Elder Waddel

This week Elder Waddel of the seventy came and spoke to us in multizone conferences. Actually it was this morning, which is why I didn't write earlier. It was really cool to come into the conference this morning and see all the hermanas from my group in the ccm, all three of the latinas are in huancayo right now which is pretty cool. It was awesome to say hi to them!

Elder Waddel spoke to us this morning about missionary 2.0. We are no longer out here on the mission to just baptize. We are here to baptize, retain and activate. We are here to teach with the end in mind. Teaching with baptism in mind brings baptisms but teaching with the temple in mind brings converts. It was very inspiring to listen to him.

Let me tell you, I am a complete whimp when it comes to altitude. We went to Concepcion last monday for pday to hike up to a giant virgin statue that you can go inside of. It would have been like a 10 minute hike but it took twice as long because I had no oxygen in my lungs. I miss sea level.... but it was worth it. It was beautiful!

Also we have an excuse "nuestros espiritus son gordos porque comen cada dia" - Hermana Orellana.

Also another quote if you will. "you take the picture because you have the longest arms" (translated) for our zone hermana selfie in the virgin... perks of being like a foot taller and the only gringa in your zone.

I love you all!!!!!

Love, Hermana White

Also, Hermana Henderson (president's wife talked today and she's very strict with the latins in them learning english. She was talking about english interviews this week and how us gringos are supposed to help with the language tests and I had five latinas all turn to look at me. Yup, I've got some teaching work this cambio :)

Sweater Weather

Monday: hermana johnson got a call that she was training again for her last transfer.... which meant that I was leaving the area. Transfer calls don't go out until Tuesday night so I had to learn the Heavenly Virtue of Patience

Tuesday: Hermana Johnson left for Huancayo (Bye mom) and another hermana who was waiting for her new companion (her previous companion had finished her mission) came to La Merced to be my companion for the day: Hna Quispe, from Bolivia. We proselyted and waited ever so patiently for the zone leaders or the district leader or anyone to call but no one did... so we took matters into our own hands and called the sister leaders.

Last Jungle Photo

Wednesday: I left for my new area: La Libertad in Huancayo! My new companion is Hna Orellana from Bolivia so I've been in non stop spanish mode since wednesday afternoon. We share our area with the office elders but they don't get out of the office much so it's basically just us.... which means our area is HUGE! Also, I am freazing. I have been literally living in the nice hot jungle for 3 months so when in comes to anything cold I am basically a baby now. And apparently it's only fall! Let me put it in perspective for you... the only reason I take a shower in the morning in because it's a rule, I wore wool socks to bed the other night and the lady's voice saying "sweater weather" won't leave my head.

Thursday: we had a zone meeting with the president. Turns out I am literally the only gringa in my zone. It was really cool, President Henderson talked about loving the work and loving the people and working hard BECAUSE we love the people not for numbers.

Saturday: We were able to go to the cultural devotional for the dedication of the trujillo peru temple. It was so awesome to watch all of the cultural dances of northern Peru. 

Sunday: The dedication of the Trujillo Peru temple!!!! President Uchtdorf and Elder Bednar came to dedicate the temple. Because we went to the first session we were able to see them put in the corner stone. It was so cute to see President Uchtdorf invite some children up and talk to them in english but they couldn't understand a thing he said. :) Also, I am incredibly grateful for the temple. I am so grateful that my family is sealed for time and all eternity. It's amazing to see how much I took forgranted before the mission but I'm learning now how lucky I truly am to have been born in the gospel.

I love you all!

Also, congratulations April!

Love, Hermana White

Extras:

yes, the area is called la libertad and we cover downtown huancayo. The other elders in our area are the office elders so we're right in the middle of everything. (also, I'm pretty sure president thinks he's super funny, Elder White is one of the four elders in our ward)

Also, just thought i'd let you know that me self esteem has never been higher. The other day someone called me a princess. I'm amazed that people have not crashed their cars from staring as they drive by. The little kids are the funniest. They'll point at me and then their parents will grab their hand and try to teach them manners about not pointing at gringas.

The Bad News Is, She's Got A Cold

Except it's not called a cold it's called "the gripe" it sounds like a monster... probably because it is. My poor companion was stuck in our room with me all monday and tuesday. I, however, was asleep and crying (not really, my eyes just decided to pretend to be waterfalls). Wednesday we got out of the house and were able to teach some people before I crashed. We call our district leader on wednesdays to give numbers and it came out that I was sick. Not 5 minutes later we got a call from the elders in our ward, one of which was the old health secretary. He told me to take a certain purple pill (amoxicilin, it's in our botequin and you need permission to use anything in there) and go to sleep... and I woke up like new the next day.

