Week 17: Mango Season!!!

Dear Friends and Family,

So first off, I can’t type super well, I’m exhausted. I was sick again yesterday and today, I just have no energy, but how lucky that today is P-day and I can recover. I think my companion and I both ended up with the flu.

Anyways, so fun story, being sick really helped with my goal of losing weight. I jokingly put that as my goal after I broke a chair the other day (the chair was already half broken though, so it really didn’t have to do with me, just bad luck and timing.)

Also, it’s MANGO SEASON!!! Almost everywhere we go, they give us mangos. We’ll just say that I always leave happy!!!

So funny story. Last P-day, we were going to meet at 3pm at the church with our zone. Well we were trying to open the gate and we heard some people whistling. Normally we just ignore the whistles. Well, we entered the church and then the whistling got louder with more people. We finally looked and it happened to be all of the elders. They were waiting across the street. We then explained to them that we have accustomed ourselves to not respond to whistles.

My companion right now is awesome. Super different than my last companion. Her and I have more in common. She doesn’t have the same work ethic as I do, but with motivation, she can work super hard.

So for those of you from Argentina, I was thinking about one HUGE difference that is here. We have a SUPER yellow carbonated drink. The difference is that in Cordoba, it was called Pritty. Here, it’s called Inca Cola and it’s not as tasty.

So a few things I don’t like. Street signs don’t exist. Half of the houses don’t have numbers and that makes directions SUPER hard to find.

Also, in this mission, there are only 3 stakes which are in Cusco. The rest are all districts. I feel like there is a lot more work when you are in a Branch inside of a District.

Well, exciting news about people. We were walking and this girl (Stephanie) calls us over. So we figured she was probably lost. We over to her and she goes. Can you visit me? I was listening to the Sister missionaries in Arequipa 3 years ago and I have seen Elders here, but I just have a lot more trust with girls! She’s super awesome. She is working on changing her work schedule so she can attend church again. Her only reason for not being baptized before was her parents, but she doesn’t live with her parents now!

Then we also were walking to lunch one afternoon and this guy says Hola Hermanas. And then proceeds to enter his house. We didn’t have the chance to see who it was and I knew we weren’t at an active member’s house, so we knocked on the door. He explained that he had talked to missionaries from another church the other day, but then they never came back and he’s looking for a church right now. He has 2 brothers that are pretty cool, not quite as excited but still attending activities. They came to a baptism Saturday and didn’t come to church because they were all sick with what I had.

Well, the most exciting part…… JOSE LUIS GOT BAPTIZED!!!!!!!!! It was super stressful. We taught him the Word of Wisdom, no problem. The next day, Law of Chastity and he goes I can’t live this. We were praying and trying to figure out what he needed. Thursday, we couldn’t find him ALL day. Friday, we taught him with a member and at the end he tells us that he’s not going to get baptized tomorrow. We left kind of frustrated and nervous. That night was his interview. We left him homework to do before his interview. Well, we returned and everything changed. He told us that he just felt complete peace! The Lord does answer our prayers!!! Well, he passed his interview. Our district leader said the interview was incredible. One of the things that you would only see in a Preach My Gospel video but that doesn’t actually happen in real life. Saturday, he was baptized!!! He was so happy. He just thanked us so much for our patience and perseverence. Sunday, when he received the Holy Ghost, he was just beaming!

Anyways, that’s it for now. My prayers go out to all of you and I hope you can see God’s hand in your life every day.

Love Always,

Hermana Carly Jo Lang

PS. Email me J carly.lang@myldsmail.net