Monday, October 28, 2013

Well I just have to say, thats a pretty big complement pa, comparing
us to a black ops teancum lol. One of our recent converts said
something about us along the same lines while talking to one of her
friends about us the missionaries. She said ¨Do you know who these kids
are? No, they’re missionaries! Do you know what they carry in their
bags? NO, they carry the bible, preaching the good word of Jesus
Christ dedicating their lives fully to him, I don´t know what you
think about that but I think it´s pretty intense!¨ It was so
funny/awesome, haha it made me feel like a black ops teancum right
there lol. However I fully know what you mean about how new
missionaries do not have the same honed skills as the older more
experienced ones do. I find myself in intercambios wanting to tell
them tons of little things that they can do to be better. But I know
the most important thing is that they feel the spirit and have the
desires to get better, then they themselves will change and hone their
skills a little more. I feel like those little missionary tactics I
have really been able to develop here in Suba as a zone leader for 2
reasons.   One is my companions, we both have the desire to get better and
I feel like it´s so much easier to do it together.   With my other
companions I felt like all that we were trying to do was just make it
through the next day alive and well lol. Here I have learned a lot of
good things and have tried to put them into practice. The second is the
opportunity to go out with the assistants every change, they always
have something that they do that is new to me and I try to apply it.
So it’s actually been really fun to try and speed up that development
even though it has been a very slow process for me lol.
So just like you guys knew, my comp now is really grea.  He´s from
Peru just in case dad missed that in the last letter;) one more time
para mi querido viejo PERU haha. We´ve been getting along great, the
truth is that it´s not that hard to get along when you both have the
same goals and like to work hard, and we both have that. He is a
little more talkative than Elder Perez but I feel like God has always
put me with companions that don´t talk a ton and aren’t that outgoing
so that I can be the one that learns how to talk more and be more
outgoing. So far I have gotten better, but I feel like the rest of my
companions could be that way and I still wouldn´t be at the level that
I want to be. The only companion that I have had that was really
talkative and outgoing with everyone was Elder Da Silva. SO it is
going good, me and Elder Landa don´t have as much in common as me and
Perez but I know we will spend these next few months working hard and
having fun:) Actually it was cool because whenever I get a new comp I
just start to bombard them with questions about themselves to try to
let them know that I´m interested and to gain a little trust with him,
but this time it was the other way around.  I picked him up from the
airport and he just started talking away lol asking me every question
imaginable that I hardly had time to ask him questions haha. So that
was cool. We also got basically a whole new zone haha, there were only
2 other changes besides Perez so for a few days we stayed basically
the same.  Then there were 2 other emergency changes that happened in
Barranca, so 2 elders came from Barranca to work here in Suba. I met
all of them but 1 today and they are super cool so I´m excited for the
missionaries that are here now. I don´t know why but there have been 2
mexicans that have been here in Suba and they are both super cool! the
one thats here is Elder Torres and he speaks english and is just super
cool, we hit it right off today when I met him.
SO mom, one sugestion, you should learn how to make a soup called
ajiaco:) Moises knows what it is, so you´ll have to ask him or look
for it on the internet. You guys should try to make it one day because
it is my favorite soup here! People have given it to us twice this
week and my comp and I were in heaven lol. It´s a traditional soup
from Bogota I think, if I´m wrong Moises will correct me, but try it!
it´s really good. Haha so we also had 2 of our favorite lunches this
week from ¨los vegetarianos¨ haha I don´t know what happened but we had
vegetarian food 2 days this week. It´s not bad, it just doesn´t taste
like anything lol, we had soy meat, rice and lots of veggies lol:) So
those 2 days were interesting.
Also it has been raining like crazy here! so one day it was super hot
when we left in the morning, then we went to lunch and it got cloudy.
We left and I didn´t think to bring my rain coat when boom! it hit us.
we were walking up a big hill that’s in our area to probably one of the
most out of the way parts here to go to our ward mission leaders
house. So we were climbing up the hill, and I just had a short sleeve
shirt on so about 20 minutes later when we got to his house I was
soaked to the bone! haha he gave me a white shirt to put on so I dried
off a little bit and put it on, but he is a little smaller than I am
so his shirt did´nt fit to well so when I came out of the bathroom he
got up and started to imitate me doing muscle poses and just strutting
around all funny, he´s always making jokes like that lol. But so I
have been getting soaked a lot here but it´s all good because I always
remember what elder Da Silva would tell me when we would get caught in
the rain here ¨the more we get wet here on the mission the hotter our
wives will be when we get home¨ needless to say, I prefer not to wear
protective rain clothing;)
..
Well Shay you’re awesome!!!!! way to go!!! I´´ll sure be praying for you
this week:) and I will tell you guys my favorite scripture next week
because I want to do some serious searching to find a really cool one!
-LOVE YOU GUYS Elder Crook


