Week 98

USC round 2 - week 1

Monday we started out the day organizing all of the candy that we got for Christmas. We have a table in the "living room" and the candy covered the whole table. We laughed about the whole thing cause Elder W has gained 35 lbs since being on the mission and his family was saying fat jokes when they skyped with him, and then our families send us a ton of candy... oh the irony. We then did the usual shopping and laundry, but this week we really didn't need to buy anything besides milk because we already have a ton of food in the apartment that we both like. The whole day I was trying to hang out with Elder N because he is one of my good friends from the mission and he went home this week. We played basketball with them and some other missionaries and it was really fun. Elder N and I played some 1 on 1 soccer and he killed me on it, ugh it was embarrassing. We took a picture that is kinda blurry but that doesn't really matter because we are going to stay in touch with each other and he is going to go to BYUI and then transfer over, so we will definitely see each other again. We then went to drop off our laundry and groceries at the apartment before heading out for the night. We wanted to try and visit a couple families, but nobody was home. Maybe they were out of town for the holidays or just running errands, but we couldn't find anyone home. Our lesson with Y was next and Y and her friend were going to teach us the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, because they both have heard it and know it by heart. It was their first time doing anything like that, so it wasn't "perfect" but I learned a lot from them. I learned what I need to focus on more as a missionary when I teach the Restoration. They also taught simply and with confidence (at some parts) and that was just amazing. Elder W and I told them how good they did and complimented them on how well they taught us, it was a good experience. 

Tuesday we tried to contact all of the referrals that we had. We stopped by a lot of houses, and the majority of the people weren't home. There was this one house that we went through the gate and knocked on the door. After the 2nd knock we see a man emerge from the side of the house and he motions for us to come to him. While he was motioning he was also heading towards the gate. We then start to speak to him in Spanish and ask him if ... was home. He basically kicks us off his property and tells us that we need to call the guy that we are looking for. We asked him if the dude lived there but he didnt answer us at all. We walked away and then this other guy came from the house and he was the guy we were looking for. He tells us that he has never talked to missionaries (thats because people don't remember the tiny conversations that we have with them in the streets sometimes when all we get is their address) but he was really nice and he told us sorry for what happened with the other dude. We biked around a lot. Peggy may have lasted me this far into the mission, but she is super heavy! Elder W will just cruise through the streets and I will be dying in the back. We had dinner with the C family and I didnt know that the drink (they give us drinks when we come over) that they have been giving us is the Aloe Vera drinks. They taste pretty good! We thought it was a type of grape juice or something, so that was nice to know what the mystery drink finally was. We talked with them for a little bit and asked them if they knew anyone that would benefit from the message of the gospel. They told us that they had some family close by that they would like to have missionaries go and teach them! Boom! A full day of nothing but contacting referrals and then a RC family wants to share the gospel with their own relatives! Worth. It. 

Wednesday we had another full day of trying to find old investigators or referrals and the like. We knocked on this one guys door and he comes out to talk with us while he is holding beer in his hand. We figured that that meant that he was drunk and that we should try to stop by another time, so we set up a time next week to visit him, hopefully he isn't drunk that time. We ate dinner with the G family and... oh my goodness. We ate dinner and we were talking to K and Hermana G (grandma) and the other Hermana G (Great Grandma). Grandma then was really tired because they had had a busy day and so she left right as we were talking to Kevin. Hermano G (grandpa - ish because he is not related to K) came in and just... ruined everything. We were talking about the Plan of Salvation and it was going really well. K has such real intent to find out for himself and he wants true facts. We explained the Plan of Salvation and he had a couple questions which we answered for him and he was good, and then, Hermano spoke. He asked a question about whether or not Jesus went to Paradise or Prison because in the scriptures (he is just referring to the Bible) it says that he preached to the spirits in prison (1 Peter 3:19) but when he was on the cross talking to the thieves, to one he said to day thou shalt be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43) and so Hermano was saying that he was confused. We bore testimony that the Restoration helps us understand parts of scripture that don't make sense. We explained to him about Doctrine and Covenants section 138 and how God still speaks to us through prophets. K agreed with us and we were so happy that we answered it, but then Hermano just said "no, I don't believe that, I want someone else to explain it to me".... AAHH!! Then K asks "do mormons keep the sabbath day holy?" To which we said yes. K then asks why the Mormons go to church on Sunday if the Sabbath is on Saturday in the scriptures. Hermano then says that "everyday" is the Sabbath day because you can always read the scriptures... oh my goodness. The great grandma then butts in and starts arguing with Hermano about doctrine and so now we had both members fighting and saying false doctrine. Well, at the end the great grandma told K (this is after a little while of them two arguing) that if he wants to learn truth, to ask the missionaries (thank you) because that is why they are here to teach us (them). So we told K to read in the scriptures and he will be able to understand what God has revealed to all of us. It was such a good lesson at the beginning, but then the spirit just left. 

