Thursday, December 27, 2012

Wesley's Letter 12-17-12


Sorry guys, this week there won’t be many pictures. More than anything it’s just because I hardly took any this week. This has been a pretty crazy week with the mission conference and everything and this next week were going to have to do it all over again, except this time were going to teach all of the principles President taught us and we’re going to have to teach it to the other missionaries.

Also, it’s been a week full of trials and tribulations for almost all of our investigators. I don’t know if I had ever told you about the single mother that we are teaching that has 3 kids and only makes about $3.00 dollars a day working all day in a bakery. Anyway this last week she got in a little fight with her 11-year-old daughter while she was washing clothes. I guess the daughter got frustrated and wasn’t thinking straight and stuck her hand in the dryer while it was on.

The dryers they have here aren’t like the ones in the USA. The ones here don’t use any heat they just spin really fast, and the speed with which it spins at is actually fast enough to suck all of the water out of the clothes. Anyway she stuck her hand in it and it was moving so fast it took her finger off, leaving just the inner bone but no skin. In the chaos of the moment her grandma grabbed the part of the finger that was taken off and set it on the counter while they looked for a tourniquet, and just after setting it down their cat jumped up on the counter and ate it. Yeah, It was one of the saddest things in the world to see this single mother break down because of her situation.

We couldn’t even have a good discussion because her toddler went around playing with everything and throwing things while she was pouring her heart out to us. We definitely helped her and inspired her to keep on enduring, but I couldn’t deny how hard of a situation she was in. It’s hard sometimes as a missionary to try to give advice to people who you know are going through harder experiences than you have ever had.

Really since Wednesday not too much has gone down (except for the sun 5 times AYO!) We just keep on keeping it on.

Smitty out.











Saturday, December 22, 2012

Wesley's Letter 12-12-12

Sup Famers,

Another week another baptism.

I’m psyched to hear about everyone’s mission calls! Tell Chelsea Snow congrats on Virginia and if she ever meets a family named Skeen their son Evan was my district leader in Champoton and he’s a straight up homie so be looking for him!

Mom you remember that package you sent me for Christmas? I already ate like all of it hahahaha! It was super sweet though, thanks tons!

The pics I’m sending you right now are of José’s baptism. Yeah, he’s a pretty cool cat. I don’t know if you remember me telling you about him last week but he’s the crazy one that cut off the scorpions tail and he also works in a pig slaughterhouse.

So the reason I didn’t write you until now is because the Mish President made us go to a big ol’ mission conference that took 2 days. It was pretty long but I felt it was helpful, so now my p-day is today.

Actually today I almost got to go to a sweet barbeque at President’s house that he was doing for his secretaries and assistants. I was super syked and pumped and everything, but in the end I decided I needed to work in my area, because basically even though we do have a lot of investigators, all of them have got to get married before they can get baptized. And all of the government offices are closing for the holidays so they’re going to have to wait for at least a month before we can move on in their marriage process. So, I felt like I’ve got to go find some more people to teach in the mean time.

Yep, so it’s a bummer because I really wanted to go, but with sacrifices come the blessings of Heaven.

Most of the pics here are from the conference but there are a few of us doing service with José.

But yeah, I feel like that’s about it this week love you all tons.

SMITTYY WHWHAT

























Sunday, December 16, 2012

Wesley's Letter 12-3-12

Sup Thugs,

This weeks been crazy good. We’ve officially baptized everyone in the Basto Uc family except the parents!

So this baptism was crazy. We were going to baptize someone else, a 16 year old kid named José, but he drank coffee so he’s going to have to wait till this week. But anyway we had everything organized and planned for the baptism this last Friday at 6:00. My comp and I got there a little early to organize everything, but it was weird because none of the 3 members were showing up. But no biggy, we would just hold it off for a little while, no rush if it started at seven.

Then I got the notice, “Hey president Salinas is going to come”, WHAAAAAT??? So then I started calling everyone asking why none of the members were showing up. I found out the reason why, earlier that day we had called the sister in the branch whose son was going to perform the ordinance for José to tell her that José was going to wait one more week so now her son didn’t have to bring his white clothes. But she misinterpreted it as, “Oh don’t worry about coming because there won’t be a baptism this week” She went around notifying everyone else in the branch that there wouldn’t be a baptism. So basically very few people showed up at the baptism, and that was sad, but it was still cool that President Salinas came to our baptism.

Yeah, but besides that this week has been pretty cool! We’ve got the prison in our area and the other day we went to the prison to go try to see all of the hammocks the inmates make. Basically on visiting days all of the inmates set up a make shift Bazaar street market to sell all of the little things they spend all day making. That’s how they kill time, make money, and at the same time to do something productive with their time instead of shank each other. Anyway we went there to get one artisan quality hammock at slave labor prices. And basically the guards didn’t let us in but there was a small store in front of the prison were they sell all of the hammocks the inmates make, a little bit more expensive, but still dirt cheep. And there is where I think while I’m here I will get any hammock I need because they sell hammocks here for under 40 dollars for what would be worth at least 200 in the US.

