December 28, 2015 The theives are getting ready for New Years

So I guess I´ll just start this story with saying that I know that there are after-the-fact stories (after-the-mission stories) but this was super intense soooo I´m going to tell it anyways.

So on Saturday night we were proselyting all normal. Actually it was the 2nd worst day of my life where we had been walking in the killer sun since 10 AM and I was super fried and tired but still excited to go to our 8 PM appointment. So it was like 7:40 pm and we were walking to the appointment and a well lit, busy, trafficky area with a group of people walking behind us. We were walking at a pretty decent speed when 2 guys who were sitting on the curb stood up and ran over to us and were saying a lot of bad words and started telling my companion that he was going to shoot him and for us to give them all of our things. So of course the first thing that comes to mind is "I´m not going to lose my new scripture case" which ocurred at the same moment that I decided that I would rather die than lose my scriptures and everything. (uh oh) So my companion hands over his bag with all his things and I took my whopping 6 soles ($1.50) out of my pocket and put it out and said "here, here, here" in a desperate attempt to get them to take the money and leave me with bag and scriptures and everything. So the guys keep screaming like crazy and I couldn´t really understand what they were saying. They were both really dark skinned and they were kinda short, like up to my shoulder so when the guy took my money and told me to give me my bag I was kinda like "um, i think imma have to give you a negativo on that one, midget"

So the guys just starts freaking heck out screaming "DO YOU WANT TO DIE DO YOU WANT TO DIE DO YOU WANT TO DIE?!?!" And I was getting mad that these freakin´ idiots were even doing all this crap when all they´re doing is robbing two bags full of completely worthless books and a bag that says "Peru Lima South, Disciples of Jesus Christ" on the front. So I started yelling at the freakin´ idiot kid telling him that the bag just has scriptures and that I wouldn´t give it to him. So he kept asking me if I wanted to die while he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out something and started swinging it up and down like a crazy person. I guess  I had a revelation in that moment that maybe it was a knife and I imagined myself getting stabbed in the stomach which was more motivating than I expected. I still didn´t lose my things though and I have an extremely lucid memory of me looking down at this kids face with his mouth wide open yelling at me and thinking "he probably doesn't have a knife, I´m over a foot taller than him" and "I wonder if his teeth would get stuck in my knuckles if I punched him right in the face" but I guess my inner coward took over and gave him my bag. So he grabs the two bags (which are both really heavy) and runs away.

So me and my companion started walking down the street and I was all mad because I had lost my flippen scripture case. So I was basically raging pretty hardcore when I decided that we should follow where he ran to see if he would leave the bags in the street when he finds that they are worth literally nothing. So we walk around the corner and we get a good 30 feet before two guys on a motorcycle pull up in front of us and were just  like "HEY, here are your bags :D" while they handed us our bags. They then explained that they had seen us getting robbed but that they didn´t know if the thieves had guns or weapons so they didn´t want to get off the motorcycle to help us. So I guess they had turned around and followed the guys and got our bags back and then they found us while we had gone back to look for the backpacks. :DDDDDD So that was an awesome miracle and all I lost was my six soles. My companion then asked me "why did you give them your money?" because the guys who robbed us wouldn´t have taken the money if I hadn´t given it to them. So my companion kept his money and I lost mine but we both got our bags back so that was super cool. Also I´m not going to proselyte with my good triple until after new years because this time of year can be kinda sketchy I guess.

So that was the biggest event since our skype call on friday :D. Yesterday we found some new investigators and it was good but they totally just started killing us for Joseph Smith and they were telling us that we don´t need the book of mormon and that we only need the bible and then they totally FREAKED THE HECK OUT when I said, "well, first we have to consider that the bible isn´t perfect" which has tons of evidence considering all the contradictions and the fact that there are DIFFERENT VERSIONS of the bible so which one is correct? None of them because it was changed in the apostacy (read more in 1 Nephi 13) :D So that was exciting and both of the lessons actually ended up really good.

Sorry for making you all stressed out telling you my getting robbed story but I guess it wasn't the first time ahhahhahahahhaha

I LOVE YOU GUYS!

Loves,

Elder Mitchell

December 21, 2015

So this week wasn´t even that exciting.

Also we went to the huacachina again but I only took like two pictures so here they are. That´s one of those peru dogs that we were all excite about before I came to Peru which are actually very common and there´s me touching one.