Thursday we taught S and did service which was cool. Gosh I really hate when I forget to write at night cause all you get is a stupid sentence like this one... 

platypus in spanish is ornitorrinco 

Friday was a pretty crazy day too. We had district meeting with our "new district" even though the only new person is a greenie that Elder A is training in the Jungle area. The Greenie is named Elder D and he is from Nevada and he totally went to the Provo MTC, hands down. The DM was good and it was one of those meetings that we were all pumped to go out and just work like crazy afterwards, thats because of the awesome DL that we have, he is super funny and crazy. We were right about to head out for the day when we get a call from Elder A. He told us that he had a referral to give to us and he gives us the referral for P O. He then tells us that they thought she was on their side of the border, but that she is on our side. He THEN says that they had an appointment with her, 15 minutes ago, and that we need to go and have the lesson with her. We call the number and she tells us her real address and we head there immediately. We get to the door and we are immediately invited in. We sit at the kitchen table and P brings her 3 children to join in the lesson with her. Her kids V (19) E (16) and J (13) and joined and participated during the lesson. We did one of the best HTBT lessons ever! E is so cool too! We asked him questions like these and this was his response.

Who is God? He is our Heavenly Father who sent his son Jesus Christ to the earth to die for us. (Boom!)

Why does prayer help us? It is how we communicate with God, and God listens to us. (Boom!)

What does baptism mean to you? It means giving yourself to God. (Boom!!!!!)

The mom at one point leaned over to the daughter and asked her "do you want to get baptized? I do." We are really excited for this miracle family. They are also from Honduras so naturally we text the ONLY member in the ward form Honduras that we found a family from there and we already have her coming out with us to the next lesson we have with them for next week!!! Super awesome miracle. We then stopped by the A family to see how everything is going there. Wendy told us that she started her divorce papers!! That is such a huge miracle because that is what is stopping Jairo from joining the church! If y'all remember we had an amazing lesson last transfer when the Ms came out with us to visit them and they told Wendy that she needed to start on the papers immediately, so thanks to the Ms everything started. We then had to leave to go to our dinner appointment and we tell W that next time we stop by that we will bring the permission form for her to sign so that G can be baptized to which she tells us that G has been begging her to be baptized and W was just wanting to know when. W then assured us that she will help G really focus to prepare to be baptized, cause G is just crrraaaazy! Dinner was just, ugh, rough. A member took us out to this burger joint and lets just say that the food didnt settle too good with either elder here, but the taste was super good!

Saturday was New Years Eve so we had to be inside our apartment by 6:00. We had some plans earlier in the day to try and go visit this one potential that we had set an appointment with and then try to visit some others around him, but the lesson fell through cause he didnt answer the door and nobody else was home. It is really weird because it has been raining a lot recently (a lot meaning at all because LA never rains). So when the rain comes, everyone doesn't open the door or is outside, so its really rough for missionaries, but it makes all the more interesting story later on right? Well we decided to go and visit the C family because they are super cool. M, the son, is super humble. When we stopped by the first time to visit with them we asked him if he knew anyone that would benefit from the message of the Gospel in their lives right now, and he told us "I need it" and so we are starting to teach him. He is super cool and just loves when we come over, and we like going over too, so its super fun. We talked with him for a bit and we also showed him a Mormon Message which he really liked. We set a time to come back and teach the whole family which will be really good because the dad is a non member, but he is the eternigator of the ward among the many here so its not likely that anything will happen, but hey, maybe its his time, who knows. We then walked back to our apartment in enough time to be in before our ZLs came to check up on us to see if we were inside by the "curfew" time. From 6-9 we did a lot of stuff, we ate dinner, cleaned a little bit, just random stuff really.

