Week 55: All's Quite on the Guatemalan Front

At the end of the day, one thing is for sure:

I am completely exhausted. Just, physically, mentally and spiritually drained.

Not that I'm saying that my week was bad or anything...it was just pretty stressful.

It all started on Sunday as Elder Gil and I went around, saying goodbye to all of the members and converts that he had grown attached to. The entire ordeal was fairly...sad, to be short of speaking. A lot of people cried when he had to go and it made me start thinking about how things will be when I leave this area...

Elder Gil saying good-bye to Aron and Ana

Cheesecake from the Franco family

We'll see how that goes.

During church that day, Manuela came to be confirmed at the beginning of fast and testimony meeting. It was a really spiritual experience, the prelude to a fantastic meeting...for some reason, the messages shared were very well delivered and really caused me to reflect.

Before I knew it, Monday morning rolled around and it was time to head to the office and prepare things for the change meeting that was going to be held the following day. Elder Gil, Elder Rosales, Elder Walton and I were all cooped up in the Mission's office until 8 o'clock at night...

It wasn't that fun.

There was so much to prepare, and time seemed to slip like sand through my fingers, it didn't even feel like I had lived a full day when I crashed on my bed and pretty much passed out.

Tuesday morning was the "Part II" of the epic, stressful office routine that was Monday...as it was the Change meeting. Elder Gil and I ran around everywhere making sure that everything was going well and that there were no (serious) problems.

The meeting itself went very, very well, and President Caffaro and his wife said that they were both impressed at how spiritual the get-to-gather turned out to be.

So that was Tuesday...

I feel like I'm forgetting something.

My new comp Elder Prestwich

Oh yeah, that's right, my new companion! During the changes meeting, we were the second companionship to show up on the slideshow, "In Montufar II, we have Elder Monson as Financial Secretary," I stood up, scanning the room for a sign of my new companion...being in the offices, I already knew who it was going to be, so I was just excited to see his reaction...

Scanning the room, I found him, sitting on the bench on the left end of the chapel, in the process of re-tying his turquoise tie, "and he will be receiving, a new Financial Secretary, Elder Prestwich." 

My new companion stood, looking a little bit alarmed, his tie sill in mid-knot, he grabbed his backpack and we left the meeting to go and give out reimbursements to the missionaries.

My new companion is from Lehi, Utah, he's been in the mission for 8 months and he's pretty tight. Nobody can say his name right though! They all just call him "Elder Sandwich" because it's easier to say :). I don't know him that well yet...but I think were going to have a lot of fun as companions.

office Elders

That night we were in the offices until 8:30 trying to make sure that we didn't lose any money in the midst of all the transactions that we made during the day (we didn't) and then we crashed, once again in the White House when everything was over.

So, two days into the week without a single lesson taught.

At that point I was definitely ready to go out and knock on some doors or something.

So on Wednesday, that was exactly what we did! We were able to crank out 4 lessons and knock on doors and everything that afternoon. We finally got a feel for how we teach together (it's good stuff) and we visited Ana Victoria that night in the house of the Pascual family. Ana has been progressing VERY WELL. Her mother gave her permission to be baptized, and now wants her to start bringing her little sister and her older brother to Church too. I don't know what that girl does, but she is incredibly motivated by the gospel (I think that it's because she has a lot of support from the members ;)) She has accepted the invitation to be baptized on the 16th of this month, and now we are working with her mom too!

Thursday was pretty much the same, there was a lot to do in our area and in the mission offices and by the time that Friday came around I was pretty much beat.

Everything is going well...but I never realized how stressful an "All's Quite on the Western Front" could be.

But I'm really excited! It's going to be an awesome change!

Let's see how it goes!

"I drew this in my planner.  One side is Jaymes in Mexico and the other is me in Guatemala"