Jonah's Week 20

Monday, March 16, 2015

Easily the best native food here is the Baleadas!! haha They are basically tacos with way soft, fat tortillas that are really similar to the tortillas in a Cholupa at Taco Bell and they have refried beans, quesillo (crumbled cheese), crema (sour cream), and eggs inside!  They are super simple but they are seriously soo good!! Basically the secret to making good baleadas is in a nice moist tortilla with super good beans!! My favorite beans are prepared with onions and jalapenos inside! It makes the flavor soo good!! 

But yea this week has been interesting!! This week was my first full week here and to be honest the days here are a whole lot less busy than my days in my last area. We have a total of about 6 investigators and that is seriously terrible!! We are working super hard to change that but it's going to take some time. It's always super interesting to see what the people say while we are contacting and normally they just say things like , "Hi I'm catholic so you can leave." Or my favorite part is when I ask them things like "Do you believe God has the power to do anything?" Of course they always say yes and then I respond with another question

"Well, do you think that God has the power to restore the original church of Jesus Christ in the earth once again?" Almost always they say no....? haha For me it's really funny but after about 10 times in a row it can get really frustrating!!

 

So because my comp and I were getting a little bit tired of knocking on doors in this part of our area we decided to take our time and efforts to a part of our area that elders have not entered for 6 or more months!! We were super excited to go over there and figure out what it's all about and why missionaries haven't been there in ages so we took one full day to go there and contact, basically to re-open the area and introduce ourselves! The enthusiasm was there but quickly began to fade! The houses were huge and super pretty but just about every house had a security guard out front with a shotgun or a rifle of some type. haha The only way we could communicate with the people inside the homes was through the walkie talkie that the security almost always seemed to have! To say the very least it was a new experience for me! And also I realized that people with money here only trust other people with money so towards the end of the day I was introducing myself a little something like this, "Hi I'm Elder McKee like Mickey Mouse, I'm from Las Vegas in the United States, and I am here to share a message with you!" To be honest that technique was actually working! I was super excited and I'm even more excited that 2 of the houses actually invited us to come back this Thursday! I'm stoked to find out if they are people of their word and actually let us enter their houses to share a message but I won't know until I show up at the time we have set up!

 

But yea the week was pretty much just a bunch of contacting and a bunch of exploring the richest part of this city! During my explorations I found the embassy of Panama and also the embassy of Mexico which was cool but we couldn't enter so we only had the chance to look from the outside but none the less it was a cool find! Also, lastly the most exciting thing that I did this week was probably step in poop.... haha I am convinced that there is nothing more dangerous in this world than the dark walkway filled with brown death charges called "La Jungla!" haha It's a shortcut in my area that we walk almost every night and there is always poop somewhere in the path and you never can see it because it's soo dark!!! La Jungla is whack! And dangerous! I hate dog poop more than anything in this country!! But hey it's fine. This week was cool I guess! 

Oh and lastly I ran into a friend from the brigada here! haha She was one of the girls that my translator, Carlos, asked to marry me while I was here for the service mission in April! It was pretty funny and it really made me realize that this is a way small world we live in and it's even smaller if you're Mormon! haha Well love ya all and thanks for all of your blessings and prayers! Please pray to help me find people to teach! We are in desperate need!!!

 

Love ya all!

Elder Jonah McKee