Sunday was a good day. Church started at 10:20 but nobody really showed up cause it was New Year's Day. We had some people show up which was nice. What was super cool is that G came to church! She sat down right behind me (Elder W plays the piano and I sit with the C family) and she leans over and with big eyes and a huge smile says "I read! I read what you gave me in the Book of Mormon, now you can give me something else to read!" She is so awesome. We totally know that she is going to be baptized one day, its just a matter of time really. We went home to have lunch but then A called us to ask what time we would go eat dinner with him. It was about 2:50 and he asked if we could come at 3. Then there was a baptism at 4 so Elder W said sure. We got to dinner at 3:10 and L had made pozole so that was super lot of food there. We had to leave a little earlier so that Elder W could pray some prelude music for the baptism. The english ward, the Adams ward, had a baptism and the girl that was baptized invited Y to go to the baptism and Elder W was asked to play, so we went. The baptism was AMAZING! The ZLs were there and President and Sister Haynie were there too. The room was PACKED with people and the spirit was super strong there. The members that participated in the service testified of how strong the spirit was and you could just feel it. It was, just so strong. The rest of the day we spent trying to talk to people but they just weren't having a good Sunday I guess, they must not have gone to church or something.

Hope the week goes good! 

Love, 

Elder Roberts

Week 97 - LAST TRANSFERR!!

Week 6 - Barrio 6to - USC area

Transfers!!!

Monday

Hung out with a lot of people. We ate Korean BBQ with the SM ZLs Elders L, F, and U, along with Elder A and McG and that was fun. We talked about everything and anything. I love those guys, they are just the coolest studs ever. We got back to the church and played soccer with our ZLs and our DL and we had a blast. Elder W played soccer and so there was someone who was actually good playing, but Elder Wu and I were pretty good too, probably from all those times we played last year:). We played some basketball too and that was fun. We then ate dinner at the V home and this time was really awkward. I had no voice and so there was no conversation while we were eating, so it made the whole meal really awkward. We tried to go and see the G family, but the were running errands or something or I think they had a family member from out of town come in so they went to go see them, or something, but basically they weren't there which was really sad cause that means that we haven't seen G in a couple weeks!!! 

Tuesday I had no voice. I couldn't talk at all. Elder W was nice about it all, and he teased me a couple times about it, but he's like a brother so it was all good. We went to the Food Bank because they had a toy giveaway. They got the toys from the Ellen Degeneres show, so there were some good toys there. Lots of different organizations were there helping out as well. Glen introduced us as his "Mormon friends" and then he would crack a Mormon joke, oh Glen. We helped out for a bit and then Glen wanted us to help hand out the toys to the kids. Right when we started to help a couple things happened. First, this organization called BloomFarms came (Marijuana group) and it was funny cause people would take pictures and Mormon missionaries would be right by the bloom farm people... lovely. Second, this guy from a latino radio show came in and brought in a bunch of singers and they were just partying. I was just praying that they would go talk to Elder W and not me cause I had no voice, but no, they decided to come over to Elder B and me to talk to us. The man introduced us as "los misioneros de la iglesia de los santos de los últimos días" almost... almost buddy. I had no voice so I couldn't correct him. He then asked us questions and I couldn't answer any of them, it was so rough. But hey, at least we were seen and that was cool too. We got a cool toy from Glen for Christmas, its a Shadow from Sonic the Hedgehog stuffed animal.... the best. We had such good plans for the day. We had a VC trip scheduled with the L family and then they just canceled. They told us that they were out of town and that they wouldn't be back in town with enough time to make it to the VC, so they canceled. Our dinner appointment was with Hermana C and she is just so lonely. Her husband is super less active and doesn't want anything to do with the church and she has really bad health and can barely come to church on her own. She always tells such interesting stories though! I will be sucked into the story and Elder W will be dozing off or playing with something. Her stories last a really long time too so you have to be nice and tell her in advance what time you have to leave by. She definitely knows how to entertain the missionaries though, or at least one of them. We talked to a couple others at night and set return appointments with them which was nice.

