Landed on Mars...i mean Arequipa

Holy cow I am actually in my mission right now it is unreal. When we were landing on the plane i looked out the window and it honestly looked like we were about to land on mars with huge craters of dirt and rocks but the rocks turned out to be little houses it is kind of funny. Mom you might be sad to know that Arequipa is one of two places in the world without an ozone so that means skin cancer for my face. Just kidding i will put sunscreen on i promise. I was really nervous, like really nervous i am sure you could tell from the phonecall. We met the mission president and his wife and visited the temple site that the temple will be built on. The church just bought the final pice of land (73rd) lot so it will be really pretty.

They lined all the new missionaries on one side facing the window and then said one two three and when we turned around our new companions were standing behind us. it was super intense. GUESS WHAT Mitch Deiderich and I are in the SAME STAKE! so crazy, tender mercies are real. My companion is Hermana Canasa and she has been here for 3 months knows no english and i will be her first training experience but here it goes haha. I really like her so far it is just a little overwhelming already but i know with the lords help i will be okay. 

I didnt sleep well last night. like at all. i think i got to bed around 4 and then woke up at 6:20 for the day. One of the first things my comp said to me was do you like to run and in my head i was like ohhhh nooooo latinas arent supposed to like that stuff. so we went on a run this morning. But once we started i felt a lot better and then she was done in literally 5 minutes haha so we are perfect for eachother.

I was overwhelmed yester and kept thinking how in the world am i going to do this and then today while i was studying in D and C 6 it said something like do not fear or something towards the end and so i am going to be just fine hopefully! love you thanks for your prayers I sure need them!!

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I Believe I Can Fly

Happy 1 month to me! Dont worry i celebrated big with a nice song entitled, God Bless America in the shower. It was a party. This week has been an interesting one full of realizations that my mission is actually starting that i can do anything WITH the savior but can´t do this on my own that is for sure. 

We taught latino´s one night and it was kinda a disaster. Some of them weren´t nice either. they asked us if we were even praying for the gift of tongues? like come on! of course we are! They also told us stuff like you cant just tell your testimony and facts tell your feelings and let it show which i understand the importance of that but come on dudes we are trying here.  After our whole district was really frustrated and then I prayed with my comp and we laughed/cried through it together. bless our hearts.

 

Temple Thursday is always a blessing. I´ve been really nervous for this last temple time and thought i would be really sad but when i was in there i was happy and just felt like everything was going to be okay! I am excited to spread my wings and fall a few times on the way to AREQUIPA!! It was awesome to leave. Also my teacher came so we could get a picture with her. She is posting it on the GRAM so follow her. ElizbrL

 

Finished the BOM last week and my oh my it is full of golden treasures. It made me feel bad for not reading them more in my past life. some things that stuck out to me this time

3rd nephi 28:33...did preach the gospel of Christ unto all people upon the fcace of the land and they were CONVERTED unto the lord.

Teaching the gospel truly does convert you. We will always be converting to this gospel and it requires action at all times.

 

It has been difficult for me to see my improvement in spanish but we taught the new missionaries and i sat there and just said to myself holy cow i used to be like that. So now i can see my improvement!

 

Lots of good stories this week but dont have time to share them all.

During a Law of Chastity lesson my investigator took a very different role and said he knows he will never have a relationship with a woman so i was thinking, does he like men?? I was so confused? and then i asked him to explain and he had a confidence problem and said nobody likes me haha and I started laughing SO hard and it was even funnier cause I had to be reverent but i just couldn´t. THEN i tried to say I know you Will have a relationship .....etc but I conjugated it wrong and said Well I know i will have a relationship and then it just went crazy.

 

ALL IS WELL can´t wait to be in arequipa even though it is bitter sweet leaving here. Lots of really good friends and have adjusted to everything.

 

xoxo hermana larsen

 

NOS VEMOS

It´s your gurl!!

I only have two weeks left in sprit prison, aka CCM. wowzers. mixed emotions because i still feel clueless in spanish but way excited cause everytime i got proselite i fall in love with these peruvians. their culture is so cute, all the girls kiss you on the cheek.

