Trials make you stronger!

With Grandpa the night before she left on her mission, May 2015.

Ice Cream

A mask that Derly's daughter made

Her bed that was broken and then fixed

I was in a service project making candy flowers for the relief society Friday night and we were leaving at 7:55 pm. Then Kelly, the counselour of the Relief Society said she didn't want us to leave until she could give us a glass of water. Which was out of the usual. I was there, drinking my water, when the worst person to get a phone call from called me, Presidente Rodriguez. It`s strange because when Grandma passed away, I knew it before President called. But this time, I actually had no idea. I answered and he said, ¨Good evening Hermana Park. I got the news from your mom that your Grandpa Park has passed away.¨ I was fine. I mean, he has been holding on by a thread for years, but I was also a little mad because I have been praying for this whole time that Grandpa could be there when I got home. I thought, why! Couldn't Heavenly Father just wait one month more to take him? But then through hugs from hermanas and the Spirit, I realized that it really is a happy thing. Grandpa Park lived a lot longer than he should have, and he is now happily with Grandma and his mother he hasn't seen since he was 4! The Gospel is so perfect. 

But to give you some follow up on everything Los Olivos,

We had what the "Z" family called a ¨hot lesson¨ on the Book of Mormon. They started out saying that they wanted to ¨break up with us¨ and stay in their own church and ¨just be friends¨ but ¨it`s not you it´s me¨ So we asked if they had read their Book of Mormon. They replied, but the kids...and the work...and there isn`t time. Which resulted in a hot lesson about how the only way they are going to be able to be able to have a happy, successful family would be through this church and the priesthood authority that Joseph Smith restored. Jorge left and returned with his phone and put himself a date saying, ¨I will read the entire Book of Mormon by October 28th.¨ We`re going to visit them tonight. 

The Familia "A". We taught only half the family this week about how knowing that the church is restored makes it possible to be sealed to their son who passed away. The sweet family of members, the Familia "B", gave them a picture of the temple. 

Hortencia is drowning in sadness for the decisions of her sons. But there is always hope through Christ. You have to put in your part and be obedient to receive blessings.

And many many more things that happened but there`s never enought time!!

I love you all! 

Hermana Park

But Hermana Park, where`s your faith?

This week we visited the Ortiz Family again and we had a great lesson on the Book of Mormon. At the end, after feeling the Spirit, when trying to schedule another appointment they said that they would call us on Saturday to schedule it. I explained to them a bit that well, it`s better to make it now incase they forget, and they said, ¨no, we`ll call you Saturday to verify if we`re going to church Sunday.¨ So I said, ¨great! So what day can we visit you again?¨ And they said, ¨like we said, we´ll call you, yeah?¨ We were with the pensionista Derly and she said, ¨haha sorry! She doesnt understand. She`s still learning Spanish.¨ Humble pie shoved in my face! Yum! After in Derly`s car she said that they would call and I realized that my faith had completely dissolved as I raised my voice just a little and said, ¨They wont call! Everyone who has told me they`ll call, never has!¨ She stopped the car and said ¨But Hermana Park. Where`s your faith?¨ I had to do some serious soul searching and I learned that really, my faith was gone! I spent all week studying about it and praying for my faith to be increased. Yesterday I decided to put it all in practice! I realized, that faith lets you have the Spirit, and the Spirit makes the work fun! I am absolutely loving being a missionary and spreading the gospel to these Lamanites here in Santa Cruz. Hortencia and Bryan are reading the Book of Mormon. Chachi is loving her Book of Mormon in Portuguese. Hortencia cried in Gospel Principles yesterday from feeling the Spirit so strongly. Artemio committed to take the first step of saying NO when offered to drink beer. These are just a few of the many many miracles we are seeing. The Gospel is unbelievably true.

You`re all invited to do something this week that makes you stretch and show your faith. Try not doubting God`s power just one time and I promise you will be amazed.

Also, Hermana Cayambe is doing really well with her English. I tried to not laugh too hard hearing, ¨You`re crazy but I amn`t.¨ She got the concept right! 

with a lot of love and some dirt in your face from all the wind in our area,

Hermana Park

Okay. I put all the photos in first so that the nice man that works here can try to find all my photos that got erased...again :) But life goes on! We`ve got pics from the activity with the Elders where we played extreme volleyball and then they bought us huge hamburgers and ice cream. Muuucchha comida. So that`s what the Elders do. While waiting, we took hermana pictures in Hot Burger. I am in front mostly because they designated me for having the longest arms! Woohoo! 

Si hay gozo en tu corázon

With the cute Valeria who got baptized in November. She has wanted to come out SO BADLY with us and visit, but is only 13 and we can´t be alone with her. But President Willard knows and loves her, so she got special permission! (And a giant 2 liter water bottle because they didn´t have small ones! haha) Oh, her favorite hymn is Si hay gozo en tu corázon - You Can Make the Pathway Bright - so she was happy! 