Wednesday I went on exchanges with my DL, Elder Wa. We were really excited because we were going to go visit a ton of people in his area and I was just super pumped to be with him (except for the fact that I was super sick). We start to head out and we take a bus. We talked to a couple people on the bus and one of the guys that we talked to was a little weird. He told us that his last name was Y, and that his whole family is from Utah. We then tells us that he has 19 siblings and that he has a cousin who is 28 years old and has 8 children of her own already. We asked him what his plans for Christmas were and he told us that he doesn't celebrate Christmas. It was a really sad scenario and the guy just looked super miserable. We had to get off the bus before we could really talk to him anymore. After we got off the bus we both figured that the guy was probably on something, which is probably true. We knocked a lot of houses in the rain that day, but nobody seemed to be home or they didnt want to listen to us. This one guy that was super stoned on a drug asked us a question which was just ridiculous and Elder Wa and I just kept looking at each other like "for real, anybody else?". We kept walking around and trying to find any of the investigators but none were home. We ate dinner with the G family because they invited us over and that was a super good meal. Elder Wa told me that he almost fell asleep during dinner and I felt really bad because that means that I wasn't involving him as much in the conversation. Its really hard when your DL is an english elder and he comes over to a house that is just super fun to talk to everyone in! But I guess if you don't speak Spanish it is a little awkward. We had a RS activity that we had to go to because the RS president wanted us to talk about our families and why we are on our mission and what would help the hermanas help their children want to serve a mission. It was nice cause the RS ladies (the cool ones) were there and so they like the activity. They also gave us a bunch of food as a Christmas gift, I think they think that we don't have any food, which we do. 

Thursday i was super sick. My throat was killing me and I couldn't speak to save my life. I didnt have any energy so I rested. When I woke up I was feeling so much better. We had our weekly planning and we went out to work. We visited with Yesenia and that was super fun. It had been a cool minute since we had visited her and we invited her to prepare to teach US the next time that we come. We wanted to do this because she has been receiving the missionary lessons for the past 2 years and her mom wont let her be baptized until "she knows more". So what we figured is that if Y teaches us, she will come to learn and understand more. We then went to go and visit the C family, the super cool RC family. We talked with them about Christmas and what they do to celebrate it. Vicente was telling us some weird ritual thing that they do back in Guatemala and I kept looking at Elder W as if to say "he knows that he can't do that now right?" Well it was a little awkward. Then we talk to the kids about how they are feeling about Christmas and Paola, the oldest, tells us that this year she just isn't feeling the Christmas spirit. We start talking to her about why she likes Christmas and ways that she could feel the Christmas spirit. During the lesson we also talked to them about family prayers and family scripture study, to which they said that they had never done it.... what? So we invited them to start doing that to help them grow as a family, hopefully they will start soon. 

Friday rained so bad! We got super drenched. We tried to visit families but nobody answered. I am so grateful for my wonderful trench coat  cause I stay nice and dry in it. 

Saturday was Christmas Eve and that was crazy. In the morning we were going to have an apartment inspection from Elder LaP and so we were cleaning a lot. Our apartment was so clean. We were waiting for Elder LaP and he calls us to say that we needed to open our garage for him to park in, but we don't have a car anymore so we don't have a garage door opener. He then tells us that unless he finds parking in the next couple minutes (which he didnt because the Rams were playing 2 blocks down) that we would have to reschedule the inspection for another day. We then receive a call from our DL asking us if we wanted to go caroling with them. We said yes and then they told us that we were also going to do more service at the food bank because Glen asked us too. We got into our service clothes and brought or proselyting clothes to change into afterwards. We did service and that was fun and then we went caroling. It was pretty funny because every door was basically the same story, it would be something like this:

(Person) oh sorry I dont have any time right now,

Its ok! We are just out caroling! We want to sing to you!

