Rachel #7 [Azua - 3] January 21st, 2013

Hello!! Oh boy. This sure was a good week – I think. I can't remember. But I bet it was great! :) Anyways, my computer is working much better now, so this email should be easier to decipher :) Yay!

My kitchen

Dad, you asked what I eat here. Well, since we cook  our own food, it is like the stuff I ate in college. Lots of simple meals. We have been experimenting with the DR food, and it comes out alright. I have definitely had better, but oh well. And it hasn't made me sick, so I am thankful for that. We tried a pineapple last week, and it tasted great!  We also had a watermelon; that tasted normal. The mangoes are not ready yet, but I am beyond excited to try those. The bananas have a sweet taste. I really like the bananas :)

My Companion

Oh! Something that Herm Gamez is working on is her Personal Progress. The president said that we could work on that. It reminded me, Heather, how is yours coming along? Maybe I could beat you done. I will start again, and I will race you. If you win, I will buy you something from here. Deal? If you lose, you get to give me all of your money! :) :)

I'm excited to say that I will probably never have to eat Arroz con Leche :) Life is good.
Oh, we bought a chicken from the colmado (corner store thing) and they pulled it out of a bag, and, chopped it up right in front of our faces! I can definitely see why Mandy went vegetarian for a bit. That grossed my out. They didn't give us the head or the feet, but only because we specifically asked for them not to. Gross. It's making me queasy thinking about it, and to think that I ate that for dinner, ick.

When we are making food here, we don't use recipes. We just guess. and it's fun. I like it. I will probably never use a recipe here. Unless I get some, but overall, no recipes. They are just guidelines, right? :) haha

So we haven't had running water for about a week. We had it last Monday until the night, and then it came on right before we left today :) yay!!! We had 2 water reserves of 160 Kg each (how ever much that is..) and once during the week, we got a little water from our sinks to fill it up some. It's hard living without water. When it came on today, we filled up all of the buckets and containers that we had. It was super fun. We also refilled the big barrels. So we will be prepared next time the water decides to leave for a week :)

Sorry that this is super random, and not structured. I write little notes on a sticky note in the front of my journal, so that I can remember all of the stuff that I want to tell you; it’s handy. But I apologize for the randomness :) I feel like I just want to tell you all EVERYTHING!

I have been told that Azua is the Arizona of the DR. It never rains here. And it is "super dry." So apparently the other parts of the country are a lot more humid! Crazy. I will be drippin sweat all day. I don't here usually. Some days are terrible though. It is tough.

Ok, so I will tell you about the week.
Monday was P day, obviously. We went to a chicken place and some Asians served us chicken, which I thought was weird... shouldn't they be in a, ya know, Asian place? I dunno, maybe I am super racist, it just made me laugh. But after, we just chilled and wrote letters and such. I wrote to Heather Stembridge and also to Lauren Richardson. I hope they get the mail! We'll see.
On Tuesday, we seriously had a miracle. We had 5 appointments with people we had met earlier, and they all wanted to hear more! So we had 5 new investigators. That was really cool. So far, we still have.. 4 of them? One has never been home, but once he finally is home, we will teach him as well. The people here are just so great and accepting. They all love Jesus! It makes it easier.
Then, Wednesday and Thursday were pretty awful. Lots of walking. Have I told you about Olga? She is a single mom of 6 little kids under 10. They are the cutest kids ever! I love them. Olga is 26, and she got baptized last May. She is great, but she yells at her kids, and hits them, and it is super sad. We don't know how to help her! (Yelling and hitting your kids is SUPER common- that is how they raise their kids. I am so grateful that you never beat me up :) thank you) but the other day, we found out that she had whacked her little boy (who is 6), with a metal pot in the back of the head, and he started bleeding and needed stitches. It was super sad. What to do? I think that we need to help her apply the atonement. We will see.  :) The rest of the week was pretty normal. Nothing really awesome happened. We got bailed on a lot. It happens all of the time (except on Tuesday- no one bailed!). But they always bail because they have no calendars, and they don't know their own schedules, so they plan to meet with us when they are scheduled to work. It is frustrating to walk all the way across town, just to find them not there. Ugh.

My District

Yesterday, we had a conference. Elder Nelson spoke. He was in the DR, but not our mission. I am glad that I know how to read lips, because I couldn't understand the accent of the guy translating! But anyways, before the conference started, The Zone leaders came up to me, and they had mail!! FIRST TIME SINCE I HAVE BEEN HERE! :) happy. I got a lot. I got 6 Dearelders, and one letter from my best friend in Minnesota :) :) :) :) Herm Gamez said that I was smiling ear-to-ear :) I believe it :) They were all dated from the first week of January. I got one from mom, dad/Jake, Riss, Nate :), and Uncle Ryan. So thank you all! It made me so happy. I guess the Dearelders take 2 weeks to come as well. Kelton's letter was sent on the 7th, and some of the Dearelders were sent on the 5th, and the 2nd. I don't know when they print those off.. So the letter I sent Nate a few weeks ago was definitely not a reply to his Dearelder. Let Riss know :) haha but you asked a few questions in the Dearelder, which I will not reply to. Ok, Ready? Go!

Oh yeah!! I HAVE A BLOG?!?!?!?!?!??!?! WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?! So these are going to be published?! Wow.. well that is a little scary. I hope I don't embarrass anyone... Oh well!!! But tell the blog I said hi! And also that it is nice of them to care so much about me, enough to read a blog about me. :)

My comp and mission friends

Before I get off, we had Samuel's wife-to-be agree to be baptized. she will be baptized the 23rd of Feb. If everything goes well, they will both be baptized then. Aracelis is crazy- I don't know if she will be baptized yet. The missionaries have been working with her for a long time, and she just told us that she didn't want to be baptized, even though she knows it is true. Ugh. But there’s a baptism this week of the elders, and we have at least 2 investigators (Argeli- he's 22, and has a little son, and is super great. We are sure that he will be baptized in the next month. Super stoked for him, and Izy- she is 20, and super outgoing and loves the gospel. She is scared to be baptized, since she's never been baptized before. She is one of the 5 we met on Tuesday. She is pretty much golden. We also met a guy yesterday- Chico- who wanted to come to church and wanted a BOM. We anticipate great things with him.) But yeah, those 2 are coming to the baptism. We're excited.

The work is progressing, and life is good. The days go by really fast, but the weeks seem to take forever; such is life. But anywho, I love you all. I hope you have a great MLK day, and enjoy the cold weather! Thank you for your support. I am sorry that these emails are super long. I feel like they drag on for ages! Probably cuz they do!

Love you forever!!! The gospel is TRUE!!! :)

All my love, Hermana Erickson :)