Letter from Cameron March 19th 2012

Oh here are the answers to your questions. I like answering questions.

 

What does your typical day look like?

Wake up study till 11 contact for 4 hours and try to give a lesson then eat usually at 3 in the afternoon we have appointments and usually don’t do that much contacting.

Then at night if we have time and money we will buy some food on the way home and eat it while we are planning.

Do you teach everyday or do you spend a lot of time trying to find people to teach?

We teach like 2 or 3 lessons a day.

Do you find it hard to get home on time or do you find you run out of things to do too early at night?

This week it has been hard we have a big area so we spend a lot of time walking. The other day I realized my legs are getting really defined but the rest of the body not really.

Whatever happened with the stake conference choir number?

Who knows I think it was for the adult part.

Did you play or not?

No.

What kind of investigators are you teaching?

Women....men are always working or a little to prideful to listen.

Part members?

More or less we have one right now

Singles?

Not really anybody is single here

Families?

We have two families’ right now it’s easier to get them in families because if you only teach one member of the family that member is less likely to join because there family isn’t involved. So we always invite every single person in the house to listen to us.

A little of everything?

Yeah basically

What is the mission expectation for lessons a week?

1 baptism a week, 15 lessons without member 5 with member and 1 new investigator every day.

I know you said earlier that you could teach all the lessons you wanted but I didn’t know if you are finding this the same in Tulancingo.

We could teach more but teaching more wouldn’t help us. We need to find people and find out if they’re ready to be baptized and if they’re not then drop them as fast as possible, because it’s a waste of time to teach as president calls "impossible."

Many time missionaries find investigators that will feed them, but don’t want to get baptized so they just hang on to them just to drop by their house during dinner time to eat. That’s a classic.

Are you still enjoying the food?

More or less --here it’s not as good as in Pachuca. They eat more soup, the food changes in every part of Mexico. In Pachuca they ate a lot of meat which was nice because it lasts in your stomach. Soup just feels like you drank a bunch of water when you’re done. That’s why I have always hated soup because you’re hungry again in less than 2 hours.

Is it the same in Tulancingo as it was in Pachullia—in general.

The food always changes with every new city limit.

I know you said it was somewhat different and you didn’t seem to be into sweet tamales anymore but what are you eating different than before?

No the tamales aren’t very popular and they don’t have people that ride around on bikes to sell them.

Are you teaching half the time now?

Ya most of the lessons I teach half the time. Elder Sebastian lets me talk as much as I want.

Where would you say you are in terms of Spanish proficiency?

People understand me. When you’re in the mtc you have a lot of errors in your speech but you don’t know it. When you’re in the field the trick is figuring out what to add in and what to take out.

Do you spend any time with the zone leaders?

Lots of time as they live 2 blocks from our house and are in our ward. We eat together almost every day, so we know them very well and spend a lot of time together. One of them just got transferred and is going to leave tomorrow. I am staying here and so is Sebastian. Tomorrow we will be in a threesome with another elder. I think somebody was supposed to come from the mtc but didn’t make it for visa problems. At least that’s the rumor I heard.

So I will be in a trio until that missionary arrives. This will be my second trio on the mission, first in the mtc but that doesn’t really count. Elder Bacob will join us tomorrow. He is in our district now so tomorrow when his companion leaves we have to go pick him up at the bus station. We will see how this goes. Bacob is known to be a little on the disobedient side, but he will be fighting against Sebastian and I on obedience issues so it will be two against one. So I’m not really worried.

 

Ana our baptism failed her interview because she drank coffee 1 day before her interview even though we made sure everything was good and explained that part and she said she would do it. Oh well she felt really stupid after and has been preparing well since then. The best part is on Sunday she brought her husband to church and we talked to him and taught him later that night, and set a baptismal date for April 1.

I think he will come through, he really liked church but this week was stake conference so it was hard to explain that normally we meet at this church on this street, but this week its somewhere else. Also another family came to church today it was pretty cool. The message of stake conference I felt like was directed directly to them.

Well this week we are getting kind of poor. Sebastian spent all of his money already and Bacob --we just asked him how much money he has and he told us 150 pesos which is terrible. I have 1000 pesos for 3 people for 2 weeks. I would complain a little more about this situation but complaining doesn’t help and I think you get the picture. Anyway honestly it’s getting to the point I might have to talk to president about it. This is a classic problem between people from the United States and Mexicans. Many times the Americans cave and start using their own money from their house to help out...but I would rather starve to death then buy food with my own money on the mission.

 

Anyway this week has been really good, I really feel like a missionary this week. Before I just kind of felt like a lost dog following his owner sometimes. That’s a little over exaggerated but you get the point.

Anyway that’s about it this week. It was one of the hardest weeks I have worked and we have had success because we are starting to teach more with the spirit and less with our minds. Well, pray for me and thanks for what you do. I’m hoping to get my package tomorrow because of changes the new zone leader should bring back all the packages that we have got. But who knows if the package has arrived at president’s house or not.

Elder Hendricks

 

 

 

 

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