01/30/2023 Hump day!!!! HALF WAY!!!!!

Well, somehow i survived half my mission and this week has been what i feel to be a perfect representation of la vida misional... chaotic

Monday we had a FHE with a teenager who's a recent convert, and her mom who is super inactive, and it was really good. Antonella (the 13yr old) made these muffins with blueberries, and we ended up talking about baking a ton, which as you all know, is kinda my thing! We were also able to talk a lot about the Book of Mormon and read a chapter with them. I could have stayed there all night  but we did eventually have to leave. A little later, we were going to visit someone else we're currently teaching, and had a really weird feeling. There were a bunch of flashlights and stuff inside the house, and we decided to not go visit her... and we also decided to go home a different way from how we normally do, which meant going around the long way through the path right next to the river. We normally cut up through centro because the path by the river can be a little sketchy at night. But, without even really thinking about it, we went up to the path by the river, and just as we had entered the path, we ran into María, who we had been trying to contact for like a MONTH, but she wasn't responding to anything. Well, as it turns out, her phone got STOLEN!!! She wasn't ignoring us, she just had to get a new phone with a new number which I mean, that sucks that her phone got stolen, but its also amazing to me that the Lord put us in her path again, especially since I had kind of assumed it was a lost cause. 

Tuesday we had a really long day of finding but it was actually really good. We found 3 new people to teach, the most entertaining of which was an older guy who was low key trying to flirt with us, in what we're pretty sure was a not creepy way. Hard to tell in Spanish sometimes. Anyways, we're never going to his house without a member. 

Wednesday was... my halfway mark. And a lot happened. 

But first a lengthy explanation of how weird it is to be halfway done with the mission: it is weird. Time is like SO fast, and yet looking back it seems like so long ago since the last time I saw all my peeps. (Dear peeps, I miss u, haha.) But I really have learned so much. I hope I can keep learning and I hope I can be happy and I hope I can enjoy doing the Lord's work. I was reflecting a lot that day about how I've learned such different things from each of my companions and I've been able to take little pieces of each of them into my own life and my own work. It's really beautiful to be able to see the Lord consecrate our efforts and to be able to take time to know Him more each day. I feel such strong desires to be my own person, but also to follow the mold of the "perfect missionary" or whatever. I want to figure out how to be "Hermana Griffin" and "Katie" at the same time, while still measuring up to the expectations of others. Anyways, sorry to get all philosophical and stuff, but it really is clear im where im supposed to be right now. 

So yeah. Wednesday. It was shaping up to be a pretty normal day, honestly. Hna Sorenson and i made smores, worked hard, got to help my favorite abuelita in the ward with her family history, and we had planned to get completos in the evening 

Let me set the scene for you: its 9:30pm, (our curfew is 10) and theres a nice crisp in the air. We both had a craving for completos and Entre Cruces was calling our name. There was just one problem... we couldn't remember where it was, and we couldn't it was called Entre Cruces. And so we wandered the streets a little aimlessly, and we were not able to find Entre Cruces. And so we asked some people on the street if they know the place where we can get some completos... but they didn't know what a completo was because one of them was from Argentina and the other from colombia. And they had less time in Chile than we had! So they were no help, but the girl from Argentina got SO excited to see Americans in the street, and even more excited when she found out we were missionaries. She told us she recognized us from YouTube, and I was like, I seriously doubt it because we're not on YouTube (but we went with it). So yeah we got her number and she's gonna get baptized (haha, that's the goal anyways, we sent her to the missionaries in argentina). So then we asked some more people about the completo place, and they told us to go all the way to the end of the street and turn left. I honestly think they were just messing with us because they don't like missionaries or something. 

So it's like 10, we get a little lost, and suddenly we find some members, who see us outside after curfew (it's okay, they're inactive), but they finally gave us correct directions to get to the completo place. They were pleasantly very fast and we had a nice little party where we ate completos and drank coke... right before we got home, I was like, let's buy some coke, it's a party, and while we were there, I was like can I also get 2 of those brownies? And I bought some brownies for us... that was my mistake. 

