So we had a lot of crazy happenings this week. Well, okay, what week doesn't? But this week was crazy in an awesome way.
First,
we had exchanges with the district leader on Wednesday. I stayed here
in Viveros and the district leader, Elder Estevez, came here while Elder
Garcia went more uptown. Elder Estevez is the other Dominican in Nuevo
Laredo, and let's just say that while Elder Garcia is super excited in a
Dominican way (those that know Dominicans will know what I'm talking
about), Elder Estevez makes him look as calm as a summer's morning. It
was a crazy, fun, Domincan Wednesday.
Before
I begine this story, let me tell you that there is a surplus of speed
bumps in Nuevo Laredo, and that I'm normally really good at getting over
them on my bike. I don't know if this speedbump was simply having a bad
day, or if I looked at it funny or something, but while Elder Estevez
and I were on the way to our lunch appointment, this cpeedbump came out
of nowhere and threw me off my bike and on to the asphalt. luckily, we
were in a rather quiet colonia, so there were basically no cars on the
road, but it was still rather exciting to get speedbumpwhacked (I'll
pretend that's a word) in the middle of the road. My arms still look
like my campanion has been beating me, but I promis everything is OK.
Elder Estevez now knows how good of a bike rider I am. :)
So
after that exciting ordeal, we came home to discover that we had left
the swamp cooler/air conditioner thing on all day, and because it's not
exactly in the best of shape (or maybe it was just installed wrong),
there was a giant pool of water by my bed. So while we were looking for
mops, we found a second (much newer and fancier) air conditioner, which
Elder Estevez wanted to try using, so we plugged it in. It worked really
well-- for about 40 seconds, when the power went out. We looked around
for a breaker box, found it, and flipped the breakers, and the power
went back on. Once the power went off again about 30 seconds later, we
realized that maybe there was a reason that we weren't using the newer
AC. We unplugged it, and tried to flip the breakers again, but nothing
happened. We aren't exactly electricians, so we couldn't really do
anything. We couldn't call anyone because our cell phone just died, so
we kinda just tried to sleep in the heat. That was rather fun.
The
next day, I turned 19 (Happy Birthday! You have no power!). We met up
with Elder Garcia and he got a little mad when we told him that we
officially had no power. We had to go to a member's house to charge our
phone, and put together the investigator report that we send every week
to the zone leaders. Turns out, when we could finally get a hold of the
leaders to pass them the report, we discovered that they had been trying
to call us all morning, because we were late in submitting the report.
Kids, make sure your phone is fully charged before you plug in a second
AC in your tiny Mexican house and kill the power.
Anyway,
we also called the landlord, and it turns out that there is a second
breaker box that we tripped that we didn't find. I'm not sure who
designed that. But now we have power, so that's all good.
Because
it was Star Wars Day--I mean, my birthday, we decided that we had to
get a cake. Elder Garcia insisted on buying the biggest, most chocolatey
cake we could find. I was not opposed, so we did so.
It turns out, it's a Latino tradition to throw a cake in the face of the
one whose birthday it is. I was naturally rather opposed to this
tradition, being a clean-freaky American, but Elder Garcia also insisted
that I at least get a little bit on my face. So this happened:
The only other exciting
event of the week was that, since it was Mother's Day yesterday, I got
to call the family. The mission president authorized a Facebook video
chat, so I logged on to Facebook for the first time in 5 months. I kinda
forgot how to use Facebook, because it took me a while to figure out
how to start a video call. But finally, technology started to get along,
and I had a great call with my family. Everyone is doing really well. I
have now called the family twice. Only two more calls before I return
home! That's crazy!!
Anyway,
this week was crazy, but crazy fun. We have a baptism on Saturday for
Daniel, so check back next week and see if I have baptism photos!
Love you all!! Happy Late Star Wars Day!!
Elder Jakob Schramm
No comments:
Post a Comment