In charge of first district meeting that includes the AP's, ZL's, Mission President, and his wife

Brian in white for baptism of Rubi in last area (we received this picture from Rubi.

Another super sick week. I think I'm actually starting to figure my way around this place as well. Now in stead of being completely lost, we're lost with a general direction. It's been a blast getting this place up and going though. It's going to be a little funky this next week though because I've been companions with one of the Zone Leaders and my MTC roommate Elder Degn out here, and will be with him for about two weeks. So things are going to stay a bit funky for a while.

I don't have much time because we're emailing in this Microsoft shop at one of the malls here. Some of the main events from the week though:

-First District meeting, and the AP's, ZL's, Mission President, and his wife show up cause they're in my district. I'd say it went pretty well though

-One of the Dominican members out here made us the best pastrami sandwiches that I've ever had when we stopped by to meet him.

-The steak dinner we had with one of the gringos out here.

-And of course getting absolutely soaked by the rain one day when it just starts pouring without stopping. We ended up getting some Popeyes at the end of our day to treat ourselves, and we thought they were going to kick us out cause we were so wet and dripping water everywhere.

We've been seeing miracle after miracle this week

San Juan street art

Well We had like the Sickest week ever. So my area covers pretty much all of San Juan. It is straight up city everywhere. This is honestly the coolest place ever. We're whitewashing in so we don't know our way around at all though. Another set of Elders pretty much drops us off every morning in an area, and we just kind of figure our way back hitting up the buses and stuff. It's a miracle me and my companion actually make it back home every day. This place is huge, and the way directions are set up out here is terrible.

My companion is Elder Shah from San Bernardino California. He's a super cool and funny dude, and was serving out in the Washington mission before coming out here. We're having an absolute blast though.

With new companion Elder Shah from California

We've been seeing miracle after miracle this week. Our second day out here, we were able to find 9 new investigator's. And then we were able to put a family of three of them on date that same day. It get's even better though. We were trying to find our way home at 8 o'clock at night  to go back to eat, and we were just completely lost. Some random dude walks out of a colmado and waves us down. So we go over to go talk to him, and he takes us inside and buys us two drinks. Then he talks with a minute and was like "You know, I actually own a couple BBQ places out here. He told us that after we finish talking we needed walk down to that BBQ place on the corner of the street." Then he calls somebody and tells him that "two guys are going to walk up with white shirts and ties, give them whatever they want." So we headed down and each got half a chicken and some french fries for free. It was so sick.

We headed out to El Moro as well on P-day to play soccer and football with our zone. I'm super excited to be serving out here. I'm excited to see what's in store for these next couple weeks. Hopefully we learn this area sometime soon.

Soccer at El Moro with the zone

More facts about this area: There's so many neighborhoods out here that are pretty much just part of the Dominican Republic. There's a lot of people that move from the Dominican Republic, and they just kind of establish their own places full of Dominicans.

Dominicans are like the coolest people ever. You can get them excited about anything. Any, and I mean any Dominican you see walking down the street, you can get super pumped up if you just say "Ayyy, Como estas?" and then talk with a bunch of enthusiasm about something. It's the best thing ever.

Dominoes is a hot game out here. Don't really have much more time to explain it this week. But things get heated here when dominoes are being played.

Meeting with trainer for first time after hurricane & understanding him

Saying goodbye to Christian a really cool member

Saying goodbye to bishop & counselors

Opening new area as district leader with new comp who has not been to the island

with "mini-missionary"

First things first, we received our transfer calls yesterday. I will now be serving on the other side of the island. It's a place called Hato Rey, and as far as I'm aware of, is downtown San Juan. The biggest city on the island. I will be white-washing (Neither my comp nor I have been in the area, so we don't know any of the members or the area). I will also be serving as the District Leader, and I will be getting a missionary who has never been to the island before.

As far as this week went, well, we had the coolest week ever. I like don't even know where to start. I guess I can begin with the "luz" issues. We were without power for like three days. It keeps going out though, so it's very possible that it's going to go out again. I have know idea why but the power seems to always go out here. It's not just our city either, it seems to be like all of this part of the island. For us, however, no power means no fans or lights and that we're going to be eating a lot of canned food. I also think it's about time that I get myself a flashlight. Some things are getting a little bit annoying to do in the dark. As bothersome as the power outages seem to be though, they're actually super awesome. We were out the other night and it was the best thing ever. It was sooo dark out, and absolutely dead quite. We went to stop by a family that we were visiting's house and had like the coolest lesson ever. There's something about having candles burning in the background with no other light that just makes everyone want to get together and tell stories. They have 4 younger boys that stayed super quite and payed attention to us the whole time we were there. It almost makes me want to have lessons in the dark more often.