Imma hit 16 months in the mission this week so woooo I´m offically an old missionary. I can't believe I'm actually 20. Also that I´m coming home next year. So that´s all happening.

My companion was pretty into english internet stuff before the mission so he knows all the words like yolo, swag and stuff so that´s silly. He also talks about hashtags and things so this week we were joking around with "hashtag this" and "hashtag that" because the WEIRDEST things happen like every day. Like a week ago I remember we were having a super spiritual experience in a lesson and then some kid just comes over to the house, stick his wang through the hole in the door and starts peeing INTO THE HOUSE and I was just like WHAT ARE YOU DOING CHILD. Also drunk people talk to us a lot so that´s super awkward always.

Change of subject, I decided that my biggest weakness as a person and as a missionary is that I get SO OFFENDED. Like seriously it just takes one person to be a jerk and I feel SO BAD ALL DAY. Elder Krantz was telling me that it´s my fault because I choose to feel bad but it´s noooottt because I try to choose to not to but I caaaannn´´ttt. Example: Yesterday I was talking to some lady in the street because I knew her son who is a recent convert. So I´m talking to her all normal, we made an appointment and then I realized that I had forgotten to ask for her phone number. So I totally normal just was like "oh, sorry, do you think you could give us your phone number so we can confirm the appointment?" and she just stared at me like satan incarnated and said "I already told you" and I was just standing there like in shock, like.. "um.. ok" So I started going through my agenda to find when I would have written down the number of this lady that I had never seen in my life and then she started yelling at me like "We already made the appointment, I told you Ill be here, you don´t need my number!" and I was just like "um, ok -- I guess thanks, we´ll see you on saturday" and then she closed the door. Like 100% everything was normal until that point and I was so confused at why she had gotten so mad. So then I basically just moped around all night full of self pity.  Sooo if you could give me psychological tips on how to not do that it would be great. :D

I think that´s everything, we´re going to skype on friday and Imma go call you in like 30 minutes to go set that up.

Thankssss

Loves,

Elder Mitchell

December 14, 2015

Hey!

So this week was pretty good even though I guess not very many exciting things happened. First off thanks to mom for the advice on controlling anxiety, I actually apply a lot of those things that you said like every single day. I actually have the thought come into my head every day of "Wow, I really hate ____" and then I think "wait, is that really rational. No. Better think of something else." "I like how ____ happens but maybe I could help to fix _____" I laugh at myself sometimes but it works so that´s good. Also I have put out the effort to never try to guess what my companion is thinking but that´s still hard because I guess I do it naturally but the effort i´ve put is still helping.

Big highlight of the week was that I got a kid in my ward to make me a new cover for my triple. And LOOK!!! It has a FREAKIN´ DRAGON ON THE SPINE!!!!!!! Like whaaaaaaattttt awesooooooommmmmeeeee 

so yeah.

The other big highlight of the week is that my companion from the mtc is in our district! Also that we had an interchange with him this week and we were together all dayyyyy whooooooooooo!!! It was Elder Krantz and he´s so awesome like seriously he´s changed so much and now he´s just all spiritual and amazing seriously 10 out of 10 best person ever! I put a picture on here so you see him and me.

Also mom don´t freak out about how we don´t get to talk for very long on skype I´m coming home here soon so don´t worry about it, yeah. Like, there´s only a few months until mothers day when we talk again and then I´m coming home like right after so no stress no stress.

Yesterday we gave talks in sacrament meeting and I talked about service and I totally taught with power and authority and called the whole sacrament meeting to repentance for not doing service, especially through callings and doing visiting teaching because protip: You have to do service to retain the remission of your sins Mosiah 4:27 best scripture ever. Also, in Mosiah 2: something we learn that when we´re in  the service of our fellow beings we´re only in the service of your God. Is it important to serve God? Yes. Then what should you do? Service. There you go, easy win.

We´re going to  the Huacachina again today so that´s exciting. I´m doing really good and everything is awesome.

With tons and TONS of love,

Elder Mitchell

Dec 1, 2015

So this week there were transfers again! And I lost my soulmate number 2 Elder P he left to go to another zone that´s a whopping 30 minutes away from Ica called Pisco.

