Rough Week + Mexican Jackie Chan and Large Spiders

Holar familiars y amigos,

            So as I write this letter I’m copying like 10 church movies that my district leader gave me from his memory to mine so I can watch them in my free time because MY COMPANION IS STILL SICK....

This has been the hardest week of my mission. Straight up. I thought about lying and saying it’s all great and just complaining to my parents in private but the people need to know the truth! Ya, boy hasn’t had the best week.

I think it’s safe to say I’ve spent more time in our apartment than outside since I arrived in Mexico... But it’s all good, as for the sickness you already know.  I just read a bunch of Liahona magazines..

Now let’s find the exciting stuff. We did teach a few lessons and Guillermo and Yadira finally are making more progress. If you remember I put them on date for baptism for this past Saturday but that didn’t happen but they are actually gonna get married on the 8th of June and then Yadira is gonna get baptized on the 9th. Guillermo still isn’t sure but that usually how it goes around here. We’re confident he’ll follow her example later. But we still had success this week! Even with a sick comp the Lord is blessing us. Finally all the paperwork came in for another couple that Elder Hernandez had been teaching for awhile. They are the ones who lost their son a couple weeks ago. But their paperwork got worked out and I paid for my first wedding here in Mexico! (I guess missionaries do that a lot because the investigators don’t have any money) So they got married and they were so happy and then we baptized them on Sunday. They are named Ezequiel and Guadalupe. I baptized Ezequiel and that was tiiiiighhtt. Afterwards they bore their testimonies and mentioned how they felt like new people and Ezequiel said he would be at church every Sunday for the rest of his life. COOL RIGHT? So yeah even though the majority of this week was rough there was still good. The most important thing is that 2 more of God’s children accepted the full gospel of Jesus Christ. Sooo chill. (sarcasm using chill)

So other exciting news this week is  that my little bros turned 11. SHOUT OUT TO THE BIG HOMIIES. Hope you guys had a great one.. I also went on an exchange with our district leader Elder Buenfil and he is just Mexican Jackie Chan.

The scariest part of this week was when we came home from a lesson with Guillermo and Yadira and there was a spider THE SIZE OF MY FACE on my bed. Any one who knows me knows I’m a little girl, so I screamed and (almost) cried and yeah... then Elder Hernandez laughed at me and killed it with a broom. FREAK I HATE SPIDERS....

So yeah.. Tough week but that’s life ya know? Hoping we can get to some serious work this week and find more people so after we baptize all the people we’re teaching now we’ll be able to keep the party rolling. Been thinking a lot about baptism this week and really just comes down to John 3:5 in the Bible. Except a man be born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God.. That’s why we focus so much on baptism. We’re opening that gate to others because we truly believe that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the only Church with the authority to do that.. So yeah its super important.

Just want to take this opportunity to put my wonderful sister on blast for never writing me.. Its cool I only cry all day because of it. Love ya!

 

Anyways, hope everybody at home is loving life and I'm positive this coming week is gonna be better!

 

Elder Jarman

Sick Companion and Arts and Crafts

Hola Familia y Amigos,

First things first shout out to the homies who had their farewells this week!! You guys are gonna kill it! Second of all, shout out to Coronado for finally winning state. 4th try in a row is the charm right? I only say that for baby B-Dau. He probably doesn’t even read this. Somebody tell him to read this hahah...

Anyways this week was not exciting so this will probably be pretty short. So remember how Elder Hernandez was better? Yeah I guess Salmonella gives false signs of being better and then it gets worse. We left the house like 2 times this week. But I appreciated the opportunity to pimp out my study space. I have like 40 pictures of Jesus smiling down on me while I study now. I cut them out of the 100 Liahona magazines we have here hahah. I also laminated my Preach My Gospel and my planner with a sweet pic of the fam on the back and a pic of Jesus on the front. Priorities?? 

So the one shining light in this week is Guillermo and Yadira. They are a couple who have been investigating with missionaries since November but have never really committed, but things have changed with Elder Hernandez and I. They’ve been coming to church and started praying as a family and they are reading the Book of Mormon and they are so great. They have a little son named Latin and he is the freakin homie! He always says adios amigo when we leave. Freakin G. So while Elder Hernandez was too sick to leave his bed on Thursday I went on a split with a priest in our ward. Joaquin. Dude is so cool. He lived in the states for a while and knows a little English and helps me out where I lack. So I was thrown out into open water without my companion and had to freakin teach these people. We talked about the importance of the Book of Mormon and I asked how the family prayer was helping their family and they said they can feel the peace it brings. Then I was just like alright we’re having a baptismal service on the 26th will you prepare yourselves to be baptized (which includes them getting married which they didn’t want to do) and they said YES! I can tell Guillermo still has doubts but we're just gonna have faith and work on that this week so they can be baptized. We should have 4 baptisms this weekend if things go as planned. Just gotta get 2 couples married and yeah es todo.