We also had the coolest miracle. We went looking for a referral that we got from the church. The thing is, as missionaries we don't have smartphones to just type in someone's address and drive over there. We have to ask everybody around us where we should be heading. Unsurprisingly, we ended up getting directed way up into the middle of the mountains (we get bad directions a lot). When we got to the top of one of the mountains, both my companion and I realized we were totally lost. So we decided to ask someone living up there where the heck we were. When we went to go talk with some people out on their patio they were the most friendly people ever and were super interested in what we were sharing. We ended up teaching the three of them and left them with Book of Mormons. One of the ladies started crying and thanking us so much. She said she had been praying earlier that day to know what she needed to do with her life, and then we showed up at their door. When we went to go visit them for the second time, we had absolutely no way of getting out to their house though because they lived so far away. We had been calling members all day to try to get a ride, but nobody was able to give us one. We decided to go stop by a less actives house instead, and when we arrived we found out that she had called another member over to give her a blessing. We happened to show up just in time to help give the blessing, and right after the blessing the member was able to give us a ride back up into the mountains to make it to our appointment which ended up going super awesome!

Then we got to take one of the young members out with us for a day on something called a "mini-mission." Basically all of the youth in the church that are missionary age get sent to different parts of the island and spend a day working with the missionaries. We learned so much, and realized that we see little miracles absolutely every day. The problem is we just get so used to them as missionaries that we don't even recognize them.

Cool view of mountains with Elder Jenson

Hanging with the Zone in Rincon

Hanging with the Zone in Rincon

The biggest baptism that I've ever seen for a girl named Karla

Karla's baptism

Another super sick week. Well besides the fact that our investigator Alex (the guy from Perú that was working on his masters degree) left to go back to Perú. He's going over there to get married to his girlfriend, and he'll be coming back in December. We definitely won't still be here in Mayagüez when that happens though, so we had to go say our last goodbye.

We did, however, have some super cool things happen though. One of which was the baptism of a girl named Karla. It was probably the biggest baptism that I've ever seen. In total, there were more than sixty people that showed up to it. Her parents haven't been coming to church for a couple years now, and we had just started working with them and the daughter. It's been awesome to see the changes in their entire family as they've progressed.

Saying goodbye to Alex from Peru

Then, surprisingly, we were able to work on two service projects. For one of them, we chopped up all the vines and stuff in the backyard with machetes, and then moved on to the front to do some yard work. The other one we got to paint a room in one of the houses of a member out here. Both of them were super fun. It's always nice to get a little change from the regular preaching and teaching.

Service!

We also were able to get a Family Home Evening set up with a bunch of the JAS (young single adults in English). It turned out to be super awesome. We had more than 10 people show up, 3 of our investigators were able to come as well. We ended up playing some games out on one of the fields at the college campus. The youth out here in this ward are super awesome. They're pretty much all college students, some of which are returned missionaries. And they're all super fun to hang out with.

Some of the other cool things that happened out here were our Haitian dinner that we had with two of the students out here. Probably some of the most filling food I've ever had. Then there was the time when some people from an Adventist church pulled over to give us some comida criolla which was pretty sick. And of course our lesson with the blind guy. Or should I say "blind guy." We spent so long trying to find this guy. We had texted with him to meet up at some place, (how he can do that while blind beats me) and when we got there he like pretended to not be able to hear us when we were talking to him. He could totally hear us though. I'm not to convinced he was blind either. Although he did have one of those blind people sticks so.. who knows. What I do know is that this week was dope and this place is sick. Transfers are coming up next week too, so hopefully I don't have to leave.

The more time I've been out on my mission, the more I realize that I knew like nothing about the gospel before my mission

Preaching in the rain

Well, in 3 days, I will have been on the mission for an entire year now. It's been weird to think about, because one of the members out here is leaving for her mission to California in 2 days. It's been making me think about when I was getting ready to leave for my mission. The amount of stuff I have learned since then is absolutely crazy. And that's not even including the Spanish. Matter of fact the more time I've been out on my mission, the more and more I realize that I knew like nothing about the gospel before my mission. It's funny how you can go to church for 18 years of your life and not seem to know like anything that's taught. I even read over my farewell talk the other day. It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it was. I guess, I did know some things before my mission. The point, however, is that I've learned so much, and I'm only halfway done with my mission.

As far as this week went, it honestly went by so fast. We had some super cool experiences though.

We got to set two baptismal dates with dope dudes. We call them dope dudes cause they're.. well dope. They're two guys our age that grew up in the states so they know better English than they do Spanish. They're out here in Puerto Rico for school or something. They have like all the same interests as us and have been telling us about all the cool spots out here in Mayagüez. Lessons are pretty awesome with them cause we get out of the normal routine. They both are super interested as well.

We also got to watch our investigator from Peru defend his thesis for his masters degree in mechanical engineering. We felt a little out of place. One of the professors was super late so we ended up having to chill in the room talking with all of the other professors in there for like an hour before it started. There was actually a professor that was there from Italy. He knew like way less Spanish than we did though, so I was a little confused as to how he was ever able to teach anybody. Our investigator's presentation was awesome though. Although I was confused like the entire time (He started talking about bridges and then showed us like a thousand super complicated equations), it was a super cool experience. Now that he's done with that, we should actually be able to meet with him on a regular basis.

Overall super sick week. The only thing we didn't get to do was hike a super sick waterfall like last week.

I can officially say I have swung through the jungle on a vine now

Crab catchin' in the streets

Well, the supposed storm that was going to hit didn't turn out to be much more than a little rain and wind. However, it somehow still managed to knock out the power in part of Mayaguez. It didn't affect us at all though. Matter of fact, we had an awesome week.