Aaaaaaaannnddd I have a new companion! Here´s a picture, his name is Elder L so that´s pretty cool. And he´s from Veracruz, Mexico so that´s pretty neat. To give you just a basic rundown of what I´ve noticed since he got here yesterday is that he´s pretty chill, laid back, he likes movies and stuff and he had a girlfriend before the mission that was almost as mexican as mine :DD Also he knows english literally perfect that he claims he learned while watching movies in english for his whole life but idk about that but maybe. He´s pretty awesome and has like half my time in the mission even though he has like 8 months but I´m officially an old missionary in missionary life time.

I think my biggest struggle in the mission as of right now is that I teach people in a very direct way. The problems originates with the fact that questions are very hard to make in spanish. So I would get frustrated making questions sound good and not-offensive and I guess I kinda danced around asking what I really wanted to know so now I just kinda ask. Example from last night when I said "so if I understand you correctly, homosexual relationships are okay because they let homeless children have a place to stay?" which was 100% literally what she was telling me so that was an interesting point of view  Also I´ve just gotten into the habit of just abusing people with my amazing power of reason. Example: a few days ago we had agreed with a 20 year old boy that doesn´t work if he could come with us to an appointment. We agreed to find ourselves in a park at. We called him in the morning to remind him and he said that everything would be good. So it gets to and I called him to verify that he was coming to which he replied "um... can I come at, it´s just that my mom just got back from the market and I haven´t eaten lunch" So of course I replied "ummm... here, I´m going to teach you. We have appointments at 4, 5, 6 and 7. So if you show up at, we would get late to the lesson and then we would be late to every single lesson all afternoon and we would probably end up losing a few because of our delay. do you understand?" I guess I said some more stuff after because like FLIP I just want to teach lessons and why are the members preventing me from doing it?!?! We did everything we could to make everything perfect and it still all just failed. Anyways yeah.

Also a few nights ago I ended up teaching a ward mission night based on eternal families so I ended up putting on the love story from "up" and then explaining that those kinds of relationships don´t have to end with death and it was super bonito.

That´s everything from this week I think, I ate up a lot of time writing to hannah :((( :DDD but that´s okay.

I LOVE ALL OF YOU

Elder Mitchell

November 21, 2015

So let´s see how much  I can write in the time I have left :D

1. Here in Peru the people are very weird. The culture is they worship anything that might give them miracles. So what they do is they build a ton of dolls, put them in cathedrals and give them the name "virgin of (insert name of the chapel where it´s located)" and then they say that they don´t worship idols which I would understand if they were even worshipping the idea of the virgin or if all the virgins were representing the same person but they don´t because they give it the name of where it´s at so obviously it´s something physical. Whatever they want to do.

The other thing they do that´s weird is that they worship and pray to their dead relatives. The extremists dig up their dead relatives dead bodies and put their bones in their house because it "protects them from evil spirits" So everyone has pictures of their grandparents and great grandparents so they can pray to them so that they´ll get blessings and stuff. Nobody can deny it, I´ve seen the bones, I´ve seen people do it, I´ve had people ask me why we don´t do it -- there´s no debate.

Now the big thing here in Ica is a little boy named Chicho. The story is that a quile ago some like 7 year old kid was playing games in some internet cabinet when there was an earthquake or something, so the walls collapsed and the boy died. Very sad. Then the mom just goes all insane-like and starts freaking out telling everyone that he grants  miracles. So the people here are about that crazy stuff so they all grabbed pictures of this kid with prayers asking for his blessing written on the picture and they put it on their walls,windows, taxis, everything. Now if that wasn´t weird enough they built a small house in the center of Ica, then they grabbed a mannequin and sat it on a chair  in the middle of the empty room, put clothes on it and covered the walls with pictures of this poor kid that died. Then they lit a bunch of candles and put them all over the floor. I just so happened to stumble upon it while proselyting at night a while ago and I left feeling afraid and disturbed. Im trying to attach a picture of it but if it doesnt work then just look up "chicho ica peru" and you´ll get a good idea of what I´m talking about. But everyone worships it and it´s all totally terrifying and you can imagine how it was at night like what the flippen flip flip.

