Week 12: Love Every Day You Have

Dear Friends and Family, This week was great. I learned to appreciate the good and bad days and there were both this week. But to start off, just a little bit of fun experiences I have had that don't have to do with the awesome people the Lord allows me to meet. So sancudos... they're basically mosquitos? Some of them carry dengue. But... their bites ITCH!!!!!!!!!!!!! I learned this week that you put lime on them and it helps. A LOT. The problem is it makes them itch even more for about 10 minutes. I literally thought I might die during these 10 minutes. I'm not sure if it's worth it! Hahahaha but it sure does help. The next thing is rain is great and not so great. Everything is muddy and puddles and you get soaked. BUT it's a lot cooler when it rains. I think the rainy season may begin early this year? But who knows. The people here always tell me something different when it comes to the weather. I never know what the weather actually is like here. AND I don't know what the conversion is for Celsius to Fahrenheit (spelling?). Next thing is I'm not sure if it's my pentionista or a Peruvian thing, but I thought gutting fish was common knowledge, but I guess not. I'm not a fan of eating fish and picking out all of the little bones. PAIN IN THE BUTT!!!! But at least the fish is YUMMY :) So SUPER gross. Yesterday we ate lunch with the family I live with so we ate dinner with my pentionista. She was busy when we came by in the night so we just went to serve ourselve. There wasn't anything except rice and potatoes which was a little odd, but I wasn't that hungry. I bite into my potatoe............ AND THERE IS A WORM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I about died. I didn't finish my potatoe to say the least. Well, then I finish my plate and then see a towel on the table covering something. So I ask my companion, what is this? We look, and it's our dinner already ready for us. YUMMY chicken. So then I ate that happily. But hopefully no one has potatoes this week with worms. Another thing I learned I am grateful for is toilets. Squatting to pee in the ground isn't my favorite... and it smells! Fun fruit of the week. Cainito? I'm not sure if that is the name. But it's SUPER sweet. I wasn't a huge fan, but it's sticky. LIKE REALLY STICKY. Like Elmers glue on your lips almost. Maybe not quite that sticky, but it was SUPER weird. The lady who gave us the fruit then said we needed someone to go kiss. Haha. I can't imagine. You'd be stuck together. WEIRD. Hermana Creek and I.  So Cool family we me this week. Agapito, Natalia, and their 8 year old daughter. Natalia's mother in law has been a member 30 years. They know a lot and the only reason they haven't been baptized is because of work really, but right now they are here in Puerto!!! So we teach them and how to prepare for baptism, they need to complete certain steps. One of which is be married before they can be baptized. Agapito is the one who was super unsure and so we explained a little and then Natalia says, ''Now my little fat man (gordito was what she actually said, but it doesn't translate the best into english) you can't escape me.'' They both just laughed and he said he was willing to be married and be baptized but didn't want to this weekend (which we weren't even suggesting this weekend) but not this weekend because he's sick with dengue and wants to be better before he gets baptized. Also, Diana uses the guide in the back of the Book of Mormon to help with her homework. WHAT??? I've never heard of that. It was kind of cool. So we're excited to work with them. Then Jimmy. He's 9. His parents are members and we're working with them so they can start attending church again, but he comes every week with his grandma. We asked him if he wanted to be baptized and he says, ''I've only been waiting FOREVER for this day to come!'' Super cute. Then we asked his little brother if he wanted to be baptized one day and he goes ''No!'' And then Jimmy says, ''That's because he doesn't even know what a baptism is.'' So we explained and at the end he goes, I change my mind, I want to be baptized like Jimmy! Super super cute family. I love this family lots. Anyways, I'm out of time. I love you all and want to hear how everyone is doing! Let me know what's going on in all of your lives! Love, Hermana Carly Jo Lang Ugliest dog that I have ever seen! It scares me everyday when we walk by it.

Week 11: Being Sick Sucks!

Richard & Delsey who come back in 3 weeks

Dear Friends and Family,

So, lets begin with that I really am doing great. We are seeing lots of success, but physically, I could be better. I have 1 infection and then on top of that, I also have both of my ears infected which makes it SUPER hard to hear and the left ear is actually really bad. I won't go into detail. BUT the dog bite is healing fabulously. That's all my complaints though. Now onto better things!!