Person: ok! Come on in!

So we did that for most of the day and it was pretty fun. One family that we went to go sing carols to were leaving right as we got there and as Elder W put it, I "summoned them" back. I think I said something like "We came to sing carols to you! Come back inside so we can sing to you!" And so they all came back and we sang and they sang with us, it was pretty funny. During that time we also got caught in some bad traffic downtown LA. So while we were in traffic we came up with a pretty cool thing, I will email it to you separately. This is so funny. We then ate dinner with the C family and that was good. They are super cool.

Sunday was Christmas. We opened up gifts. Went to church. Sang some hymns. Ate some lunch with A F. Went to go skype our families. Ate dinner. Went to go see the G family, they weren't home. 

Love,

Elder Roberts

Week 96

Barrio 6to - USC - Week 5

Monday we were right about to start our pday adventure for the day and we found out that Elder W had a flat tire, so we had to walk our bikes to the store for it to get fixed. In the meantime that the bike was being fixed we did our laundry (biking with laundry is a whole different experience let me tell you) and got the rest of the stuff that we needed to do get done then. For shopping we bought a little more healthier than usual and spent less money anyways, its a sign I tell you. We then made plans to go shopping at Fig at 7th to see what cool stuff they have there at the shopping mall. So we went and we were trying to find some cool USC stuff or some cool LA Rams stuff, but nothing that was like super cool, but we did find some cheap sweaters that looked nice and so we got those. We then got back to go and have dinner with the V family. They have recently been called as the ward missionaries and they told us that they would take us to the VC after we finished eating. We had a VC appointment with the G family and they had arrived before us, so I think they looked around the temple at all the lights there before we got there. The sisters that gave us the VC tour were a trio of sisters and it was a very different tour than I have had in the past. Both Elder W and I were looking at each other during the tour because we had no idea where the sisters were going with the tour or anything, and we didn't even talk! We barely spoke a word at the very end. It lasted for a while, BUT all in all it was SUPER good, why? Because the G family loved it and so that's what matters the most. The V family bore powerful testimony during the tour and that was amazing. I also wore my new cool shoes to the VC so that was cool too.

