Week 43

So yesterday, I hit the 10-month mark on the mish. The time just keeps on rolling along right? It seems like everything is going to be so much different when I get back though. Well, onward to the highlights (and lowlights) of the week...

Last Tuesday, some genius in Honduras decided to close down the ONLY highway this side of San Pedro for a political demonstration. It also happens to be the highway that we needed to use to go to our district meeting... and the highway that thousands of other people were using that day. We ended up walking about a 4-mile stretch lined with cars to get to another bus. I'm definitely not voting for that guy haha

Friday, we had another service project with that same guy where we planted corn. This time, we hauled lumber for him, which was pretty back-breaking work. After we roasted the corn that I helped plant, and ate it right there in the corn field! Kind of a cool experience.

What was NOT a cool experience was when my comp lost the key to our house. We've had key issues before, and long story short, there's no backup key. So, using a combination of screwdrivers, rocks, a hammer, and brute force, we broke the lock off the door and were able to enter the house. The bad news? It took us an hour to do it, and we still haven't bought a new lock and keys. Currently, we're using fingernail clippers or a knife to open our door, which makes me feel like McGyver.

In baptism news, we're hitting a streak of pretty bad luck. We're having a hard time getting people to church, which obviously makes it pretty tough to baptize. It's still possible that we baptize 4 more during September, but only one looks even close to a sure thing. But the first priority this week is sealing up those baptisms :)

In the cultural note of the week, it's time to talk about one of the most annoying things about Honduras: weddings. In order for families to get baptized, they have to be married first, which is obviously great. But here, it's a HUGE pain to set up a wedding. We have to get these documents called partidas, which basically mean that the person who we're marrying is currently unmarried. The bad thing is you have to get the partida from the place of birth of the person. Since our area is so huge, our leaders ask us to get a bunch of partidas to help other missionaries with their weddings. For example, this last week we took out another partida, and due to a variety of circumstances, ended up wasting five hours to do so. That was also the day my comp lost the key haha. It's funny now, but it definitely wasn't then.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers, for reading the blog, and for sending letters. You guys have really been great in the 10 months I've been gone. This week, special thanks to my parents for the package, and to Gram, Michael, Orson, and Ashlee for your letters. Also, congrats to Ashlee on your MISSION CALL TO NORWAY! I feel like you kinda rigged it by taking Norweigan in college though. But congrats nonetheless! Hope everyone has a great week y nos vemos en la semana que viene!

Week 42

Today is "Dia del Niño!" Don't worry, I don't really know what it means either. Apparently, all the kids in Honduras break a bunch of piñatas and eat a ton of candy. Pretty cool holiday if you ask me. But I took a break from the piñata-breaking to write you guys about the week that was...

As far as baptism news, it was a bit of a slow week. Out of our main investigators, we are teaching two little girls (age 10 and 8), who are daughters of a member who moved to Belize. They live with their grandma, who is also a member, but is super inactive. So the difficulty has been finding people to support them, help them go to church, etc. It's still a work in progress... Also, we are working with a 19-year old guy named Edin. He's already gone to church twice, but both times it felt like we had to drag him there. He just needs a little motivation, preferably from the spirit. Also, we have tentative baptismal dates for two other people, references from a super awesome member family that help us a ton. Sadly, those five people didn't go to church yesterday, which made me feel pretty down. We'll see if we can help them out this coming week, and seal up a baptismal date or two... or five haha.

In the crazy/funny story of the week, we went to a member's house on Friday to teach a quick lesson, invite her to church, and if possible invite her non-member husband as well. Well, turns out they had a visitor, who is a friend of the family. We started talking with this guy, and realized after a little bit that he was drunk. He was still cognizant of what was going on though, so we taught him a bit about the word of wisdom. After the lesson though, he told us he was a part of a band, and that he wanted to sing a song for us. He proceeded to sing a song for us, while "playing" his harmonica, which was really just a piece of paper he put to his mouth and started humming. It was loads of fun, and I enjoyed it a lot haha

In the cultural note of the week, we're gonna mix things up and talk a little about music. (Just a disclaimer, missionaries are not supposed to listen to worldly music. But I'm on buses for about 4 hours a week, which ALWAYS have music playing. Plus we hear music in the streets quite a bit too.) For some reason, Hondurans actually listen to quite a bit of music in English. Sadly, the most popular English artist is Pit Bull. I'll be honest, I still don't understand most of the music in Spanish, but my favorite songs in Spanish are by a guy named Prince Royce. He sings in English and Spanish too, so you get the best of both worlds! Look him up on youtube if you have time, and you can get a feel for the Honduran ambiance that I enjoy every day :)

Tengo que irme porque se fue la luz en San Marcos y les estoy escribiendo en Quimistan. Tenemos que viajar en bus hasta San Marcos para trabajar el resto del día. Gracias por todo su apoyo! Y gracias por usar la traducción de Google para entender lo que digo. Hasta la próxima semana! Adios

Week 41

So this week's e-mail comes to you on a Tuesday. And the reason why takes a little while to explain...