Today at the temple this one woman came up and sprayed me and my comp with essential oils haha i think she saw me sniffling what a little angel though!

My maestra aka my saving grace here is my best little amiga i have here. she makes me so happy and she will ask me if her hair looks good for a fiesta she is going to and stuff. besties in peru.

PROSELITING, this time i was paired up with a latina and a few members. nobody spoke english but i was able to barely get by with my nods and smiles. for the first 4 hours we went through a list to try and talk to inactive members but NONE of them were home so....we went to the park. We sat next to a grandma and her grandchildren and my comp started talking to the grandma. I asked if they read the bible and they pointed to one of thekids how likes to read it and i brought out the BOM obvi and began showing the kid the pictures in it and tried my best to explain the stories in spanish. trainwreck i am sure. When we left he read the chapter i asked him to to his whole family and it was so sweet. I hope one day I will somehow somewhere run into them! We were fasting and so hungry when we got back but then we had a testimony meeting the next morning that went over 40 minutes. #didntmind #whohaveiturnedinto

BEST WEEK OF FOOD. EVER.

one morning there was a slice of avacado. i was in heaven. then, there was rice,beans and GUACAMOLE and fijetas. Closest thing to cafe rio i will ever get and it was so delicious.

Also, I went to Migrations again this week for 9 hours but got to eat PIZZA HUT after. It is a sit down restaurant here and i was thrilled.

Me and my comp are sister leders over all the north american hermanas! Which is way exciting cause now it is actually a calling to ask them if everything in the stomach and bathroom things are going well! haha so happy

FUNNY STORY OF THE WEEK (yes it is about the bathroom but it has NOTHING to do with me)

my teacher was telling a story and says in his little accent ´´what do you call when yougo bathroom and make lots poop´´ the whole class was laughing way hard

Someone went to hug an old grandma and her dentures came out and onto his suit hahaha

I am feeling good. THis week my testimony of the savior has increased x100. I love peru and have worked really hard this week! I have been ablse to see which elders want to work hard and which ones want to make up their own weird fairy tale worlds. Yes they are writing a book. I know they are werid. Wish you all the best!

Love you more than all the rice grains on my plates.

xoxo Hna. Larsen

on the 8th day of constipation......

DONT WORRY IT WASNT ME!!

the new sisters that came had a rough week haha i feel so bad. like the caption says...pretty much explains what happened. yesterday i walked into the bathroom and lets just say there were some unholy smells in there.  We are all praying for them!

 

Our teachers have told us that we are now fasting from english so now our class is not quite as loud as it used to be simply cause we cant talk. when we do talk in english we do push ups. So i will be getting swoll in lima. :)

 

Hermana Rivera: she is my cute little peruvian teacher at night times and she just makes me so happy and i feel so loved. One night we were doing excercices on the computer and she saw me staring cause i was a little overwhelmed and she just gives me a hug from the back and says Si Se Puede (Yes you can) honestly, started tearing up a little cause sometimes you just need a little hug and it reminded me of home.

 

I found a video on a computer and i listened to it which i still dont know if thats against a rule but it was a talk so i did it. it MADE MY WEEK.

some things that reallys hit me. ´´When i find body begging for rest, and when i start to slow down, i tell myself remember him.´´ Jesus never stopped what he was doing or took a break. Enduring to the end is a hard concept but i want to endure THROUGH the end not just slow down before i get there.  That was elder Eyring

 

Elder holland: ´´ You let them know (missionaries) that when they struggle, when they are rejected, spit at, and cast out, they are standing shoulder to shoulder with the ONLY pure and perfect missionary that ever lived. And that they have EVERY reason to stand tall.

 

HOW COOL IS THAT! i got pumped and excited to be here!

 

SOME FUNNIES

1. My comp and I were doing some abs excercised and she totally farted way loud and i couldnt stop laughing for about 10 minutes. the human body doee!! so funny.

2. Some elders district rooms smell. A teacher came in and took our aersol spray can and doused their room with it and 1 minute later an elder was throwing up cause the spray was so strong. This poor elder has been sick since like day one though and they might send him home. He is the one they had to bless over the stalls...so pray for Elder 

Today the temple was so so nice. all the little peruvian workers are so cute. . The temple is my favorite part of the week.

