¡Buen dia mi familia!
It's been another full week with lots of Gospel study and
Spanglish!
After last week's email, we attended the Buenos Aires
Temple. Even though everything was in Spanish the spirit was still very
present. After the temple I was thinking about the people in Paraguay and
wondering if I would ever be able to teach them in their "native
tongue" and mis compañeras y yo stopped and talked with a family. The
father was very excited and spoke English/Spanglish with us. He introduced all
of his boys to us and explained that he did not have any names for his boys
when they were born, but turned to the Book of Mormon and named his boys after
prophets and great leaders. He and his wife currently teach seminary and work
very hard for their family. He asked us where we are going to serve and when I
said Paraguay he said "Oh! I was born in Paraguay! You will learn
much!" That man and his family touched my heart - it was so wonderful to
have a real life example of what my goal is out here. If I can help someone's
family come unto Christ and even just start to become like that man's family
then I will have so much joy.
Language learning is hard - but I have faith that if I keep
at it, it will come eventually.
On Sunday I played a special musical number with Elder
Thompson singing "Praise to the Man". It wasn't super spectacular or
anything, but special shout-out to Mom for pushing me through piano lessons! I'm
the only one in my distrito who can play and add to the generic himnos.
Later on Sunday we had a great lesson in Relief Sociedad on
hope and humility. Our teacher quoted, "Humility is not about thinking
less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less". I definitely get down on
myself at not knowing Spanish very well (which is silly, I know) but it helps
me to keep in perspective that I am learning Spanish so I can communicate with
the paraguayans, not for my personal gain. My patience is growing - both from
the language and by having to cut the meat in our meals with plastic knives -
which is really good.
This last Monday I caught a cold/sore throat that's been
going around all the missionaries in the CCM. After sleeping through most of
Monday and a lot of cold medicine I am almost 100% better! I just have little
sniffles now. And my compañeras haven't gotten sick (knock on wood)! Heavenly
Father definitely answers prayers.
On Tuesday our Latina roommates and the first wave of
missionaries left and it's been very quiet and English-speaking these last couple
of days - which has been a nice break after being sick.
I hope everyone is doing well, I think of home some but my
mind is usually preocupado with Spanish.
On Saturday we go out into Bs As to proselyte!!! I have no
idea what we're going to do... but we've got an exit plan! haha - If all else
fails, we don't understand anything they are saying and we feel we can't just
say "mucho gusto" and leave, we will say "¿Podemos cantar?"
(can we sing?) sing a hymn in Spanish and leave a pass along card with the
missionaries of the area's phone number. It'll be good to get out of here and
practice listening to native Spanish speakers more.
Estoy aqui porque amo a toda la gente de Paraguay!
Hna. Carr
P.S. Funny things in the CCM: 1) my name is always at first
Hna. Aúto or Hna. Alto, depending on who I'm introducing myself to haha and 2)
When you say you're from utah the Latinos always say "oh, la
fabrica!" meaning Utah is the factory of missionaries! They get a lot of
Utahns coming through here I guess. haha
