week 11: a robbery

Hermana Buda was so nice to come find me and bring me stuff from home.

I got robbed finally, the disappointing part was it was by an ATM. I was running a little low on money because we paid for water and I don't get reimbursed until next week, so I thought I'd use my card and withdraw some money. I went to a bank and put my card in the ATM and then it never came out. I went in to the people and asked in my broken spanish how to get it back. They asked me what bank it was from and I said Wells Fargo. They told me it's gone... so when I called home we had the adventure of trying to order my a new one with a video chat and a phone on speaker. 

    Other than that this week has been pretty good. Tuesday we found a lady and started teaching her the first lesson. Then we invited her to read the Book of Mormon and she started talking about how she reads the bible all the time, and she has this really awesome website she goes to where she can learn more about it. Then she gives us both cards for the website and she was a TJ!!! TJ stands for testigos de jehovah, or Jehovah Witnesses. We were pretty sad and then we ran into a drunk guy who was much sadder. He started telling us that he lied to his wife and he had a rose and a steak in a bag for her. I was so close to breaking down laughing and felt kind of bad. After he left me, and my companion just started dying.

     We had zone conference so I got to see the temple because zone conference was in the church next to it. We also had splits and I went with Elder Hurren, one of the zone leaders. He was super fun and we were crossing these train tracks and he wanted to walk down them and look for people. So we did and we found 2 people that are interested. He gave me some advice to live my mission without regrets. If you want to talk to someone, or go somewhere, do it, while staying focused on your purpose.

--Elder Thompson

Bits and pieces from family phone calls:

The Veracruz temple is so small. It's 9,000 square feet...the timp temple is over 100,000 square feet. I'll get to go there for my 1 year mark, and again before going home.

I'm still struggling with the language. I just want to understand people, really understand them. But I also know I'm doing all I can to learn.

When we got to church Sunday, the other elders came to find me and said they had a surprise for me. They took me over to meet Rocio. She is from Saratoga Springs and is friends with my dad's secretary. Her mother lives in Veracruz and is sick and so she came to visit her. She got in contact with my parents and they were able to send me Oreos and gatorade mix and a few other things! The other elders gave her mom a blessing, and then she asked me to give her a blessing. It was scary, but I did it with the help of the Lord.

Veracruz Temple

best zone!

Zone Conference