Week 65

It was a good week. As always I'll start with day 1 and fill you all in on how busy things are here. 

So on Sunday night our pension (the woman who prepares our meals) told us that she could no longer give us food because her husband is really sick and went to the hospital, so we have just been kind of bouncing around. We ask members to make us food and buy food and whatnot and it has actually been kind of cool. We have gotten to know a lot more members, which is good. 

On Tuesday we went and visited a family in our ward whose son just got home from a mission in Ecuador. He is super cool and has gone out working with us almost every day. Another returned missionary from Iquitos gave us a total of 17 references because no one in his family is a member of the church, so we are working with one of his aunts right now that actually seems like she will end up progressing so I will let you know how that goes. Later that night we had a meeting with the stake president and we planned our activity called "Eat and Be Merry" it is gonna be super cool. We are going to have games in every room and all of the investigators are going to go play Play-Station and Poker and whatnot and then we are gonna shut-off all the lights suddenly and relate it all to how our life can end unexpectedly, while we are enjoying ourselves, and what if we're not prepared to meet our maker... it is gonna be boss. 

 

On Wednesday we went and did service in Chacarilla with the elders, I will send pics. And then we did exchanges with them afterwards and elder Chau came with me in my area. It went pretty well. 

Thursday we had another pamphlet table activity in Monterrico in the morning and that went really well, we found a lot of people and the elders there are teaching a couple of them now. They really needed help because they had no one to teach. That night we had to go to the stake center in La Molina to interview an investigator for baptism. I interviewed him, it was kinda weird because he didn't like to give straightforward answers, but it was all good. Oh, and we played basketball with a couple of guys that were there at the stake center.  Elder Hunt was on exchanges with one of the assistants there, so he and I played against the guys and schooled them, it was fun but I am rusty! 

On Friday, we had interviews in the morning and our district meeting. President and I talked for like 30 minutes even though the interviews should be 7 minutes. He first started talking to me about football and how the bishop in his ward is the head security guard for the CEO of Nike and how he is Tongan and how all of his sons are playing ball. Supposedly his son is at Utah State right now, his name is Ia Wolfgraham if you want to look him up. But anyway, afterward we talked about the English class I am gonna do and he gave me tons of ideas from the way that his ward did it in Brasil. It's gonna be super cool and I am gonna do two classes, one that starts on Friday and goes for like 5 weeks and then I am going to do another one that is much more organized for 8 weeks. It will be cool, he showed me pics of kids that were baptized from the class in his ward and then went on missions. I am excited! 

Saturday was a normal day and Sunday we did nothing. Haha we were literally stuck in the house all day due to the national census. We went to Monterrico to do some things because the elders there are having problems with their house. The members there made us lunch and made me a birthday cake and everything and it was awesome. I had helped the sisters move out of that house when I was in San Borja but the elders recently moved back because the house is super super rich.  The mom that lives there made me and Elder Beach talk to her children that are living in Provo to test out their English, so that was fun. 

The package you sent is gonna get here this week so that makes me excited and overall I had a good b-day. Even though they say that the census was a failure because only like half of the population did it because there were a total of like 50 questions, but oh well. 

 

Today we just chilled with the zone, I will send pics. Good week overall. This coming week we have leadership council so that will be fun. Thanks for the birthday wishes, love you guys. 

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Much Love,

Elder Mortenson

Week 64

Let's just say that it was another busy week! I met 3 general authorities this week so that was cool. We started out the week good, on Wednesday we went to Chacarilla in the morning and ate lunch there because their pensionista owns a restaurant. She made Arroz con Mariscos which my comp asked her to make.  Honestly i have no idea what it is in English, it was like a flavored rice with sea critter things like shrimp and clams and scallops, it was fetching good! Then we went to San Borja and did service in a children's hospital there. It was for an organization called Operation Smile I think, we just moved boxes of stuff for them. We unloaded 2 whole moving trucks full of food and whatnot. It was 2 zones of elders because the sisters went on Thursday and they were actually in charge of making the children smile. I guess they didn't want a bunch of ugly guys playing with children and trying to help them have a good time, but its all good lol. 

Later that night we had such a sweet lesson with Aliana. She's 15 and has been investigating the church for like 2 years now, her best friend is a member. She had a lot of doubts about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon and we have been trying to help her for a long time now. So we showed Jeffery R. Holland's testimony, where he talks about why it doesn't make sense that Joseph and Hyrum Smith would die for something that was false, and then I shared Hebrews 9, I believe it is, about where if someone gives a testimony it is in force even after they are dead. And then 2 Nephi 29 that talks about how the Book of Mormon confirms the truth of the Bible because it is the testimony of two nations. We asked her if she would complain about getting more cake, or more money, or why she has a problem with the Book of Mormon if it is actually a second witness of Jesus Christ? Let's just say it was a super spiritual lesson and her friend bore her testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon as well, it was awesome! Then we invited her to be baptized on the 27th and she said yes. But then she went home and got in a huge argument with her parents about it because she is only 15 and we need signed permission to baptize her, so we had to go talk to them with the first counselor in the ward and her dad said he would think about it but it doesn't seem very likely at this point. So we are going to try to do a fast with her and another investigator to try to help them. 