Thursday we had a zone meeting in Villa Rica. It's a little city about an hour away from la Merced. There's a city called Oxapampa out somewhere in that direction as well which is a was a German refugee settlement so there's a lot of German influence out there. I actually saw a wooden house with a normal roof on it. It was actually really weird. The zone meeting was super good. Our zone leaders did an example where they held a broom stick close to the floor and told an elder to jump over it. Then they asked the elder to just as high as he could. The zone leaders asked him: If you can jump that high why did you only jump high enough to barely make it over the broom stick? If you can do so much more why do you only go as high as the bar that is set for you? 

It was really cool hearing them talk about our potential and it just really hit me that I can work even harder.

Friday night we had a fire pit with the ward and a bunch of our investigators came. It was super awesome! We taught Peruvians what roasted marshmallows were and we sang hymns and everyone just talked. It was super cool.

Missionary work is hard. It tests you both physically and spiritually. Satan is working against you in all directions. He knows that you are a servant of the Lord, but so does our Heavenly Father and he'll let us stumble but he won't let us fall. I am so grateful for the atonement of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I have become so much closer through prayer and fasting to our Heavenly Father than ever before in my life. I've realised how much I need to improve but I've also come to a better knowledge of the grace of God. Yea, we're not perfect. We don't have to be, we physically can't be, we just have to be perfecting and if we're trying our hardest, the rest will be made up for us. In the words of Lowe's: never stop improving.

I love you all so much!

Love, Hermana White

PS: I got both packages. Thank you so much!

Guacamole and Historia Familiar

So my companion and I have been given the assignment of being the
sisters over family history in our area. Every Thursday from 4 to 8 we
have to be in the stake center helping people with family history. This past Thursday was our first time... and nobody showed up. So for
four hours we were able to explore our own family history. It makes me
so sad that I didn't get into family history before the mission because it is so cool! I'm way super excited to work with the members
in our stake and then to go home and work on my own family history!

Also, Thursday, on our way to the family history place we passed a little shop with this chocolate cake on the counter... umm, yes. So we bought cake and contacted the lady there. She was super nice. We were then walking again and we were like: "Hey lets make guacamole so we have a snack when people come" So we went looking for palta (avocado) and the first two little tiendas didn't have any. We kept walking and I look above my head and right above us, over the sidewalk, is a giant avocado tree. The were too high to reach but still, I am so blessed to be serving in the jungle. Anyway, we got the stuff to make guacamole but we didn't have a spoon or a knife... or anything so we walked back to the cake lady and asked if we could make guacamole in her shop. She said yes and then asked what guacamole was. Seriously though, Peruvians are so nice, random people just let you make crema de palta in their stores. Also we introduced someone to guacamole. Also also, I found out from my companion that if you leave the pit in the guacamole it doesn't go brown.

I know you were super interested to hear about my guacamole story.

The work is awesome, the area is beautiful and my companion is fantastic.

I love you all!

Love, Hermana White

Happy BIrthday Dad!

The Cat Came Back

Yes, if it looks like there are grass or tin or chickens
on the roof...you're probably right

Sometimes weird things just happen on the mission. Let's look at last tuesday (happy birthday Libby) for example:

Wake up at 6:30, that's pretty normal, exercise, eat breakfast, study. So far we're doing pretty good. Then we have a district meeting and one of the zone leaders says, Hey, there's a package for you we're going to go pick it up and bring it to you after this. Sweet! So after district meeting we head back to our room, do a little bit more studying and then we get a phone call from said zone leader. "Hey Hermana White, I'm really sorry but this package was actually for Elder White" Yea, bummer. I think the elders in the office were bored and thought it'd be funny. 

Anyway, so we go through the rest of our day and then we end with a family night thing with a family (bueno, two families) of less a bunch of less active girls ranging from 12 to 18 in age. It was super fun, we were able to just talk to them and gain their confidence, even the confidence of the oldest sister who is not a member. It was really special for me to see all of these sisters giggling and making a cake together in the kitchen. I love having so many sisters (Ben, you're awesome too). 

Anyway, now we get to the weird part. We went to visit a recent convert really fast and her mom was like: "you want a cat?" Um no thank you, we just like to come here to hold your cat and then give it right back..... five minutes later we found ourselves walking back to our room holding this cat. We were obviously really tired, without very much will power. We gave the cat to our pension and she brought it back in the morning saying that it had killed one of her chicks. Ok, so now what do we do with this cat? We shoved it out the window. Not 30 seconds later we got a knock on our window. This man hands the cat back to us "Hermana, your cat" As if to say, Hey, you accidently shoved this murderous beast out the window, here have it back. Thank you, thank you very much. We then brought the cat in a bag up to the down town area and let it out. Our district probably judges us so much.

On a much cooler note another investigator was baptized this past Saturday. Her name is Claudia and she was a street contact! She's 17 and basically the sweetest, most precious thing ever. She had a lot of questions and a lot of skewed beliefs at first but now she has a strong testimony and participates in all the activities at church. We just love her so much!!!!

I love you all! Enjoy the flood up there in Texas. (that's so weird to say up there when refering to Texas)

Love, Hermana Blanca