06/12/23 Soup.

 It is a well known fact about me that I'm not really a soup person (or maybe it's not that well known but, for the time being let's assume it's a well known fact about me that I'm not a huge fan of soup). 

And... soup in northern chile is exactly the kind of soup that I'm not a fan of. Water based or lentil based, with a lot of salt and very little of anything else. I mean, yeah obviously there's vegetables and usually chicken or beef, but the point is the only flavor is of salt. 

And when someone is sick, what is the thing that everyone brings to said sick person? 

Soup. 

(In case you haven't guessed yet... I got sick this week haha) 

Here's the story: 

Monday and Tuesday I was completely fine. We watched this broadcast in chile and Argentina with elder christensen (area president of South America South) and elder soares, along with the temple president of the santiago temple, and all of their wives and children. It was really good! And a little trunky haha, it talked about marriage and family. 

Tuesday we had a very normal day, lessons, door knocking, meetings, etc. We also happened to have soup for lunch lol. Later we had a family night with a family that has a 4 year old girl who loves me hehe (and I love her too, she's adorable, and we were playing briefly with her toys, and she has a toy kitchen and it's her favorite, just like meeee). 

Wednesday we got up and i felt a little bit of a sore throat, but nothing too big, i figured it was because me and my comp sing together a lot in the pension or maybe just because some mornings my voice is just a little raspy cuz its cold outside... so we went to our district counsel meeting, and during the meeting, I started feeling really tired, and my head felt super heavy. So I put my head down on the table for a couple minutes, and my district leader was like, Hermana Griffin are you good? Like are you mad about what I'm saying or something? And I was like, no no im fine im just tired or something it's all good, I promise I'm listening (i wasnt really listening  oops) 

So he continued to talk and then the meeting ended, and I felt really cold. But it's about wintertime here in chile, so I was like oh how weird, guess I'll just put on my jacket. Then we took a bus up to where we work, and when we got there I was doing... really poorly 

So we went to the house of the people who were gonna feed us lunch, and they let me lay down on their couch. I didn't hardly eat any of the lasagna they gave us... and then we finished lunch and I was like, Hermana I think I'm dying so we went back to the house, and I had a fever of like almost 102 (38.7-38.9⁰c) so I laid down and slept for like five hours. 

While I was sleeping, my comp talked to the mission presidents wife and she told us we needed to go to the hospital (I complained a lot because the last thing I wanted to do was leave my bed, especially where I'd have to be sitting in the waiting room for like 5 hours probably for them to tell me I'm sick and give me some meds I won't take because I can't swallow a pill to save my life, literally). My temperature stayed within fever range for more than 12 hours, and my head hurt, a LOT. 

When we went to the hospital, it was faster than I expected, but then they made me take my shirt off and put wet rags and everything on my chest and head. I was shivering. 

And then the doctor comes in and it was a dude, and I was SO uncomfortable hanging out in my garment top and I was like, can I put my shirt on? And he was like, no your temp needs to cool down. And I was like, please? And he had this look on his face like he thought this was the dumbest thing to argue over, but he let me put my shirt back on before he did the checkup on my lungs and everything. 

I was grateful. 

So then they were like, ok we're just gonna inject you with some medicine and write you a prescription for some antibiotics, because you have... acute pharyngitis (at least that's what Google translate says it's called haha-en español se llama faringitis aguda). Which, after some searching I learned means that the tubes and stuff between my nose and mouth are either inflamed and/or infected. 

And anyways, I was like, uhhh do you have to inject me? And he was like, well we need to get the fever down, and I was like, isnt there a pill for that or something?? 

And basically after some back and forth, I got away without being stabbed () and they sent us home with a prescription. Which, had an allergy pill instead of an antibiotic attached to it luckily, Hermana Wu was in contact with the mission doctor, who was like, she needs an antibiotic, and so hermana Wu was like, come to my house to pick up the meds (at this point its like 11pm and none of the pharmacies we could find were open anyways so, double rescued by hna wu). 

She handed me like 4 boxes, and I was present physically but mentally dying haha, a high fever does that to you. But one thing I did understand: you HAVE TO take these antibiotic pills or else you'll have to go back to the hospital and they'll stab you. 

And those who know me well understand that this is a lose-lose situation... 

How many pills have a swallowed in my life? 0. Ninguno. Zero. Jamás. 

