HOLA MI FAMILIA!!
HAPPY NEW YEARS!!! Holy smokes I
have so much to tell you but NEVER enough time so here I go. First of all, last
week, which seems like FOREVER AGO, Elder Wilde in our district went home. And
it was sooo hard. It literally felt like a piece of our family was taken away. It
had only been a week but we had grown so close and since it was only the 5 of
us we were all just best friends. He didn’t go into details but he had talked
to us about how he was having a hard time with being away from home and said he
went to bed of a wet pillow every night (crying) and he just missed his family a
lot and he was struggling with Spanish a lot because he was kind of shy and it
definitely put him out of his comfort zone. He’s only 18 though so he said he
really wants to try again when he is ready. I really hope he does. He was such
a good kid and just so sweet. He shared his testimony with us and we had a
district prayer as well as gave him a blessing before he left. It was so hard. I
just wanted to beg him to stay, tell him he could do it! But I knew that wasn’t
my place and he had been meeting with pres Cardon so I needed to trust pres Cardon’s
decision. UGH. It still just breaks my heart seeing him go home.
So that was a rough
start to the week, and we were all pretty upset for a couple of days. But we
have to move on with out him. My companion and I have gotten along better this
week, we’ve always gotten along pretty fine. But she doesn’t try as far as
working goes. I finally had to get on her and say she was never gonna learn Spanish
until she forced herself to speak it. Because in our lessons she just speaks in
English when we are suppose to be doing it all in Spanish. She kind of ignored
me for the rest of the day but she has been trying a lot harder lately, THANK
GOODNESS! So our lessons are going a lot better.
Classes were about the same
as usual. We aren’t allowed to speak English in class anymore so it’s all in Spanish,
its super frustrating but I can see the improvements I’m making. Saturday we
got to go proselytizing AND IT WAS A BLAST!!! BEST experience yet! For one we
got paired up with a new companion and mine was a cute little Latina from
Equador and she spoke no English but I was able to still talk to her. We got assigned
some less actives to go teach so we got to walk around lima! For reals! It was
a pretty nice neighborhood compared to the others people got send to. But we
knocked on doors, I was able to introduce myself in Spanish as well as say the
opening prayer and bear my testimony at the end, the rest my companion took
care of, but I was for the most part able to understand what they were talking
about. It was so cool and I loved that it was REAL missionary work! But my
companion was a boss, she talked to everyone! She’d look at me and nod at
someone and I’d just nod back and we’d go up and start talking to strangers we
met on our way to the other houses. We ended up getting 5 new contacts with
strangers and got there number to turn into the missionaries in the area. Yep
we basically rocked it. I LOVED HER! We agreed (in our charades/ Spanish
communication) that we were the perfect companionship and that we wished we
could be companions, cause she said that she felt like she was dragging her
companion behind her too. Ah I just loved her so much, we bonded so much! She
is serving in Bolivia though.. :( I got her email so we will keep in touch
though. But yeah such a cool experience to be in real Spanish discussions.
On Sunday the older
district above us and all the Latinos left for the field. They were a pretty
big group. So it is literally just my district and the district of 3 elders
above us left (we call them the 3 Nephites) but yeah so a total of 7
missionaries in ALL THE CCM right now. Hermana Sission and I are the ONLY girls!
Its so weird, we have the entire girls hall to ourselves. Its kind of lonely
and looks like a ghost town. And we are only getting 2 new sisters at the end
of this week. So we will still be really small. It was so sad to see them go. I
stayed up talking till 2 the night they left with one of the sisters I was
really close with. We shared a room so we got pretty close, her name is Hermana
Reynolds from New Mexico, I don’t know what part, she is a convert to the
church and is just super awesome. she is 21 years old and 5´0 haha. And I had
to say goodbye to all my Latinos elders. They were soo cool! I got all their
emails though. Ha. So I guess in Spanish they don’t use the phrase ´what in the
world¨ so we taught all the Latinos to say it, its so funny! Its everyone’s
knew saying around here ´que en el Mundó¨ its great!
and I guess that
leaves us to today, since there is only 7 of us the ccm pres and his wife took
us to the beach! As well as the capitol building and we got to tour all the
different things around there, we went into a huge cathedral, it was sooo
pretty and so detailed, and underneath it they had catacombs we got to go see
where 25,000 bodies were buried and we got to see the bodies, of course they
were only bones but it was crazy! So so many all just pilled on top of each
others, the skulls were the coolest part. but yeah it was a lot of fun and a
great way to start the new year.
That’s all I can think of...
I love you guys and I LOVE being here. No where else id rather be! I’m so jealous
you got to talk to Amber! Have a great weeek!
Con amor!
Hermana Nielsen
{Pictures}
For our pday today since there is
only 7 of us missionaries in the entire ccm because all the others left for the
field and we don’t get noobs til Thursday WE GOT TO GO TO THE BEACH! and basically
tour the capitol and see all of lima! it was a BLAST!!
