So, uhh, I got this gross hand rash
and so it hurts too much to type.
So I’m just going to copy and send my comp’s email. P.S. I have not even
read it, so good luck.
Buenas Tardes a todos
This week was quite the one indeed. At the
beginning of the week, according to the rumors, we assumed that we would both
drop 6 months in time serving in the mission. That meant that my
companion would go home in a month but as for me, I just thought to
myself, "Man, I got so much time left, whether they drop that amount or
not. I'm just gonna keep my enthusiasm up about the mission." So as we
know now, there were a total of no changes at General Conference in contrast to
the about 6 changes that people in my mission thought were going to happen, so
we did indeed have a multitude of disappointment around us after the Sunday
Afternoon Session of General Conference came to a close. Nevertheless, I was
personally a-ok seeing as my perspective of the concept of time has drastically
changed since I got into the mission field anyway. But now that that's
addressed, I'll get into the other aspects of the week.
So the other day, Elder VanBuskirk and I
were walking, and a lady walked by and she was holding a baby. We said our
usual greeting as we do when we pass by anyone in the street, which was,
"Buenas!" (short for "Buenas Tardes!"). She, then, pointing
to the baby, looked at my companion and said, "¿La quieres?" (Do you
want her?), to which he quickly replied in Spanish, "No I'm good, thank
you very much.", and then she replied something to the effect of, "I
don't either, but I mean what can we do?" and then she walked away. Don't
worry, she was still holding the baby, she just thought it necessary to make
the remark. Now this was a pretty quick exchange between Elder VanBuskirk and a
random lady in the street, but I feel like there's so much more to it. She,
holding her own product of the beauty of nature, decided in that second that
this child was too much work. In two easy words, "La quieres", she
was willing to sell the life of her very own child to the very first white guys
that she saw in the street.
We had another interesting encounter while
we were walking the other day as well. We get a lot of hissing when we walk,
you know, because we're white. If you're not familiar with what hissing is,
it's when girls (or guys, but usually guys do it to other girls. It would be
kind of weird if we got hissed at by guys) make a loud hissing sound while we
walk in the streets to let us know that they see us, and they're interested.
It's kind of annoying but it's also a very good self-esteem booster, not gonna
lie. So a lot of girls in the streets like to show their appreciation for us.
Sometimes they pair the hissing with a little remark like, "Hey gringos,
how are you guys doing?", you know, just like the regular cat-call
remarks. However, the other day we were walking and we got our all-time
favorite cat call. I cannot compare it to any other cat call that I have ever
gotten, because it was that much better than all previous ones combined. We
were walking, and we got hissed at, and it just so happened to be that the girl
hissing at us was directly in front of us, so we were kinda forced to continue
to walk in front of her. There wasn't a way to avoid it either, so we continued
to walk and just braced ourselves for the cat call. To our pleasant surprise we
hear her say, "¡Wow, ustedes comen maíz!" which directly, and without
any innuendos translates to, "Wow, you guys eat corn!" There is
nothing really left to this experience. I think that I'm just gonna leave this
one here for you guys to interpret because I haven't quite figured it out yet.
There's this guy who sells empanadas
literally right outside of our house, and they are delicious. When we usually
pass by, I just ask him for like a couple chicken empanadas, maybe an egg one,
maybe a ham and cheese one if I'm feeling adventurous. However, this last week,
we were introduced to something incredible. We saw these people ordering larger
empanadas. Made out of 2 dough circles rather than the usual 1. So we asked our
empanada guy, "hey man, what's that big sucker you got there?" and
he's like, "oh, that boy? That right there is the completo." Now I
don't know if any of you know Spanish or not, but "completo" means
"complete." So we're like, "Wow, what's the completo?" and
he says, "It's full of every last ingredient that I have on this here
table." It's important that you all know that I would have bought this
thing no matter what price he gave me, but nevertheless, we asked him how much
it was and he said it was 60 pesos, which is like a dollar and 20 cents in
English. That's actually a really good deal compared to the 25 pesos he does
for each individual 1-ingredient empanada, so we went for it. I didn't get a
very good picture of it, but as follows is the best I could have done. From
this angle, you can see some egg yolk on the right, egg white on the left, some
ham, chicken, and cheese in he middle, and other ingredients that are unseen to
the naked eye:
Let it be known that that empanada was
unbelievable.
Alright, well, as you all know, it's the
season for sharing! This past Saturday was the birthday of our Savior Jesus
Christ. We know from modern revelation that the real birth date of the Savior
was not in fact on December 25th, but instead on April 6th. So in honor of His
real day of birth, we celebrated Christmas in April. We invited the other
Elders in Pantoja to eat some pancakes with us, and we listened to Christmas
music, and we ate, drank, and were merry, every last one of us. We ate pancakes
and pineapple, drank chinola juice, and talked joyously. And I have a pic here
to prove the feast:
Also if it means anything, we also had hot
dogs with the Pantoja boys on Thursday to celebrate the season for sharing.
