Buenas tardes, President Murphy,
Well, I sure am happy to be back in Otavalo! I feel like I just know how to connect with these people. It's like coming home, and I am so so happy to be here! Too, Hermana Carré is great. She's happy and kind, and we work really well together. It's sad that she will be leaving at the end of this transfer, but it just means that we want to work as hard as possible in this transfer!
We currently have two with a baptismal date. Johnathan and Christian Remache. Their mom, Adriana, is a less-active member, but she is trying to reactivate herself, and the lessons with these kids are great. They listen really well, and it all makes sense to them. They are well on their way to being ready for the fifth of May.
We are really trying right now to work more with members. We have a plan this week to meet with at least one member each day to explain the mission plan to them, and ask them to accompany us or help us. Too, we just got a new bishop in barrio Latino, and so we are planning a noche de hogar (family home evening) this week in which we can offer to help him in anything, and ask him to accompany us, and to ask for priesthood blessings like Elder Falabella said. Bishop and his wife are very excited to help the ward, and we are excited to work with them! We are hoping that Bishop Piedra will call a Relief Society and Young Men's President, especially since Johnathan and Christian are in that group. We are trying to contact all referrals within 24 hours, and we are really appreciative of the members trusting in us to teach their conocidos.
Too, I love what President Aurala said in leadership council about smiling and being a new person if you want to make friends in each new ward. I've always held back a little in new wards, and typically I leave not knowing too many people, or just knowing them as Hermano or Hermana, but in these two wards, I really want to work on loving people and actually getting to know them. Asking them questions, learning their names and being more sociable. I want to help everyone, and make connections with as many members as possible. Especially with two wards, I need to learn how to keep them straight. I think that will be one of my biggest challenges here--keeping straight who belongs to which ward! This is a new and exciting experience, and I can't wait to see what happens!
Too, we have plans this week for Moronitas with the hermanas in Central and in Imbaya. We want to go over the points in Preach My Gospel about how to be a successful missionary, because we want to change the view of success here in Campo. Too, we want to focus on obedience, and what it is that is expected of us. I just want to show these hermanas that I love them, and that we are here to help them. I also want to work more with the zone leaders to ensure that we are doing our very best as leaders to help each missionary fulfill their purpose. There's a lot to do, but thank you for trusting in me. I won't let you down.
Too, I love the Book of Mormon reading challenge we have for the next three months. I especially love the question from last week about what it means when Nephi says, "Nevertheless, I went forth." To me, that means trusting in God. I've had a lot of experiences in trusting in God on my mission. When I broke my ankle, I prayed over and over to again understand why it happened, and I never really received an answer. And at the end of my month at home, I prayed to know if I needed to come back. After all, why would God have made it so that I had to go home if only to send me back? It didn't make sense. But I also felt very strongly that I needed to come back. I know that trusting in God even when we don't understand His plan is sometimes incredibly difficult, but that's what faith is. Knowing that even when we lack understanding or a knowledge of things to come, He will guide us and help us achieve that which is right.
I love being a missionary. It's hard and exhausting, but there is little more satisfying than knowing someone who decides to change their life for the better. I love that my mission has taught me to love people, no matter their difficulties or circumstances.
Thank you for your example and your counsel. Thank you for helping us be better, and for always guiding us.
Have a wonderful week,
Hermana Kennedy
I'm so grateful for my mission. It has taught me a bunch of things that I can see now (but maybe couldn't see earlier when I was frustrated with Heavenly Father). It has taught me that I can love other people, and that I can be loved. I've always thought of myself as someone who isn't super friendly or happy, but the mission has taught me how to be that way. It's taught me how to get along with people, how to get to know them, and how to connect to people on a personal level. Too, I'm really grateful for the lifelong friends that I've made here. I've had a lot of luck with companions, and I'm grateful that I'll get to see a lot of them after the mission. Too, it's solidified me knowing what I want to do with the rest of my life. I want to help people. I now that being a Physician Assistant is a way that I can do that. I can help, but it's not so heavy as being a doctor, so I'll have time for my family too. My mission has also taught me to see the best in every situation and to not judge people. Everyone has a story (right, Mama?), and everyone has the capacity to change, but they all need someone to believe in them and show them that they care. Life here in Ecuador is super hard and different, but I've learned to laugh and smile in every situation, and that's something I don't think I would have been able to do if I had stayed home. And Spanish. So many things make sense now because they translate from Spanish.
