Losing My Own Language!

Buenos Días!

 

So this week I had to call the church offices in Salt Lake the other day and it was super awkward because I didn´t know how to explain what I wanted to say in English.... Oh and first I called the Temple haha. So I had to find the missionary department too and my spanglish was very pronounced and it was just great. In the end, I finally found someone that could help me with what I needed and then I had to explain what I needed. ¨Um..... I.. oh um.... Agendas...... I don´t know what they´re called in English but they're the things we use everyday to plan what we´re going to do.... um handbook, planner? Something like that?¨ The hermana in Salt Lake... ¨Daily planners.¨ Me: ¨Ah sí sí. Daily Planners. Those. Ya those.¨ After awhile of that and trying to explain what I needed, the lady on the other end started laughing. ¨Oh Elder, you´ve forgotten your English!¨ Yup, that´s my life. ¨Where are you calling from again?¨  ¨Bolivia Santa Cruz North.¨ ¨Haha yes Elder well I´m glad that you´re so (enveloped or involved or into or something like that) in your mission language.¨ ¨Thanks.¨ Then it got worse at the end because I didn´t know how to say goodbye without being super awkward...... ¨Thanks...... thank you very much..... Thanks¨ La Hermana: ¨Is there anything else?¨ Me: ¨Um no, that´s it thanks......... ya........ thanks........¨ La Hermana: ¨Oh..... ok......¨ Me: Thank you very much....... yup.....¨  Hermana: Ok.... Bye........ Me: ¨Ya..... thanks........ um, bye?....... ya.... ¡Hasta Luego!¨ then I hung up the phone super fast. I´m ashamed. I couldn´t think of anything else to say so I said something in Spanish and ended the call. Other than it being really funny, deep down I really don´t want to call Salt Lake again because I´m just going to feel dumb again without knowing what to say haha.

But ya, other than that my week was good. We had a conference with everyone else in the South America Northwest area yesterday and it was really good. Everything was about the work of salvation with an emphasis on the ward council and it was really, really good. Then afterwords our stake president spoke, who is powerful and was definitely inspired yesterday might I add. He talked about a lot of things, but one thing really important is unity. We´re all on the same team here so why are we fighting or pointing out the faults of others? But there were a couple of other things that I noticed yesterday that were even more interesting. 1. When the stake president was talking, he was using a lot of examples, and with every single one of his examples, the people were saying, ¨I can do this.¨ Or ¨I can do that.¨ Or ¨I would like to do that.¨ But he never used an example saying, ¨You could do this.¨ Or ¨you could help that person in this way.¨ Or ¨They are closer with that family than us so they should be the ones helping them.¨ No. We have to stand up and do our own part. And we always have a part. Sometimes we just have to look for it, but I promise you all, there is always someone there and you always have a part. 2. Elder Perry from the conference in Junio [June] was talking about the missionaries and members working together. Something that I found interesting from that is that he never once said, ¨.....you can acompany the missionaries.¨  But he did say, ¨........the missionaries accompany the members.¨ Or however you want to say that in English. But ya, you can all make a huge difference if you´re the ones finding people and helping your friends and then the missionaries acompany you to go teach them. (I hope I´m saying that right, but something tells me that that´s really choppy or doesn´t sound right, oh well, but you get my drift).

 

But ya, we have some good people that we´re finding.... Ah! Almost forgot! I was ingressing [entering] the baptismal records the other day and was putting into the system the baptisms from Guayara this last week and guess who´s names were on the papers?! The 2 sons of the family that had baptismal dates for last week! They got baptized! Don´t know what´s going on with their parents yet, but that was good to know a little bit about what happened. I expect that they´re still teaching the parents, but they were always a little more closed off and weren´t going to church. But when I left they were asking questions about baptism and were praying, so I´m hoping that they´re still progressing in that aspect.

 

But yup. That´s about it.

 

Parker THAT¨S AWESOME!!!!! [Vocal Music Sterling Scholar for his high school] ¡Felicidades! [Congratulations!] That´ll be a ton of work, but you´ll learn a lot from it. Stuff to help you out later in life.

 

Read. Pray. Then read some more. Then pray some more. Then go out and share what you learned with someone. You´ll find that it´s not as hard as you think. But how will you know that if you don´t try it? Hmm..... Preguntas [Ask]. Go and be examples of Christ!

 

Love you all and wish the best,

Oh ya, Happy Thanksgiving haha!

¡Que tengan una buena semana! [Have a good week!]

Elder Groneman