"Who Wouldn't Love This Life?!"

Hey guys! Monday I picked up my companion. His name is Elder Barahona. He is not set apart as a missionary but prefers to be called Elder. He is 24 and is from a part of Huancayo called San Carlos. He was baptized when he was 10 but went inactive for 10 years. He recently was rescued six months ago because he had found a lot of problems in his inactive life and wanted to be better. He lives in Huancayo with his little sister while the rest of his family lives in Lima. He has studied 4 years of architecture and has one to go. He has decided to serve a mission because he doesn’t want to lose the opportunity. He is a really good guy. We went to the “el Tirol” waterfall because it’s easy and the new people wanted to see a waterfall. Tuesday I gave training on miracles and then had a good day of work.

Wednesday was a productive day. I received a call and got the news that the Hermana’s pension’s daughter wanted me to baptize her on Saturday. So that was fun. I also had the chance to give a blessing to the mother in law of the Hermana’s pension. She has cancer and is heading to Lima for a more powerful treatment. It was a cool blessing. We put a baptismal date for Jersy and his little brother, Kevin. They are really excited and I hope they keep these desires to continue learning. The date we put is the 17th of October. Thursday we did a service project for Hermano Wanambal (Jose) and his family. Jose is actually a returned missionary from Chiclayo. He served here in San Ramon as well which is kind of cool and met his wife during his mission (not so cool) then after the mission he came back for her. The service we did was scrape old paint and debris off his house and then poured some concrete to make a sidewalk outside his home. We had a normal day after that except at 8 pm I had to go pick up a missionary in La Merced. His name is Elder Hernandez from Mesa. He went to Westwood High School I guess. He had gone to Lima for migraciones and I had to go pick him up in the terminal when he was making his way back to Pichanaki, his area. He crashed with us for a night and then Friday we traveled to La Merced and sent him off to his area.

Friday we had some pretty decent success—five lessons and two new investigators. We found a SWEET family that I think is going to progress really well. They live in a little pueblo named Huacara, outside of San Ramon. The dad’s name is Fernando and the mom is Mercedes. They have been married 8 years and have six children. They are very, very poor... but seriously are such happy people. Fernando was like asking us how long we would be visiting them and told us that he didn’t want us to ever leave because we are like family. We had been there only fifteen minutes! It was a miracle to find this family honestly. Saturday I baptized Grisell Almendra Marquez Solis. Who is the daughter of the pension of the sisters. She also turned eight on he same day of her baptism. Which was cool she was of course terrified of the water. She cried coming out of the water and hugged me for like 10 minutes until I had to basically drag/carry her out of the font because she was so cold and scared. Her parents are members but her dad was not able to baptize her at this moment in time... after she was all dry she bore her testimony and said she felt a strong power and feels clean.

Sunday we had an assistance of 136 people. We had various less actives there and one investigator, the wife of Jose Wanambal. All in all it has been a good week. I am happy and working hard with my new companion. He is learning a ton and loves the life as a missionary. But let’s be honest... who wouldn’t love this life?!

I love and miss you guys a ton. I will talk to you guys again soon!