To start off, I want to share a funny experience. After the first hour of church which is the sacrament meeting, we have a class for all of the investigators of the church. We were in that class with the elders and some random guy opens the door and shouts '' HERMANOS!!!!! Today I am happy because I'm here to give my soul to God.'' The teacher didn't know what to do and just said ''That's great,'' and went on with the lesson. We couldn't stop laughing though.

Another gross thing is we are teaching this lady who is progressing slowly and she always gives us THE best drink... ok, well it's not my favorite. It's called agua cebada, but out of all the agua cebadas, her's is the best (because it's loaded with sugar). The thing is, this time, I look down and there are ants all in my drink. There was nothing to do. I closed my eyes and chugged the glass and then smiled! Yeah... I hope you guys don't have ants in your drink this week! May God bless you.

Ok! Now to talk about people!!!!!!!!! To start off, the Family Yanqui. They are a reference from a member. Their 9 year old son always comes to church so we went to visit his parents. Come to find out, they are members, but they have been inactive for 10 years and were talking about coming back to church. WELL.... THEY CAME THIS SUNDAY!!!! Woohoo! Jimmy (the little boy) wants to be baptized. So we are working with the family so that hopefully his dad can be worthy to baptize him, but we haven't gotten that far yet. But it was really exciting to see the parents who have a lot of challenges right now attend church with their 2 little boys and they always invite their neighbor who is a single 30 year old man to always come listen to the lessons. He couldn't come this Sunday, but he said he's going to arrange all so he can come this following Sunday.

I found this in a store and thought it should
be on awkward family photo.com

Next is Pedro. He's old. like 70? I don't know. But he doesn't move super well but understands and is super friendly. He has a lot of desires to listen and be baptized. He also came to church this week. He should hopefully be baptized by the end of this month! His son Nil who is 24 also has some interest. We haven't had much time to work with him because he's rarely home but he loves the church. He attended for a year when he was younger with a family that used to live across from them. I'm super excited to work with them.

THEN! Our family. Junior and Erika and they have a 1 year old. we brought a member with us Saturday to teach them. We were going to teach, faith (fe) repentance, bap`tism, holy ghost and endure to the end. So I started off with the question what is faith, but I said fe. Well, the member heard the word for tea or te. He then went off for about 45 minutes about the word of wisdom. But, here's the thing, it resolved a lot of doubts Junior had and we found out that like half of his siblings are members in another branch! Super cool. They both agreed to be baptized. Now they just need to decide to get married. I'm super excited for this family!!!! We're buying their book of requirements to get married today!

Anyways, short on time. I love you all. Here is my thought. Where much is given, much is required.


Love you,

Hermana Carly Jo Lang

Week 10: A New Zone!

Friends and Family,

So this last week was pretty interesting. It was overall a hard one.

But to start off, more about my interesting life here in Peru. We have a pentionista who cook breakfast and lunch for us and then we either don't eat dinner or we buy something or snack. I usually am really not all that hungry with the heat. Also, address here SUCK. They are super hard to find. There aren't street signs and the majority of houses don't have numbers on them and most people don't even know their address. This makes it a bit difficult to find people in our Area Book.

So we have a new zone. 10 new people (half of our zone). It is super fun to have transfers. A little sad to see everyone else leave, but fun to meet new people and learn new things and more excitement. 

This past P-day which was moved to Tuesday with transfers was THE whole day because a lot of the sectors don't have people to work in them because we are putting companions with other people who don't have companions. So it was me, Hna Olivera and Hna Creek the whole day. We just enjoyed ourselves. We walked around. We went to the biggest bridge in Peru (don't be too excited, it's not THAT big) we bought smoothies, painted our nails, talked. AND...... we put our mattresses on the floor and built a fort. It was legit. We slept in our awesome fort and told stories :)

So I have found that my new favorite fruit is copasu (but it's not in season until spring time...) and I LOVE Ahi de gallina. Definitely the best meal I have had here.

So to start off, my camera was stolen... I was super worried about what to do. And then the next day, I found out from my pentionista that she had my camera! What a blessing! Her grandchildren were playing with my backpack and had taken it out! 

Well, then, our guy Fransisco who is working to be baptized, we haven't been able to find him ALL this week. Plus, our family of gold, Richard and Delsy, they are leaving for a month for Cusco. We will definitely call them to see how they are, but that is a LONG time to be gone. Hopefully they will still be excited when they come back. We will be praying for them.

Also, our convert Fransisco is moving..... This broke my heart a little bit. 

