May 28, 2012

hey mom!

man sounds like it was a pretty busy week! sounds like the air show was cool, but sorry you´re not getting any sympathy from me with the rain haha. we`ve been getting some nasty storms down here, just about every day at 4 it rains, it`s a lot of fun...:) i`m glad things are going so well though. i actually had a fairly interesting week too.

so monday we went to this place called boquete, and it`s a really cool place. it`s like a little city in like a bowl  with "mountains" on each side. it`s really cool cause it`s all just super green and then you can just see the little houses on the bottom, it`s a good site. and so we went there and did a little hike to a waterfall, and it was kinda disappointing cause we walked for like an hour and it ended up being just this tiny little thing, but oh well, it was cool to walk through the little rain forest. plus the temperature is a lot lower than the rest of panamà so it was nice.

tuesday and wednesday were pretty normal, nothing really exciting happened those days, but the zone leaders told me that i would have to go to panamà on thursday to get my card thing that says i live here and am legal. and so, being like 8 hours away from the city, we had to take the bus at midnight to get there by 8 30 in the morning on thursday. that was a little miserable. the buses are nice, it was this huge double decker thing, but it wasn`t very comfortable to sleep on so it was a long ride. so we get there, and just as my luck would have it, they had spelled my name wrong. so we were walking all around this building trying to get someone to fix it, but for some reason they were like 2 days behind, so they couldn`t do it. so i had to go home without the card, and i have to go back either this wednesday or the next to try and get it again. so basically we just went to panamà and back for no reason, it was great.

so friday was more or less normal too, we didn`t get back to the house until midnight so it was another short night. but we went to lunch on friday, and we eat with the zone leaders, and they asked if we could go to puerto armuelles on saturday. it`s like 3 hours away, but they said they needed 2 elders to go with them so we said sure. so we had to get up at 5 saturday morning to take some more buses to travel to puerto armuelles. we get there, and appearantely they have like a million members, but none of them go to church anymore, so they called in like 14 elders to come in and go talk to every house and see if they had moved or died or go to another church. so me and my comp went with the relief society president and just went looking for people all day. most of them had moved and didn`t live there anymore. a lot of them no one knew who they were, and a couple went to a different church, so that was a long day. but we did a lot of work and that should help out a little bit there.

here`s where it gets really cool though. so friday we went to teach this lady, and her daughter was there, and she was super interested in everything we said, and really wanted to read the Book of Mormon, so we were pretty pumped about that. and so we left her with a BOM to read, and we left. on saturday, we went to mcdonald`s after all the member searching we did, and she just happened to show up right behind us. so we were just talking and whatnot, when she pulled out the BOM and said like hey thanks for the book, you can have it back now. and i was all bummed cause i thought she was golden too, but we were just like oh no it`s yours, it was a gift, we want you to have it. and she just got all embarrassed and started laughing, and her boyfriend was there too, and he pulls out this huge spiral bound notebook, and opens it up, and they had photocopied every page in the Book of Mormon! it was probably the coolest thing i`ve seen! she paid 23 bucks for it though so i felt kinda bad haha. but we were way pumped about that, and she said she really wanted to go to church so we were excited.

so now it`s sunday, and she does come to church, and it was probably one of the best sundays i`ve had here. sacrament meeting was really good, and afterward she said she felt like crying during the last hymn, and that night when we talked to her she said it just felt different, and she didn`t feel like she did in other churches where she can`t wait til it gets over. it was so cool! so we had a super good lesson with her and her boyfriend and sister, and we put fechas for all of them! i don`t know why, but they`re all just super interested! she already knows it`s all true, she just wants to learn a little more. we really have done nothing, but they`re just prepared and ready to hear all of this. so i`m really hopeful for her and her boyfriend and sister. we have changes this week though, and i doubt that i`ll go, but i do hope i stay, cause i really want to help them!

so yeah it was a really interesting week,  but it ended up being super good. i`m pumped to go back and teach them more, and just see them progress. things are just really good right now! it`s nice for a change. but i think that`s about it, so i better run. thanks a ton for the emails and the support and everything! i hope everyone has a good last week of school!

much love,

elder paskett