Also I don’t know if you saw the pic of the scorpion on the string but basically that’s our new pet Panucho and we gave him a leash so he doesn’t go wonder off. No.... but really do you remember the Jose that I told you about? Basically he’s a genuine Mayan mountain man. We were just sitting around when I noticed a scorpion. I was like OH CRUD! But José being the crazy, psycho, manly man that he is, goes up grabs it by the tail and using a small rock cuts its stinger off! It turns out that without its stinger scorpions can't do anything. Then he showed me the Meridence tradition of putting it on a string leash, haha Jose is hilarious.

Basically I’m out of time again, PEACE OUT!

SMITTY


























Monday, December 3, 2012

Wesley's Letter 11-26-12

Sup Famers,

As it sounds from all the letters I’ve been getting, like everyone in the world is getting sweet mission calls. Tell Karissa and Danielle congrats, and that President Dyer and President Crickmore will be great mission presidents.

I’m super psyched but super bummed at the same time that I won’t see anyone when I get home, because of their missions. But it is better for them to be there than at home.

Also tell Matt to ask his comp which ward he was in while he was here in Merida. With that I could tell you if I knew him or not.

Alrighty, well things have been going pretty awesomely around here the miracles just keep coming...

This last week the 3 we had planned to baptize we decided to wait till this week because the dad is a police officer who does 24-hour shifts and works every other day. Last week he would have missed the baptism and the confirmation due to his schedule but this week he’s got a schedule that is going to work. So the baptism will be on Friday, and he’ll also be able to see the confirmation. And now the girl Vanessa her boy friend are going to be baptized that same day, so now it’s 4.

Yeah, the parents would also be getting baptized but they need to both get divorced first from their first spouses and then get married to each other. As of now it’s going to take a while for them to acquire the money necessary for it, but they both seem pretty determined to get baptized. Even if I don’t end up being the missionary that baptizes them I will at least leave this area knowing that even though they’re not baptized they are definitely converts, and they participate more in ward activities than most members.

All right to explain these pics, firstly there are a few pics of my comp killing a scorpion. Basically we just casually walked into the house after a fun filled day of work and we find this abomination chilling on the wall above the fridge. You may not be able to tell very well but that guy was massive, by far the biggest I’ve ever seen here. It was about 6 inches long so we took our pics and then curb stomped that sucka with the blunt end of our broom.

There are a few other pics of my area. The walls with the graffiti on them are actually the airports walls. It’s pretty sweet, it goes for like a mile of pure graffiti paintings like those.

My area is pretty sweet, and also the ward is really good. The member I told you about before with the charter bus helped us out the other day to pick up an investigator that had basically lost all faith that there could be a church whose members gave liberally of themselves and that really lived the standards that their church preached. But with that ride and her meeting the rest of the ward at an activity she was shocked and now very interested.

Sorry I’m all outta time again.

I love you all tons and really admire all of those who have recently decided to go serve missions. It really changes everything.

Love,
Smitty





































Saturday, November 24, 2012

Wesley's Letter 11-19-12

Sup Fam n Friends,

Good news, this week we baptized again whoop! Their names are David, Armando and Veronica. Do you remember a while back when I told you about the lady in my last area that wanted to get baptized but her husband didn’t let her? Well that’s Veronica, and on Saturday she finally got baptized! So my comp and I went all the way back to my old area, to show our support. She seemed super happy. Unfortunately we got there after the ordinance was done because we took the wrong bus and had to walk like 18 blocks! But at least I felt good about going out of my way to show her my support.

The other Armando, he and his sister Josaline, both got baptized. Because their mom has been less active in the church we’ve been working hard with her and her kids to help them come back and now they’re finally active again.

The other family is the family Vasto Uc. They’re investigating and have recently been having some economic crisis because the dad is a police officer that has been out of work for a while, due to a work related injury. Basically a kid on drugs hit him with a 2 by 4 while he wasn’t looking and broke his arm but we’ve been helping them out tons and teaching them the gospel.

At first while teaching the family the dad was the only one who listened to us. The mom and the kids all would run inside and hide, thinking we had no idea they were home.

The mom even said she hated that we came. But as the story goes now they’re all aboard the baptism boat, David was the first to shove off from port, but this week were baptizing the rest of the kids! The mom and dad still aren’t married so we’ve got to resolve that before they can get baptized. But they are both super grateful that we kept visiting them in the beginning, despite their objection to it. Actually in this album there’s a picture of the mom Nelly preparing a pib she had made for us to show her gratitude. The same lady that was always telling us she was too busy or not interested to hear what we had to say.

There’s a pic of me impersonating the street venders that sell stuff from their trikes, I’m selling the pibs Vasto Uc FAM prepared for us. Hahaha! Yeah, well now they’re all super excited and the girl Vanessa and her boyfriend Jose are preparing to get baptized. He’s super funny. Right now were trying to convince him and David, when they turn 18, to go out and serve a mission.

Ok, another pic that I’ve got here is another member of the branch. Hermano Cruz Chan. He is a bus driver who took his work bus and picked all of us up, the Basto Uc family and a bunch of other investigators, to go see another baptism in the branch. We rolled up in style.

Yep well that’s all folks,
Smit