Basically everything is good. I can{t believe it has been a week. time flies when you are in a classroom 24/7. Thanks for all your prayers i think about it all the time.

 

I love you and the lord does too!

Wish i could send pictures to you!! Just 3 more weeks though!

xoxo

Hna Larsen

Proselyting in Peru

Hola!!!

 

How is everyone? I love getting emails. pday is such a good day i love it.

Temple thursday was so needed. i just sat there after and prayed to feel all of your guys´love and to feel god strengthening me and i really needed it today. thanks for all your prayers.

 

I´ll begin with some of the cool spiritual stuff

PROSELYTING

I got paired up with hna. mason who i love and who also left this week. basically what i learned is that i know 2% of what people say back to me in spanish but that i love peruvians already.

1. We were contacting in the parks which are more like grassy sidewalks and we saw a woman and started talking with her. my comp took over and told her about the book of mormon. For the next 20 minutes no joke the woman was questioning why the bible wasn´t enough. so i just sat there pretending like i knew what her concerns were and then i finally just gave my comp the eye and bore my testimony about the bom and the only way for her to know if it was the word of god would be for her to read and pray about it herself. (rewind for a second, before we started tracting i decided to write my testimony in a BOM and also my comp wrote in it) I handed her the book but she said she already had one, then I said well take this one and read the last chapter in moroni. after the day two elders said they came across a girl in a park sitting down reading and they said hello and was about to talk to her and then they saw her reading our testimonies written in the book. so she was reading yay! Everyone is super receptive here and it was a really good experience. reminded me why i am here in the first place.

2. another way old man was sitting on a bench and we asked him how he was. he goes, i am cold and i am sad. poor guy. after we told him of the plan of salvation he said he believed in god because he sent two angels to him. what a solid dude

 

STRESS MANAGEMENT CLASS

way fun. we got to scream in pillows and throw soccer balls at eachother. although, mostly they just talked about how many things are stressful in the mission which made me more stressed because i didnt even recongize or thought of some of them. haha

 

STAR SPANGLED BANNER- Upon being asked what hymn i would like to sing, i started star spangled banner and by the end all of us were on our feet with our hand over our hearts belting it out. GOD BLESS THE USA. Man i love patriotism. Some of the peruvians came in and were cupping their hands over their ears. Our teacher whom i love, said she would show us the peruvian anthem and she pulls up youtube but there was a naugty commercial and everyone saw and quickly covered each others eyes. she was so flustered and worried so she said quick quick himno himno!!

 

MY DISTRICT

our district has 14 amazing people in it and they are my new family/BFFs here in the CCM. We were told they were going to split us up because ours is kinda big and so we were all way sad, then the day it came to split us me and my comp went early to see who it was and they said they wouldnt split us up anymore! So then we told our teacher to play a really rude joke and say 4 people that would be moved to a different district. one of the elders got really fired up and goes BRUJA (witch in espanol) and it was just really funny

 

THE COMICS

1. ELDER ?- This is one of the hardest i have ever laughed. elder ? is a latino missionary and the night before the latinos and latinas had to leave one of the latinas came in and told us that he was writing a love letter to her during class and the teacher caught him, gave the letter to El Presidente...When elder ? found out president got it he fainted and had to go to the hospital haha so he couldnt go on his mission until a few days later. then, later that night he slipped a note under the door towards the hermana his letter was to and she showed us north americans and let me tell you. It was the juciest love letter that i have ever seen. no wonder he fainted haha.

2. THE FART

One night we were praying and all of a sudden i hear this fart so i start to laugh naturally. i thought it was my comp cause she had the toots and she laughed a little as well. I found out later that an elder in my district dared another one to open the door to our class fart and then keep going. it made my week.

 

My favorite part of the day is when i am let loose to study outside on my own and playing soccer. I scored twice yesterday holla! Doing something other than sitting makes me feel human again.

 

Love,

 

your favorite missionary eva

 

Hermana Larsen