FAMILIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My week
was GREAT! I honestly LOVE it here (except for the humid days, yucky).
Good to hear that you got that message :) He's really a great Pres, but
they leave next week to go home and Pres and Sis Jensen will be coming.
We're sad to see the Jergensens go but super duper excited to meet and
welcome the jensens!!
I MISS THE MOUNTAINS SO BAD!! Hahaha but really this
whole flat thing with no hills is the worst. I never have any idea where
on earth we're going and which way we're facing. If it weren't for our
GPS, we'd always be lost. The river Dubuqe is totally flooded. TOTALLY.
It's been flooded since we got here and flodded the main Dubuqe street
and half of a park, and just basically everything in the area. I have
some pictures that hopefully can give you a good idea :) It's been dumb
because we need the Dubuque street to get to our area, so we have to go
all the way around....But good news! It opened again last night--so the
flooding is subsiding :) Yay!! Mormon Trek is the road that the Martin
and Willey handcard companies took to go to UTah!!! Our church/stake
center that we attend is located on the spot that they started from! How
cool is that!?!?!?! Also, we'll probably get a chance to go to the
Nauvoo Pageant!!! We'll see what the new pres thinks.
Questions:
*How was church on Sunday? Did you go to a Spanish-speaking branch/ward?
Church
was super duper!! The first week there wasn't too many hispanics there,
but yesterday there were more! They're starting to love us and our
horrible spanish. hahah Most of them if not all are from Mexico and are
TINY. Like the men are 5 foot 3 tiny. But they are honestly the most
beautifule people EVER!! Understanding them really isn't too bad...it's
when they actually use tenses that I get lost....but for the most part
I'm catching on. thanks to the Spirit I can mostly understand the main
ideas in lessons. But I'm not terrified to talk to people in Spanish
anymore!! Approaching the strangers...I'm still a little rough on that.
But compare me now to my first weekend--Bam. You'd all be proud. It's
really quite hilarous how I sound when I talk spanish :) Alll the
mexicans just smile at me and nod saying, you speak good!! I've heard
worse!...so comforting :)
There is this giant hispanic family in the ward called the
Santos. They are so beautfiul and so cool!!!! Matilde (the mom/gma) and 7
daughters and 2 sons...or maybe it's six daughters. More about how cool
they are in my letter today.
*How do you get around? Do you have a car or walk or bike?
We
have a 2013 Ford Fusion. And it's gray, which is the best part :) We
basically ahve the nicest car in the mission and all of the elders are
crazy jealous. We can talk to it and tell it what song we want it to
play from our ipods and stuff. It pretty much rocks!! We're probably
gonna get bus passes real soon because there are a lot of hispanics in
Coralville area and we've found a lot of potentials there. We have
walked a couple of times just around Coralville (Boston way right by the
mall, knowing you're gonna Google map it) and it was a SUPER humid day.
I was sweating so much my face was liquid water. No joke. It was so
gross. My garments are fine though. I really don't think the cotton ones
would make a difference. It's gonna be hot either way :)
*How big is your area?
HUGE!! And we
don't even live in it!!! That's the worst part and it's really killing
our miles (we only have 1000 miles a month and we're 200 down because
our car was driven from Des Moines transfer week for us--becuase we're
opening a new area...hope that made sense :) So we live on Court street
in IC (Iowa City) and our area is north of the 80. Dumb dumb. And it
goes over to Johnson road, up to Linn Johnson road...and over for
forever. If you go to the church maps, go to iowa city, and then find
the one that's a rectangle that hugs the 80, that's us!!
*Are there other Spanish-speaking missionaries in the city too?
So
there are two wards in IC for spanish. Us and the fourth ward (the
gun-shaped one right below us). The hispanics just split between us and
them. The zone leaders, Elders Andreasen (he went to LP) and Bates used
to cover both wards, but now since we're here, opening the area for
hermanas, we're in the first ward, and they cover the fourth ward. The
ward is obsessed with us....I don't think that they know that I'm just a
regular, tallish person from Utah with a really special calling. But
without my calling/nametag I'm really not that cool. But whenever we go
to dinner appointments the kids are all freaking out and their moms are
so releived that we've finally arrived. hAHAH the ward members here are
mostly young families whose husbands are residents. So yeah.
*How do you do your contacting? Do you knock on doors, find people on the street or in stores? Or do you get referrals?
We've
done mostly member stuff. Like lots of the members are great, but not
really all that active. Or they don't know any gospel principles. (the
ones besides the medical student families). One member that we did some
service yesterday on Hna H's birthday is a recent convert. Lucienne is
her name and I adore her. She's around 50, lives in a trailer park, and
has probably 8 cats. So...she has a
lot of stuff in her house and so we went and did some service for two
hours, folding laundry and picking up newspaper off the ground (two
black bags FULL). I chucked this copper metal bowl thing into the trash
(becuase I thought it was junk...it kind of looked like it should have
been the bra on a viking breastplate or something) and I thought she was
going to rip my ears off. Aparrently she had shaped that bowl herself
from a chunk of copper and I was stupid enough to throw it away. Let
this be a lesson to you all to never throw people's copper bowls away.
Even if they look like viking bras.
We've witnessed many miracles this week as we've run into
people at the oddest times and places. Like we went to go find this less
active for the fourth time yesterday, and as we were walking back to
the car (she didn't answer again) I felt like we needed to stay, but Hna
H wanted to go. Just as we were talking about it, this man came out of a
door right above us and was staring at us with his spiked lemonade in
his hand and a sandwich in the other. I looked at him and knew we had to
talk to him. So I said, Hola, and Hna P did the rest. I should have
kept on talking, but I let my fear get the better of me--It is so much
harder than I thought to talk to these Mexican men about the gospel.
Tha's the other thing. I have no idea where all the women are
hiding....we have all men investigators right now. Anywyas, he was
interested,. We've had about four of these type of experiences this
week. The Lord is helping us find the people He's prepared!!
*Where do you live? Is it a nice place?
We
live across the hall from some serious pot smokers. It smells wretched
in the hallway, but our apartment is really big, actually. I absolutely
love it there. I always feel safe, secure, and at home. The shower is
gross, but when is a shower really ever wonderful except in Hawaii...?
Yeah never.
*Do you have an address where we could send you a package if you need it?
Iowa Des Moines Mission
8515 Douglas Ave. Suite 19
Urbandale, IA 50322
Sorry I forgot this last week. Send letters here too :)
*How are your shoes? Did we pick good ones?
I
get more and more obsessed with my blue ones each day. YOU HAVE TO GET A
PAIR. They're wondermus. And really all my shoes are fabulous. Not
perfect for Iowa, but still fab. They're made for lots of walking, and
we have to drive everywhere...but my feet have never hurt, so that's
super duper, no?
Well I've got one minute left here on
the computer, so I love you all, thanks for the updates, and I hope you
had a great father's day, dad!! I was thinking of you all day and I had
cereal for breakfast for you :) I'm sending you my letter today.
Love you all soooo much
Hermana harkness