Email: June 18, 2018 - Spanish class, Zone conference, Father's Day
Monday: P-day this week was actually pretty lame. We didn’t do much we just visited some members in Elder Burnett's old areas. The people were cool and all, but I was just pretty bored during all of it.
Tuesday: So today was finally the start of our Spanish class. We have been trying to get the word out as much as possible. The thing is the homeless in LA will tear down your posters and stuff for absolutely no reason at all. So a lot of these we put up ended torn to pieces because people are people.
Elder Jones wasn't feeling so hot today and we needed people that spoke Spanish to teach our class. So, Elder Spalding and Elder Carlisle were with me today and Elder Burnett stayed with Elder Jones
We had dinner with a part member family and we had some pretty good Papa John’s pizza. They also let their turtle speedy (yes, that is actually the turtle’s name) out of its cage and he just roamed around, and they let me hold him.
Spanish class finally rolled around and guess how many people showed up? If you guessed 1, then you are correct. We had a solid 1 guy show up to Spanish class today so it was kind of a flop, but that doesn’t mean we are going to stop doing it. Humble beginnings.
Wednesday: Wednesday was a really good day. To start off we had zone conference down at the Artesia building. It was nice to be back in the south bay and feel that south bay vibe again. I miss it a lot. We had some good trainings and one that stuck out to me was budgeting. Lord knows I needed this training because I absolutely suck at managing my mission money. So, starting next transfer I'll be doing that hopefully.
We met with a less active named Ramon. He is super awesome. We met him at a Starbucks in downtown. While we were waiting for him this bird just flew right onto the table we were sitting at and just chilled with us until Ramon showed up. It was weird, but it was super cool.
As we came to the end of our lesson with Ramon we had one of the coolest spiritual moments on my mission. We asked him to say the closing prayer and as he did he began to choke up. He finished and we sat there for about 3 minutes as he tried to recompose himself and finally I asked him how he was feeling and he laid it all out. It was cool to see the spirit work in him. But it was also cool to feel my testimony grow from that experience. Even though we are in a loud busy downtown LA we were still able to feel and hear the still small voice.
As we were waiting for our Uber back (for those who forgot or don't know, yes, we have Uber. We are the first mission in the world to have it). Anyway, we are waiting and this Indian guy just rolls up to us on his bike and begins talking to us about how he used to meet with missionaries about 10 years ago in India. Ever since my best friend Elder Hansen went to India I just love Indian people. Now and it seems that they just pop up everywhere just waiting for us missionaries. So we gave the guy our contact info and he went on his way.
Thursday: Thursday we had an awesome district meeting this morning.
Friday: Today we visited a referral that we had for a man named Frank. We were excited to go into this lesson and finally find a new investigator but turns out he is actually a member which is ok too. He had just gotten out of prison a week ago after being in for 42 years. He told us why he was in. I don't want to freak mom out too much, so I'll just leave it at that.
He was a super nice and funny guy. He is just so extremely happy to be out and about in the free world again. He even wanted to take a picture with us.
Saturday: Saturday was an awesome day. It is the second time on my mission that I did not change into proselyting clothes the entire day because we had that much service that day. We started by doing building cleaning which consisted of sweeping up the parking garage.
Afterward we went and weeded the backyard of a potential. If things keep going well, we will be taking them to the VC. While we were weeding we were listening to some words of the prophets and for those who don’t know what it is, it is music with general conference talks placed over it and they are awesome. So we are listening to this music and the neighbor of the person we are doing service for comes out and sees us. We got talking to them and now we are going to give service to them also.
After we weeded the backyard we went to a food bank and gave service there. We did the usual of filling up the shopping carts and stocking the shelves.
Then after that, to finish off the night, we cleaned up the after the youth conference that the stake was having at our church building. It was fun to be able to joke around with the youth as we were doing it.
Sunday: Happy Father's Day Papa Smurf. I'm grateful for that you have done for me and the family. For all the exciting adventures and events that you want to take us to, and the enthusiasm that you have toward everything. One of my favorite memories of my dad is when Silver Leafe turned in to silver lake aka when everyone's basement flooded. I remember the late nights of service that we would give moving furniture, cutting out carpets, and using shop vacs to suck up all the water. I remember coming home exhausted but grateful for how fortunate we were that our basement didn't flood and the opportunity we had to grow closer. I know I have sat by your side for countless hours over the years and I'm glad that I would be able to come home and give you a break from the hard work you had already put in for the day. I'm grateful that you found my conversations with my friends to be funny even though you could only hear me and I'm grateful for you letting me be able to get out for that night at my free will. I'm grateful for that trust because that trust changed my life. I love you Dad
- Elder B (Frank likes to call me this, also so does Ryan the 9-year-old from Manhattan Beach)
P.S someone got stabbed in front of our church building and there was blood all over the place. I’ll put those pictures in a separate email to spare those who don't like blood.