To start off, I think I figured out why our power always seems to go out. So after Hurricane Maria, a lot of the power lines got totally damaged. The problem is that it seems like nobody out here knows how to fix any of them. We walked out of our apartment the other day and we saw them "working on the lines." I kid you not, they were just hitting the power line with a hammer and some sort of chisel thing. Then they just left the cut in half power line laying down onto the sidewalk. As to what they fixed, I have absolutely no idea.

We did, however, have some pretty sick lessons. We even got to teach one of our members' mom over skpye. He's the one that goes out with us all the time. He started telling his mom about the church, but she lives in the states. The missionaries over there started to visit her, and he wanted us to be able to have a lesson with her, so we all got around his phone and did a video call to teach her a lesson.

One of our investigators also sent us a text saying he know the Book of Mormon is true. He sent in in really really broken english though, so we'll have to see if that's what he meant to say. He's the one that is from Peru and currently trying to get his masters degree. He's always way to busy to meet with, but he's finally going to present his thesis this Wednesday so he should be pretty free after that. I think it's so funny when people try to talk to us in English, but they have absolutely know idea how to really speak English. Believe it or not, it's always the drunk dudes out in the streets that know the English. For some reason, they're always the ones to know it perfectly.

We also got to check out the campo out here. One of our members was driving us to an appointment, but he ended up going the complete opposite way. We ended up driving for like an hour and a half through the middle of the jungle. Then we had a zone activity out in San Sebastian on P-day and we got hike to some waterfalls which was super dope. I can officially say I have swung through the jungle on a vine now.

"Dope" waterfall

Beautiful waterfall area

View from the waterfall

Vine swinging in the jungle

Balled out with some kids on a homemade basketball hoop

Balling up on a homemade hoop

Well if you were looking for an interesting week, you got one. We did like so many different things that I'm probably only going to be able to remember like a quarter of what actually went on. Matter of fact I'll probably just list my highlights of each day. 

Monday: As a missionary, this is our preparation day, or "P-day." There is no such thing as a bad P-day. It's like a missionary's weekend. We get to do all those cool things like shopping and emailing. After all that, we get to basically do whatever we want. My favorite part of this P-day, however, was our dinner with one of the members of the stake presidency. They made some super bomb food, and we got to listen to all the coci while we ate and talked.

Tuesday: We got invited inside the biggest mansion ever. It was massive.

Wednesday: 4th of July. Well not really. Even though Puerto Rico is technically part of the United States, they don't really celebrate it here. Matter of fact, we asked some kids about the 4th of July, and they had absolutely know idea what it was. Their parents ended up having to explain to them that it's an American holiday. It's all good though cause we bought a bunch of hot-dogs, watermelon, and Malta to celebrate it on our own. This also happened to be the day that I found out I was a maltaholic. They sell this drink out here called Malta. It's like Puerto Rican's rootbeer, and happens to be the best tasting drink ever. I can't get enough of it. Then we got invited over to eat some shrimp and pasta with one of our investigators that we just set a baptismal date with.

Thursday: I have been in Puerto Rico for a couple months now. This is the first day that we've been able to do more than just carrying in groceries for service. It was awesome. One of the members invited us to come out and help work in someone's backyard. We cut a bunch of plants and super tall grass with some machetes right next to this creek. I almost fell in like five times. I also got little cut's all over me from the plants, and to this day I'm still itchy. Totally worth it though. Hopefully we get invited to some more service projects. 

Service with Joey

Friday: We had a lesson with one of the Peruvian students on campus. He's trying to get his doctorate degree and is currently working on his thesis which is about 90 pages. Consequently, this dude literally has like no time. We were finally able to meet with him in the evening, and he told us he hadn't even had time to eat at all that day because he was so busy. We had a super awesome lesson with him though, and we were even able to get two members to come out with us to the lesson. 

Saturday: We balled out with some kids on a homemade basketball hoop. They were using a red milk-carton crate with the bottom taken out as the hoop. It was actually super genius and worked way well. It even had a little bit of spring cause they hung it up with these flexible cords. We totally destroyed. Afterwards we had a bunch of little kids asking to take photos with us. It wasn't even just the kids that were around the hoop; there was a little kid that came running out from his house down the street so he could get a photo with us. We left that area with all of the kids thinking we were famous, and my companion and I weren't about to tell them we weren't. I mean why else would there be two dressed up gringos walking down the street wanting to play a little ball.

Sunday: This is normally a day of rest. I have to say I don't get to much rest on Sundays though. We were asked to give talks during sacrament meeting, and we were given like no time to prepare. We actually ended up going over our time allotment of ten minutes though, and left the last speaker with like 2 minutes. I was also asked to confirm an 11 year old boy that was just recently baptized. That was a super awesome experience. Then we had to do some other work and didn't even get time to go to the classes. 

Today: Supposedly there's some sort of hurricane or tropical storm that's supposed to be coming today. We're not really sure how big it is or if it's even going to hit us though. Hopefully it doesn't knock our power out for too long.