temp doesn’t go down at all.  Well that’s all I’ve got for you this week.  Sorry that I don’t have many stories and i don’t have any really good pics either. 

Love all y´all miss u guys!

First pic is a sunset after the rain, really dope but you can’t see it too well in that pic.

Second pic is a cockroach i killed that flew in through a slot in the window while i was taking the shower. I aint a fan of those things…i swear this one was as big as my hand

Happy Easter (week 14)

Hey fam and friends! Wow, what a week of super good stuff.  so this week we honestly didn’t have much luck with our investigators which is a shame, but we got blessed with a baptism!  It was sooo awesome and such an experience.  So I only have time for a few stories.  So Saturday we had the baptism and we were supposed to baptize the mom and the son but it ended up just being the mom nikki.  So the story is that on their baptism day they were both sooo excited and were ready to go all dressed in white clothes with the font full of water.  so we had a member give a talk and i was going to baptize nikki, the mom, first.  So I’m about ready to baptize her when all of a sudden the zone leaders had an emergency and couldn’t make it and she doesn’t know much Spanish.  I was going to do the baptism in English for her, and the zone leaders were going to be the witnesses because they both speak English and all was going to be well.  So the Zone Leaders didn’t show up and i didn’t know the Spanish version to baptize her.  So I had to hurry up and memorize it in 5 minutes and it was chaotic but i did and the baptism was such an amazing experience.  my first convert…what a blessing from god.  So then it was my comps turn to baptize nikki’s son.  he was soo pumped so they start getting in the font and trent, the kid, put his feet in the water and got sooo scared. It turns out that the kid is deathly afraid of water (which no one told us about) and he refused to get more than his knees wet.  Well, he is only 8 but it was still ridiculous.  he was screaming and kept on asking us to drain the water in the font a little lower.  it was soo bad hahaha he was in the water for like 30 minutes with members around trying to cheer him up.  he wanted to get baptized but was just so scared of the water.  I even tried bribing him with McDonald’s delivery (I know im a bad missionary) and tons of other stuff.  it was sooo funny and so ridiculous and is a story for the ages.  In the end he never got baptized which is sad, but he wants to sometime this month but idk if it’s going to happen with that situation.  But the spirit was so strong while i was baptizing nikky, super crazy experience, i remember what i had to say in Spanish and everything.  So another story for you is today me and my comp went on a wild goose chase for these popusas we heard some people talking about.  The popusas were out of our area so we got permission to leave our area but we didn’t  know exactly where they were.  So it turns out that we got lost and ended up in dad’s old stomping grounds la chorerra which was super funny.  But we did end up getting the popusas after hours of searching lol they were soo good. so yeah thats some stuff this week.  love u all and have a good next week!

PICS

1. the pupusas today. soo good, kinda like an inside out tortilla fried with cheese and meat and beans. super good, its originally from el salvador .

2. all of the kids have bikes like this i dont even get it. they all light up at night and have huuuge speakers on the front and are always blasting music. but the bikes are always rusty and crappy and i dont understand how they even steer with the speaker hahahaha.

3. A desert i had yesterday.  sooo weird kinda gross but kinda good. an old lady that’s sort of an investigator made it.  she’s from the Dominican Republic and this dessert is traditional there i guess.  Its dulce, like a gross choco honey sugar thick sauce with canela, and beans, i think they’re kidney.  the dessert is called avichuela con dulce.  soo wack, almost good though.

4.  the baptism ayyyy sooo awesome.

5.  a tie the kuna made me, shes soo talented its so dope all hand stiched with fabrics. super cool.

Remembering... Grandma (week 13)

Hey momma, thanks for the email…crazy stuff.   So did gma just died of old age or what?  but yeah, I’m taking it well.  I was super super sad at first but luckily i was at the apartment and not out and about when pres called me.  I was a little worried at first about why pres would be calling me, out of 200 missionaries, but it was a super sad time when he broke the news.  It was just shocking, idk, i just never expected it.  So it was super shocking and I was sad the first day but I’ve been a lot better after that.  I just told my comp i wanted to stay in for an extra hour and think about my memories with my grandma.  She was so grandma to me you know…loved grandma so much.  But its all good… she’s better now that’s for sure.  She’s in paradise with all of her other family watching over us so that’s super comforting.  Hope you’re doing good momma.  part of me being so sad was thinking about you and what you’re going through so that part was hard.  Hang in there and find comfort that gma is soo happy now.  Hoping and praying grandpa is doing ok.  Kk love you mother thanks for the update glad the funeral was good and I miss you tons.   I heard your talk was amazing…that’s typical, no surprise there.  I’m going to miss grandma.  idk why, but I always felt like she loved me more than the other grandkids…hahaha…kind of joking but not really haha.  Love you mom hang in there love you sooo much!!!

