Lorica, Life in a Tropical Wasteland Week 15

Epaaa homies! Hope everyone has 20 months left in the mission like I do, oh wait... But fo reals hope everyone is doing well. Hope no one has a heat rash like my companion Elder Bigelow. We went to the hospital to get it checked out and had no idea what to do or where to go since neither of us have been to a hospital in our lives, especially in Colombia where theres armed guards at each entrance. So we just kinda walked around til we kinda found out where to go. 

This week we bought peanut butter that came with free microwave popcorn which was pretty neat. PB&J sandwiches are bomb.com. Only one person in our branch has a microwave so we made the popcorn at her house and she was amazed. 

Shoutout to Hannah for praying for the people here to give me food I can actually eat.

Our mission is getting changes to the way that meals work. Right now we have to buy our own breakfast and dinner if we want them, and different members feed us lunches each day of the week. Now, the mission is going to start paying one member per like 4 missionaries to cook all 3 meals for them every day. That means that perhaps, we can tell this cook person what kind of food we would like to eat (not beans). So maybe all my problems will be fixed. Blessing from the Lord. It should start in about two weeks so I'll keep you all updated on that sitch. 

Everyone here takes English classes from the time they are young to the time they graduate. But as far as I can tell, the ONLY thing that they can say in English is "How are you?" But none of the English teachers here actually speak English so no one can pronounce English words. So what it ends up sounding like is "HARJOO?!"

We had a capacitation (I think that's an English word) all day on Saturday from our Mission President Calderon about the importance of teaching with clarity and it really is true. Theres a quote somewhere that says that a true expert is someone who can explain something complicated where everyone can understand. Being an expert doesn't come from knowing. It comes from organizing and expressing that knowledge. 

This week we were walking by our favorite pizza place, which is actually the only pizza place in Lorica, and we noticed something weird. There was a sign on the door that said: Do not enter, keep closed. Kinda weird, like oh maybe they're cleaning or something. We keep walking and we notice that there are people inside, eating pizza! Now we're just confused, like did these people ignore the sign, or is it actually open? Then we realized, the sign is in English, these people don't speak English, they have no idea what it says. It made us giggle a little bit. It was a real testament to me that in the words of Selena Gomez, everything is not as it seems. 

Love you guys lots! Hope you homies are all good

Construction started on the Baranquilla temple! I forgot to mention that!