So yeah. Sick companion, arts and crafts, lots of studying and reading and with some serious faith we’ll be dressing in white this weekend! Hope we get to work our butts off this weekend. Running out of time here. Promise next week's letter will be more exciting! Love you all!

Elder Jarman

blackouts and rivers of rain and a baptism and God has a plan.

Hola mostly friends but the family too.

I say that because I skyped the fam yesterday and they already got this sweet weekly update, so shout out to all the homies who still remember that I exist! Hope people read this still, and still follow me on twitter....

Alright business time. This week was.... HARD. So let's start the story at last saturday the 5th.. We ate tacos off the street. Best thing I've eaten in my life right? But it gave my companion salmonella. 10 points to the white boy for being the one who avoided the parasite. Anyways, hes been bedridden basically the whole last week. And then in the middle of the week I got sick but mine was a throat infection. I'm better now and so is he for the most part so hopefully we can get a lot done this week. The reason all that is hard is because there is nothing worse than sitting around a house all day. I studied a bunch and slept some a played a little chess on my sweet chessboard that I bought at Tajín, but overall it was just a bleak week. But cool stuff still happened because freak its Mexico.

So Mother's Day here goes hard. All you mommies who are reading this, move to mexico because they throw mad fiestas for the mamas. Mothers Day here is the tenth though. They were having this huge loud party that night in the centro and the whole town was there and we were at home getting ready for sleepy time and then the power went out in the whole town. Literally the entire town. So then they just got even louder screaming and yelling stuff I dont understand completely yet. Thanks to the homies at Sunburst Shutters I do understand when they cuss though. And they do it alot. I guess its not offensive. Like it is still a cuss word but the children and the moms and grandmas and everybody do it and no one ever is offended. 

So back to power outage thing, that happened like 3 more times during the week for hours at a time and then the most intense rain and thunderstorm I've ever seen happened on Saturday. I was running in the street with water up past my ankles. Hahaha so fun. But yeah so we had a sweet baptism this week. His name is Samuel and he's 13 and he is the son of a family that Elder Hernandez baptized right before I got here. But the cool part is his dad recieved the priesthood before and was the one to baptize him. We had the baptism just immediately after church so the whole branch was there and it was really great.

The real reason this week was hard though was because on Friday, when Elder Hernandez was supposed to be resting, we went out to Cruz Blanca and the same family whose son got baptized Sunday had a tragedy. Their oldest son and his girlfriend (they are getting married this week and baptized this weekend) had a baby boy. I think he was like 7 or 8 months, but he died on Thursday night.... We went out to Cruz Blanca and spent the whole day helping them with the funeral and food and stuff with the rest of the branch members.. It's the first time I've ever seen a dead baby.. It was really sad, but it was not as sad as it could have been. The family still smiled occasionally and the mother and father of the baby are doing okay. Why? Because Elder Hernandez found them and taught them all before this happens, and they know about their Father in Heaven's plan for all of us. They have the comfort of knowing their son is safe and happy and that they will see him again for sure. I am so grateful for our Father in Heaven's plan for us and that I can be a missionary and share that message with the people here.

Were getting healthier, we're stoked for this week to work hard and find families, and we're about to go play some volley with some of our cuates. I actually got some pics to load this time so I hope you like them. I love you guys! Talk to ya next week.

Elder Jarman

Viva Mexico!

¡Que Onda Cuates!

I'm using a Mexican computer now so I can put cool upside down exclamation points. The down side is that google chrome is trying to tell me that every word I type is spelled wrong hahha.

Currently I am sitting in a little internet cafe type place (not sure what they are called yet). Sorry this is so late but you'll understand when I explain my week and day hahah. So Kohl told me my emails are too long so I'll try to summarize.

