First, some pictures from my super fun birthday last week. I love the Mexican tradition of shoving the birthday person's face into the cake. But maybe not as hard as this.
We destroyed my Iron Man piñata.
The Elders dressed up as Golosin the bear.
Right after what was definitely the strangest week of my whole life, I had one of the best weeks of the mission.
It started on Tuesday with a zone conference, the first meeting with President S we've had. Compared to all the rules he was going to put, he doesn't really want to add all that many. Just district classes Monday at 5, a very structured personal study schedule, obedience in waking up and coming back home, and... the part in the hair. I'm not catching the logic there, but whatever. A rule's a rule. But as all who know my hair will testify, it is impossible to put a line in it or control it in any fashion.
In front of everybody Sister S had all the Elders sit down so she could show to us where to put the line in the hair. When it was my turn I told her before sitting down, ''I don't think it's possible, but go ahead and try.'' She said, ''With faith everything is possible,'' shrugging off my remark as if I hadn't already attempted to put a line in my hair 5,000 times and failed every time. After about 5 minutes of combing and spraying and geling she began to realize that the task was at least going to be difficult. ''I don't get it,'' she said. ''Your hair just doesn't stay when I put it to one side.'' I replied, ''I told you, it's not possible. Look at my cowlick. Notice that the cowlick is not exclusive to one spot but is actually my entire head.'' Sister S investigated as I had suggested. ''Oh, dear, I think you're right. For now you don't have to put a line in your hair, but we'll wait for your hair to grow out a bit more and try again.'' Not that growing it out would help at all. I had some serious 'win' points afterward for earning an exception to the rule.
Cowlick is called ''whirl' in Spanish (remolino). Random word of the day.
I'm glad the Sister understood that it legitimately was not possible. It’s never been possible. My entire head is a remolino.
This week I painted a house. We were planning to teach a lesson to a family but ended up grabbing some buckets and the brushes and getting to work. We ended up painting the whole house in just about 3 hours. The mom was seriously impressed, but the grandma even more so. This is the family we met contacting a few weeks back who was very open to us but the grandma didn't want the rest to go to church. The simple charitable act of giving service was able to completely soften the grandma's heart and allow her grandkids to go to church with no problem.
Another highlight with that family was playing with old VHS tapes. They had recently upgraded to DVDs (yay technology in Mexico) and the kids were breaking all the tapes open to play with the bajillion meters of black tape inside, wrapping it all around the house and ''kidnapping me'' by tying me up in the tape. I can't even quite describe why it felt so great. It simply felt like I was a little kid again for a few moments. Little A gave me his favorite movie, ''El Planeta del Tesoro'' as a souvenir of him. Even though I can't watch it I'll treasure that VHS as a sweet gift from a humble child.
Things got relatively calmer this week about the whole dangerous situation. My secret source let me borrow something really cool that made me laugh really hard.
Yesterday I gave a talk in sacrament meeting. I used D&C 59:21 as the theme and talked about recognizing the Lord's hand in all things. Afterward the members told me thank you for my talk and they said that anybody listening would have said it was a Mexican talking for both the accent and perfect grammar. It was a really good way to say goodbye to this ward I love so much.
I can also testify this week of the blessings of obedience. Simply because I do the best I can to do the Lord's will He blesses me in all aspects of my mission. This week we have 4 baptisms planned and if C comes back we may even have 6. I will pray with faith and hope that everything works out well according to the Lord's will.
Thanks for the French tips! I'll have to print them off next week. There's an Elder in the mission who's from Canada and speaks French and Spanish but no English, so I was able to talk with him one night about how people speak French and he said instead of saying ''je ne sais pas'' they just say ''je pas!'' Spanish is actually his first language and French his second. Hopefully this transfer I can go to his zone and talk with him more.
The most interesting fish I have ever eaten.
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