Monday, October 21, 2013

Missing Elder Perez



Gosh I love you guys so much! Once again thank you so much for the
letters and support that I get from you every week. It is truly a
blessing that very few missionaries have here.  I love you guys sooo
much!
Well I´ll just cut straight to the chase.  Elder Perez is gone:( gosh dangit
I´ve never felt anything like this after a companion leaves me behind
in an area. Usually I´m super happy and excited but now I´m just kind
of in a funk and missing him. WE just worked so well together, we
never fought or argued once. He didn´t even annoy me at one moment
during the last 3 months that we spent together. Gosh it was just
because we both were able to get along easily with mostly everyone, so
when we were together it was just so chill and relaxed, and yet such a
busy and hectic time with all that we had to do and get accomplished.
He was the very first companion that I had that we would just stay up
and talk all night. Haha even when we were in companionship study we
would just get on a gospel topic and talk for the whole hour not
really studying anything but those were the best companionship studies
because we really became friends and that united us and made us work
really well together. We both this morning confessed to each other
that he has been my favorite companion and I also was his favorite. He
left to Bucaramunga this morning to finish his mission there.  He has 3
changes left so it’s pretty probable that he will die there. He is also
not zone leader anymore. As for me, I get to be with Elder Landa from
Peru. He was my zone leader in Cucuta for 2 changes so I hope that we
can work even harder for these next 2 changes that I will be with him,
he gets here tomorrow morning so I am in trio with Elder Hicken (who
went to the salt mines with me) and his new companion. Elder Hicken
has also become one of my best friends here in the mission.  He’s from
Logan haha. Went to Logan high and was friends with Spencer Mckay lol.
So whenever I talk about some of my cache valley friends he usually
knows who I´m talking about. It´s just weird because I kinda feel like
dad felt when I left to come here. (obviously on a scale a lot smaller)
But I know that I can have a better next 2 changes here then the last
2 changes.  I know it´s possible but I just can´t see how it could get
any better than it was with my compy Elder Perez. One thing I can say
though, is that I enjoyed every minute of our time together. I don´t
have any regrets about how we spent our time together, and that is a
great feeling and these last 3 months that just passed by like the
blink of an eye will be such a cherished memory:) Honestly there are a
lot of good things out there and a lot of good feelings, but there is
no better feeling than getting home at 9 o clock planning, being super
tired physically but knowing that you did some good work and feeling
just spiritually full. Like just such a huge peace that we had a good
day, and we did a good job for the Lord:) I had a lot of those nights
with Elder Perez.
So I´ll tell you how our baptism went this week, yea it was a little
crazy lol. So we got to see the baptism of the bishop’s sister in law.
And guess who baptized her....yeah of course the bishop! haha he’s
awesome. BUT so I guess there was a marriage going on on Friday night,
the night of the baptism. We didn´t really think anything of it, just
that we´d have the baptism in the baptismal room and the wedding party
would be in the cultural hall. Well we were wrong! so the baptism was
supposed to start at 7, and we got there at 5 to start filling up the
font but NO. I guess the caterer needed to use the baptismal room to
serve the food (yes the kitchen is in the room where the baptismal
font is, a little weird but there you have it) but he wasn´t using the
stove so I asked him politely if we could help him move his things to
another room in the church and he got all mad and huffy and told us
no, haha he was even a member and told us no. Not wanting to argue I
called the bishop and was ready to call the stake president lol, the
bishop told me to just kick him out, but to do it nicely and we could
all figure it out. By this time it was 6 and we hadn´t even started to
fill the font. We told the member that we had direct orders from the
bishop to use the room for the baptism and not for the wedding party.
So he gave in but was pretty mad(I still don´t know why, it was
just a room) so we felt like he was not liking us very much. We helped
him move all of his stuff and food, to another room which was the same
except it didnt have the stove or a countertop and it took about 15
minutes. So I turn the hot water on in the font not bothering to check
it because usually it is always hot. Then we organized everything and
cleaned the room and got everything ready. All of this took about till
7:15 and no one had showed up. So we just waited a few minutes and
everyone showed up at once wanting to do the baptism quick. Then the
bishop had the idea to feel the water, it was ice cold lol. I guess
the hot water heater didn´t turn on...oops. Then he kind of
reprimanded us for not checking, my guess is that he did not want to
get into an ice bath (shay:) haha on a dark drurry day when it was
already raining. So he spent about an hour trying to fix the hot water
heater, but his efforts were fruitless! haha so he just bucked up like
a coast guard lifesaving swimmer and stepped into the water, the
investigator too got in. And after all that time and hassle, basically
yelled wow this is freezing! Everyone started to laugh and he baptized
her and everything worked out fine. Afterwards Perez told me, well I
felt like halfway through everyone hated us, but now it’s all good. It
was a good little adventure for us:)
So today I didn´t really have much of a p-day, we had quite a few
changes in the zone and since my companion left early this morning I
have been trying to get everyone where they need to be, coordinating
with all parts of the mission. And taking lots of taxi rides lol, and
here the price is not negotiable so I have spent more money then I
would have liked. Haha funny story before I have to go, one hermana
got changed to go to Cucuta. So the bus left at 3 and I told her she
needed to be there at 2 because if she got there at 3 she was going to
miss the bus. Well we went to the bus station at 2 to drop an elder
off and pick up another one. And they hadn´t arrived yet. So I called
again and they said they were just going out the door. Haha well that
was just a little white lie. Because the assistant called me at a
quarter to 3 and asked me why the hermanas still hadn´t gotten to the
bus station. Well that made me nervous so I called them and they were
still in the house lol. So I told them that they were going to have to
find their own way to Cucuta because they missed the bus. I think they
met the bus on the outskirts of Bogota but am not sure because they
haven´t called, nor will, nor do I want them to.
Well I sure love you guys, I got a good kick out of shay at booster
club:) she is so funny, but thats just shaylen for ya:) as awesome as
can be. Love ya toots!
-Elder Crook