Next, I had this goal to run every morning this week. Monday-Wednesday, we weren't able to leave our apartment, so Thursday, I was super excited to get up and run. We leave our apartment and the park is closed. No big deal, I'll just run around the perimeter. We saw a couple walking their dog on a leash (which I've never seen someone use a leash here btw). The dog was super friendly. So I begin my run. I am about 3/4s of the way done with my circle and I pass this couple with their dog. Well other dogs in the street started to bark and this sweet little dog got scared and so it jumped....... and..... BIT MY LEG!!!!!!!! I would be lying if I said it didn't hurt. So we went to the hospital. I have to take these pills for infection and they told me not to walk for a couple of days (oops! I may have been walking right after we left the hospital). It's starting to bruise now, but at least it has stopped bleeding.

Well, so we went by the house of this guy with the dog later so they could pay for the costs. Come to find out, she's a less active member, their neighbors are this family where the grandpa is interested, the son is a member, and their granddaughter found us on the street and we have been trying to find her ever since. What a miracle! Then we contacted the house across from them. The lady there is interesting. She won't be baptized but says the church is true and has read the Book of Mormon. We asked her for a reference and we met the girl next door. Alexandra!!!!!!! Alexandra wants to be baptized. She knows a little bit about the church already, but not a ton, but we taught her the restauration and she is AWESOME!!! So we'll see her Wednesday. Anyways, super awesome! She's 18 years old!!!!!! Anyways, there are always miracles when you look for them, but overall, this week was hard.

Well, I love you all, but haven't heard from you guys in about 2 weeks! Write me emails!!! Ya??? Love you!

Love,
Hermana Carly Jo Lang
carly.lang@myldsmail.net

Week 9: Welcome to the Jungle!

Friends and Family,

This may be a little shorter. I typed everything and then it all got deleted somehow. So I’m shorter on time.

How are my emails? Am I boring you all to death? What do you want to know more and less of?Are they too long?

My mission consists of Madre de Dios (where I am in Perto Maldonado), Cusco, Apurima, and Puno which is SUPER cold apparently. So a little bit of everything. Heaters don’t exist in any of the areas that I serve and so if I’m somewhere cold, it will be REALLY cold. Here, we don’t have hot water which is normally just fine, but it can get pretty chilly here and then cold water isn’t so fun to shower.

So last week we didn’t go to the chacra because we didn’t have time. But we went to La Havana. It is complete jungle there. SUPER pretty. We learned a lot about plants and such in the jungle and there are pictures from that that I am sending. Then we played soccer and the Americans won!!! Aka my team J

So question for you all, what do you do when you have a hard day?

So about the people I’ve met!!! Richard and Delsy are a couple with a baby. We keep teaching them and they are very slowly progressing. We taught him about prayer and how he needed to pray to know if this were all true. He then says, I want to know it’s all true, but I have a lot of doubts. I told him that when we pray and ask specific questions, we receive specific answers. He then says, oh goodness, this is going to be a long prayer tonight then. Haha But we have another appointment with him today!!!!

Carlos and Marta, they are a couple who have been taught by MANY missionaries before us. They know everything. They are slowly progressing. He has doubts about baptism but we went to their house for lunch yesterday and we talked with him for a while. I may have jokingly baptized my companion with my water bottle (she didn’t know it was coming) But I explained that if we don’t do things in the right way, then it doesn’t really count. I have great faith that he’ll come around. His wife wants to be baptized, but won’t do anything her husband won’t do.

Fransisco (this is different than the other one who was already baptized) He has the same first and last name though. He is going to be baptized this month! And!!! He and his girlfriend are going to get married. The only thing that weirds me out is that he is 56… and she? Yeah, she’s my age exactly. Kind of weird. But they’re happy and he’s super excited.

Also, thanks for the package and letters I’ve received. I have loved each and everyone and each has helped me when I needed it.

So quote of the week, Me: Do you attend any specific church?

Guy: No, I don’t go to church

Me: Oh why don’t you go to church?

Guy: Because I’m Catholic

…. Haha someone please explain this to me!!! J

Anyways, Scripture for all of you Matthew 16:25 ‘’For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.’’

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week and that you can see the hand of God in your lives.

Love, Hermana Carly Lang

PS. You can use Dearelder.com to write me as well, but when you use that, write the date so that I know when you wrote the letter. Or… you can just email me because that’s probably easier for you.    carly.lang@myldsmail.net