Hello my Dearest and Wonderful Family,
I have not yet read your letters. Some of my friends wrote me and now i am low on time but i will print them and read them later. Well this week was fun adventure. Two of my favoritest memories in the mission probably of the whole mission happened this week.
I guess I will start out by explaining that we were supposed to have a baptism on saturday but it fell. We had to cancel and call everyone like 3 hours before. It was for Carmen the18 year old that had visited the temple. She has made best friends with the single adults in the ward and has been wanting to be baptised for a while. THere is no doubt in her mind of the truthfullness and she wants it so badly. She is so strong and is even sticking to it even when her grandparents and boyfriend do not support her at all. THe reason it didnt happen is because she apparently hadnt told her parents that she was planning on getting baptised on saturday till that morning. they had been supporting her in investigating the church but they kind of freaked out and told her she is doing it too fast. They told her they will support her in time. So we are on pause with her for a little, we are working with her to try and show her that it might get harder the longer she waits and that she might have to do what she knows is right even if her parents arent super fans of it. But there is no way they will disown her or anything. We ended up having a lesson with her that night with her friends in the ward and it went really well. Her faith is growing so much.
OK....now the funniest story of the mission....well remember our dear little drunk man in our ward (the one i dragged home a couple times before). Well he is a good friend and the missionaries have always been his like only friends and biggest support. Well Walter hadnt drunk for like 2 weeks and the time before he had drunk for 15 days straight (and probably stuff a lot stronger than beer) and was doing really bad with health. we were visting him a lot this week trying to keep him strong and halping him make goals. well we had an appointment saturday morning with him and his mother. when we showed up his mother was sitting in the son in front of their house and said walter had just left to go drink. Right when we heard that battaglia and i took off running in the direction she had pointed. we wanted to catch him before he got wasted. We were practically sprinting through an empty house lot. Here is when i should tell you that the people here throw garbage everywhere, especially in the empty lots next to their houses. Well we are running through a huge concentration of garbage and of course Hna. Battaglia trips and eats it right in the garbage with broken beer bottles, rotten food (something large and pumpkin looking) and everything else that is awful and disgusting. Well, obviously she got right back up and we kept running as she had blood running down her legs. after a few minutes of not finding walter we stopped and i got out my hand sanitizer and was just using my hands to wipe the blood off her and trying to disinfect her deseased open wounds.
We stoppend at a members house and cleaned her up but went right back out to try and find walter. Starting with a prayer we went back to where the general area i know Walter is alwasy at. We saw three of the same drunk homeless guys we always see and went up to them to ask where walter was. Now, dont worry. THese guys are harmless. We actually made friends with them the week before. We had given them a box of food ofa million patches and tamales people had given us for the new year. So we knew we had the hook up with the low life of Jardines. They told us that walter was in the cantina by the corner but down the callejon (dirt road). We went looking and couldnt find a cantina just super poor cinderblocked homes and we hard a woman screaming like she was possesed behind one of the doors. it was kinda creepy. We went back to the drunks and told them we couldnt find it. The main funny one (which was wasted) just yells, [MADRE! LA CALLEJON! haha we tried so hard not laugh. the other one not so drunk said it was the black door. i then asked , so there is no sign? he siad no. we then knew it was a sketchy cantina. i asked if it was dangerous they said not if we are only looking for someone. i asked if was dangerous sometimes. all he said was...sometimes.
haha. yep...well we went back...knocked on the door...and it opened up to a courtyard of wasted men. half smokin, probably more than just cigarettes and we see walter sitting there. he sees us and looks so ashamed. i just command him, Walter Venga!! And he comes with head down low. Sadly he had been drinking for more than 3 hours and was gone. we baught him some lunch and took him home, but we thought he was just going to go back since he was already so drunk. Well, that was a super fun adventure. We now know where the sketchy side of Jardines society all waste their lives. And we have a pretty solid relationship with the homeless drunks:)
Ok, so i dont know if you remember about Familia Aguilar. THey were our first family we taught together. Last week I think I wrote that they told us they just want to reactivate in the catholic church. It shocked us and we had a hard time with it because they had been so preaperd and opened to the church. well last monday night our citas fell and we realized this might be the moment to visit them. we made them cookies for an excuse for them to feel bad if they tell us to go away (and so that we could get our plate from them another day) They were doing some reconstruction on their house and couldnt but told us to come back on friday. Lorena was super friendly and it went better than we had hoped. We went back friday and Lorena and the kids invited us in. We ended up waiting for the dad, Luis, for an hour but had a good time talking with Lorena and the kids. We develped a lot stronger relationship with them and the kids LOVE us now! He got home but asked if we could come back the next day and teach. SO we went back but he had friends over and he asked if we could come back sunday night. We felt that maybe he was trying to just keep us away. We didnt know how to prepare for the lesson or knew what they would say. We just put all our trust in the spirit to direct our words. Well....it was incredible! They werent closed to learning more at all. They still are interested in learning more, they just thought since their son had done his first communion with his grandparents they didnt want to have the kids in one religion and them in another. We had such a powerful lesson about the book of mormon and that they can really know if the church is true or not. We realized that Lorena had been more open and friendly to us and interested because she had read and Luis hadnt. SHe even remembered everything, the importance of the priesthood and baptism. So even before we could invite them to church they said they were gonig to be there 5 minutes before 9 to come and learn and that they really want to pray to know for sure for themselves. We love this family so much and are so excited about them. Their little 8 year old girl, Sophi, is like my new best friend. She kept trying to play with my hair during our lesson. SHe is such a doll. It was cute when Luis and Lorena asked their kids what they thought. Sophi just said, Im with these guys! and pointed to us. haha
Ok. one last story. Sunday at church was incredible. Nivia and Jose both came to church. Nivia always is working in the hospital on sundays and she finally could come. She is SOOO golden and prepared and wants to be baptised. SHe was super interested in everything and was eating it all up. We are going to set a new baptismal date with her this week. Jose is the sweet tiny 76 year old man that is getting baptised this saturday. We have started calling him our pequeño novio. haha. he told us he is pretty attatched to us. he is such a sweetheart. As we are sitting in sacrament meeting i look over and see Estela walk in with her 4 children. I was freaking out. I told you that only like a week after her baptism she dissapeared because she got kicked out of her home and moved and we had no way of communicating with her. She now lives in the other ward area, but she came the 30 minutes here, with all the kids dressed and clean and she came to pay her tithing. I was more happy than you can imagine. It had been 2 months. I got an hermana in the ward to give her a blessing because her hand is still broken. I just absolutely love Estela and especially her little girls. Little Letty and Laura are the most beautiful girls. They have such dark indiginous skin. I love them in their corte and typical clothing. I thought i would never see them again. But she came after 2 months and she paid her tithing!! She has no money, but she did it!
Well, i have written another novel this week, well I love you and hope you enjoyed the stories. It was an exciting week. I am sorry it is written so ADD and junk, but i would rather ramble and get more out.
I will read all your letters later today. I love you SO much! I couldnt ask for the greatest family in the entire world. This week I have been really thinking of how perfectly blessed i have been to have you all! Thanks for your prayers, support, and for being such wonderful examples. I am still praying for you always!
Love Hna. Broadbent