It all started Monday morning, when our zone started our journey to hike Mount Cosuco. In order to do it, we found a guy to drive about 10 miles up a steep dirt road with 14 missionaries in the bed of a truck. That was a bit of a nerve wracking experience. Then, to make matters worse, the car broke down when we were almost to the top. The driver told us he would fix it while we hiked/explored the rest of the mountain. It was a lot of walking to see a waterfall (which I admit, was pretty cool) and a crappy park (which wasn't cool at all). After that little extravaganza, we returned to where the car had broken down... to find out that it still didn't work. To make a long story short, we had to wait until 7:00 at night for them to fix the car. Then we took the 10-mile ride back down a steep mountain in a recently-repaired car... still with 14 missionaries in the bed of the truck. We said a lot of prayers before that part of the journey, and we sang hymns for most of the ride as well. Kind of a strangely cool, bonding experience for the zone. Anyway, we finally made it back down safely. However, there were no longer buses to take us back to San Marcos, which meant we had to spend the night at another companionship's house (coincidentally Elder Hebert's house). I slept (or tried to sleep on the concrete floor), and we went to our meeting this morning. I am currently wearing Elder Hebert's missionary clothes with my tennis shoes because he didn't have another pair of shoes. I feel ridiculous haha. But at least we're all ok, and I'm finally back in my area.

K I only have 30 minutes today, so gotta make it quick

- We had another baptism! I performed the baptism of Jessica on Saturday, and we had a pretty big turnout! Baptisms make me so happy haha :)

- There is a member family in my area with a pet squirrel. One day, we went to visit them, and the squirrel had escaped it's cage. I'm sure you already know this, but squirrels are extremely fast and difficult to catch. We all tried to catch it for about 10 minutes, until I finally was able to grab it. He wasn't too happy about that, and proceeded to bite me about 10 times before I could put him in the cage. Don't worry, I'm pretty sure I don't have rabies. I've only foamed at the mouth once since then (Just Kidding mom!)

- Last week, I talked about baleadas, so I thought I would keep up the theme of food. This week... bananas! Hondurans include bananas in pretty much everything. In addition to plain bananas, they have banana soda. They have platinos, which is like a bigger, less sweet version of a banana. They put bananas in soup, which in my opinion, is a terrible idea. And they make "tejadas," which can best be described as a banana chip. They slice up bananas, and fry them like potato chips. It's actually quite good. Anyway, that's all for this week. Eat a banana for me, and stay away from steep, dangerous Honduran roads. Adios!

Week 40

Hey everyone happy August 27th! I can't believe another month is about to come and go! Crazy how time flies sometimes...

Well, the biggest news from this past week was obviously changes. From my perspective, the most important thing is my new comp, Elder Ampie (Am-pee-ay) from Nicaragua. He has the exact amount of time as me in the mission, but an extra six weeks in the field (Latins only stay 3 weeks in the MTC, and we stayed 9). It's always a bit of a challenge when a new comp comes to my area because I'm basically in charge of everything. I feel like it's been a pretty smooth transition though, and I haven't messed things up too bad haha. We've only been together 5 days, but he seems like a good guy and we get along pretty well. Just as importantly, he's a good missionary and we've mainly been on the same page in lessons. We'll learn and grow together during this change, and see what kind of success we can have :)

The other important news is that Jessica got baptized this past Saturday. Since my comp is new in the area, I had to be the jack-of-all-trades in the baptismal service. I led the music, performed the baptism, even bought the refreshments... and then was part of the confirmation the following day. Kinda crazy, but it all came together and went pretty smoothly. Ironically, we have another baptism this Saturday with another lady named Jessica haha. She's a young single mom that is living with her brother and his family, who are members. We had been teaching her for a while with limited success, but something changed about 10 days ago. I'm not even sure what happened, but we challenged her for baptism (for like the 5th time), she accepted, and since then, she's done everything necessary to be baptized this Saturday. The only real challenge we faced with her was tattoos- she really likes tattoos for some reason, but told us she is willing to give it up. Just more of life's little miracles, I suppose... Also, if any of you have any friends named Jessica, go talk to her about the church!

