So This past week, I left Ochi and made it to Boulevard (Kingston). The church building is a two-story building and has the generic Mormon tables, decorations and "won-doors" I oh so missed from my American church buildings! My house is super sick, we are on the second story in a cute likkle neighborhood called Pembrook Hall. My new companion is Elder Porter from Mesa, AZ and my roommates were Elder Stolp from South Africa (he's white) and Elder Peterson from Farmington, Utah. Elder Peterson died though so we got Elder Banton from Linstead, Jamaica. We have a cool house and we laugh a lot. I didn't know how unhealthy it was not to laugh. I hadn't laughed much in Ochi. In the past week, I have laughed more than I have throughout my whole 6 months in the mission! To all readers: Find ways to make yourself and others laugh. Make memories every day and LOG THEM so you can remember them all! This has become important to me, and it will be important for those who come after you, your siblings and your posterity. I want to give them my life story with videos and pictures, not just by word of mouth. I want them to see how dumb I was!
So some stuff about my new place. Random things. Less mosquitoes in the house, but after dark they are ruthless. I can actually ride my bike everywhere instead of pushing it up the hills and riding it down. The church is huge and member work actually exists here!A four- man house is so much more fun. I don't feel like curling up in a corner and dying anymore because I have people to mess around with. I love it. The people here are so great too! The stores are also going to be better, more Americanized.
Here is a day-by-day:
Wednesday: I got to transfer meeting way late because it started to rain and then we got a flat tire. Made it in time for the closing hymn and prayer! I got carted around with the Zone Leaders until I made it to my house! I got unpacked and went to see some cool members in the Boulevard ward (eeep! a ward!).
Thursday: We did service at Sister Hamilton's house and had a blast chopping yard. She fed us this fish and provisions soup with water crackers and such, it was way different than I expected, but it was good. I'm going to take the idea and make some kind of chicken pot pie lasagna thing with it. I am loving the food options here, things I never would have thought of for sure!
Friday: Super planning and helping Elder Peterson get packed to go home, we had a few appointments too, nothing super special though. Good lessons!
Saturday: International Day of Service! We donated our hands at a local kindergarten to rebuild their schoolhouse and paint it up and make it look nice! As we pulled off the boarding on one of the walls, a few hundred HUGE Cockroaches literally poured out of the rotten wood! If you're familiar with Weird Al's song "Weasel stomping day", and the Wild Thornberries, we had a smashing time! It was so gross and really messed up. A few people got them in their clothes as the likkle buggers were trying to get away. Remember that scene from "Mummy" with the scarabs? yeah. *shivers* We painted each other and stuff, it was fun! We got pizza afterward and that's always a treat here! Cheese isn't very cheap here. Just dairy in general isn't cheap!
Sunday: I had an actual ward! Wow it felt like home, and I actually felt like it was an LDS worship service. The sacrament was one of the most powerful meetings since I became worthy again from my apostate days. I felt like I became a new person and really reflected on my whole life. I love this faith because it promises the most blessings, makes the most sense and has the most freedom of all faiths out there (yes I also heard about the pope's "Sunday only proposition").
I'm grateful to be a part of it and have an incredible opportunity to share it with these wonderful people of Jamaica. I know that what I share is true and there would be no purpose to life without the truths that only our religion has. We have the true meaning of life and our eternal destiny. In the name of our Lord and Savior I testify of these things. Amen.