 Wow, my first transfer in Panama is done…can you believe it!  This week was good, besides the sad news about grandma, and i made it through my first change…12 weeks in the mission…haha, feels like nothing when i say it in weeks.  Only one more transfer and I’ll be done with my training…crazy stuff.   Ok, as for me this week it was busy.  We have a baptism coming up with the two people from the Bahamas and I’m really pumped for that.  They are really excited to be baptized and they love our message.  We meet with them like every day almost haha.  She’s struggling because she’s getting kicked out of her house and doesn’t have a job because she doesn’t have her panama green card yet (it’s called a carnet).  So we are trying to help her but there’s not a whole lot we can do.  Lets see what else, i don’t know its still the same old panama. We had our first “all out day” which is a new thing in the mission.  Every last Wednesday of the change is an “all out day” which is a day where we don’t stop to eat and we work our bums off for 12 straight hours.  There’s more to explain but that’s the jest of it.  But that day was nuts and super tiring.  I still love it here and the people are still totally amazing.  The Kuna Indians are the best and are such good people.  Not the smartest or educated bunch but soo fun, funny, and are so humble.  My favorite Kuna lady is a member and she’s making me a tie right now with a bunch of hand sewn fabrics.  They are super good at art and make beautiful clothes.  The Kuna women wear all of these traditional beads, nose rings, and colorful clothes they make out of a bunch of different fabrics.  it’s hard to explain; only dad would understand haha.  The rainy season is coming up and I’m not too excited for that haha…apparently it rains non stop for like 6 months…ouch!  We already had a little rain and it just makes it more humid and muddy and but doesn’t change the temp one bit.

Love you all, Elder Call

First Pic - a kuna lady brought some crabs back from San Blas so she gave them to us and they were soo bomb…it came with yuka, like everything does, and cooked green bananas hahaha good stuff.  

Second Pic - some of my favorite American elders at General Conf.  sorry for my eyes but every time i smile they close so my bad…sorry.

Third Pic - me with a bird at some inactive members house lol.

Fourth Pic - a baby who’s like 3 months old downing a malta.  i thought this was sooo funny…literally a newborn drinking a malta…so typical here in panama.

Last Pic -  my comp…he’s hilarious…snacking on spicy chips with ceviche like usual.

You are the Best! (Week 11)

Hey fam n friends! Another week gone, cant believe it. next week wwill be the end of my first change in Panama cant believe it. This was another good week especially because general conference. I didnt think i would ever utter these words but i freekin love general conferenece. Its soo spiritually uplifting and it was such a treat this week. Poor monsons havin a rough time pray for him. my fave talk was Either the asian in the first session sunday or eyring in the second. Loved what the asain said bout looking to the light, lol im calling him the asian cus i dont have my notebook with all the names and my writings. But He was amazing, every session and talk was. Well this was another week without baptisms. I dont know if i told u guys but part of the reason its hard right now is we are oppeneing this area. So we dont know anyone and its especially hard with me and not much spanish. but i was blessed this week and i street contacted a lady and her son from the bahammas. She speaks english and i have been working hard with her. She came to church last week and to general conferense. she is reading the BOM also and things are going great. SHe loves the church so pray for her so shegets baptised. Shes had a super rough life and this would really help her. She has a son whos 8 too. i will let u know how things go with her. Lol what hapned this week other than that, now that im typing this i have no idea. Lol funny things lemme think, well there is a croc obsession here everyone wears crocs its hilarious like everyone. also i found out my neighbor sells duros and i have been working him for free ones and its going alrite. Also went to the city with another new elder oh crap thats a really funny story but no time. basically we had a craaazy time getting to the city cus we both dont speak that good of spanish, we got lost and tons of things went wrong ahhaa. but we made it to immigrations. Lemme tell ya, immigrations makes the dmc look chill. After 8 hours of sitting in a furnace sweating my bum off im finally a legal citizen of panama ayyyyyyy. so thats good stuff. well its still hot here. havnt stopped sweating since i got here im dead serious 24-7. 

