February 22, 2016

Wellll another week in the jungle paradise of Iquitos. This week zoomed by and I can´t believe I almost have six months on the mish! Super crazy. 

So proud of everyone! It sounds like it was a week full of good news. Congrats to Allie and Hannah and Nicole!! They are going to love BYU, I know it. And Mikey too!! He could surpass me but that´s ok he deserves it. 

The internet is finally (relatively) fast so I can send pictures! 

This week it has been raining almost every day so it is really fun. There have been a couple days where we have had to run home in the rain. After literally two minutes in the rain we are already soaked and we get home and have to change everything. It makes it kind of an adventure to go out and preach the gospel. The rain makes it hard to teach though. The roofs are just corrugated steel and so the rain pounds on the steel and you can´t hear anything. We had one lesson and they asked me to give the prayer and we were already huddled in a little circle to be able to hear one another but I still had to yell the prayer and everyone started laughing. It was not the most effective lesson I´ve taught. 

- soaked after literally two minutes in the rain

- when you are already soaked from walking, nothing left to do but play in the rain 

This week we have also been receiving a lot of food from the people we go and visit. They always invite us to have a glass of soda or aguaje, my favorite. Sometimes we eat strange things, like soda crackers with straight up butter on it like jam. It´s nice though that they always want to treat us so kindly. People really have strong positive connections and memories with the missionaries and it is nice to be an inheritor of that and I hope to leave the kind of impressions so that other missionaries will receive blessings because of the relationship of trust I left with the people here. One thing I´ve learned a lot about in the mission is that people just want to be heard, they want to feel understood and feel like someone is listening. If not by the missionaries, by Heavenly Father. 

We also found a burger place that we like a lot and we have gone there several times. One of the members noticed we like it so they invited us to an appointment and bought us burgers. The guy that makes the burgers told them, ¨Oh, I know how the Hermanas like their burgers, don´t worry!¨ It´s a dream come true, I have always wanted to have my favorite restaurant where the people know my usual order and it´s all happening people! His name is Paloma too so that´s also fun. 

This week the gas station that is on the corner of our street finally opened. It was quite the event. I didn´t realize it would be so spectacular, but they had like a red carpet and fancy dinner and models and motos with huge ribbons. We didn´t realize what was going on, but the night before it opened we just saw a huge line of motocars, that extended probably a half mile away from the gas station. We asked some people what was going on and they told us the gas station was opening and that they would be giving out free hats, t shirts, cups etc. It was insane. They were there all night and then in the morning they lined up again to get gas this time. It was crazy and we had to pass the line every time we wanted to go anywhere. But we have a gas station! We were excited because it was going to have a mini mart too but they changed it last minute to a repair shop so boooo!

- the line of motos that extended down the block and right in front of our house

We got the Liahona for this month and, after looking for what I wanted my new agenda cover to be, I read it. I really enjoyed the article by Elder Christofferson about finding our lives by losing them in Christ and I have been thinking a lot about that. I see a lot of sacrifices that people make to follow Christ. At first, it made me uncomfortable to invite people to do things I knew would be difficult for them - like leave a job that requires them to work on Sunday, or pay tithing when they make very little - but I have learned and I have seen that the Lord blesses us for our sacrifices when we put him first in our lives. It still isn´t easy to extend those invitations, but I have learned I can do it with the faith that I know the Lord will provide for them if they make that sacrifice. When we lose the lives we knew before, we find a better one in Christ. 

I know the church is true and that Heavenly Father is aware of us and loves us infinitely. I have been thinking about that too with the article about the mother learning about gospel truths through motherhood. Her story about the iron and her daughter has been on my mind a lot this week. I love it a lot. 

I love you all so much, I hope that this week is just as good for you. I will be going to another stake conference this week because we are getting a new stake president. It´s not a normal conference and there are a lot of rumors floating around that we have been hearing a lot about, but we will see how it goes. Elder Uceda will be here again this week to call the new stake president so that´ll be fun. 

Love you!

Hermana Fitzpatrick

- the umsha from carnaval a couple weeks ago! 

Everyone grabbed the little plastic things and fruit when it fell