Man vs Spider

Hey guys. This week started off pretty good but got progressively worse. But some exciting stuff happened so here we go haha

Two drunk guys

On our way back to the apt one night we stopped to talk to a guy. We didn’t know it before, but he was quite drunk. As we were talking to him he would keep shaking our hands. Like every 10-15 seconds he would say “gracias hermanos” and shake our hands again. Then another drunk guy came out of the alley nearby and they both started talking to us and shaking our hands. I was enjoying it. We asked them if we could share a message. They didn’t really process what was said and kept talking. But then they said that they wanted to pray with us. Then they grabbed our hands and we made a little prayer circle. Two drunk dudes and two missionaries holding hands in a circle. I wasn’t really sure what was going on or who was supposed to be praying, so after we stood there for a little bit I just started to pray. They shouted “amen” and stuff during the prayer which was good. Then one of the drunk guys hijacked the prayer and started to talk. Eventually it ended and we all stopped holding hands, except for the drunk guy on my left. He didn’t let go of my hand so I just stood there holding his hand for a bit. It was just a funny experience. Obey the word of wisdom kids.

President Interviews

We had president interviews this week which was great. We walked like 30 minutes to the chapel for interviews, and right as we were walking up to the gate, President pulled up in his car. He pointed to the gate for us to unlock it for him, but we didn’t have a key for this church building. Elder Lugo knew that, and turned to me and said with his spanish accent, “you just lost the best opportunity of your life”. But I decided I could just try the key I had anyways. And it worked! I was able to open the gate for Presidente Breton. It was quite nice.

But interviews were great and President Breton is the best! He is really happy with the work me and Elder Lugo have been doing here. It's nice to feel appreciated.

Man vs Spider

One night this week we left the window in our living room open which wasn’t very smart because the next morning there were hundreds of mosquitos everywhere. So I spent the morning killing as many mosquitos as I could with my zapper thing. After killing a bunch, I went to my closet and saw something moving in the back. So I ran into the other room and grabbed my bug catcher. I came back, and there in the back of my closet was a tarantula. It was nuts! But I was prepared. I quickly was able to catch it with my bug catcher. But this thing was massive and I didn’t want to crush it because that would be nasty. After a little bit, we decided to try and burn it. So while Elder Lugo held the bug catcher, I grabbed a lighter and some mosquito repelent and lit it up. It was so sick! First the tarantula got lit on fire but then, tragically, the whole net on the bug catcher got set on fire too. So I’m gonna have to make a new one. But we successfully killed it. The rest of the day I don’t know why but I was just replaying in my head the scene of Hagrid from Harry Potter crying at Aragog's funeral. Someone should go watch that clip for me.

Teaching People

I’m still really really overwhelmed with all of the people we're visiting. Like I don’t know how to help them all. We did have 9 people come to church again this week which was good. Also it’s kinda funny because most all of them were people who we didn’t think were gonna go, and all the elect people didn’t show up. Even though we spent our morning going to each of their houses trying to wake them up. Oh well. 

One of the elect people that came to church was this guy named Isaac. He’s from haiti and only speaks English and Hatian Creole. So I felt kinda bad for him not being able to talk to anyone at church. I did my best to translate for him during sacrament meeting though. He’s cool. 

Another cool thing was that we’ve been able to get a lot of members helping us out with lessons. Yesterday we had a great member come to all of our lessons in person. Having a member to help testify of what we’re teaching is really powerful. 

Our friend Jeremy is still coming to church all the time but is wanting to push his baptismal date back. But our friend Joan is wanting to get baptized. Joan and Jeremy are friends so we’re going to try and do it on the same day so that they can support each other. 

There’s honestly so much to do and I’m pretty overwhelmed but we're staying busy which has been really good. 

Spiritual Thought

So this week was tough but I know I’m doing my best. I’ve been praying really hard for the Lord to help me figure out what it is that I’m missing and what it is that I can improve on. Still haven’t gotten an answer, so hopefully I can figure that out soon. I want to be the best missionary I can be and I just feel like I fall so short all the time and I get really really discouraged. So these scriptures in D&C 6 were good for me to read. 

