Elder Thompson: Veracruz, Mexico/ Bakersfield, California Missions: week 13: holy water

sometimes ya just gotta try and win the stuffed penguin!

Hey Everyone,

This week was a tough one. We had Elder Hawkins get transferred and we have a new Elder named Elder Ordell. He was Elder Arroyo's companion in his last area. He's from Idaho. We had an interesting experience when we were contacting. We started talking to this guy and he was a little strange. Then he offered us Coca-Cola, but our mission president has a rule that we can't drink coke or pepsi, so we asked for water. He said he didn't have any, so he ran across the street and bought some. He came back and poured some water for us, and then some in his hands and said in the name of the father, the son, and the holy ghost, then started washing off his arms and face...wow.

Other than that, not much happened. We had almost all of our different appointments fall through this week. I had a really tough time with all of that. Manuel left for his family, and after he sells his house he'll be coming back. We also went on splits with Elder Gallegos. He's leaving this week to go home, and this was one of his old areas so we're in a trio right now. It's been fun getting to watch some of the ward members react to seeing him again.

--Elder Thompson

Bits and pieces from family phone calls:

It's a struggle trying to feel like I'm doing enough on weeks like this. It was a bummer that so many of our return appointments were busy/no shows. My dad gave me some good advice about trusting the Lord when I know I'm doing the best that I can.

The roads here are interesting. Some are dirt, some are cement, and some are literally just so destroyed they don't even look like roads. One of our bus routes is so full of potholes and uneven ground, we get air time over the bumps.

My mom asked me how often we clean the apartment...I mean, we take out trash and kill cockroaches...and no, in 7 weeks in the apartment we've never cleaned the toilet. I guess we might need to rethink the cleaning thing.

My bank card made it to the mission home and I'll be going there to pick it up in the next week or two!

I also got advice on how to tighten the earpieces on my glasses. They won't stay on because of all the weight I've lost, so I'm gonna use the hotplate in our apartment to heat up the ends and try to bend them a bit...update on that next week.