So we're having our little fiesta because im halfway through my mission, and we eat these brownies. And they're so delicious. But we suddenly realize theres something inside of them... theyre chocolate chips, we said... but they were not chocolate chips. They were nuts. And my comp is VERY allergic to nuts. So the next 20 minutes finds us in the emergency room, waiting to be admitted so she can stop having her allergic reaction, which through a series of tiny miracles was a lot milder than it could've been! We had to wait 3 hours to get admitted, and then an additional 2 hours to get done. So we were there until 4 in the morning. They gave her some drugs in her arm, and we ended up teaching people in the hospital at 3am who were about to get their gallbladders taken out. We didn't end up getting anyone's numbers we thought that would be maybe a little insensitive. But what a night 

The next day we were exhausted, and we had to try and fit a whole day of work in like half a day because we were traveling that night. It was a very busy time. But we even worked on the bus! When we arrived in Copiapo, we both wanted to sleep, but there were 6 girls and we were staying in the living room, so it was really hard to try and sleep... which is fine because suddenly the zone leaders asked me and another hermana to do a musical number for the next day at zone conference. So we learned a song and practiced it a bunch. 

Friday was zone conference. It was pretty good. They talked about the importance of getting more spiritual and strengthening our relationship with God, and they talked about repentance. I enjoyed it. And then we had our musical number which actually went pretty well! We sang I Stand All Amazed, a mixed english/spanish version. Everyone was crying and stuff, so overall a success. Lunch was papa johns  and after lunch they had all the dying missionaries give their last testimonies. Something I loved from them was one of them said they know if they were the only one who came to Earth, Jesus still would have atoned for their sins. It made me sit and think for a while. If I was the only one Jesus would still atone for my sins. He didn't do a convenient one by one thing, he suffered and atoned because He loves each and every one of us. 

Saturday we had lunch with some cool members who gave us umitas, which is basically like a tamale but they eat it with sugar. Kinda weird, but we also had lasagna and pie. Funny story, one of the elders in our ward was being really sarcastic and the hermana was NOT having it with him. She said the next time she's only inviting the hermanas and not the elders... which is funny because when we got here she would never invite the hermanas and only liked the elders. She was also asking me when transfers are. Kinda awkward  

Sunday we had 5 amigos at church!!! And then we were able to have a meeting with our branch president to see how we can better build trust and help the ward. It was really good, and we think his suggestions will be really helpful. 

After lunch we went finding for the entire rest of the day, and it was hard work but it was so good. We invited one of my favorite people in chile to come with us, Machi. And she is so cool. Returned missionary, world explorer, never been married. She's basically living out my alternative universe dream... I've talked about this before, part of me wants ya know, a family and all that stuff, and part of me wants to stay single forever and have tons of adventures because I don't know if I'll ever find a man who isn't overall not good. So yeah. She's living that alternative life dream. And she loves doing the Lord's work with us, so we had a blast. 

We found this family in a park, and they were with their dad who is 88 years old. He has alzheimers and doesn't remember very well, but he was a professor of English and spoke really good English. He doesn't get to speak english very often and was really self conscious that he wasn't speaking well, but we told him he was speaking perfectly, and he was so happy about that that he did a little dance. I cannot explain to you all the amount of joy we got from making that abuelito's day. He went to pull out his glasses but they were kinda dirty, so I asked if he wanted to us mine (sunglasses) as a joke, and he put them on! And his daughters asked if we would take a picture with him, and we said, why not! I'll attach it below. Unless I forget. 

In the evening we went to this hill and knocked doors up the hill, and then at the top we could see this really pretty bridge, which is called Death Bridge because a lot of people apparently jump from it  but I spoke wrong and said Bridge of the dead body... and machi thought that was the funniest thing she's ever heard. She was also teaching us really random chilean phrases. Overall a good time. 

God knows you. He knows me. He loves us. And only through His help and love can we find true, lasting joy in this life. 

I love you all so much. I pray for you all a ton. 

xo-hna griffin 

PS, one of these pictures is weirdly zoomed in so you can only see my comp... but it's the only picture where you can see death bridge sooo yeah sorry about that.