Talking to everyone we see and having a blast doing it

We had transfers this week. Both my comp and I are staying for at least another six weeks. Matter of fact our entire District is pretty much the same. Only one of the missionaries got switched up. I'm super excited though cause our ward is way awesome out here.

Preaching in the rain

As far as the week went... It was awesome. I ate my first hot food since I got here in Puerto Rico when I got the Jalapenos on my subway sandwich. I'm still trying to get used to no Mexican food. I bought some Sofrito or some seasoning like that today though. Apparently Puerto Ricans put that on everything. It's like a Puerto Rican salsa that's not hot. We'll see how cooking with that goes.

We found some really awesome people this week as well. We met this one Dominican kid that is just super cool. He loves when we come over, and now we're trying to start teaching their whole family. We also ran into quite a few people that grew up in the states. We're starting to teach like 3 people from New York.

Probably one of my favorite parts of the week was our dinner with the only two gringos (white dudes) in our ward. And get this, one of them is from Newbury Park and the other is from Thousand Oaks. Or in other words I know the two white guys that grew up like twenty minutes from my house back home. It's a small world. It felt so weird talking about basketball and sports on the way to their house in English. We ended up having some Honduran enchiladas (His wife's from Honduras) looking out at the water from their beach house and speaking English. The only way it could have gone better is if it wasn't a cloudy day.

Dinner with Gringos on the coast

As far as the rest of the week. It's been the same old daily missionary grind. Talking to everyone we see and having a blast doing it.

Driving an abandoned boat

Book of Mormon Experiment

Well we did something this week that most missionaries probably don't get the chance to do. We got to ditch our name tags and change into regular clothes. Then our entire zone participated in a Book of Mormon experiment  inspired from the experiment done in the video "Let the Book of Mormon speak for itself" at the college campus in our area. We pulled a bunch of pages from Book of Mormons and then went around asking people if they wanted to participate. What they had to do was read the page and fill out a sheet on the back asking them questions like where they thought the page was from and what stuck out to them on the page. There's rules however that we can't proselyte on campus. So we got permission from our president to go in regular clothes without our tags. We didn't even need to do it with our companions. We just had to be near each other (sight and sound) while we each talked to our own people.

Book of Mormon Experiment with District

Brian Book of Mormon Experiment

Page out of Book of Mormon used for experiment

The results were incredible. A total of 12 missionaries participated. The experiment lasted for a little less than 2 hours. There were a total of 170 people that participated in the experiment. 89 people gave us their contact info saying they would like to learn more, and 32 references were given as well (Name and number of a friend that might be interested). Overall we got a total of 121 names and information which we have now been contacting throughout the week to coordinate visits. Almost everybody that participated wanted to learn more. Of the 17 people that I got to participate, only 3 weren't interested in learning more about the Book of Mormon. I'd say it went pretty good.

As far as the rest of the week, nothing too new has happened. I'm going to stay out here in Mayaguez for another transfer with my companion Elder Jenson. The power went out again. It wasn't for the whole island though, just our street. We had the craziest thing happen though. We didn't have any dinner appointment set up so I was planning on just eating a can of cold beans or something when we got home. Right before dinner we stopped by a former investigator that we had never met before. After talking with him for like 20 minutes his wife came out and told us to come in and eat. She had made us a meal before she even met us. Overall not to bad of a week.

Sunset in Puerto Rico

First water rejection - most missionaries in PR go their whole mission without that happening

Brian next to "cool pier"

Another awesome week. We finally got to have a zone activity out here. Which was super awesome. Puerto Rico is such a pretty place.

Anyways the work out here is going amazing. We were able to get 13 different lessons where a member came out with us. The ward here is the best. In one of our lessons a member was telling us the sacrifice he made to be able to come out and teach with us. He said it was all alright though cause "God called first." Those are the kind of moments we get to see that just keep motivating me to go out and preach.

So there's these things called Colmados out here in PR. They like little all-purpose stores that also sell alcohol. We met one of the owners though and recently we've been teaching him in his colmado. It's the hardest and funniest thing ever though cause we're just surround by a bunch of borrachos (drunk people) and the places are just disgusting.

I also got my first water rejection. Most missionaries here go like their whole mission without that happening. It was the weirdest thing. She just said no. My companion and I were so confused. That shouldn't happen in Puerto Rico. We were also given the most disgusting sticky cups with water this week as well. Which of course we had to reject.

Then there was the time when there was a huge traffic. We looked over to the other side of the road and an entire lane of traffic was driving in reverse. It was the funniest thing ever. The drivers here are just don't care. Everyone drives on the shoulders and runs the lights and stuff. The cops don't really seam to care. I guess everyone just got used to driving with no stoplights from the power outages.

Zone grill out

View of Mayaguez near the water

Zone pic with zone T-shirts

On the way to zone activity with comp Elder Jensen

At the beach but not in the water

Teaching Peruvian, Haitian, and Dominican college students

Pic by the church

This week was yet another amazing week. The work is moving so fast and I feel like we never have enough time for anything. It feels like I was just writing home like yesterday as well.

We're finally working with a bunch of different investigators now. Our days are now filling up with lessons instead of finding activities. Interesting enough, a lot of the more solid people we are working with aren't even Puerto Rican. We're teaching a Dominican student, a Haitian student, and working with a Peruvian student who was just recently baptized. They've all come out here to study at the Mayaguez college which is apparently a really good school.

As far as Puerto Rico goes, I guess I'll share some culture differences that I think are pretty funny:
- All of the school buses are pimped out. I'm talking about flashing lights, blasting music, and I swear some buses are low-riders or something. I still can just not get over this one.

