Bolivia Bound

La Semana Loca

September 16, 2013

Yep, that about sums up my week. It was loca. It all started Sunday night/Monday morning last week, early in the morning, when I started to feel pretty sick and spent a lot of the night throwing up. After I threw up magnificently in front of my entire zone of missionaries, the zone leaders made the executive decision that they were taking Hermana Maldonado and me to the clinic, ha. And Mom, Dad, although maybe that doesn’t sound very funny to you, believe me, it’s pretty hilarious. It was super similar to that time when I got sick on the airplane, with this uncomfortable silence with all the missionaries staring at me and no one exactly sure what to say while my companion looks frantically for a Kleenex or something and no one has anything... definitely memorable, ha. And hilarious, so don’t be worried. Anyway, so we went to the clinic, which was SUPER crowded so we were there for the rest of our Pday and more, and ended up losing some proselyting time, all for the doctor to say he thought I had a stomach infection but he wasn’t sure, so he wasn’t going to do anything and come back if I felt sick again. So that was Monday.

Tuesday, I felt a lot better, but it was still a crazy day because we had interviews with President Willard - my first interview with him since coming to the mission. He is fantastic, seriously like a dad here in the mission. It was weird, we had the interview in English and I had to pray in English but I couldn’t do it. I ended up praying in a kind of weird, mixed up Spanglish. Then that night, Hermana Wursten, my companion from the CCM, flew into Santa Cruz from Tarija and spent the night with us, because the next day was... immigration! That’s right, I am now officially a resident of Bolivia, for the next year until I have to do immigration again. It took like half the day, which was a pain, but it was fun because I was reunited with everyone from my district in the CCM, or at least everyone who is now in Santa Cruz. Those guys are like my family. Fantastic. The only downside was that, once again, I started to feel pretty sick. Once again, the zone leaders made the decision that yes, I was going to the clinic, and yes, they were coming with us. This time, the doctor decided that I did have a stomach infection after all, and gave me medicine. And not to worry, I now feel much better and am in tip top condition. This happens once to basically every North American missionary, or so I’m told.

Anyway, so with that crazy start to the week, Thursday we were finally able to get started with some real proselyting, but still, the entire week was full of challenges. We couldn’t find investigators, members couldn’t accompany us on visits, etc... it was one of those "if it can go wrong, it will go wrong" weeks. We ended up losing the baptism dates for two investigators, Augustin and Soledad, because Soledad didn’t want to go to church when we went to pick her up, and Augustin because his mom, who is menos activo, decided that she doesn’t want him to get baptized. But the good news is that we are continuing strong with Hugo for a baptism the 28th - he is progressing really well and has now gone to church on his own three times! Also, we are preparing Karen for a baptism on the 28th as well. After she traveled for a few weeks, we are finally going to get started teaching her again tonight, and I know that she’ll be ready for her baptism. Even in the hard weeks, I know that the Lord is with us and He is preparing people for this message. I’m learning lots here in the mission and I’m super motivated for this week. I know it will be lots better. :)

Here I am in the clinic with my IV thing. They hydrated me with a bunch of stuff on Monday, and then decided there was nothing wrong with me and sent me home.