And on a scale from 1-10, how much do I hate needles? A lot. 

But I was not about to go back to the hospital, so I had to figure out how to swallow the freaking pills.

When I arrived at the apartment that night, I also had instructions on how to cool down my temperature, which were, be in as little clothing as possible and use wet rags and fresh air to cool off. 

I have a pink night gown that I always use, so I decided that was good enough. I put all my blankets and sheets to the side and laid down and used the wet rags to dampen my arms and legs and head and chest, with the window wide open (we're on the 8th floor). And then I suffered. 

It took the better part of an hour to get my temperature down to a healthy level, but once it was down and had stayed down for a good 20 minutes, I pulled my blankets up and passed out for like 10 hours  

In the doctor's office they also said I was supposed to rest and recover for the next 3 days, so I wasn't allowed to really work or anything, and I wasn't really supposed to leave the house. So we had some chill days watching the beach from our big windows and our balcony. 

On Thursday I no longer had a fever, but my sore throat had gotten worse, and my head was still hurting bastante. I slept a LOT, and when I wasn't sleeping I was reading and studying. I hardly left my bed at all. 

Wednesday night I had tried, really tried to take the darn pill, but I couldn't. I ended up straight up eating it. It was terrible 0/10 would not recommend, would not do it again. Thursday night i had to take the second antibiotic and I had tried all day to think of creative ways to take the pill. So I crushed it into a powder and put it on a very small piece of bread with peanut butter. Also terrible, but slightly less terrible than just straight up eating it. But seriously, not the answer, 1/10 would not recommend unless you hate yourself a lot and want to be miserable and ruin the taste of peanut butter. 

Friday I was feeling better and also worse... my headache was gone, but my sore throat had gotten worse, and I was SO congested. Like, indescribably congested. Just pure boogers hahahaha, and like, I live with 3 Chileans, and my accent in Spanish with boogers was apparently really funny and kind of French sounding?? Idk 

 

That day we also were able to make a few phone calls and video calls to actually teach people, but I also started coughing a lot so I tried not to talk much because when I talked, I coughed  

During the day when we were bored, hna Cabrera looked through my friends list in facebook and stalked a bunch of random people and I told her stories about all of them, and also found out that a bunch of them are engaged and/or married now... funny how life is like that, and suddenly tons of girls I knew from high school now have different last names and some dude at their side  imagine getting married young, psh, I'd never do something so silly () 

And we also saw how many of them have left the church. Basically there were three options, (1) on a mission (or recently returned), (2) married, or (3) left the church. 

Some people had more than one of the options as well (normally the first two haha). But more than anything it blew my mind how people had changed so much in such little time! 

These conversations got me thinking about life... how people we see daily can become people we never talk to. People we love dearly can become complete strangers. 

One time I told my mom how I was kinda sad to return to something (college life, maybe?) because I knew it wasn't going to be the same. She told me it never is the same again. And that's why we have to enjoy the moment while we're in it. 

But isn't that so hard sometimes?? I think ever since I was little I wanted to be a grown up and i was always looking forward to the next thing (going to yw instead of primary, being big enough to go to stake dances, being old enough to date, being old enough to live on my own, getting married-didn't happen-, going on a mission, getting transferred, getting promoted, completing a year, completing the mission, completing my degree, etc.) 

But that's something that I need to learn to do, is enjoy the moment, enjoy THIS phase of life, because it's never going to be like it is again. I think there was some old book I had to read that said something about this, "they were the best of times, they were the worst of times" or something like that, idk I don't have open internet access. 

So yes, life has its really hard things, and its really good things. But I can testify to you all, that if you're looking for the hard things and the bad things, that's exactly what you're going to find and ALL youre going to find. But if you're looking for the good things and striving to be grateful, you will see the hand of God in your lives, and you will be able to see the ways the Lord is blessing you and uplifting you in THIS moment, even if you're in the middle of a grand trial. 

But anyways, philosophical rant aside, I will return to the entertaining tale of my trials this week hahahah. 

So Friday night I had to figure out how to take a pill again, and I put it in my mouth and tried every trick in the book, and I just couldn't do it. It started dissolving and I was NOT about to have a repeat of Wednesday, so I spit it into a cup. And then I got to thinking... what if I take it like a shot?  so I put just a little bit of water in the cup with the pill and dissolved it as much as I could, and then I prepared a second cup which I put about the same amount of water in, along with some sugar, and next to that I had my water bottle which I had filled to the brim. 