- If you ask someone for directions here be prepared to get a 10 - 15 minute lesson on where the house you're looking for is. Even if it's only like three houses down. I'm not even exaggerating. They literally come out of their houses (like no matter what they're doing) to come and give you the most detailed yet most confusing directions in the world.

- Nobody refuses you for water... Ever. They could be yelling at you to leave, but if you ask them for water, they'll still go get you some.

We got to have zone conference this week as well. It was super awesome. We drove down to Ponce and had it out there. I got to see a bunch of Elders that I knew for the first time since before I was sent to New Mexico. Our President focused super hard on ministering. It doesn't matter who you are. You could be a missionary, student, or an old dude. Everybody can minister. It's how we can continue the Lord's work.

With President & Sister Smart and Elder Jensen (companion)

Pic by coast

Dealing with 36 hour power outage

So today wasn't too crazy of a week. Just the same old finding all day every day. It'll be nice to get a solid pool of people to teach. We are still trying to build our teaching pool. A lot of people we are teaching are just some people from the casarillos (free housing) that don't have all that much potential. And believe it or not, I haven't done any service out here.

Whitewashing is opening up the area. We didn't know anybody cause both of us were new to the area. We didn't even have a map of the area. We didn't know where to shop, where the church was, or how to even get home if we went anywhere cause we didn't know where we lived.

Wait never mind, the power shut off over the whole island for like thirty hours the other day. I guess it wasn't that normal of a week.

It was like around lunchtime and all of our fans and lights turned off. Then our mission president texted us saying the power went out on the island for who knows how long. Funny thing is, our water in our apartment didn't work either. That must have been a completely separate thing though because we were the only ones without water. We ended up just doing regular missionary work throughout the day. When it got dark though we had to go to a restaurant (with a generator)  because we didn't really have food that doesn't need to be cooked.

We decided to treat ourselves to some Chinese place. Or should I say "Chinese place." We ordered Chow Mein and got...... chicken and rice. I guess that's what I should have expected from out here. Long story short though our power and water eventually came back on.

As far as the mission goes, I've had to change up my teaching style completely out here. It's amazing how different the work is. However, as different as my day to day routine is, the nature of the work is exactly the same. We offer the same message, and the same blessings. We study from the same books everyday, and the joy we get by getting to share the gospel with everybody is still la mejor cosa del mundo.

Having a blast out here in this mission

The shores of Mayaguez

It's honestly been a pretty crazy week out here, but I'm finally adjusted to the life out here. It's insane how different it is.

I'm serving out in Mayaguez which is a busy college city on the west coast of Puerto Rico. Our ward's super young and super awesome. We've been whitewashing though so when we first got out here, we knew nobody and none of the places out here. It was super hard to get to meet all the members and learn the area the first week or two for me. Especially since I had to adjust to Puerto Rico and the way people speak out here. Which is super fast and they cut a bunch of things. Now I can understand people, and I know my way around...  for the most part.

The weather here is crazy. It rains every single day. Just straight pours. Which is awesome for days where you can stay inside. As a missionary though we can't just do that. So we get soaked. When it's not raining it's just super hot and humid. It felt way funky at first just dripping in sweat all the time, but now I'm pretty used to it. The work's still super fun though.

As far as my week went, it went awesome. Well except for my birthday. The only day of the week that didn't go as expected. I started off the day right when I woke up by spraying Deet 100 mosquito repellent straight into my eye cause I missed my elbow because I was tired. That burned for the next hour and a half, and my eye got all swollen. Then when we got back from our run our power went out. I decided to make myself some pancakes cause the microwave didn't work. It wasn't until I got everything out and ready to be cooked before I realized the stove was electric not gas. Then we got soaked later in the day cause it started pouring and the street we were on like legit turned into a river. My companion (Elder Jenson from Washington), took me out to a panaderia for lunch so that was pretty awesome.

All in all I'm actually having a blast out here in this mission. The work is super awesome with our ward.

With current companion Elder Jenson

With MTC companion Elder Barker

Exchange with Elder Glissmeyer who served in Simi Valley after hurricane

View of Mayaguez

Opening a new area in Mayagüez

This has honestly been the craziest week. I'm currently serving in a completely different mission. And believe me, the entire lifestyle / work is different out here. My companion Elder Jenson, who is from Washington state and served in the Long Beach area after the hurricane and was one of the first missionaries to return back to PR, and I are whitewashing in an area out here called Mayagüez. So I flew out here on Tuesday (not having a companion felt super weird). Then I arrived late at night, where we ate and then went to sleep. With all the travel I ended up getting very little sleep. Then I received my companion and headed out to my new area. We are going to have probably on of the best missions in the world with all of the different stateside experiences.

We knew nobody, and I was just trying to adjust to the culture. I didn't even understand anybody at all for probably about the first two three days just cause of their accent here.

Anyways as far as the mission goes, I actually did more service in my New Mexico than here. We proselyte pretty much all of the day. There's still damage from the hurricane out here though. We have running water and electricity. We are getting prepared for hurricane season though
and it pours like all the time here.

A lot of the streetlights don't work. It's not like the states though where it becomes a four way stop. Here traffic just flows. It seems to work pretty well though. Well... we did get rear ended driving down to our area. But that was just cause it was pouring and everybody drives like maniacs out here. My town is a college town right by the beach. Our ward seems so awesome though. Everybody is super young which is awesome. Just need to get to know everyone now. And learn the area. And learn the culture here. It will all come though. I mean after all I've only been here for a couple days. Everything here is also in Spanish also. Which is super awesome cause I'll probably get way better now.