Ok, so I feel like these blog entries are pretty much the same every week, so I decided to spice it up with some tidbits about Honduran culture! I feel like you guys have no idea what it's like here, and that's my fault. So I'm gonna have a little section from now on about what it's really like here in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. We'll start with every Latin's favorite subject- FOOD! And the staple of any Honduran's diet is the baleada- flour tortillas with some kind of combination of beans, cheese, eggs, mantequilla, avocado, chicken, or chorizo (the literal translation of mantequilla is butter, but it's really some strange kind of butter/sour cream mixture that tastes amazing!) The real difference is the tortillas though. The women here make tortillas basically every day, so they've gotten pretty good at. My comp and I tried to make tortillas last Monday with limited success haha. It'll take some more practice, but at least I have the recipe for when I get home! :)

Ok, now that I've made you all hungry, I guess it's time to go. See you next week (most likely with another baptism under my belt). Adios vosotros!

Week 39

Ok there's a TON of news this week, so I'll just get right to it. First off, my birthday was awesome! Not the same as a birthday back home with family and friends... but cool nonetheless with my Honduran family and friends. I can't believe I'm twenty though! That just seems so much older than nineteen for some reason. Maybe it's cuz those carefree teenage years are a thing of the past. Someone asked me on my birthday how old I was, and I automatically started to say nineteen before realizing my mistake. Guess I'll have to get used to that...

So it was pretty gnarly to celebrate my birthday with two baptisms! (Actually, there were three, but one was an 8-year old from a member family). It was a pretty neat birthday present to see Mirna and Benjamin enter the waters of baptism. I'm amazed sometimes that I get to be a part of these great experiences :) In other baptism news, we have one (and possibly two) this next week. Jessica, the 16-year old with the addiction problems, has just completely stopped with all of her addictions. It's been incredible to watch the change that she has made. When we met her, she was shy and didn't really want much to do with religion. Now, she loves it when we come over, she reads her scriptures, she feels comfortable praying, and most of all... this is important enough to her to stop the bad habits she was forming. Hope to tell you guys next week about her baptism and her friend as well (who has received an answer to her prayer, but refuses to believe us when we tell her that... it's frustrating.)

Also, I had my best day of the mission this past Tuesday! Why? Because Elder Hebert and I finally went on divisions together! The dream team was back in action, even though it was only for a short time. We had a great day... really successful as far as missionary work, and then we stayed up til about 3 in the morning drinking soda and talking about all the crazy things of the mission. Good times! :)

Quite possibly the biggest news of the week is that I will be getting a new companion this next Wednesday! Surprisingly, my two best friends in the mission (Elders Hebert and Hanson) are staying in my zone, so at least I have that to look forward to. I'm getting pretty nervous about it, but I'm excited too! We'll see what happens this Wednesday!

Shout-out to Michael, Tyler, and Kimber for your fantastic letters this past week! I love hearing from everyone about normal life haha. Thanks again to everyone that has sent me a letter in the last nine months!

Elder Birt

Week 38

WOW... as in Word of Wisdom. I don't know what the heck happened this week, but it seemed like all of our investigators decided to have problems with the Word of Wisdom. Kind of frustrating... and it means there will not be four baptisms this next weekend either :(

The most frustrating case was when the 16-year old girl who was going to be baptized admitted everything to us. It wasn't frustrating because we lost a baptism, but because she already has so many addictions at age 16. Cigarettes, alcohol, and marijuana- it was obviously devastating to hear, but I'm glad she admitted it to us so we can help her overcome these issues. I think before, she was planning on keeping everything hidden and getting baptized anyway, which obviously would have been a bad situation. We're working with her on everything, and I can see a real desire to drop the bad habits. I'm just hoping that will be enough. Other investigators mentioned WOW problems as well, either with cigarettes or alcohol. It's just so sad to see such great people throw everything away for nothing.

Two of our other investigators who were going to be baptized on the 18th didn't come to church. One can still be baptized, but we haven't been able to talk with him because he left... and nobody knows exactly where. So that's a little disconcerting. The other didn't come to church, and has had problems making a commitment for baptism. It seems like her decision changes every time we visit her. Sometimes she says yes, others no, others that she needs more time...

