08/01/22 Earthquakes and Milagros and Everyone is in love with Hermana Thom

Hello friends and family and other people who are reading this for some reason!!!

This is a lot of words, I'm not gonna lie, a LOT happened this week haha, sorry in advance but if nothing else I do believe you will all be entertained

As always, CRAZY week!! 

-Tuesday we had service all morning, and then we stayed out at the property... where we were painting and picking up trash... to have a barbecue! I ate like 4 hot dogs and was very full... and then the members wife showed up, with chicken and rice and served us all big plates. I almost exploded!!!! Later we also had a little milagro with a girl we've been trying to contact for a while. She is friends with the bishop and he referred her over... then like the next day she tested positive for covid and we couldn't talk to her for a while. But!! Tuesday we were planning on just dropping off a pamphlet and seeing how she was feeling, but then she invited us in and we taught her the restoration!! 

-Wednesday we had a 6.2 earthquake (and we didn't have completos at lunch time, BUT we did have them that night). The earthquake was crazy because we live on the 11th floor and the buildings around us were all swaying. But nothing fell, and we were fine. Honestly if it wasn't so unexpected and intense, I might have thought it was really fun haha. It lasted almost a minute, so crazy stuff!! 

That night we had a little FHE with a less active member named Angel... I'm not gonna get into it too much, but he's an interesting dude... more on him later, but at the end of the night when we were on our way out, he sneakily put this little cloth bag into my comps hand, and she didn't know what to do so she didn't say anything until we were in our building in the elevator  and then she was like hermana, angel gave me something  and it was... this black diamond ring???? Made of real silver and everything??? Like I said, more on this in a minute. 

-Thursday we had intercambios!!! I got to hang out with Hermana Perez all day, and let me just say, I LOVE her She's so funny and so hardworking, it was a good time... but we had a little problem that day. Let me explain:

 So we have this member who knows us pretty well, including that I enjoy cooking. So she signed up to give us lunch that day, and so we call her in the morning to see when we should come. She told us she had to go to the store and then she would call us when she was on her way home. Now, it takes about 50 min to walk to her house, so we left a little early, figuring we could street contact or knock doors near her house. 20 minutes into our walk, she calls us and is like, 

ok hermanas you can come over now! And so we decide to just go straight there. 20 more minutes later she says, 

hermanas what's taking you so long?? You have to hurry because you're cooking. 

Wait. What?? We're cooking? We don't really have a lot of time!!! 

But it was fine, I cooked. 

So I made 2 good sized pizzas, and between me and Hermana perez, we ate one of them. But then, the member is like,

Hermana you have to make more pizza. 

But... we have a lesson in 25 minutes and it's like a 40 min walk away!!! 

Well I need more pizza for my son and for his girlfriend and for my mom and for my husband and for my other son... 

OK where are all of them? 

oh they're coming in like 3 hours. 

So you want me to make pizza for all of your family who won't be here for 3 hours, even though we have a lesson in 25 minutes. 

Yes, and you better hurry, you have a lesson in 25 minutes!! 

So I made two more pizzas, as fast as I could. And then when the pizzas were all ready to go, it was about 10 minutes until time for our lesson, and we're like, 

OK Hermana we need to go now, bye! 

Aren't you gonna share a message? 

We have a lesson in 10 minutes, we see you like twice a week, we need to go. 

But hermanas you're missionaries, and my son just got here and he wants to here it! 

So we share a message. 

And then, the son is like flirting with Hermana perez, and not really having any worry in the world. But finally we got out of there, and made the 40 minute walk in about 15 minutes, all the while this random black dog is following us (this is important later), in spite of us telling the dog not to and trying to shoo him. 

So we get to our lesson like a half hour late (we texted ahead and he was fine with it), and we teach the restoration, and it went really well! He said he plans on reading the book of mormon and everything. So then we leave this lesson and the same black dog is following us still. Then we had another lesson with a little 9 year old, and we were in there for like an hour and a half... and then we come out and the same black dog is waiting outside for us and follows us home. We have a gate to get into our apartment so we left the dog outside and go upstairs to our apartment. Like an hour later, we get a call from the same member 

Have you seen our black dog? 

