Hola Familia

hola,

how are y'all doing? this week has been good. It feels like last monday was forever ago, but it's been great.

On Saturday we did Mormon Helping Hands with the ward. We went to a park close by to the church and cleaned it. It was alot of fun. I'm always impressed by how many cigarrette butts you can find on the ground outside. I wish I had a penny for every one I picked up. It was a good time though. The members were so funny.

We had a lesson with one of our investigators this week and we were trying to get a member to come with us. We were calling everyone we could think of and had nothing. So, we went to the lesson to teach just us. Well, we stopped by to visit a less active that lives right next door before because we got there a little early. She ended up coming with us to the lesson and it was awesome!! This woman is amazing. We've visited her a few times these past 2 weeks and she is so interesting. She's been a member her whole life but has gone inactive because of work (and some other issues), but it was amazing to watch her in our lesson. We taught about the book of mormon and what it means to recieve an answer that it's true. She would bear testimony and would say exactly what Maria (our investigator) needed to hear. It was amazing. You could tell they both were really taking into consideration what they were feeling. It really helped Maria because she says she accepts the Book of Mormon and believes it's true, but mostly just because it's a book about God. She hasn't really prayed and ever really gotten an answer.  She's not really committed either so we were hoping that talking about that would help her commit a little more. It was so powerful.

Latinos are so funny, they react 2 different ways to questions we ask them. Either they will just accept everything you say and say "oh si todo esta bien, todo habla de Dios" and then when you try to ask them something to go a little deeper, they'll just say "no se" OR you'll ask them one quesiton and the flood gates will open and you can't get them to stop talking. It's really funny to watch the 2 extremes, actually, it's kind of frustrating, but in a good way because it forces me to think more about how to ask better questions and teach better. Somewhere there has got to be a happy middle right?
I am so glad to be in Spanish work though. So grateful. Latinos are so fun to work with. I have never been told off by a Latino. They may have commitment issues but they will never chew you out for being a missionary. If you have Christ on your name tag then they'll always be nice to you. We've had a couple experiences talking to white people (is there a non racist way to differentiate that?) where they tell us that we're cults or that we're being deceived or they just straight up yell at us. I guess it's good because then you know right off the bat that they're not interested. It's funny how different Spanish work is than English work.

On Wednesday, we had a good day. Literally at every house we went to, they wanted to feed us and so we ate a TON of food! By our last appointment, I was sooo sick. All of the food was really good though. At this one member's house, she made a fruit salad kind of (Latino fruit salads are kind of different), bit it's really good, you eat it with chili and lemon. That was our first house and I ate alot there not knowing what was to come. At another house, we had this Nicaraguan drink that's really interesting. At first I thought it was coffee, so I was a little nervous. Turns out though that it's this kind of drink made from burning maiz and then adding sugar and water. Very interesting and good at the same time.

It's been a good week. Hope you're all doing well...Staying "Boston Strong"... :) 

Love you lots, thanks for everything.

miss and love you,

Hermana Laree LaPierre