So after like 10 minutes of talking myself into it, I took my antibiotic shot glass and threw it back, only tasting the bitter chalkiness for 3 seconds, because I followed it immediately by the shot glass of sugar water, and then by a TON of normal water. And honestly, 6/10. Ideally, take the pill like a normal person, right?? But like, if you're crazy like me, and you CANNOT, in spite of trying 10,000 times, this was the least unpleasant way I've found to get the medicine in your system. 

Saturday was interesting because my comp ended up leaving for part of the day to go to a baptism in the stake next to ours because she started her mission in that stake, so someone she was teaching over a YEAR ago was getting baptized, but I still had to stay, but with a different hermana. It was really a chill day overall, just something changing is something worth writing about, right?  

I continued to have LOTS of congestion and when my comp wasn't in the baptism we talked about our families a lot, and she told me about some of her plans for when she goes home (next week). 

My comp for the day, Hermana colicheo wanted to buy her comp a present to celebrate her comp reaching 6 months in the mission, so we actually ended up leaving the house for a bit. Like 30 min. But it was already dark out (at like 6:30pm) and the air was cold, and she walked really fast (we all do as missionaries haha), and that combination turned out to be really bad for my congestion  I ended up coughing a ton, and being overall pretty miserable for the rest of the night. 

But in spite of that, we got to see a cool miracle. 

We received a self reference who told us she had seen a sign from God that said she needed to talk to us. We called her and shared our testimonies and talked to her about the importance of our relationship with God. She committed to going to church the next day and we set a day to come visit her once we're not sick anymore. 

That night I decided to try the accelerated shot glass method of taking the pill... basically I did what I had the night before but instead of dissolving the pill, I tried throwing back the water with the pill in it... didn't work. I ended up just dissolving the pill and taking it that way again, following it with sugar water and then a LOT of regular water. 

Sunday we went to zoom church, and then the elders came over to give us the sacrament and also to give us both blessings of health (or whatever they're called in English ), for my companion because she started having a sore throat in the morning and the LAST thing we want is for her to be sick this week, her last week in the mission field (how lame would that be??) 

We spent the day studying and sleeping, trying to get rid of the last little bit of infection that I have left in me, and trying to prevent her from getting what I have. I personally felt really edified by my studies... 

And we also played scrabble in Spanish and I WON!!! By 4 points  

But anyways, that about sums up my week, it's been the most eventful, uneventful week ever. I also forgot to write last week so here's what happened last week, the short version because this is already bastante largo.  

Things that happened last week, in no particular order--

Crazy bus driver dude: the song "it's my life" played as we sat in this bus going 100 miles an hour down a steep hill and the bus driver who looked to be about 65 years old and was wearing a blue and red faded tie dye shirt took a large swig from his can of red bull. We didn't die :) 

Dentist again: so the first time I didn't actually do the root cannel, and my inability to understand medical Spanish at the time stopped me from actually understanding that. Oops. Now we're good though. 

Elsa: little old lady we met who I felt an instant connection to. She's super catholic and not really interested at all, but I love her. She was talking to us and actually believes a lot of what we believe, but didn't necessarily understand the point of baptism by immersion, and wasn't willing to listen to that kind of conversation. She worked in a catholic school with small children and helped them to have spiritual experiences and she gave us juice and talked about how she recently got divorced so she lives with her son. She had a way of talking and explaining things that just draws you in. I love her. I want to be her haha. 

18 year old girl asking me not to spoil the book of mormon for her hahaha: esthefany, we love her! She's been listening the book of mormon and said she's so drawn into whats going to happen next in the story that she doesn't want to stop listening. She had reached the part where Nephi kills Laban and asked us not to tell her what happens next, she didn't want any spoilers hehe. 

Oh yeah, in case you were wondering what we ate for all that time stuck in the house... everyone gave us soup. 

Love you all! 

xo-hna griffin

Fotos: 

-fhe we had with our favorite members here, the hermana is very pregnant hehe, she's also my dentist lol 

-intercambios w hna Gailey last week 

-this cat looks like a cow 

-soup. 

-someone gave us Macdonalds (also soup) 

-that time I left the house for five minutes and there was a pineapple outside 

-zona antofa 

-me, dying, after like 3 hours in the ER