Thursday, January 4, 2018

Week 68: New Year, New (and downright crazy) Experiences

Hey Family!

So sorry that I couldn’t talk to you guys yesterday, its just that the New Years here is crazy. Everybody just drinks and then they are all hung over or are still drunk on New Years, and so they don’t open their internet places. We walked around Sogamoso for darn near 2 hours trying to find an internet and couldn’t find it. But I am here now.

This week has been… like the holidays are awesome as a normal person, but as missionaries sometimes they are hard. We have had a number of disappointments this week. Adali… I don’t know… we are putting off her baptismal date for right now, just because she doesn’t feel prepared. We are just trying ot find out what she needs. I think we will know today. The familia Medina, Bryan y Jason, they are going to be baptized here this Saturday, so that’s good. So starting at the beginning of the week, this Wednesday and Thursday, we had intercambios with the assistants. It was really awesome. I was with and Elder named Elder Patterson, whose family lives in Utah. It was really awesome, just because I felt really inspired afterwards. Made me realize how much a good leader can inspire other people. I have a lot of respect for him. One of the things that he told me that really impacted me was he asked me: “how have you served every person in your zone individually?” and I thought about that and I really couldn’t say that I had served everyone individually. Made me think and the told me that I should do that. That was really good advice. That and a lot of other things for the zone. We have really been hitting it hard trying to be good leaders…. It’s a never ending process I guess.

OK, so New Years here in Sogamoso is crazy. The 31st we were dead tired, so we went to bed at 10:30 like normal,  but I did set an alarm for 11:55 so that I could go to bed and then wake up right before midnight. At Midnight exactly, here in Colombia, the whole world just blows up. They have SO MANY fireworks. It was awesome. I woke up at 11:55 and me and my companion were sitting there talking about our New Years resolutions, and then 12:00 hits and low and behold its just a light show. I look out my front window and there are just a bunch of crazy fireworks. They aren’t like the huge and cool fireworks like the 4th of July, but they are big and loud. They are like the really loud ones that give a flash and then a bang that you feel. They are not a whole lot of the expensive, showy fireworks, but everyone and their dog was setting them off. It was actually a lot bigger than in Bucaramanga, which really surprised me. That went on for a constant 20 minutes where they were blowing the whole world up. That was fun. I just sat there and was like WHOA…

So then the next day, well yesterday, was P-Day, and we got up at a normal time, and everyone was out of the streets, there wasn’t even a dog in the streets. All the bars were like people going home. This was at 6:30 in the morning. All the people were leaving the bars to go home and then we went to Duitama to go to a place called Pollito Boyacense, which is like a tourist town, but we met with some pretty drunk people. One of them told us in very creative language, because me and Elder Coop were talking in English, told us in some very creative English that he didn’t like gringos and that we should get out of his land, out of his country. We just said “Gracias” and he was like “ya, that’s right. Get out. I am gonna pull out my gun.” And that kinda shocked us. So he reaches back behind his back into his pants and he discovers that he doesn’t have a gun. Then he says “it’s alright, I’m gonna pull out my knife.” And he is like searching his pockets and he doesn’t have a knife either. So me and Elder Coop start walking. And he is kinda chasing us. We start walking fast. He is still chasing us. Then Elder Guerra comes up and he’s from Panama, but the guy asked him too “are you a gringo? “ and he said “No, I’m from Colombia, cant you tell by my accent?” and he’s using a bunch of Colombian slang. And the guy says “oh good. Come here. ” And he gives him a big hug. He’s so drunk haha. As he gives Elder Guerra a hug, Elder Guerra searches him for weapons and he didn’t have anything. So he was happy after that, after finding a Colombian. He totally forgot about the two gringos and went on his way. There was that guy, and then there was another guy that came up to us and said “Preachers, tell me the word of God.” So we gave him a pamphlet and sent him on his way. Then on the bus on the way back to Sogamoso there were two guys that got on the bus, and it’s a really tiny bus, and they were singing along to the music the bus driver was playing and they were dancing on the bus. It was just really weird. There was just a ton of drunk people. Now everyone is just hung over, it’s more normal. Haha. Colombians drink a lot. We actually talked to an investigator today, we called him yesterday and he didn’t answer. He said “Sorry I didn’t answer you yesterday, I was drunk out of my mind.” Oh good. But ya. Crazy stuff that happens.

So I guess what I have learned this week is really serving people because you love them. I got some letters from you guys in the packages, and by the way I got the toys and everything and I gave them to the family and they were just elated! They were just so happy! The little girls put on the bracelets and everything immediately, and the little boys didn’t waste any time pulling out the Nerf guns. So that was pretty fun, thank you! But also in that package I received some letters. One of them was from Josh, and it talked about how important it is to teach by the spirit and love the people. He was like “I know you hear this a lot, but it’s important.” Haha. It really is important. Serving because you love people is the only way to do it, It’s the only way you will be happy doing it because it’s the only way you will want to do it. So I have learned that when I love the people and when I love my investigators and I love my zone, I am going to exhaust all of my energy every day trying to serve them and I am going to be happy doing it. It’s crazy because you are on the go from 6:30 in the morning and you have got something to do every minute of the day until you go to bed at 10:30 at night. I don’t know, when you do it for love, for charity, for the people that you serve, there’s nothing better.  So I guess that’s what I have learned this week.

Well, I think that’s it for this week. I love you all so much. Oh, I also wanted to mention to you guys, that there was a Sister Missionary that took my camera in a multi-zone conference a couple of weeks ago and she took a picture and wanted to delete it, and she went and deleted it, but it was in English and so instead of selectin delete this frame she deleted all frames. She deleted all my pictures. I didn’t have them backed up, but I wasn’t worried about it because I know you can recover them. I gave my camera to a member because I don’t have time to recover them, and now he is telling me that he cant recover them. He waited a long time to do it, so I am a little worried about that. But ya… So I have recovered about half of my pictures, I just don’t know if I am going to get the rest back from my mission which really makes me sad and makes me wish that I had sent more to you guys. But we are going to see what we can do. I will take my camera to the center and see if I can pay someone to do it. Could get pretty expensive, but we will see what we can do. Alright, love you guys so much, talk to you next week. Chao!


-Elder Lewis

Elder Lewis with a pillowcase signed by the primary 
children from his home ward. 

Elder Lewis with his Christmas gifts from his family

Elder Lewis with a t-shirt made up of the handprints of his 
parents, siblings, and niece and nephew. He said it was very creative! 

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