33 Fear not to do good, my sons, for whatsoever ye sow, that shall ye also reap; therefore, if ye sow good ye shall also reap good for your reward.

34 Therefore, fear not, little flock; do good; let earth and hell combine against you, for if ye are built upon my rock, they cannot prevail.

35 Behold, I do not condemn you; go your ways and sin no more; perform with soberness the work which I have commanded you.

36 Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not.

37 Behold the wounds which pierced my side, and also the prints of the nails in my hands and feet; be faithful, keep my commandments, and ye shall inherit the kingdom of heaven. Amen.

Also another thought - this week I got an email from a friend from high school that I heard from in a while. Then all of these memories just came back and it was so weird to think that I even existed before the mission. I was remembering stuff that happened before the mission and thinking “man how did I forget that?”. I think that when we step through the veil we’ll feel the exact same way with who we were before this life. We’ll remember stuff so clearly and be like “man how did I forget all of that?”. I’m really excited for that day when everything will make sense!

Ciao

-Elder Wride

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And for your enjoyment if you got this far - here is a little bonus section that Ethan sent to us today over facebook messenger, with the note of "I had a traumatizing experience but don't want to put it in my weekly. So here it is for y'all because I feel like I have to tell it to somebody." I want this to be part of his blog book record, so here it is. Pretty funny. Ethan sure has come a long way from his teenager days of not wanting to use the hand towel that his little siblings touched!

The Toilet Hunt Elder Ethan K. Wride It was about 5 o’clock on Friday, August 20, 2021. We had just finished a rough lesson. It was one of those lessons where you start and then the investigators hijack it and just talk about their lives for an hour. Then at the end of the “lesson”, we were really trying to get out of there so we could be on time for our other appointments. But, they weren’t done with us yet, and brought out some bread and some homemade “juice”. I knew that my body would prefer not to eat it, but we had to go, so I hurry and scarfed the bread and juice down as fast as I could. About 15 minutes later, I could feel that my stomach was having some difficulty, and was going to need to have some alone time. I told Elder Lugo that I needed to use a bathroom, and he laughed. We were nowhere near the church or the apartment, and finding a bathroom wouldn’t be easy. But I knew that I had to do it. Toilet #1 - I walked into a church where a lady was sweeping. They are christian, so I thought it would be an easy win. I asked the lady who was sweeping if they had a bathroom I could use. Without looking at me, she pointed to a door nearby. I opened the door. Yes, there was a toilet. But that was it. No sink, no toilet paper, just a toilet. And the toilet was so close to the door that I couldn't shut it all the way. The lights didn't work either so I couldn't even see where I was pooping if I did it in privacy, which meant that if I wanted to poop everyone was gonna have to watch. I stood there analyzing the situation for a minute. I didn’t want the lady to be offended that I chose not to use it, so I tried to stand in the little toilet room and attempted to close the door, which I couldn’t. Finally I just walked out. I told the lady “gracias”, and continued my search. Toilet #2 - I walked up to another lady sitting outside her house if I could use her bathroom. She said that it was broken, but referred me to talk to a guy in a colmado across the street and that he may have a bathroom available. This led me to “toilet” #3. “Toilet” #3 - I say “toilet” because it was not a toilet. I asked the guy at the colmado where I could go to relieve myself, and he said “poo poo o pee pee?”. I didn’t want to admit to him that I was going #2 and it wasn’t going to be pretty out of fear that he wouldn’t let me use his bathroom, so I said “pee pee”. He then pointed outside to a group of cement blocks, where behind the blocks was a shack. He told me to go there. I was already skeptical, but figured I may as well take a look. It took a while to open the door because it was nailed into the wood (the only way they could close it I guess), but I finally got it opened. There was just a cement floor with a little hole, probably the size of a bottle cap. I had barely got a look when I said to myself “nope” and headed out to continue the search. At this point, Elder Lugo was laughing pretty hysterically at every one of my attempts. But I was determined to use a toilet that would clean me up, not make it worse. Toilet #4 - We walked for a bit and found some people sitting outside their house. I chose them because their house looked somewhat orderly. We asked one of the guys two questions. First, we asked, “can we teach you about Jesus?”. He said sure. Now that I think about it, we probably should have asked question two first because of how urgent the matter was. So then we asked question #2. “Can we use your bathroom?”. I said “we” because I didn’t want to be singled out. He looked very surprised, but said “ok” and went in before us to clean up I guess. After a couple minutes He came out and motioned for us to go in. So I went in to use the bathroom. This was definitely the best option thus far, but still wasn’t great. The toilet had previous remains in it, which surprised me because the guy had gone in before me to clean up. Now that I think of it, he may have gone in before me to use it. Who knows. Anyways, so I looked for a place to flush it. There was no way to flush. I was about to see if I could lift the top of the toilet off to try and flush it manually, but then quickly noticed that there was no toilet paper anywhere in the bathroom. Then I checked the sink. To sum it up, it was broken. And even if it worked, there was no soap. After a couple minutes, I knew I had to keep looking for another toilet. But I was running out of time. My stomach was not happy. Then suddenly I realized that I had to pretend I was using the bathroom because everyone was waiting outside for me and could hear everything I was doing. In a moment of panic, I pulled out my water bottle and began to pour some into the toilet, trying to create the correct sound. Thinking I had done a good job, I opened the door, and everyone was just sitting there in complete silence. I could tell Elder Lugo was fighting trying not to laugh. I did not use the bathroom. I knew it, and I knew that they knew it, but we all just pretended that I did and I left.