Just thought I would tag that on real quick.
As for Christmas decorations, due to the
slowness of mail service from the United States to the Dominican Republic, my
companion received his Christmas package pretty recently. We thought it would
be a good idea to take the decorations received in the package and get the
house all nice for the special occasion. I would love to say that the main
reason we decorated was because of "Real Christmas", but I feel like
the bigger reason was the overstock of unused Christmas decorations. But let
the record show that I feel our intentions were just either way. I also have a
couple pictures of our set-up that I would love to share, which I will caption
along the way.
Our Christmas Tree made of streamers:
Our real fake small christmas tree which has
under it 2 wrapped copies of El Libro de Mormón: Otro Testamento de Jesucristo:
And that concludes this segment of pictures
with E'K
Actually I do have one more picture, but it
has a story to it first. So my companion has had this super weird rash growing
on his arm pretty recently. It wouldn't have been super bad, but one part kept
getting scratched and stuff, so it turned out pretty bad, and looked infected.
We decided to call our leaders in the mission so they could help out, but none
of them answered, and ultimately we decided to go to one of our favorite
members, Hermana Castillo. She's a retired nurse, so we went over to see what
she could do about it. She said it looked infected and proceeded to start
poking the crap out of my companions already-hurting rashes, and then continued
to rub alcohol on them up the wazoo followed by some antibiotics. Looked pretty
dang painful, but logic says that what she did probably helped. And while he
was in pain, I took the liberty to get the camera out and take a quick picture
of Hermana Castillo just poking a needle right into the rash. You are all very
welcome for the imagery:
Alright I'm gonna get into just a quick
spiritual experience we had from the week so that this email isn't entirely
just rashes, getting hissed at and getting a baby offered to us. So we loved
conference a whole lot. I, as many could probably relate to, never appreciated
General Conference as much as I could have before I came out and decided to
serve a mission. At first, I thought I was beginning to love it because of the
excitement of changes that our new beloved Prophet Russell M. Nelson has been
making. But seeing as this conference had no changes involved, and I held onto
my excitement about hearing from those called of God to speak to us this last
weekend, it seems as though my appreciation has just grown regardless of what
changes in the church are made during the 5 sessions. I loved all of the talks
which were given. Of the talks, I personally felt like the words of Elder
Holland and those of Elder Bednar just resounded with me the most. I probably
resonated with Elder Bednar's talk so much just because I love the Temple so
dang much. I've had such an appreciation for it since I was able to enter with
a full-use recommend and receive my Endowments. I love the encouragement that
was given to us as endowed members to, in a sacred and humble manner, be more
open about the nature of the House of the Lord. By doing so, we can surely
excite other friends of ours to receive the same things as we have, which are
so necessary to return to the presence of our Heavenly Father. That being said,
I would invite everyone to get excited about the Temple. It's not meant to be
seen as something to be nervous about. In contrast, and it's meant to be
something to look forward to, and be excited about. And that's essentially what
I got out of Elder Bednar's talk, and why I loved it so much.
Speaking of General Conference, between
sessions, we got ourselves a sweet dinner appointment with one of our good ward
friends, Khenry. He found us after the second session on Saturday, and invited
us to come over and make empanadas with him. So we were super excited about
that being as empanadas are delicious. I already mentioned above our experience
with the ultimate empanada. So we went over there, and before Khenry started
the actual empanadas, he gave us this test empanada thing, which was just made
out of the empanada dough. He just about burnt it, so I decided to take the
reigns in the kitchen, and I had him put the ingredients in the empanadas while
I went and fried them at a better temperature. In the end, it turned out to be
a delicious empanada night, and we got to hang out with Khenry and the other
Pantoja Elders before trying to go back and do Priesthood session. Long story
short, we did not get to watch Priesthood session until Sunday because our
leaders didn't want us getting home late, but it's all good, everything turned
out just alright anyway. And to end the email, I'll add the picture from the
empanada night with the boys.
This one is titled, "Me, in what looks
like what could be a picture in the next edition of the 'Adjusting to
Missionary Life' pamphlet":
And that should just about do it for the
week. I love you all, and I will talk you next week. E'K out.
Hey I’m on rn, but I can’t stay long because
I have to go to the hospital to get a rash checked out. Love you.
Hey, is there any way you could get Mrs. Jonathan
to do a recommendation for me at BYU? I think her position and great spirit
could help. And I know that she hasn't thought about me since 5th grade, but
she seems to have a good outside view of us and the family.
Plus, I started my BYU application and put
most of the essays in already, but I need the transcripts, and if you could
help edit my essays, too.
Gotta go. Talk to you tonight. Love u.
Hey, I’m back.
I’m good, but the doctor says it herpes.
Freak,
I don’t know if it’s the same thing.
I'm
fine. Don’t worry. I got the medicine I need.
Gotta
go. Love you.