Ok, now that you're all sad and disappointed, it's time for the happy news of the week! One baptism is still a sure thing! So we will definitely be baptizing Mirna on my birthday. She's the one that's known the church for FOREVER, but just recently settled some Law of Chastity problems. So she will finally get baptized, and is already planning to go to the temple :)

Also, thanks to Gram and Michael for the packages. I still have stuff from three packages, and I don't think I've eaten so well the entire mission. Thank you so much. Thanks for the letters too- Gram, Pop, Michael, and all of my many cousins. It was a very enjoyable day when I got those packages! :)

Again, if you want to check out some pictures of the Celestial Zone celebration, check out the pictures on http://veirsblog.blogspot.com/. It's good stuff! Thanks for everything! Have a good week, and do something cool on the 18th- from what I hear, it's a pretty awesome day ;)

Week 37

Hey everyone! Sorry there was no blog entry last week! We got back late from San Pedro, and I was scrambling to write a blog entry to let you guys know what was going on. And halfway through... the power went out :( It was REALLY bad timing, and I felt super bad about it. But I'll try to make this week's entry twice as entertaining to make up for it!

So... I didn't get to tell you guys about my AWESOME P-day last week. My comp got called to the mission office cuz he had to go to immigration. Obviously, I had to go with him, and I thought there would be nothing to do. But no! Elder Hebert's companion got called there too, so we were in the same boat! And there happens to be a mall a block away from the mission office! So Hebert and I went to the mall, and spoiled ourselves with a little bit of Little Caesar's, Wendy's, and Cinnabon's (we couldn't decide on just one haha). It was obviously really fun, and in a weird way, it felt like I was in America for a little bit because the mall was so modern... but then I heard everyone talking in Spanish and was like "Oh yeah, I'm still in Honduras" haha.

The P-days have been pretty wonderful as of late because today we went to San Pedro again, this time to eat at the President's house! Why? Because we were CELESTIAL ZONE! So today, our whole zone went and played soccer and then enjoyed the wonderful spaghetti and brownies of Sister Veirs. I'm still pretty full because I just couldn't stop eating such delicious food haha. Also, the zone sang Happy Birthday to me and Elder Hanson, who also has a birthday in August :) If you're interested in seeing pictures, there are some on the mission blog (my parents can post the address).

Ok, now that I've talked about all the fun stuff of the past week, I should probably talk about the actual work we're doing. We've been blessed with so many miracles as of late. Everything went smoothly for another baptism this past Saturday. Antonio Lopez is one of the newest members of the church family, and was/is really excited about his baptism. I think I've mentioned before that he has some memory issues. He's also one of the poorest people I've met in Honduras. But he has such a genuine desire to do what is right and help people in any way that he can. Last night, he even asked us if he can come visit other people that we're teaching. We were like "Heck yeah, just let us know when you wanna go!" So hopefully he'll stay excited about the church, and help others find the blessings of the gospel :)

Also, this past week, we set not one... not two... not three... but FOUR baptismal dates! And coincidentally, they would all be on my birthday haha. That would be one heck of a birthday present. We're fairly sure about all of them, but keep it in your prayers that they can stay firm in their commitment to be baptized. Here's a quick scouting report of each of them:
-We met Mirna Ortega last Sunday. Apparently, she had attended church regularly a year ago, but couldn't be baptized because of some issues. Basically, she was married with a guy, but living with a different guy. Now, she's still married, but not living with the other guy anymore. So she is willing to live the Law of Chastity, which had been the only obstacle keeping her from baptism. The rest was easy because she already knows basically everything about the church. When I talked to her the first time, she even started talking about the Book of Mormon, temples, baptisms for the dead... so she's definitely ready.
-We've been teaching Jessica and Helen for a while now. They're both teenagers- Jessica is 16, Helen is 13, and they've been going to youth activities for the past month. But for some reason, they would not come to church. This past Wednesday, we challenged them for baptism (for what had to be like the fourth time). Jessica accepted, and Helen said she had to think about it. But Helen apparently received her answer three days later when she attended the baptism we had. We talked with her after, and she told us "I want to get baptized too!" They came to church for the second time yesterday, and are excited for their own baptismal service in a couple weeks.
-Benjamin is another teenager, who just turned 15. We've been teaching his whole family for the past month, but he's been the only one who has shown any signs of progress. He's come to church and the youth activity for the last three weeks, and accepted a baptismal date yesterday. We asked his mom (who, sadly, is determined to stay Catholic) for permission, and she said yes. She even said she'll go to the baptism, so hopefully that changes her mind about things. After all, it would be a pretty powerful spiritual experience to watch four people get baptized, right?

Ok, that's enough miracles for one week, I suppose. Oh wait, no it's not. ELDER HEBERT AND I ARE GOING ON DIVISIONS TOMORROW! We finally convinced our district leader to do it, and the dream team will be back in action :) I can't wait! Thanks for all the prayers and support! And a special shout-out to Gram and Ashlee for your letters (extra bonus points to Ashlee for a hand-written letter. Yeah, it finally got here haha). Have a great week!

-Elder Birt