No pics of me sorry alwasy forget. first is of my carnet, which pretty much means im a citizen of panama if cops stop me ore something. secons is of my mtc comp, idk i just think that kid is hilarious. cus its totally who the kid is, miss him so much love that kid. we had such great times. saw him at the city for immigration and that was dope. last is of a mountain by my house im guna hike with my comp next pday i will let u know how it goes im pumped. kk im out peace yall. much love -elder call

Love you!! (week 10)

Hey momma, thanks for the pep talks; you have no idea how they actually really help me and I’m serious about that.  It’s hard, I’m not going to lie, it’s really freaking hard…by far the hardest thing I have ever done.  Luckily, I aint a wimp and you taught me how to work.  Mainly it’s the Spanish that is the roughest…it’s hard feeling kind of lonely all day…I’m not too cocky anymore haha…super rough and humbling.  Life here is still good though and I love every minute of it, which is just crazy, but its totally true.  I love you momma so much you’re the best in the world…miss u tons.  Thanks for the prayers…I pray for the fam also every minute.

I have like ten minutes to grind this email out so please ignore the typos lol…we never have enough time i swear.  Good times though and another week down…its going pretty fast.  I’ve been here for more than a month now so its just crazy stuff how fast time flies.  We had 5 investigators at church today so that was pretty awesome…i was pumped.  Well life is still good and I’m hanging in there through some really hard times but there’s super rewarding times too. Some of the hards are the language…you already know that.  Another hard is my unsettled stomach.  I don’t know what they put in the food down here but my tummy does not like it…sooo out of control, hahah, i guess it doesn’t like all of the beans, rice, and strange unnamed tropical fruits. 

Something funny that happened this week is we were walking down this random road and we heard this really loud out of control spanish music…like sooo loud.   So we decide to walk by, cuz we were wondering who could possibly be so obnoxious, and we take a look and it is our bishop hahahaha.  Turns out he’s an uber driver in the city part time so he has a boof little pimped out car.  The car has a little disco ball, a flashing strobe and disco lights…it looks sooo boof i almost died laughing.  But that’s the church down here for you…out of freaking control.  The leadership and stuff is so different than the states.  Another thing you have to understand about my area here in panama is that every family lives in a hut and makes like a dollar an hour.  So they all live in shacks but then they’ll have the biggest speakers you have ever seen in your life that are all shiny and chromed out.  Like i don’t understand…they live in practically cardboard houses but then have the fattest speakers with the biggest subs you have ever seen…just incredible sound systems.  Everyone is just way into music but they play the best music though too.  I looove the music down here…we hear it everyday all day from the street…tons of columbian music and tons of fun salsa and merengue music.  Another thing is that these people have literally 20 kids each.  Like there could be a young couple that’s around 25 years old, and they’ll have something like 10 kids that are all 6 months apart…kinda thought that wasn’t possible but I swear they’re straight rabbits down here haha.  Just know that I’m happy, I’m having super good times, and me and my comp are working really hard. 

I will send a better email next week…love u all!! --Elder call

This week... (week 9)

Hey fam and friends,

This week was good in panama as usual.  Times are still obviously sooo hard with the language and stuff but I’m getting adjusted well and everything is great.  My comp still knows no english, and I still know no Spanish, so that’s a bit rough. Besides that i still looove panama.  It’s so beautiful and green and the people are so amazing.  We had some rain this week and I’m NOT too excited for rainy season to get here but I’ll make the best of it. Well we have a bunch of new investigators so we’re teaching a bunch of people.  I teach a good amount, my comp is hard on me that way, which is good and bad.  We still have those baptismal dates but i don’t think any of them are going to pull thru…none of them have come to church even once.  That’s the biggest challenge so far for baptisms.  They all work or play soccer on sunday and we have to convince them that god and family is what is most important.  Our Mission Pres I haven’t told you much about but he is super strict.  Apparently the president before him was super lax and every single missionary was disobedient.  So when he left they sent in the big guns…and I mean the BIG guns!  My mission pres worked for the FDA and also owns like a drug testing company.. soo yeah…strict!  When he got here he literally sent like 30 missionaries home early right away.  He’s super strict and legend has it he keeps return home flight tickets in his pocket just waiting to be used.  Obviously that’s a missionary joke…but I’m not so sure anymore if that’s really a joke or not.  So that’s that, but he’s still a really good guy and our mission is really successful.  We are one of the highest baptizing missions in the world so the mission is doing something right.  My comp got bit by a dog last week and that scene was sooo funny it killed me.  But he was not happy with me laughing about it even though it was pretty darn funny.   I now hate dogs…all of them and I now will never ever own a dog.  Everywhere we go there are 100000000 stray dogs.  I used to feel bad for them all but I don’t anymore.  They bark all day and threaten to attack us constantly…it’s the worst!  I go to the city tomorrow for my 4th week new elders meeting and I’m super pumped for that.  Another quick story…I really had to wee super bad and my comp didn’t want me to because we were walking on the street.  I decide I have to go anyway so I go into the jungle a little ways off of the road.  After taking care of my biz I leave the jungle and when I get back to the street I look down and i am covered in 500000 ants. They were biting me everywhere and it was the worst…I kinda freaked out…lol…such a mean trick but the ants taught me to always obey my companion haha. 