On Thursday we went to San Borja and set-up a table with pamphlets and invited people to take one.  We did get some references from that. We also scanned pages of the Book of Mormon with the "Questions of the Soul: Where did I come from?  Why am I here? Where am I going after this life?" written on the tops of them and gave them to people saying we were taking a survey and it was cool. Tons of people read from the Book of Mormon to find the answers to the questions and it turned out pretty well. 

On Friday we had a multizone conference with Elder Godoy from our area presidency. He told his whole story about how he was converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ when he was like 13 and how we never know how big of an impact we can have on someone. The sisters that taught him didn't know that he would go on a mission and later be a mission president and become a Seventy, etc... and help out hundreds of other people. It was really cool. We had a leadership meeting with him after lunch with all of the zone leaders which was cool as well. He put us into groups and had us come up with 3 things that we would do or 3 ways to better the mission if we were mission presidents and then we talked about them and I feel like because of what was said, this next leadership council is going to be crazy because we are gonna talk about a lot of things. 

Saturday we had a day full of appointments and all of them fell through so we contacted all day. That was fun. 

Sunday was stake conference. I don't remember his name but a seventy from Columbia was visiting and he wanted to talk to our investigators after the main meeting, so we were able to meet him. Afterwards, we went and ate with some Venezuelans(idk how to spell that) in our ward. They are really cool. There are tons and tons of them here in Peru because they are all fleeing their country because of the bad circumstances in Venezuela right now. Haha their accents are kind of hard to understand, but they were telling us all about Venezuela and how cool it was before everything went down. 

Then, we went to a meeting in La Molina with almost the whole mission and all of the ward leaders and Elder Calderon talked to us. I think the best part was just seeing everyone from my other areas. Zully, the pensionista from Vitarte almost started crying when she saw me. My companion loved seeing everyone too, because he is about to finish, so he was able to see a lot of his old friends. 

Today we went to Chosica. It is so far away, we left at 8:30 this morning and got there at like 11 to visit a family that my comp baptized who's son is leaving on his mission tomorrow. It was really cool. they made us Pachamanca which is BOMB and we just got back a little while ago. But ya, it was a good week. We have interviews this Friday. I hope we get a little less busy so that we can focus on our area a little more, but it is awesome! I finished Jesus the Christ finally and I started the Book of Mormon over again. I've been studying a lot about the 12 Tribes and the Kings of Judah and whatnot to try to be able to understand what was going on when Lehi and his family left Jerusalem. Let's just say I don't really understand yet, but I will. Can't wait to celebrate my birthday on Sunday with the countrywide census, should be cool. I wish everyone a great week. 

--

Much Love,

Elder Mortenson

Week 63

Wow, this week has been really busy. We literally haven't had time to work in our area which is really sad.  I would kinda like to just focus on proselyting in our area, but the whole zone and all of the activities is our responsibility.To start out, Tuesday and Wednesday were almost normal, we had to go to the office Wednesday afternoon to get all of these banners and whatnot for the "Open Chapel" activity that was on Sunday. The secretaries weren't in the office until like 3:30 so that was when we went and we had to haul all of this stuff back to our apartment and that took a really long time. 

Thursday we had our district meeting and did exchanges with Monterrico, I went with Elder Valle and that was fun. Peru soccer played against Argentina that night and that wasn't the best thing for us because almost all the businesses shut down and there were no buses nor people in the streets so we just kind of walked around trying to contact. The game ended up in a tie and so Peru plays again tomorrow at 6:30 against Uruguay, I believe, so that they can get into the World Tournament or whatever so ya that makes it hard. 

On Friday we did an activity in the morning in Chacarilla to help out the Elders there. We took a table to a park and put a ton of pamphlets and whatnot on it and went and contacted people around the area inviting them to choose a pamphlet. We ended up getting a good number of references for them so that was cool. We are going to do it again in San Borja this week because that area is really struggling. Then in the afternoon we went to the area building for our investigator's interview to get baptized. It was pretty cool because there were some other elders there from Los Portales in Vitarte where I had served, and they gave the full update on the converts there and that they are still active.  Then their investigator finished his interview and came and said hi to me and what do you know...it was a guy that I found with Elder Ponce. I was so happy I couldn't believe it! I told them that I never thought that he would get baptized because he was super super Catholic and I was going to leave him. But he was just baptized so that was cool! A big testimony to me that no effort is wasted in this work and that some sow and others reap. Then we had two more interviews that night for our other two investigators.