That's a lot of reasons, but I love the mission. My mission has been hard in different ways than most people, but Heavenly Father has taught me a lot, and they are things that I think would have taken me years to learn on my own.
Okay, good spiritual stuff. But moving on :-)
It's awesome here. I love Otavalo. I love walking the streets and hearing Quichua again. I'm hoping to pick up on it, but so far, I only understand when there are Spanish words thrown in too. Some missionaries' favorite phrases in Quichua include "kushki" which means "money", but also "mishki, mishki" which means "delicious". People always laugh if after eating a meal, you say "mishki, mishki". I'm going to have to start caring my Quichua notebook around with me again to start noting new words and phrases that people are willing to teach us.
I've also eaten a lot of potatoes this week, and combined with the stress of being in a new sector and a new companion, I'm very worried about gaining weight. Pray for me that I won't be too stressed, and that I won't stress eat. I'd really like to keep losing weight so I come home being able to wear pants again.
Speaking of pants, I love pants. Aren't they great? I'm so happy each day to come home, take off my dress and put on pants and a superhero t-shirt. Only four more months until pants again.
Too, some members today lent us their WASHER! Oh my gosh, I actually got to wash my clothes today! It's basically a miracle! And they'll be dry by tomorrow morning, because the washer can wring out water better than any human hand can. Next week? Sheets and my towel!
Here we live on the fourth floor, so each day, after feeling tired and exhausted from walking all day (I have an average of 14,000 steps each day which equals over seven miles), we have to climb up four freaking flights of stairs. Goodness, I want to die. As if the elevation isn't high enough already!
Also, there's an hermana that always accompanies us to Jonathan and Christian's house, because she gave us the referral. She's a funny old lady named Maria, but the funniest thing is how darn short she is. Like, people in Quito are short, and then there are Otavalanians. She basically comes up to my waist line. On the first night with that family, she came in, and I was already sitting down, but as we were leaving, she stood up and turned to the Hermana Adriana to say goodbye, and I stood up. When she turned around, she exclaimed, "Oh carambas!" That's like "Oh my GOSH!", and then she just started laughing. Good times.
 |
| Here's a pic from a couple of weeks ago when one of my friends from Mitad del Mundo came to see me in Santa Anita. Her name is Rosa Jumbo, and as you can see (maybe...), she is VERY little! |
Final story for this email: Last night, we were finishing up our weekly planning, and we get a call from a member, asking if we can come and lock up the chapel since there's no one there who has a key who can do it. The chapel is a good 10-15-20 minute walk depending on if you're living in Otavalo or not, so we said sure. Anything to help the members! I grab the keys, but we leave our bags in the apartment, since we are coming back to finish weekly planning. We walk and walk, and once we are in the sight of the members, Hermana Carré looks at me curiously and asks, "Hermana, do you have the keys?"
"Yep, I have them."
"No, not the house keys. The chapel keys."
"What chapel keys?"
She realizes at that moment that the chapel keys (which I didn't know existed) are in her bag.
Which we left in our apartment...on the other side of our very long walk.
But at this point, the members see us and say, "You saved us!"
We are like, "Yeah...."
Anyway, they wait outside the gate, and I'm like, "Hermana, I need to use the restroom.. Tell them they can leave." So she does, and they leave. I use the bathroom, and then we make this whole show of pretending to lock up the chapel for any hooligans who might be keeping an eye. Leaving it entirely open, we RUN back to our apartment, Hermana Carré books it up the four flights of stairs, comes back down, and we head off again, praying that no one went into the chapel, because, of course, it was just robbed last week. Thankfully, since it was robbed, there isn't really anything for anyone to take, but still. We were rather stressed. Thankfully, no one went in, and I got in my step count for the day! We laughed for a long time about that.
Anyway, it was a good week. The members here are super friendly, the potatoes are still gargantuan and served whole, and the dogs don't bark as much as in Quito, so that's nice. It's nice to feel at home here.
I love you guys a lot. Keep being good and faithful and loving other people. I love you all and have a great week!
Love,
Hermana Kennedy ("the granddaughter of President Kennedy", as everyone tells me here :-))
 |
| Here's me with Hermana Knapp right before I got on the bus to Otavalo <3 |
 |
| A double rainbow this week. |
No comments:
Post a Comment