You know in the book of Alma, where Moroni smites off the
scalp of the Lamanite Captain?
That´s pretty much how my week went.
Not to say that my week was bad or anything but....
The first order of business: hair and haircuts. On Thursday
during dinner, the CCM barber stops me and a few other elders, saying that our
hair is too long and that the day of reckoning has fallen upon us. So I
begrudgingly followed him to the gym where he proceed to give me the worst
haircut of my entire mortal existence. Not only was the experience traumatic
(the guy used a razor blade to trim my sideburns! I mean, who does that?) but
the results were even less-rewarding. Because I still don´t have my camera, the
best way I could describe it to you is in two words: Charlie Brown.
Think about it.
Now that I look like the round headed kid, my luck with the
language has followed accordingly. Every time I feel like I am taking a step forward in my studies, I take two steps back. For example, Saturday night, my
district was doing a role-playing simulation with the Hispanos. I was an
investigator struggling with the Law of Chastity and an Hermana from the other
district was teaching me why we should follow God´s commandments. But there was
just one problem: I had no idea what she was saying! She was speaking so fast
that the best I could do was provide the occasional "....what? Oh, si si
si...." So my mind was wandering to say the least and I was getting really
discouraged at my language-learning skills. Finally the hermana asked me
something under the lines of, "¿cuantos años tiene?" All I knew to
say after that was how old I was.
Unbeknownst to me, I had told her that I had been struggling
with the Law of Chastity for 18 years.
Needless to say, I have been studying infinitely harder at
learning spanish since then.
On another note, our investigator, Jose agreed to be baptized! He´s scheduled for August 17th! ....which is all fine and
dandy...until he revealed that he had been converted 10 years ago and is now our
instructor for nighttime classes. But while he wasn´t a real investigator, the
spirit that was felt in our discussions with him was definitely real. So
now, our district has graduated to teaching 2 fake investigators and a
less-active member entirely in Spanish!
The food here is actually getting increasingly
more....American. On Saturday, we had hamburgers and Chinese food (which I´m
told are the USA´s greatest contributions to modern society). But with
each day I´m discovering more and more how the CCM is like Hogwarts for Mormons. Every day I´m drawing more comparisons and they always seem to make my
day...it took me 18 years but I finally made it into what feels like a Harry
Potter book.
...too bad my haircut makes me look 7 years younger
than I really am. But even though some weeks may be rough, the salvation of
souls was never meant to be easy work! While there may be some tough moments
the work goes forth undeterred!
AND I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!
-Elder Monson
He also mentioned he would love a Dear Elder letter so he can read it when he is off the computer. So if you'd like to write him that way every once in awhile go to... dearelder.com and choose Guatemala MTC. Thanks for your support and love, I know he feels it!
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