Hermana Rowe en Bolivia: Un Ejemplo de los Creyentes: Amo Sucre!

I asked Jessica what things the sisters told them they were doing wrong. Did it apply to obedience or just the way she and her comp were doing things. Both, there were some things that I didn´t even realize that were in the handbook (because we´d only read it together one time, at the very beginning of my training when i really didn´t understand that much (and actually we are supposed to read the handbook together every single day, which i didn´t know either...)) that we were either going directly against (and i seriously did not know) or that were being bent a LOT (I know I shouldn´t play the victim here but I feel a little bit like one because of all these things that i´d never known or realized because i´d never been told about, or i had but i didn´t understand). But it´s ok now because we´ve been doing a lot more things right this week :)

So! Welcome back to the Bolivian life I´m living, friends and family! I have to say, I feel like I don´t have a whole ton to say this week, but we´ll see I guess.

Tuesday: We had district meeting like normal, and the topic was the small simple things that we should be doing obedience-wise. It was super great. My invitation to all of you is to to do the small simple things that add up to a great big relationship with God: Read the Book of Mormon, at least a few verses every day, and pray every morning and night on your knees. I have seen such a large spiritual progression in myself as I´ve done these things, and I know that we can have the spirit with us more abundantly as we do these things. This is something that we talk about with people pretty much every day, and I have seen the huge difference it can make in people´s lives. On Tuesday we ate Pique Macho at the pension, and it was SO GOOD! Apparently the pique macho from Cocha is better, but I was happy to eat it. It is french fries with ketchup mayo fried egg, steak strips, hot dog, peppers, and onions... it´s pretty good :)

Wednesday: Happy 4th of July y´all! I made sure to subtly rep my país by wearing red white and blue. We ate ice cream, and also made a dinner of hot dog, rice, eggs, and I drew fireworks on mine with ketchup mayo and mustard. It tasted super good. :) (Yes I know, Bolivian food is oddly sofisticated but super child-like at the same time) It was a good day, even though I was a little trunky thinking about friends and family :) I really tried hard to lose myself in the work for the rest of the week.

Thursday: We had interviews with Presidente Montoya, and he basically told me that Hna Padilla is going to Cochabamba for the next transfer, and that I´ll have at least one more transfer here in Sucre (YAY!!) But we won´t ´officially´ know until this Sunday night. It was really good to talk with him. I was able to express a little of my frustrations and ask advice about what to do when I want to be more obedient than my comp (he told me that was a common theme this transfer, so it´s good to know that I´m not going through this alone).

Friday: I actually can´t really remember much from Friday. I know we actually had time to get in all of our studies, so that was good! Let´s just assume it was a good day because I can´t remember haha

Saturday: We were going to have a baptism, but the date fell through because she wasn´t ready. We are hoping that she´ll be ready in another few weeks, but we´ll see. But it was going to be a group`baptism at the stake center, and they had asked me to do the special musical number, so we went anyway. I sang Teach Me to Walk in the Light (because two of the people being baptized were kids over 8). I´m really glad I´ve been able to use my musical talents to help others feel the Spirit. I continue to play piano for the ward in sacrament meeting every Sunday, and I´ve been asked to sing for things many times.

Sunday: A very good happy day! I was a little stressed out in the morning because 5 mins before the meeting one of the people giving talks hadn´t showed up yet, and they asked me to share a message. It actually turned out pretty good! I´m choosing to count it as a blessing that I had to do that because seriously I have seen HUGE improvements in my spanish. I understand the majority of things that people say, and Ï´m able to respond adequately, so it´s looking pretty good! Almost every other week President Montoya tells me in response to my weekly emails to him that he is really seeing a lot of improvement in my Spanish as well! It makes me happy :)

Today (Monday): For P-day today we hung out at the stake center and played games. One of the Elders (My district leader, Elder Fisher) bought Settlers of Catan from the Cancha in Cocha, so he brought it and we played it! It was super fun. (It was also super cheapy and a rip off of the original, but I´m not complaining haha :) A lot of things in Bolivia are like that. For example: All the movies here you can buy for 1 or 2 bolivianos which is like 20 cents, and they are ALL pirated. It´s so funny because it´s illegal to pirate movies in the US, but in Bolivia it is actually legal. And ALL the stores do it. It is next to impossible to find a movie that is not pirated. So at the end of my mission every has to let me know what movies they want, and i´ll buy them here since they´re super cheap. And no, they are not all in Spanish) We also played soccer, and we were all surprised by how tired we were after! (the hermanas, idk about the elderes) (btw we played separately, don´t worry) But I guess it´s because we don´t run at all, because it´s not really safe for the hermanas to go on morning runs because it is still dark out when we get up (also it´s cold because it´s winter here).

AAAAAaannd here we are. Thanks to all for your emails, it really does make a difference! I love hearing about what is going on in your lives! Lots of love and keep doing the small simple things!!

AMOR,

Hermana Rowe