Elder J has had pain in his heart and left arm for the past 4 months, including once when he fainted while playing soccer. We called the nurse and she referred us to a cardiologist in one of the nicest hospitals in this half of the country. So we went to San Pedro Thursday morning taking a taxi, a small bus, and a smaller bus that they call "rapiditos" or "really fasts". the rapidito experience was fun because the van is about the size of a 12 passenger van, just lower to the ground, and I counted, and they fit 21 passengers, plus the driver, and the guy that opens the door and takes your money! they PACK people into buses here, and they drive really fast and crazy. it's really a cheap thrill, and you get to where you want to go!
We went to the cardiologist, and he did a test with sensors on Elder J's chest, arms and legs. Then we went to the mission office to talk to Pres. Klein, so that was fun to get to know where the mission office was. Pres. said he'd send the test from the cardiologist to the church doctors and see what they'd think. Then as we left he let us get some snacks and soda from his stash. HE HAD ROOT BEER!!! i've been on the look out for root beer for a year and I haven't found any until we visited Pres. Klein. I love my mission president! When we shook hands to leave, President asked me with a smile "Elder Pollock, do you know CPR?". I paused, remembering when I learned it in school, and for First Aid and Lifesaving merit badges and said "Yes I do." I felt a little more responsible for my companion after that.
We went home taking a taxi, a small bus, and another taxi. The whole time home I was felling really sleepy, and I wanted to close my eyes and sleep, but I didn't let myself. I told myself that I could sleep when I get home to things I've seen for my whole life, but right now i'm in such a beautiful, different place than I've experienced, so I need to keep my eyes open and remember what I'm seeing, and just soak it all in for the short time I'm in this strange place.
We went to the cardiologist, and he did a test with sensors on Elder J's chest, arms and legs. Then we went to the mission office to talk to Pres. Klein, so that was fun to get to know where the mission office was. Pres. said he'd send the test from the cardiologist to the church doctors and see what they'd think. Then as we left he let us get some snacks and soda from his stash. HE HAD ROOT BEER!!! i've been on the look out for root beer for a year and I haven't found any until we visited Pres. Klein. I love my mission president! When we shook hands to leave, President asked me with a smile "Elder Pollock, do you know CPR?". I paused, remembering when I learned it in school, and for First Aid and Lifesaving merit badges and said "Yes I do." I felt a little more responsible for my companion after that.
We went home taking a taxi, a small bus, and another taxi. The whole time home I was felling really sleepy, and I wanted to close my eyes and sleep, but I didn't let myself. I told myself that I could sleep when I get home to things I've seen for my whole life, but right now i'm in such a beautiful, different place than I've experienced, so I need to keep my eyes open and remember what I'm seeing, and just soak it all in for the short time I'm in this strange place.
It's A Boy!
Elder H is 23, he's from Managua, Nicaragua, and he has a degree in civil engineering. He's good at English for a beginning missionary, and he's learning English so he can take a test to get accepted to MIT to get his master's degree. So he was super excited when I said i'm into math and physics too. so he's helping me review what I've learned in calculus. It's been fun to talk about calculators while walking.
I got transfered to Tocoa, in Zona Olanchito, which is the zone farthest from the mission office. it's about 4 hours by bus to San Pedro from here, and I'm in a big branch with another companionship of elders and a companionship of hermanas. The building is really nice because it has air conditioning, an indoor half court, and a piano in great condition. We eat lunch at a restraunt run by a member. it's carne asada, or grilled or fried chicken everyday, with rice, refried beans, coleslaw, and fried plantain. it's the best meat i've had in the mission, and it's my lunch everyday! Our house is good too because it has Air conditioning in the room where we sleep, so I actually get COLD at night :0 and we ALWAYS have running water :0 the one thing, is that we don't have someone to do our laundry, so we have to do it ourselves. this morning i washed my colors by hand in our pila, and took my whites to a laundromat and payed L100 to get them cleaned, and we'll pick it up later today.
We had a great experience on Friday the 24th, pioneer day! We planned an hour in the morning to do street contacting, so we left the house and started walking down a street, and the first house where someone answered the door was a black woman who was very excited to see us. She invited us in, and said we needed to sing hymn no. 2 with her because it's her favorite. she was a member baptized in El Salvador and She's been to The Guatemala temple. So we sang, and shared a scripture, and got to know her better. She speaks Garifuna, the dialect of the native blacks, and she was speaking it to her sister in front of us, and it sounds really cool. it turns out that she's only visiting, and she lives in Gracias a Dios, the department of Honduras farthest east where there aren't missionaries. So I got to know a pioneer! it's fun to be on what feels like the frontier of missionary work sometimes. Someday there will be missionaries who speak garifuna, and the scriptures will be in that language, and i'm here now laying the foundation.
I got transfered to Tocoa, in Zona Olanchito, which is the zone farthest from the mission office. it's about 4 hours by bus to San Pedro from here, and I'm in a big branch with another companionship of elders and a companionship of hermanas. The building is really nice because it has air conditioning, an indoor half court, and a piano in great condition. We eat lunch at a restraunt run by a member. it's carne asada, or grilled or fried chicken everyday, with rice, refried beans, coleslaw, and fried plantain. it's the best meat i've had in the mission, and it's my lunch everyday! Our house is good too because it has Air conditioning in the room where we sleep, so I actually get COLD at night :0 and we ALWAYS have running water :0 the one thing, is that we don't have someone to do our laundry, so we have to do it ourselves. this morning i washed my colors by hand in our pila, and took my whites to a laundromat and payed L100 to get them cleaned, and we'll pick it up later today.
We had a great experience on Friday the 24th, pioneer day! We planned an hour in the morning to do street contacting, so we left the house and started walking down a street, and the first house where someone answered the door was a black woman who was very excited to see us. She invited us in, and said we needed to sing hymn no. 2 with her because it's her favorite. she was a member baptized in El Salvador and She's been to The Guatemala temple. So we sang, and shared a scripture, and got to know her better. She speaks Garifuna, the dialect of the native blacks, and she was speaking it to her sister in front of us, and it sounds really cool. it turns out that she's only visiting, and she lives in Gracias a Dios, the department of Honduras farthest east where there aren't missionaries. So I got to know a pioneer! it's fun to be on what feels like the frontier of missionary work sometimes. Someday there will be missionaries who speak garifuna, and the scriptures will be in that language, and i'm here now laying the foundation.
Small and Simple
Sunday we had a great lesson when we visited an old lady whose 76 and has been a member since 1980! She{s really tiny, so tiny that she would have to look up to see my tie pin, and she has bad circulation in her legs so she can{t walk to church. But we could tell that she has a rock solid testimony for the one thing she does really good - she reads the scriptures everyday. we could tell because her mind is sharp. We told her we were going to read a scripture in Mosiah 14, and she turned right to the page without help, and read the scripture (which can be a lot to ask of an old person sometimes). She has a great understanding of the atonement. After we read the scripture, she said she had a question from something she read, so she turned to Alma 37 talking about small and simple things, and asked what it meant by : confoundeth the wise. so that was a very good question. She told us she has been invited to go to other churches, and she goes to not offend her friend that invited her, but she tells them she{s a member of la Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Ultimos Dias, and the other churches don{t satisfy her. so it was awesome to meet a rock solid pioneer whos testimony continues strong.