I would have taken down the guys number before leaving but I was too humiliated to ever want to see him again. Toilet #5 - At this point, my body was starting to panic. I decided I needed to play it safe and stop by the house of a member. So went to a member house and asked if I could use their bathroom. He asked me a farmiliar question. “Poo poo o pee pee?”. Remembering what had happened last time I answered that question incorrectly, but still not wanting to admit that I was going to be in there for a while, I shrugged and said “Honestamente, no estoy totalmente seguro”. He laughed and pointed to where the bathroom was. There was just a curtain of privacy. I looked inside the bathroom, and the toilet was missing the toilet seat. And there were previous remains in there yet again. Nevertheless, I decided I was going to make it work. But there was no way to flush the previous remains. Neither was there a way to wipe myself after going. And yes, there was no sink. Suddenly, the curtain opened and Elder Lugo handed me some napkins that he said were from the member. I pondered the whole situation, but just couldn’t bring myself to it. Alas, bathroom #5 also failed me. At this point, I was freaking out. I decided we were going to have to make a speed walk to the apartment, because if I ran, it would make it worse. However on the speed walk to the apt I decided it would be faster to go to the church. Elder Lugo was really enjoying all of this. A little too much. As I speed walked, I was remembering all of the people I’ve contacted who I’ve shaken hands with. I was stressed out. After a while, with the church building in view, my body timer went off. I knew I only had two minutes until the beast was unleashed. So I broke into a full sprint and left Elder Lugo behind. Normally, this would be against mission rules, but it was an emergency. Toilet #6 - I never use a toilet without covering the toilet seat with toilet paper first to be safe. But this time, I had no choice because of the timer. I sat immediately upon it. It worked quite well, but the door lock was broken so I had to stick my pen in it to keep the door shut. While I was in there Elder Lugo was shouting stuff at me from the door with his broken english like “how’s it going?” and “is it coming out okay?”. It was humiliating, but there was nothing I could do. After a while, the problem was fixed. I was able to wash my hands too. When I left the bathroom, there were elders outside who looked worried. But I said "nevermind, I am well enough off".

-THE END- 

Corey's comment: That brings back a lot of memories

Hyrum said: I laughed hardest at "Nevermind, I am well enough off" (a quote from Joseph Smith to his mother after he experienced the first vision, haha)

Ethan also commented today "It's also recently occurred to me I'm out shaking hands all day with these people, and I did not find many sinks, soap, or hand towels in my visit borrowing their bathrooms today. I'm going to make sure to try and always fist bump..."