But yeah, out of time, love u all! --Elder Call

pics i have, me cuttin open pipas, green coconuts. Also we had a garbage bonfire last night which was dope. The people burn all there garbage or litter it. Like were talkin garbage everywhere its kinda sad. and its always smokling plastic cus they dont care what they burn its great. kuna BOM there language is nuts, and i might have to learn alot of it. and a huge spider cant see it that well but its a massive banana spider

Panama! (week 8)

Hey fam and everyone, thank u for all of your emails. Wow this week was soo nuts but now that i’m writing this email i’m forgetting so much of this week already haha. Super crazy here and the language is rough so i pray that catches on soon. the investigators are awesome though…all super nice and most of the time they will help me.  I still get made fun of alllll of the time but that’s chill…really not that big of a deal.  it’s suuuper humbling though and its so crazy how much u have to rely on god and just beg u can pick up the language so u can communicate. its frustrating sometimes with a latino companion too because we don’t understand each other…still great though but it takes a ton of patience.  The language is by far the biggest issue right now.  Life is good though, super hard but good. Crazy times!  we got two baptismal dates this week so that’s awesome…baptism dates are for the 25th of the month.  we are teaching a ton of investigators and walk everywhere to meet with them…super draining and soo frustrating with the language.  i have a quick story but probably don’t show the kids the whole thing. so we met a member at a chino and she bought us maltas. She was from the D.R. and was super funny but a total nut…in her fifties probably. So we reluctantly go to her house which is literally a shack and she’s a straight horder. Crap everywhere it was soo gross. but me and my companion are laughing the whole time because she’s a nut…all of a sudden she starts slapping chicken feet on the stove and i almost thru up just watching it.  I was laughing with my comp about it when she wasn’t looking, but i had a bad attitude about the situation cus we were supposed to be doing cosechas (certain type of tracting we do).  so then she starts talking to us more about her life. she grew up in the dominican republic and when she was 14 she was raped by a bunch of policemen.  she ended up getting pregnant at FOURTEEN and having TWINS…one was black and one was white.  from the time they were born they were always fighting and never once got along.  she ended up working on a boat and making a little money, then got in a car accident, and got injured bad enough to lose her job. She was broke and had to move to panama.  Here in panama she barely scraped by begging and trying to feed her kids. She ended up having two more kids and was homeless with her kids her whole life.  the kids are all older now and her daughter has cancer and the other son lost his job.  tons more has happened to her but basically she’s had the saddest life ever.  I’m crying just writing about her.  after she told us those stories, suddenly the chicken feet she gave us started to taste a little bit better and my troubles seemed a little less.  My judgment of her went down 100,000 percent and all i wanted to do was help her and give her all the money i had in my wallet.  moral of the story…never judge anyone no matter what because we have no clue what people are going through…always feel blessed for what u have.  our struggles may be hard but the rest of the world’s struggles are 2,000 times harder.  So that’s all i have for now because I’m kinda out of time…sorry that story was a little longer than i wanted it to be.  It’s SUPER crazy and awesome down here and i’m loving every minute of it, even though its by far the roughest thing i have ever done.  i have a bunch of pics and i will send them all out.  Love you all, Elder Call

first morn waking up in panama. took the pic from the hotel in the city. wow has my life changed since that day

snip bit of our crib, thats the kitchen lol prob the best part of the crib 

just a  pic of me bein a man of the jungle

my comp, me plantin yuka with a kuna, they are everywhere, majorty of the people i am with are kuna in my area. super awesome i loove them. they love all gringos but thats a story for another day 

e today on pday with the bucket and a tupper wear. we dont have running water like half the time so we have to shower with the bucket lol it sucks. gets so hot we have to air out with the fan lol