So on Monday I said goodbye to big scary Elder Kulu and got in a van to the airport with a bunch of other guys who had been waiting for visas. They are part of my generation, which is the word they use to describe a group of missionaries who enter the field together. When we got to the airport Elder Rhodes was there getting ready to fly out too. Hes the homie who caught an alley oop and 360 dunked it in the MTC. So we flew to Dallas and there I talked with the fam for a while on the phone. That was cool. Then we flew from there to Veracruz. The sad thing is that our bags did not go with us to Veracruz. The airline people just left them on the tarmack because there wasn't enough room in the plane. When we arrived in Veracruz the mission president and his wife and kids and the assistants to the president were all there. President was super nice and his wife is an angel. But president quickly turned into the biggest boss ever talking to the airline about our bags. He handles business hahah. Because we didn't have our bags we had to stay at the mission office in these dorm thingys for a couple days til they arrived.

On Tuesday I met my companion, Elder Juan Manuel Hernandez Da Silva!!! Everybody google him. Apparently he plays professional soccer for a team called Atlantico or Atlantic or something like that. Hes from Cancun and he is also a dolphin trainer.. Literally the most interesting man in the world hahah. He speaks a little English too and understands a ton of it so we communicate well hahah.

Wednesday we left with my bags to our area. I'm in the north part of this mission which means when it splits I'll be in the Xalapa Mission (pronounced Halapa).. Elder Rhodes and basically anyone else I know from SLC and the MTC will be staying down in Veracruz. Our zone is Poza Rica, which is the biggest city close to us. But our area is called Cazones.... Let me tell you about Cazones. You know the town in Nacho Libre? Well then you know Cazones. Except it's in the middle of the selva (jungle). It's this little town and there are a ton of pueblitos (smaller towns) around it. We do a lot of proselyting and teaching in the pueblitos so we take these fleteras which are flat bed trucks with two benches, and they pack about 20 people into the bed of these trucks, and just go hahaha. They also just put as many people as can fit into taxis (7 seems to be the maximum). So yeah there are tons of wild dogs roaming the streets here, and when I say tons I mean there are literally 5 or 6 on every street all day every day. They are harmless though. I've also seen luchador posters and drunks just roam the streets at night and it's just crazy. And perfect. I really really like it here. The funniest thing is that everyone's houses are super run down (including ours, no toilet seat hollerrrr) but then the whole community takes immaculate care of their campo (soccer field). It literally is perfect hahah. Mexican priorities are hilarious.

So the rest of the days since then have blended together, but thus far I've drank a ton of soda, eaten a ton of beans and rice and all manner of delicious mexican food. Ate the best tacos I've ever tasted on Saturday night from this taqueria in town. Elder Hernandez said it isn't even the best one in this little town though so I'm stoked to eat at others. I ate a fruit I've never seen in my life called guanabana. It's this spiky green thing. And I've been eating fresh lychees all day errday (they are so much better fresh, be jealous Jessica). Mexicans eat weird. They have a massive meal in the middle of the day at 2 (comida) and then a tiny one at 9 pm (cena) and a tiny one for breakfast. (desayuno) My body isn't used to it yet. So the church is super strong in this mission. There are like 4 stakes. But we just have this tiny branch here. 200 members and about 25 are active. We have a branch president and a president of the relief society and that's it really. So we dont have tons of help on the missionary work side. And I guess this area doesn't baptize very well usually because we are so far from mission headquarters (5 hours north) and missionaries come up here and be lazy... But that is gonna change. We're gonna baptize like crazy and work like crazy. The only thing that impedes me right now is the language and not understanding their culture really but Elder Hernandez is gonna train me and were gonna work hard and find people who are searching for this gospel.

So today for p day we went to Tajin where there are a bunch of ruins. I'm sending pictures of all my adventures thus far and Ill have Jessica post them on facebook.

So now for the good news bad news section of this letter.

Good news- I'm happy, I'm healthy, I'm safe. I'm excited.

Bad news- I'm sunburned, this is the second hottest area in the mission, and there is no AC anywhere except the little casa de oracion (we aren't big enough to have a chapel). 

The other bad news goes out to my friends. I'm not allowed to email anyone except family. I know its a tiny rule but im doing everything I can to be really obedient on my mission. So you'll have to hand write me. And we only get mail once every 6 weeks so I wont hear from you guys much. Really during the day on p day I have no time to write letters. I still want to hear from you guys and getting handful of letters every six weeks would be amazing, but I probably wont be able to respond. I hope you guys understand and I hope these email posts will be sufficient. But I gotta devote myself to the Lord and focus on being here in Mexico. I love you all and really hope to hear from you. Heres the address of the mission

Elder Price Dix Jarman
Misión México Veracruz
Calle Altamirano #27
Entre 1° de Mayo y Carranza
Col. Flores Magón
Veracruz, Ver 91700

So yeah mail me stuff there if you want! 

Les Amo!!

Elder Jarman