Saturday was super busy as well. We got up and went to the chapel to fill-up the baptismal font that morning and then went back later to get ready. After that we had to go and meet the sisters to get some baptismal clothing because we didn't have any. Later that afternoon, we went to Monterrico to interview their investigator and then returned for our own investigator's baptism. Wow, it was a super busy and stressful day, but my companion was able to baptize Liliana, her son George, and Angie. so that made it all worth it! We were also able to start our fast. 

Sunday we went to Ward Council in the morning and presented our idea about teaching English classes that I am going to start doing on the 27th and I think will turn out really well. We´ve been talking with President and he has given us a lot of tips and I think we will get a lot of people to come. Then we went proselyting and ate lunch and went to church at 2:00 PM, it was so weird having it so late in the afternoon. And then we left early to go take all of the materials and whatnot to the stake center for the "Open Chapel". It went pretty well, we kind of just brought people in from the street and showed them around... 

Anyway, today went well. Ate a nice hamburger and watched "Frozen". I created a plan to workout and it is going well. We have like a mini-gym in our house that I get to use and it is sweet. I am so out of shape though, I did some legs this morning and am sore. I'm really not the same as before. I'm taking my protein now as well and am determined! Um, leading a zone is rough and a lot of work but I am learning a lot of things! My companion is awesome. He is literally like Breygan Holbrook in Latino form. He loves to sing, which is cool. 

I am almost done with Jesus the Christ, it has taken me forever to read it. But all is well! Thanks for the support. 

--

Much Love,

Elder Mortenson

Week 62

This week has been very interesting. Haha I haven't even had time to unpack yet because I got here and we went to work. To start off, we did exchanges with the San Borja Elders on Wednesday because they are really struggling. It was cool to be able to go back to my old area. I was the one directing and leading my companion around! I showed him a lot of the former investigators that we were teaching when I was there and some of the good members that can help them out. We visited the members and even my converts and they all told me that I had grown taller! And that I speak Spanish way better than I used to. I hope I haven't grown, but I will have to measure and see how tall I am now. Another strange thing is being in the area where I used to come and do exchanges. A lot of the members and investigators recognize me from when I came like a whole 8 months or so ago. 

Our area is interesting. There is a poorer part, but I can't say that it is that poor compared  to Manchay, up on the hill where I just came from, and the rest is like super rich. I am excited for the challenge that the zone poses and to see what we are capable of doing. We spent the whole morning on Thursday just brainstorming, thinking about ideas and things that we could do to help everyone. We will see how we do. My companion is Elder Rojas from Trujillo, Peru. He is super cool, we have a lot of fun together. He is kind of like Elder Garate so I think this transfer will go well. 

On Friday we had the Leadership Council and that was good. President burned all of us. He gave a training on how to be a leader and what we needed to do... He focused especially on the way that a leader should correct another. Lets just say it was a firey meeting. 

Saturday was a really good day to watch all of the sessions of conference! I was able to go with Elder Beach and Elder Walsh from my zone to the chapel in La Molina that is just like right around the corner from our stake center and watch conference in English. We were there with all of the other elders from my last zone, La Molina, so that was fun. Afterwards we took out money and ate as a zone and went back and watched the Priesthood Session that night. Sunday was good as well watching conference all day. I have to rewatch and read the talks but the one I remember the most was Tad R. Callister´s talk on the Book of Mormon. Hahah he breathed fire from the pulpit like a dragon. 

Today we went to this park that is called the "Girlfriend´s Park". I don't really know, lets just say that they said it was cool and it had like trees shaped in hearts and whatnot...... my companion knows a guy from Vitarte that is a professional photographer and he came and took pics of us. If you would've asked me to do that before the mission I would have said no, but let's just say that my standards of what I call "fun" have dropped really low since being on a mission. We ate completos, which are huge sandwiches and played some games. 

On Sunday, the family that we ate with knew Elder Griffin from North Logan. They showed me pictures of him and his wife and I couldn't believe what I saw. He married Marquis!?! We graduated together so that was kinda surprising...

But everything is going great. This week should be another great week. We have 3 baptisms on Saturday and on Sunday we are going to have an "Open Chapel" activity in the stake center. Our sacrament meeting here starts at 2:00 in the afternoon...weird schedule they got. Thanks for supporting me out here. 

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Much Love,

Elder Mortenson