Monday, January 2, 2017

And a Happy New Year

As we all mention the corny joke of how we haven't seen each other since last year, it's good to sit down and reflect on what 2017 has in store for us... except when the only thing that's in store is the cold hard reality of life as a college student. Still, the mission goes on, and I'm trying to focus more on the fun that I'm having here in this moment!

This last week was a little difficult to meet with our progressing investigators, but we did catch up with them in their doorways a couple of times. The larger part of our time it seems was spent trying to work with some of the new investigators that we found but weren't home the second time we visited, or contacting references. One good thing that I've noticed from this last week is the progression that has happened with our investigators Leila and Roberto. They've been talking to the missionaries for a while, and since I've been here we've focused on marking a date for marriage. At first, they weren't very keen on it, but now they're talking and working towards a time where Roberto's parents will be able to come from São Nicolau. Another difficulty is that they normally can't get Sundays off of work, although Leila is seeing an opportunity that may work wonders for the both of them, as she is the driving force to follow the Gospel. The best news is that they went to church this week over in Santa Maria! We were pretty stoked about that, and we hope that soon enough we can work it into a regular habit with them. The main problem is that in Cape Verde, and especially Sal, people don't have the same 40 hour week schedule that most people in the U.S. have, and a lot of people want to have the weekends off, but only a few are actually able to make it happen. I think that may be the main cause of inactivity in the Church here: people get their hours changed to work on Sundays, and they choose work over coming to church. It's kinda sad, but we find our victories with the people that put the Lord first.

We had a division the other day as well. I went with Elder Leyton over in Santa Maria. He's a really funny guy from Peru. Santa Maria is even weirder than Espargos is, and I think it's mostly because they have a street that looks eerily similar to a street I once knew back in downtown Livermore, California. Also the fact that there are a lot of hotels and even a really nice Vila. I got to meet a few of their recent converts from last Saturday, including the casal whose marriage we went to with Elder Green. Those two are working with a lot of really really cool people. It bumped up my spirits and gave me the desire to find those kinds of people in our area.

To be honest, our New Years celebration was pretty lame. We went home an hour early, and because we had nothing better to do, we called it a night. We got woken up by the fireworks here at midnight, including a really loud siren. I stayed in bed the whole time, but Elder Teela actually got some good videos of it. That's about as crazy as our party life is here on the mission.

Well, now that it's 2017, let's make it count, am I right? Have a good week, and a good year everyone!

Boas Entradas,
Elder Penner

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