What up my people,
this week seemed to fly by, until we hit fast Sunday, I'm
pretty sure fast Sundays as a missionary count as four days. Seriously, Sundays
alone are already my least favorite day when it comes to missionary work. Sunday-Bumday?
nope not on the mission, you probably work the hardest on that day. I think the
reason it's so hard is because that's the day that you go to church for 3
hours, and then that gets kind of tiring, and so then you go home and take a
good 4 hour nap, and listen to hymns, watch church movies, really the whole
idea back home was to "just take it easy" or "the Lord wants you
to relax" I told my self just a little before leaving on the mission, but
there's none of that. Also, fasting is super hard when you are out working all
day, especially when it comes to not drinking water. there was a couple of
times in the summer where I thought I was going to pass out because of not
drinking water, so I learned something important, when it comes to being
hydrated in the summer, drink water, the Lord understands.
Me and Elder Crane got up early this morning to get our
laundry done, it was raining a little bit, there was a cool breeze,and just for
a split second it didn't feel like I was in dirty crowded California. I really
love that early morning feeling, when there aren't too many people out, because
seriously California is super crowded, that's something that I won't miss too
much after the mission. This p-day has been super cool, me and Elder Crane went
to the mall, I was trying to look for a cord for my Ipad, but man it was super
cool to go to the mall, they have a pretty nice one here in West Covina. it's
really the first time that I have had to do something on P-days other than
golf, I wish they had at least a zoo around here or something, we don't have
any hikes in our area, so it was nice to do something, and really feel
refreshed and ready to work.
The other day we went on exchanges with the Elders in our
pad. it was really interesting because they are the spanish Elders for our
area, so pretty much the whole day I had no idea what anyone was saying. That
made for an interesting experience. I'm pretty sure I had the deer in the head
lights look most of the day, people would look at me and start speaking in full
blown Spanish, it was really weird to think about how there are so many
missionaries out there that speak so many different languages. I was lucky enough
to speak english, and for that I thank my Heavenly Father. the Elder that I
went on exhanges with was pretty intense too, I think it was good to see
different types of missionary work, and how you can apply it to your own style
or area. Before every time we talked to anyone he wanted to pray, which sounds
like a good thing, but unless you have served a mission previously you don't
understand how much we pray already, our whole day consists of praying, luckily
that was only for a day, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was over 100
prayers offered that day. overall, it was a pretty cool experience, I felt
pretty grateful to be in english work.
Last Thursday we went over to the Martin family, to see
James and sister Ketchens (the Ghetto black family) and she fed us Chitlins,
which basically is just boiled pig intestines with hot sauce, or as they like
to call it "soul food" They smelled horrible, and I'm pretty sure all
they consist of are just literally fat. They were super chewy, but they tasted
better than they smelt which still wasn't all that great, I think the hot sauce
helped numb my mouth to the texture of them. My companion was already having a
hard time eating them, (not that I was doing much better) but then out of no
where Sister Ketchens started to tell us about the time she got shot 8 times by
an AK-47... which in of it's self is already pretty crazy story. to say the
least, I was fascinated, I began to ask more questions of here experience, one
of which she was explaining how literal parts of her muscles and flesh were
laying on the floor beside her... at this moment I looked over at Elder Crane,
He was as white as a ghost, his shirt and his face didn't have much of a color
difference. I've only heard of this happening, I have never experienced this
happening until this moment. his eyes were fixed on the Chitlins, he was
slouched over, and he didn't look like he was going to last much longer, that
guy was going down any moment now. "oh, man! sister ketchins, I'm really
sorry, but we got to make it home to get there by curfew." If elder crane
was going down I didn't want it to happen in this house, it would have probably
led to the ambulance coming and all sorts of drama going down. soon we were out
of the door, and I told elder crane to lay down, after about 5 minutes and some
water he was good to go, but man, I have never seen that happen before, not to
say that the story wasn't one of the most graphic stories I've heard in a
whilem, and not to mention that the chitlins made things astronomically worse,
but man it was just super weird. Everything is good, and Elder Crane is doing
fine, so no worries there. I love being a missionary, there is so much crazy
stuff that we do all the time, and so many crazy people that we talk to on the
daily, something I believe I was made for.
Until next week,
Elder LeBaron
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