We went on an awesome little hike this morning to a small waterfall. It’s the only interesting thing to see in the entire area, but I wasn’t super motivated to go see it, which is why it took 5 months for it to happen. We walked through the jungle on an unmarked trail, scaring away tropical birds and trying not to get bitten by too many insects when the waterfall just appeared out of nowhere. We were the only people there so we got to take some decent pictures. Then we went back to our apartment and made French toast for breakfast. It was fun to change up our P-day schedule for the day. Our […]
Time in the Mission & Language
It was a long week, and it’s still incredible hot, but we are finally getting water delivered again. The work has been frustratingly slow and Carnaval has literally been leading people to choose devil worship over the Lord. Tomorrow I’ll have been on the mission for 6 months. My Spanish has improved so much. I’m very far from being fluent and my accent is a weird mix of gringo and Argentine, but I can pretty comfortably do the things that I need and want to. I think the best part about it is being able to understand who people are. I am living with my American companion, a Peruvian, and an Ecuadorian and the conversations […]
Barney, Like the Dinosaur & Carnaval
My new companion and I worked like crazy this week. His name, Elder Barney, is easy for people to pronounce because they all know the children’s TV show about the purple dinosaur. He’s from California and has been on his mission a month and a half longer than I have. We’re both pretty new, which is putting our Spanish knowledge to the test. It’s Carnaval, which is basically just a big festival to celebrate the things of the world and get as drunk as possible. It’s not had a huge impact on us, just that we’ve had to steer clear of the main road where all of the partying is happening. Thanks for your love […]
Heat and Changes
There’s a big change in Tartagal! Elder Gibbs left this morning to go work in a different area. My new companion, Elder Barney, gets here this evening. We’ll be here together until at least the end of March. The heat continues. A couple of days this week, it was so hot that we had to stop walking every couple of blocks and drink water in the shade so our heart rates could go down. There are a lot of problems with the water in the region I am in right now. The water supply gets cut to whole neighborhoods during most of the day because there just isn’t water to keep it running. The family […]