Uhhh yeah I think that's who's been following us all day. 

Oh is he with you now? 

Now we're in our apartment. 

Can you check if he's outside? 

Uhhhhhhh ok. 

So we go outside and sure enough, hes right outside the gate, right where we left him. So we call the member back 

Yeah so your dog is just outside of our apartment building. 

Oh great, can you bring him back over here?

(Inside my head: I'm sorry, WHAT? You want us to bring your dog back to your house, which is almost an hour walk away, at 9 o'clock in the night, after everything else we've already done for you today????) 

Um, no we can't. 

Why not??? 

We're missionaries, we have things to do, and also it's really dangerous where you live and it would be almost 10 by the time we got there, so no we can't. If you want your dog you need to come pick him up (did I mention she has a perfectly functional car? The 50 minute walk is about a 5 minute drive) 

Fine, but I can't come for a half hour. And you have to wait outside with my dog and make sure he doesn't get lost or anything. 

Ugh. 

But a half hour later, she was still not there. We called her and she said she would be another half hour. So it's 10 o'clock at night, freezing cold, very dark, and she finally comes by and picks up her dog... glaring at us the whole time.... and that was that. 

Anyways. Intercambios, good times. 

-Friday we had my least favorite thing here for lunch, along with salad that tasted like chemicals. There was a bowl of lemon juice to put on the salad, and the son of the lady who made the food literally drank the whole bowl of lemon juice for dessert, and then was licking the salt shaker. It was a weird lunch. Having food that I don't really like always makes me miss home so thats kinda where my head was at. But then we had an "ataque" where we went to centro and set up a table and just talked to everyone who walked by. We were with these two elders who had soooo much energy. Like a scary amount of energy. They waved at everyone, including people in cars, so it was interesting. We got a bunch of references, and most of the people who wanted to talk to us were creepy hombres. Yikes. But anyways. That night we had a gospel principles class and Angel gave my comp a box of chocolates. Again, more on this in a moment. 

-Saturday we had the ward talent show and so I made Crumbl Cookies and my comp played a beautiful song on the piano. The talent show was really cool, my favorite thing was this couple who did Chile's national dance (I guess that's a thing, do the states have a national dance? is it cotton eyed Joe or something dumb like that?) and it was literally so cool to watch!! After the show, Angel came up to my comp and was just complimenting her excessively and then a situation I don't feel like explaining happened where he touched her shoulder and she had some weird uncomfy feelings,  because he's getting more comfortable and more daring and yeah if you really wanna know, shoot me a personal email as always. 

-Sunday we had some milagros!!! We had 4 hours of meetings but after all of that our friend we've been teaching gave permission for her 10 year old to get baptized!!! So she's getting baptized next week!!!! Woooo!!! After that this same friend got a blessing for health, and the spirit was so strong, she started crying. I have very good feelings about where that's going!!!! Then in the evening, we got a call from our district leader about Angel... apparently he's lied to us about a buuuunchhh of stuff, including how he told us he went on a mission to Spain, but he definitely did not go on a mission to Spain, or at all. And a bunch of other sketchy stuff was going on there, so we're cutting contact with him, and there's a slim chance my comp is going to get emergency transferred. Which we're both praying really hard that she won't because she really wants to be here for our upcoming baptisms and we're finally having success after 2 months of working really hard (for her almost 4 months-we live in a really tricky sector because it's wealthier and more spread out than most). But i know and so does she, that if she gets transferred out of here, that is God's will, and she's needed somewhere else. But also I would definitely cry. A lot. So yeah we're really hoping that doesn't happen. 

-Today! Monday! Literally just a normal p day,  nothing special to share as far as I'm concerned. Oh except my comp hit her 9 months today wooo! also I don't know how it's already August, that's crazy. 

Ok, 1000000000 words later I'm done. 

TLDR: Angel is creepy, and because of that La Tommy could get ET'd. There's a member who's inconsiderate of our time. I make good cookies, and although I didn't get completos on Wednesday, I did have completos on Wednesday, so yeah. 

Love you guys!! 

xoxo, La Griffy (hna griffin)