Tuesday was just a really strange day. We started out a little early visiting V S, the lady that totally rejected the Christmas video last week. We talked with her outside her house and showed her the Christmas video. She liked the video, but still didnt seem very happy to see us. We asked her if she remembered anything of what the missionaries had told her about the Restoration, Plan of Salvation, anything, and all she said was that they told her about God. She then begins to tell us that she feels that she just needs to continue in her "own path" which is the nice way of saying to missionaries that she doesn't want to meet with us anymore. We looked at each other and did the only thing we could do: testify. We testified super simply of the Book of Mormon and the Restoration that there is no way anyone could not understand what we had said. We said a prayer and then left. We were both a little sad but felt happy at the simple, but powerful testimonies we had felt and shared with her. We then went back to the apartment to make some lunch. After that we decided to walk to Sophia's house. When we got there the mom asked us if we knew how to put together a table, to which we said yes. We put together a table for her, and it is a nice looking table not gonna lie, and so that was fun to do some fixing here and there. S now has the first article of faith memorized and we challenged her to have the second one memorized by Sunday. While walking away from S's house, S's dog named Precious, followed us. Elder W told me that the dog likes to run away, but that it always ends up back with Sophia. We kept walking (because we were going to be late to an appointment and had to go and get our bikes from the apartment. The dog kept following us. It was being a very good dog and stopping at lights and it was smiling the whole time. This dog didnt have a collar or anything so we really had to be careful. The whole time I was thinking whether or not we should call a member to come pick up the dog and take it back to S, or if we should do it ourselves, but I think we just kept walking because of how epic of a story it could've ended up becoming (just wait for it). It followed us all the way to our apartment and even walked in with us. We had to drop off some stuff at the apartment and get our bikes and all of our neighbors were wondering who's dog it was. There were even some neighbors saying "i am hungry, lets cook it up!" Not knowing that basically the dog was ours. Now we had gotten the bikes and Precious after a lot of whistling to have the dog continue to follow us. Now Elder W was sure at this point that if we rode our bikes to our next appointment that the dog would follow us. S then gives us call and she is just like any other little girl who lost her dog. Back story now, S used to be super depressed and so her mom bought her Precious so that she wouldn't be depressed anymore. So you can only imagine how S is feeling because she doesn't have her dog with her. Elder W assured her that her dog would come back to her. So then he starts to head to the next lesson on bike and tells me to go in front and lead us there and that he wold make sure that the dog followed. By taking back streets and sidewalks we were able to be in our lovely trio with the dog Precious. We almost lost her at the final turn to the house, but we got her. The house had a nice fence around it so we knew if Precious would be in the fence, that we wouldn't have any problems from then on. This whole time Precious hasn't even barked or anything. We knock on the door to the L family and they see our lovely dog. The whole family comes out and they start petting the dog and we tell them the whole story. Hermana L then tells her daughter to go and grab something from inside the house. That "something" was a guinea pig. They bring it out and were hiding it from the dog, thinking that the dog could sniff it out and find it. It got to the point that Precious was clueless and so the oldest daughter (while holding the guinea pig) basically set the guinea pig on Precious, that when Precious recognizes the pig. Precious then starts whining and appears "scared" but really its what a dog does when it wants something you know? When a dog starts whining and the tail starts wagging and the dog then comes in front of your legs and looks at you like "can I have it?" But this family didn't get it. So they kept holding the pig and then after a little bit went and set it down in the front lawn because there is this whole setup for the pig to play in with a bunch of holes that it likes to go into. We were talking and then all of a sudden Precious sees the pig and takes off! I shall liken this account to that of a cheetah vs. antelope on Animal Planet, National Geographic, etc. Hermana L jumps up as do I and she goes for the pig while I go for Precious. Precious actually had a good little "taste" of pig that night and if it wasn't for the intervention, Precious would be like all the other Peruvian dishes of cui. The hermana was freaking out and the kids were just laughing. We then put the pig inside and taught them the lesson that we had prepared. We were waiting for one of the members of the ward to come and pick up the dog to take it back to S, but it seemed like they were a little late, so we decided to just take Precious back with us (making the story even more epic). We almost made it back to our apartment (which you could say is like the halfway mark back to S's house) when we came up to an intersection. We were biking and Precious was following us and then the light turned red. We stopped, but Precious kept going.... (this is the part where you don't tell the kids). Precious went into the intersection with oncoming traffic and a car, in the words of my companion, gave it "a friendly nudge". Well that friendly nudge scared Precious and even stopped traffic. The dog ran back to be with us and so we dropped off our bikes and then we just decided to carry the dog back to S so that way nothing bad would happen to it. We get there and Elder W gave the dog back to S and she was just so happy to get Precious back! It was a good deed done. Total miles traveled with Precious 7.0, accidents 1.

