Tuesday, April 10, 2018

Sleepless in Santa Cruz


The office boys!
 Me and Elder Lisonbee when he got here!
How I felt at the end of transfer week.

Friends and Family, I am very grateful to have Pday this Monday, and that transfer week is over. You will understand very soon the reason for my subject line.

Ok, so this past week was my first transfer week here in the offices, and the only way I can describe it is it’s like the episode of The Office where Dwight lights the trash can on fire and does a fire drill, and everyone just goes insane, and at the very end, Stanley just has a heart attack. Yeah, it’s pretty much just like that. We were all over the place getting the missionaries to their new areas, picking up the people coming from Tarija, getting the missionaries who were heading home through their English tests (all 14 of them). Yeah, and that was Pday last week, so it was a pretty crazy start to the week.

The next day, we were welcoming in new missionaries! We had to go with President to go and pick up the first group of missionaries at 3 am, so we woke up at like 2, and after, we went at 5 to go get the next group. but the best part was that group was Elder Lisonbee, my friend from the MTC who had to go home, but just got back out here!!! I was so dang excited to see him, right after he came out of the terminal, he shook President's hand, and then I just gave him a huge hug and welcomed him to the mission. Oh my goodness I can’t even describe how good it was to see him. It was definitely interesting to welcome in new missionaries, I always feel so so new because my companion is super old in the mission, and both the AP's too, so I always feel like the new guy. So it was definitely interesting when they started asking me questions about the mission, and I had to answer like I knew something.

On Wednesday we had to get the missionaries up at 5:30 so we could get them started on their visa work. We sent the new missionaries off with their trainers, and it was a pretty normal day after that. Thursday we were just making sure that the old missionaries got to their interviews on time, when something surprising happened. One of the hermanas called us and said that her companion had been bitten by a bug of some sort, and was now having problems walking. They got a taxi and rushed her to the hospital, and then we arrived to give her a blessing. Elder Lozano gave her a beautiful blessing, and she was able to get well enough to take her flight to get home.

Ok, Thursday night was one I’m never going to forget, because it’s the time that I pulled an all nighter in the mission. Not because I wanted to, but because one of our jobs as secretaries is that we have to take all of the old missionaries to the airport to take their flights home. Well, the first flight left at 2 am, so we just had to stay up until midnight when we had planned to leave, and then from then on, it was non stop taking one group for their flights, returning, loading up the next group, and repeating that until we sent off the last missionary at 1 in the afternoon the next day. We couldn’t go back to the house and sleep though, because there was a ton of stuff in the offices that we had to do, and we had appointments with investigators, for the first time that whole week. Sooo we just got to work. I don’t know how we did it, but the Coca Cola we drank and the Lord giving us strength was enough for us to get through the day--especially during the cita with Herman. He had lots of questions, and we were so tired that we could barely think, but the Lord helped us have the spirit and be able to answer his questions.

So, Saturday, we woke and tried to get to work, but with no sleep all week, and tons of stressful work the whole week, Elder Lozano got pretty sick, so we pretty much stayed in the whole weekend and he just rested up and tried to get feeling better.

Well, here’s to another week here in the work of the Lord, and hopefully we get a little more time to be in our area this week!

Con mucho amor, Elder Christian Duvall Newman

Mom, sounds like you guys had a pretty eventful spring break!! Thanks for that awesome talk, Hopefully things calm down for you guys this week! Love you tons mom!!

Dad, dang, cold storage is looking pretty awesome! And I hope you enjoyed your birthday!!! Thought about you tons yesterday, hope that it was awesome!! love you Dad!!!

Emma, well, sounds like you had a busy week like me! I’m sure that the yearbooks turned out awesome!! Remember to take some time and relax a bit, ok? Love you Emma!

Sarah, Sounds like somebody had an even more eventful week than I did!!! Hope your teeth recover well! Keep taking it easy until you recover! Love you Bear!

Callie, Hope you had a great spring break! How fun to celebrate Dad’s birthday!! Today, for fun we had a zone activity, and now we are back in the offices to write! Love you Callie!!


Mom’s Questions:

1. This week we had empanadas. I’ve never heard you mention them. Do you eat empanadas in Bolivia?

Yes there are empanadas, they are super good! What you need to look for now are something called Salteñas. They are super similar to empanadas, but something traditional to here in Santa Cruz

2. How was your week now that transfers are over? 

Well, things have finally calmed down, but now we are just trying to get Elder Lozano feeling better.

3. What type of exercise do you do? Do you get to exercise daily? 

We have a treadmill in our house, so sometimes we use that, and also sometimes we go downstairs and play Ping Pong. Also with the occasional basketball game with Elder Johnston.

4. How is Herman doing? 

He is super awesome! Don’t know if we will be able to baptize him on the 14th (we just haven’t had much time to visit him), but he is progressing really well!!!




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