2. Yesterday was the primary program. It was basically the same as a normal utah primary program but peru style. The poor primary president was stressed out of her mind trying to get all these kids to recite their lines and everything and it was quite entertaining but not all sacrament meeting reverence worthy but that´s okay. The other problem is that there were an increased number of crazy kids running all through the aisles. One of them ran over to me during the sacrament prayer and wacked my face with a piece of cardboard and then started turning on and off the lights. I´m not really that patient of a person but I was able to just keep calm with just the thought of drowning him in the bathroom toilet. But seriously he wasn´t even the only one like it was all so crazy it was the worst.

3. We had a baptism of a boy who wasn´t able to get baptised with the rest of his family because his mom who lives in spain wouldn´t give permission but she came and we talked to her so everything is good now. Everything went well.

4. Also last night we went to an appointment and instead of asking for the man we had contacted named francisco Ramero I asked for Francisco Ramera. His wife then cracked up laughing like crazy because Ramero is a normal name and Ramera means harlot so that happened. She was actually a very nice lady and we have an appointment with her next week :D

That´s everything that´s been happening recently sorry for not writing recently but now you know.

October 20, 2015

Hey,

So I guess I´m not sure if my life just isn´t very exciting or if I´m just not an exciting writer or if I´m just used to the exciting life but I feel like this letter won´t be super interesting.

I guess the first major thing was the turn out at church this week. We found 4 new investigators last week and 2 new families and both of the families came to church so that was awesome.

Also as you´ve noticed transfers were this last week and GUESS WHAT!!!

NOTHING HAPPENED AGAIN! Like holy cow I´m with my companion AGAIN!!! 3 transfers together that´s like over 4 months we might as well get married like flip  This like doesn´t happen very often, actually like never but that´s all okay. Plus my companion is the new district leader so  every time he does anything I say "no, you can´t do that, you´re a district leader now" or "what, you think because you´re a district leader you can touch all my things?" I think it bothers him but that´s okay because we´re in kind of a bother-each-other kinda relationship. There´s an awful lot of screaming in our room even though we just like yelling at each other to get some more spice in our relationship because things are getting old  but really we get along really well and we´re seeing more success in our area and yeah so EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!!!

Stake conference was this last week and my favorite quote from the meetings was "What you are looking for is in the scriptures". I believe that everyone in the world is looking for something, to be happier, to make an important decision, to  have a happy family, to understand why we´re even here on the Earth and just a whole ton of things, that´s why I like that phrase, because EVERYTHING you could EVER LOOK FOR can be  either solved or found in the scriptures. I testify of the scriptures and their ability to change lives. To make bad people good and good people better and to help us to be guided in a world of increasing wickedness. I wish that EVERYONE would put the goal to have a DAILY SCRIPTURE STUDY IN THE BOOK OF MORMON consisting of at least 15 minutes, and that when we do that accompanied with prayers of faith, sincere intent and the desire to apply the scriptures to our lives we will FIND WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR!!! We will be guided to find it. I KNOW that when God inspired both ancient and modern prophets to write scripture they were thinking of Peter, April, Sarah, Rebecca, John and Will each INDIVIDUALLY to help them on the path, if we would only be willing to look for it.

 8 For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh,findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.

 9 Or what man is there of you, who, if his son ask bread,will give him a stone?

 10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?

 11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts untoyour children, how much more shall your Father who is inheaven give good things to them that ask him?

 12 Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that menshould do to you, do ye even so to them, for this is the lawand the prophets.

 13 Enter ye in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate, andbroad is the way, which leadeth to destruction, and manythere be who go in thereat;

 14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, whichleadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

Another funny thing is that I talked to a mom this week whose son is on a mission and she told us that she doesn´t want him to come back because in the mission he is safer from temptation and things :DDD Don´t worry about me!

I love you!!!

Elder Mitchell

October 12, 2015

okay,so this week was mostly uneventful again.

Had an AWESOME experience ponderizing 1 Nephi 15:11

Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hathsaid?—If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me infaith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence inkeeping my commandments, surely these things shall bemade known unto you.

Okay, so remember, that if you want to receive answers for your prayers you have to NOT HARDEN YOUR HEART, ASK IN FAITH, BE DILIGENT IN KEEPING THE COMMANDMENTS!!!!! And when you do that then SURELY these things shall be known unto you!!!!!!

