Lizards and Stitches

Hola Familia,
It’s been another great week here in Bucaramanga. We have been working hard in our area this week and there is lots and lots of potential. We also went to the Zone Leaders Seminar in San Gil which was awesome and had our first baptism here in the area and with it my first trip to the hospital :) The weather here has been great, not really sunny and hot but not raining lots either, just cool and fresh.

Bucaramanga really is the best looking city I think in the mission. Nicer roads and parks etc. and lots of nice big apartment buildings etc. The UIS (Santander Industrial University) which is one of the biggest and nicest in Colombia is here in our area and also the Bucaramanga soccer team stadium is here in our area.

Our apartment is small for the 4 of us and was a huge mess when we got here but today for P day we got it all cleaned up and organized and now it’s looking much better. Our bedroom has a big slide open window with a somewhat view of the city so that’s pretty cool.

Things are going very well with the ward. This is a nice strong ward with good leadership and experience and we are seeing the blessings of that. We are working very well with the Bishop and leaders and things are going great. On Sunday we had 17!!! people in church who aren’t members. Only 12 of them are officially investigators but just the same, that number is great. It’s a challenge to talk to all the people who want to talk to us at church and organize all the visits people want us to make. We have hardly had any time to do contacts since we got here because the planner has been full of appointments with members’ references.

Since arriving, we have been out of our area 4 of the days, we have taught 30 lessons and 27 of them have been with member present. So things are going great and we are working like crazy. We get home every night dead tired, we plan for the next day and update the area book, talk with the district leaders (we have 4 districts so in order to really have good communication with them we talk with 2 each night so that its not a rush etc). For some reason the offices sent us another cell phone so now Elder Butler and I both have our own phone which really helps. It’s really awesome to get to know the missionaries in the zone and see how much some support and encouragement and example can help and how much we have grown to care and worry about them.

On Wednesday morning all the zone leaders from the mission got here (Bucaramanga) because it’s the closest major city to San Gil where the leadership seminar was. We all met together at a chapel and then our rented bus got here and we all went to San Gil. They let us watch some movie about a high school football coach who turns Christian and wins state etc.

It’s funny to see the make up of the zone leaders. When I got here there were about 8 Gringos in the whole mission and now the U.S. is the country that has the highest number of missionaries here and so the majority of the zone leaders are gringos. Since the last time I did a zone leader seminar (as AP) there are none of the same ZL's but I know all of the ones who were there so it was nice to talk to them etc and we had a fun time. I got to see old mission homies like Elder Wagstaff, Larsen, Williams, my son Elder Larson among others.

The first day was basically a free day. First they rented some little fields and we all played soccer, then everybody got cleaned up, ate lunch at our hotel and they gave us a few hours to go into San Gil and look around etc. I bought a plastic ant (they eat big fried ants here) and a cool typical Colombian Hat. Then that night we watched a movie and just relaxed a little bit. The next day was full of training sessions etc. They assigned various Zone Leaders to give training sessions about things that have worked well in their zones which was very cool and we got lots of good ideas to use here. They asked Elder Butler and me to talk about how we are working with the church leaders in our ward and stake. We presented our plan to visit each bishop in the stake and all the things we are doing in our ward and everyone thought it was great. We stayed in a hotel room. Elder Butler and I are getting along great. We both have similar personalities although he is a little more soft-spoken than I have gotten to be. But we have great unity and we are really enjoying and working hard together.

On Friday we had the baptism of Yicell. She is a little girl (10) who is living with her aunt here who is member. She has been going to church forever but the missionaries never talked to her mom to get permission for her to be baptized. We started teaching her, found out she wanted to, then called her mom and she was fine with it. So on Friday we were getting everything ready and as the font was getting filled I noticed that there was a tiny lizard in the water. I started walking down into the font to get it out and luckily I had my almost worn out Rockport shoes with no traction and slipped on the stair. I grabbed the rail but fell and hit my elbow on the other stair. It hurt but I thought it was just pain so I got up and walked back out. Yicell arrived and when I shook her hand she said "me pintaste....you painted me" I looked at my hand and my whole sleeve was covered with blood. We rolled it up and found that the impact had opened a nice big hole right below my elbow. It was like when I cut my shin and you could see right in there. We got it cleaned up a little bit. I wanted to stay and finish the baptism so I covered it with some gauze, finished the baptism service and we headed to the hospital. The mission has insurance with the nice hospital there so they just send a fax and we go right in to the "VIP" service. We went in, talked with the doctors etc. Everyone looked at me kind of weird, for one because I’m a tall white guy with blonde hair and second because I had blood all over my shirt. The doc and nurse looked it over a little bit and decided I would need a pre shot for hepatitis or something even though I already had one and then gave me a numbing shot on my elbow and put in 4 stitches. Haha I had to get the hepatitis shot on my butt which was a tiny bit awkward, but after the stitches went quick and painless. I taught the doctor and the nurse a little as they were doing the stitches and told them how to get to the chapel where they live. So in the end it will be a good remembrance scar of my time in Bucaramanga and next Friday they will take my stitches out.

As of now as soon as I finish writing this Elder Mura and I will take a bus to Barranca. It is part of our zone and they have a possible baptism on Saturday of a guy who I actually met there so I will go with Elder Mura and do interchanges and work with the missionaries until Wednesday which is Zone conference here in Bucaramanga and possibly interview this guy for baptism. And Elder Butler will stay here with Elder Muras comp, Elder Moreno so that they can teach all the lessons we have planned in our area.

Well fam life is great. I think some Colombian post office workers are eating my birthday package haha but who knows, there still is hope. If not at least someone can enjoy it. I'll get to have plenty of whatever was in there after the mish I’m sure. I am trying my hardest and the spirit is very strong. I know we are in the truth and I absolutely love life. It is such a blessing to serve the Lord as a missionary and I’m so grateful that I can. HAPPY FATHERS DAY to Ben Bill and of course Dad. Be of good cheer and enjoy life. talk to ya next week. Love Elder Barnard