Wednesday I went on exchanges with Elder B. It was a very different exchange, but I learned a lot from it. We had service in the morning at the food bank and there was a lot of drinks that were forgotten to be refrigerated and so we had to throw them all out. It was a very sticky and tedious work, and we really only got about 2 pallets done. We then went back to change into our prosecuting clothes and head out for the day. Elder Wa had told me about some of the plans that he and Elder B had made and told me about the people that we were going to visit and what I could do to help out with the teaching a little bit. We were able to take a member out with us for a couple hours and he is super cool. His name is K and he is a recent convert. He really really wants to just be solid and he testifies of his experiences which is just awesome! We knocked on a couple doors and nobody really wanted to listen to us. We knocked on this gentlemans door and talked to him for a little bit about our message and it was really sad to see that he didn't really understand why we were there, so sad. We were on the same street as a part member family in the Spanish ward, but I remembered that the majority of the family (the younger generations) speak english and because the wards meet in the same building around the same time, we figured that it would be a good idea to maybe introduce the rest of the family to the English elders. The lesson started out a little awkward at first, but then the daughter (who is in her 20s) started to laugh at the personality of Elder B and the lesson was good from then on. They even got a return appointment which was super cool. Elder B then gets a text from a member of the Primary asking if he would be Santa Clause for the Primary activity that they were having later that night (like a 3 hour notice, ya know). So Elder B is here freaking out and I'm here telling him that he is not about to go and ruin a bunch of little children's Christmas! I kept telling him that he had to be the best Santa that he could be and say the whole "HOHOHO!" In the right way. We visited a couple more people and those elders are teaching some of the coolest people ever! Well, it was time for the activity and the primary gives Elder B the Santa outfit to wear. It was a total wreck. The kids here in LA are just super opinionated at such a young age that none of them even believed for a second that it was Santa, it was so sad. We had a kid come up to us (you know, cause we are taking pictures of the whole thing and taking videos at the same time) and he said "that is not the real Santa. 1 - Santa's belt goes along his belly, not under his belly. 2 - Santa doesn't talk like that. 3 - Santa doesn't have dark skin. Well kid, you totally got me there, that first point is definitely his strongest let me tell you. Well anyways Elder W and I had correlation but during which a crazy thing happened. Elder B had ran to go change form being Santa and so he is in normal missionary clothes right? Well a bunch of the primary kids chased him down and sat him down in a chair to tell him what they thought of him being Santa. They called him a "bad man" for pretending to be Santa and then they started hitting him! But oh! What wrath were upon the face of the parents of those children! They called their kids over and ooooooooo yikes! Those chanclazos tho!!! We then switched back to be in our normal companionships at that time. Pretty climactic ending to an interesting exchange to say the least.

Thursday it rained. It was a a light sprinkle at the beginning, but then it started to rain pretty good. We had to bike to a finally that lives in the very top corner of our area, so its a pretty long bike ride. Along the way I almost got "doored" which was such a heart pounding moment. Here we are biking and then this father opens his door and Peggy out of nowhere pulls some sick power slide maneuvers to avoid being hit and then everything is ok, but it was seriously a freaky moment. We then ate dinner with the G family and that was good. Then the rain started to pour. Elder W didnt have his jacket, but he did have an umbrella and so he decided to bike with one hand holding an umbrella and one hand on the bike. He totally looked like a character out of Mary Poppins or something. I was just drenched. We got back and decided to lock up our bikes and to go tracking. We really didnt have any luck. We had a lot of doors closed on us that day, and the only guy that talked to us didnt want us to come back to visit with him, but we still had a good conversation with the guy.

Friday I came down with a cold and it was just a really rough day. We were able to have some meaningful stuff happen though. Our WML calls us and asks us "elders, what are you doing right now?" "Eating dinner at our apartment, why? How can we help you?" "I want to come with you to your lessons, when is your next appointment today?" (The time and place) "ok, see you then elders!" Hermano F is just so awesome. He came out with us for the rest of the night and we visited 2 families with him. He even invited both the families to come to the ward Christmas party and they both came! #memberpower #HermanoFlores 