Tuesday: So today was finally the start of our Spanish class. We have been trying to get the word out as much as possible. The thing is the homeless in LA will tear down your posters and stuff for absolutely no reason at all. So a lot of these we put up ended torn to pieces because people are people.
Elder Jones wasn't feeling so hot today and we needed people that spoke Spanish to teach our class. So, Elder Spalding and Elder Carlisle were with me today and Elder Burnett stayed with Elder Jones
We had dinner with a part member family and we had some pretty good Papa John’s pizza. They also let their turtle speedy (yes, that is actually the turtle’s name) out of its cage and he just roamed around, and they let me hold him.
Spanish class finally rolled around and guess how many people showed up? If you guessed 1, then you are correct. We had a solid 1 guy show up to Spanish class today so it was kind of a flop, but that doesn’t mean we are going to stop doing it. Humble beginnings.
Wednesday: Wednesday was a really good day. To start off we had zone conference down at the Artesia building. It was nice to be back in the south bay and feel that south bay vibe again. I miss it a lot. We had some good trainings and one that stuck out to me was budgeting. Lord knows I needed this training because I absolutely suck at managing my mission money. So, starting next transfer I'll be doing that hopefully.
We met with a less active named Ramon. He is super awesome. We met him at a Starbucks in downtown. While we were waiting for him this bird just flew right onto the table we were sitting at and just chilled with us until Ramon showed up. It was weird, but it was super cool.
As we came to the end of our lesson with Ramon we had one of the coolest spiritual moments on my mission. We asked him to say the closing prayer and as he did he began to choke up. He finished and we sat there for about 3 minutes as he tried to recompose himself and finally I asked him how he was feeling and he laid it all out. It was cool to see the spirit work in him. But it was also cool to feel my testimony grow from that experience. Even though we are in a loud busy downtown LA we were still able to feel and hear the still small voice.
As we were waiting for our Uber back (for those who forgot or don't know, yes, we have Uber. We are the first mission in the world to have it). Anyway, we are waiting and this Indian guy just rolls up to us on his bike and begins talking to us about how he used to meet with missionaries about 10 years ago in India. Ever since my best friend Elder Hansen went to India I just love Indian people. Now and it seems that they just pop up everywhere just waiting for us missionaries. So we gave the guy our contact info and he went on his way.
Thursday: Thursday we had an awesome district meeting this morning.
Friday: Today we visited a referral that we had for a man named Frank. We were excited to go into this lesson and finally find a new investigator but turns out he is actually a member which is ok too. He had just gotten out of prison a week ago after being in for 42 years. He told us why he was in. I don't want to freak mom out too much, so I'll just leave it at that.
He was a super nice and funny guy. He is just so extremely happy to be out and about in the free world again. He even wanted to take a picture with us.
Saturday: Saturday was an awesome day. It is the second time on my mission that I did not change into proselyting clothes the entire day because we had that much service that day. We started by doing building cleaning which consisted of sweeping up the parking garage.
Afterward we went and weeded the backyard of a potential. If things keep going well, we will be taking them to the VC. While we were weeding we were listening to some words of the prophets and for those who don’t know what it is, it is music with general conference talks placed over it and they are awesome. So we are listening to this music and the neighbor of the person we are doing service for comes out and sees us. We got talking to them and now we are going to give service to them also.
After we weeded the backyard we went to a food bank and gave service there. We did the usual of filling up the shopping carts and stocking the shelves.
Then after that, to finish off the night, we cleaned up the after the youth conference that the stake was having at our church building. It was fun to be able to joke around with the youth as we were doing it.
Sunday: Happy Father's Day Papa Smurf. I'm grateful for that you have done for me and the family. For all the exciting adventures and events that you want to take us to, and the enthusiasm that you have toward everything. One of my favorite memories of my dad is when Silver Leafe turned in to silver lake aka when everyone's basement flooded. I remember the late nights of service that we would give moving furniture, cutting out carpets, and using shop vacs to suck up all the water. I remember coming home exhausted but grateful for how fortunate we were that our basement didn't flood and the opportunity we had to grow closer. I know I have sat by your side for countless hours over the years and I'm glad that I would be able to come home and give you a break from the hard work you had already put in for the day. I'm grateful that you found my conversations with my friends to be funny even though you could only hear me and I'm grateful for you letting me be able to get out for that night at my free will. I'm grateful for that trust because that trust changed my life. I love you Dad
- Elder B (Frank likes to call me this, also so does Ryan the 9-year-old from Manhattan Beach)
P.S someone got stabbed in front of our church building and there was blood all over the place. I’ll put those pictures in a separate email to spare those who don't like blood.
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| Me and Speedy |
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| Our friendly neighborhood bird |
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| Red Zones for our mission (2 of them are in my area. Skid row and echo park) |
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| Elder Burnett, Frank, and me |
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| The youth conference was a Hawaiian theme so I had to grab one of these |
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