Cannot even put enough exclamations on that one

We had a baptism this week but no pictures for now but we´re super excited. Basically the greatest ever. Been talking to Tanner White and there were some SUPER insane coinsedences and he´s gonna help me out with getting some papers for some investigators, will talk about it next week.

I LOVE YOU TEAM

Elder Mitchell

October 5, 2015

Ok, so this week wasn´t super eventful but yeah.

Soooo, the big news is something called "el niño" which is some huge storm that´s supposedly coming here to peru. According to everyone who lives here, it´s a storm that comes ever 10 to 20 years and what happens is that it gets REALLY hot REALLY early in the year. Like right now it should still be chilly from winter but it´s been pretty toasty for like a month and that´s unusual. What happens is that it gets hot for a long time and i guess the water from the ocean and everything evaporates more than normal. So that happens and that evaporation makes clouds, and then the clouds come over to places like where I am right now and it rains. The problem is that it doesn´t rain here and it never does, so when it does rain, then this desert sand dunes place turns into a muddy mudslide place and the whooooole city fills with mud. Now, originally i didn´t believe any of this peruvian conspiracy nonsense, but i guess it´s pretty serious because the stake keeps having emergency preparedness meetings and the schools have changed their schedules to acomodate for school to get out almost a month before summer vacation starts. So now ALL the kids are either studying on Saturdays in addition to the rest of the week, or they are studying 2 days a week from 7 am until 6 pm in addition to the rest of their schedule being normal! Like poooorrr children are in school for almost all day that´s the worst.

The other horrible thing is that the puppy that my pension had died. The grandpa guy was backing out with his car and crushed it´s legs or something and then it like jacked up it´s stomache or something so it´s gone. At least I got that incredible picture before that happened that I sent you guys last week.

Also, so I guess I was thinking it was funny reading about hanks frustration getting people to read the book of mormon, but it´s super true. Just throwing this out there, but if you WANT TO KNOW, then first you have to READ THE BOOK OF MORMON, I have seen SO many people who just START to READ THE BOOK and they have INCREDIBLE, LIFECHANGING transformations in their life!!!!! Like, seriously, just READ IT. I spent so much time whining to myself before the mission because i felt like I didn´t receive answers to my prayers but guess what? I DIDNT READ THE BOOK OF MORMON, at least not as much as i should have.

I love you guys!

EVERYTHING IS AWESOME WHEN YOU´RE PART OF A TEAM

Elder Mitchell

September 28, 2015

So this week was good. We went to the Huacachina and it was super awesome.

um, yeah. We did exercise like crazy this week so that was good. We have some awesome investigators that are progressing really well so we´re really excited and everything is going super good.

Fasting was awesome, 10 out of 10 would recommend.

sorry today was even shorter than last week, THANKS FOR THE EMAILS

I love you!

Elder Mitchell

September 21, 2015

So sorry I just like to spend all my time in internet like on lds.org and stuff so now I have like no time.

Everything is going AWESOME! The work went REALLY REALLY well this week and after 8 weeks and I´m still basically in love with my companion. So glad I got 2 transfers with him. 3 will be unlikely but maybe maybe.

Um, yeah. We still do excersize just like crazy all out every day and today we just killed ourselves again with chest and arms so that was super cool. We taught a new investigator last night whose name is carlos that´s just the coolest kid on the block.

Probably the greatest thing about the mission is just LEARNING HOW TO LOVE PEOPLE. 10 out of 10 would recommend.

We´re going to the Huacachina today, go look it up on internet because it´s gonna be awesome.

I LOVE YOU GUYS

Elder Mitchell

September 14, 2015

So this week was not super eventful. Actually I don´t remember really anything so it´s probably just going to be a disappointment.

Sometimes I haven´t told you is that we´ve been doing a lot of exercise. Like, we get up at 6 every day, then we run like a mile, then we lift weights with a member in like his back yard for 30 minutes, then we run the mile back to the room. So that´s pretty exciting. The other day we helped him grab one of the chickens the member had so my companion could hold it by it´s feet while the member chopped into its neck like some kind of barbarian to kill it for lunch while the poor white kid just stood there absolutely horrified but whatever.

Actually that´s everything that´s happened. Except the pension bought a new puppy and it´s my best friend and we had that baptism but that´s it :D

Sorry I used all my time already lo sientooo

Love you, team!

Elder Mitchell