Saturday we woke up a little earlier than usual to go to the Christmas Devotional for the mission. I was feeling so sick that it was really hard for me to get started in the morning. We arrived at the Kent building about an hour and a half before the meeting started, so we arrived early to say the least. We got there and everyone (generally speaking) was wearing a festive tie or outfit. It is really different in the mission now because Elders and Sisters sit together in the same zone whereas before all the sisters would sit in the front and the elders would sit according to the zone that we are in. The Christmas Devotional started and you could just tell that this was going to be different than last year. The Haynies started us of by reading the accounts in the New Testament about the events surrounding the Savior's birth along with musical numbers from a variety of missionaries, it was super cool! Everyone was very respectful to the performances and we all liked them too. After the musical numbers were over we had a testimony meeting and then broke out to lunch where we took pictures with President and Sister Haynie. I also took pictures with a lot of Elders that have become some of my closest friends on the mission, I didnt get to all of them, but I got a handful. We then watched a movie that is called Silent Night that was put on by BYUTV and it was super good. It was really funny to watch it as a missionary with all the commentaries that follow being a missionary... lets just say that there was a lot of laughter with the movie. The Haynies then gave us a temple recommend holder to all of us (which is super cool) and that was the Christmas Devotional. We then got back to our apartment just in enough time to change and go to the ward Christmas Party. Normally we would have stayed for a little bit of time, but when almost ALL of the people that we are teaching right now actually came to the dinner, it is so much more meaningful for us to actually be there with them and help them feel comfortable with the members and spend some time with our investigators. We actually had one of the nonmembers that came tell us that she wasn't going to dance because she believes that we aren't suppose to do that, well by the end she was dancing so thats a good sign. We took a lot of pictures and it was super fun.

Sunday was super cold in the morning, like 39 degress cold. Now California doesn't get that cold here in LA and when you bike to church in that weather and you have a cold, it is pretty miserable. Church was good, except for the fact that nobody showed up! It was so sad because this always happens at ward Christmas parties - everyone shows up to the party, but then nobody shows up to sacrament meeting. It was also super cold in the church, like around 63 degrees when we were trying to fix the thermostat to about 73 degrees. Nobody in the building even knew how to fix it! Oh there were some cranky faces that day. Thankfully a lot of the cool members where there, yes there are a lot of cool members in this ward. Hermana S is definitely one of the funniest members in 6th ward she had brought a bag of candy to share with everyone in Gospel Principles class, totally brought back memories to all those candies that we use to buy for school and for church... goodness. Whenever we get our food list from the RS the RS president always seems to have "another hermana" who "signed up on the dinner calendar" but that we never called her and then that poor hermana was left with cold food made and then wasted.

(Shhpeal) Ok, first off, please put your phone number by your name so that way we can call to confirm the dinner appointment the day before. 2 make sure that you signed up on the right dinner calendar. 3 actually make sure that you signed up on the right week and not one in the past or one in the future. A helpful hint would be to tell the missionaries at church (because you see them) that you are feeding them that week. Next, if they dont call, dont expect them to come! And definitely dont make food for nobody! And lastly, dont get upset at the elders when they dont want to eat 2+ plates of food, normally they dont do that. 

Anywho, thankfully we had an hermana tell the RS president that everything was good and that there had been a confusion with the hermana who complained, so that was all good. We then made sure that we would go with the C family to the VC to see the orchestra that was performing that night. We asked a couple of the members to give us a ride if they had time and we found a couple people that said that they could take us. We got back to our apartment for our lunch hour, but because we were having dinner a little earlier than usual in order to get to the VC on time and get seats, we ended up making a GINGERBREAD house during our lunch hour. Now, I dont know why we have never made gingerbread houses, but that was my first time. Yes, the first time I ever made a gingerbread house was on the mission. AND it was super epic. Pictures will follow (we have a lot of pictures this week, so I think I am only going send the pictures that are necessary for the stories and everything). We then ate dinner with A F and that was really cool. He was talking about how he loves church during the Christmas season because he feels that he learns more BECAUSE he wants to learn more. He says that during the Christmas time he has this longing to learn more. #eternigator. Its also funny because they had just come back from a birthday party for the wife of the EQ president in the ward #eternigators. So ya, their day basically was church, birthday party for a ward member, feed the missionaries... what a day man! We then got a ride from the V family to go to the VC and holy smokes was the VC packed!!! There was a huge line just waiting to be seated for the concert. Well, we got some good seats in another room and the C family told us how much they loved it. TOTALLY RANDOM - there was a GA there. He walks up to us and starts talking with us and then says "by the way, I am one of the new GA" like its nonchalant or something. He totally has a cool style of fashion, red peacot and one of those hats that dad wears. We then went and took pictures with the C family around the Christmas lights and they just loved the whole thing. 

See ya Sunday!!!

Love,

Elder Roberts