December 31, 2013
Ha, quite a week, not
sure if I'll be able to fit it all in, so I'll keep it brief. Anyway, I had a
great Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Christmas Eve we kept working
until 8:30. The last two hours were pretty hard. No one wanted to listen
to us and all of our planned visits fell through. We ended up walking around
for a really long time visiting every person imaginable. I definitely missed
our normal Christmas traditions at that point (especially the dessert party,
since I was pretty hungry).
After that we went
with a family in the ward to eat dinner at their house. As is the tradition
here, we ate a bunch of incredible delicious tamales wrapped in plantain leaves
and drank ponche, a cider made out of pineapple, sugar cane, coconut, papaya,
and a bunch of other dried, canned, and fresh fruits. I must say, this is one
Christmas tradition I might have to pick up. After that we just hung out for a
couple of hours or so. I had no idea that saying up past 10:30 was so
difficult. It was almost embarrassing. Anyway, we then went over to the house
of the President of the Ward (the Escuintla District was just made a Stake and
they haven't called a bishop yet). There we watched all the fireworks
at 12:00. For weeks people had been selling a ton of fireworks on the
street and in the tiendas. Fireworks and firecrackers are used pretty much
24/7, during the entire year, but I couldn't believe how crazy it was at
midnight between Christmas Eve and Day. It was like a war zone. So much
smoke, explosions, machine-gun noises, rockets, etc. They aren't many laws
about firework safety here. I saw the 5 year only son of a member here who had
the biggest burn I have ever seen. A firework exploded right in his chest. His
burn was multi colored, with a very thick, bumpy scab. My stomach dropped when
I saw him. It was so sad.
Christmas day we spent
in our house. I loved my phone call home. Those 40 minutes went by so quickly,
but it was great to be able to talk to them again. You don't realize just how
much you love your family until you can't be with them. Then, at 5:00, we
went out to work like normal. In all, a very good Christmas. It made me rededicate
myself to work as hard as I can to bring souls unto Christ and unite families
for the eternities so that they can experience the same joy and peace that I
have.
Opening the Christmas box.
New shoe inserts along side old inserts
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