Our Hermanas activity last Monday was drawing eachother! We passed around papers and each turn everyone had to draw something, like the mouth or hair, then write a note on back! It was a really fun activity and I love all of these hermanas :) First pic was smiling, second was what our picture was doing. haha 

In our zone conference this week, Presidente told us that companions share bread, 

because the word "pan" means bread. haha

The Tabladita sister leaders came to town! I got to go out with Hermana McDonald and it was wonderful. She is a great missionary and I love her a lot!

BURGER KING. I was so happy!! 

from the trunk of our taxi after women´s session. hahaha we´re being safe I promise! 

"By the miracle of modern technology the separation of time and vast distances vanishes. We meet as if we are all together in one great hall. But even more important than our gathering together, is in who's name we do so." --Henry B. Eyring

I was able to watch the Saturday conference sessions in English at the stake center, but with cool new wifi, everyone had to be in their own building, so I watched the Sunday sessions in Spanish. Everyone send me your favorite conference quotes because some things just don't translate over. It was a wonderful week and I promise I'll write more next week!! I love you all so much!!

The 411 on everything Santa Cruz

Hermana activity of making crepes and skits with our 2 zones

elevator pic

 Salteñas and coke is the blood of Bolivia

 I went running in the morning with Hna Huber and came back to this! Happy 9 months! Hermana Orozco, Secce, and Canales made if for me :)

The hermanas in my apartment :)

Sorry my emails haven´t been coming through! hope this one makes it!

Here´s to all who have been reading my lame journal entry emails and who want to know what I´m actually doing!

SANTA CRUZ is wonderful. I actually really love it, even if it´s humid! Here are some fun facts:

1. We have hipermaxi. It´s a little smaller than Walmart, but way bigger than anything in Tarija. I was in shock entering in. haha

2. Rav 4´s in blue must have been on sale here. 

3. Everyone talks about how we don´t have a sea because Chile stole it from us. (Thanks Chile.)

4. I have no idea where they come from, but there are horse and buggies driven by teenage boys. 

5. Because Santa Cruz is flat, it´s very windy. The fun part is that the clouds move very fast! It´s fun to look up because there´s always a different cloud. That must be how the time moves so fast here! 

6. We live pretty close to a circus and e v e r y night at 9:15 they play the same Bruno Mars song from 2010. 

7. It is comprised by 8 rings. We are in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. So the ward has a little more money. Our ward mission leader bought us all BURGER KING in correlación and WE ATE THE LETTUCE. I will never take lettuce for granted again! Also he and his wife took us home, and I wore a seatbelt for the first time in 9 months. It was a beautiful moment.

We got a call Saturday morning saying that the baptism we had planned for Yolanda and her son Antonio had to be rescheduled for this Saturday because yesterday was elections. The law here is that you can´t have meetings of any kind election day. So better safe than sorry, we couldn´t have a ¨meeting¨ Saturday night. That also means no church yesterday. So we were on lock down yesterday. That will have been 4 days of February locked in!

Late news, carnaval was fun! We studied all morning, lunch, ¨personal projects¨ for 4 hours of writing a letter, reading conference talks, etc. at 5 dinner. Then read the missionary handbook for an hour, made goals. Watched the missionary transmision from January for 2 hours. Then planned for the next day. That was what we did for 3 days. Then did it again yesterday.

Everything here is wonderful! Hermana Orozco from Colombia says hello to all. We are working with so many families to get them baptized and Yolanda and Antonio will be baptized this Saturday sí o sí. (That is a phrase here that means for sure! But directly translated is yes or yes!)

I love you all and hope everyone is nourishing their spirits by praying and reading the Book of Mormon EVERY DAY and not being a Sunday Mormon, but every day of the week :) You are all wonderful and Christ knows you all individually and is waiting with arm outstretched to bring you into His fold. Follow Him! It´s tough, but worth it.

Love,

Hermana Park

Water balloon fight!

The hermanas in my zone when we went to the Casa Dorada! 

It is really pretty and is on the bill 20 in Bolivianos! 

 

My district, Elder Hernandez, Elder Palomar, Hermana Petroff, me, Hermana Paz, Hermana Cabrera!

 After the conference, 2 of the hermanas from Bermejo stayed at our house! Hermana Padilla (my former companion I had for 2 weeks!) and Hermana Logovii, from Samoa! I got to teach with Hermana Padilla again and it was just like good old times, 4 months ago!

We found a restaurant called XOXO that had buffalo wings! 

(Do you like the Louisville shirt I found here? haha)

This Wednesday are transfers! Just glad they weren´t last night! It´s scary because I have been here in my beloved area of Tabladita for a good chunk of time! 1.5 months in the MTC, 3 weeks in Senac, 6 months in Tabladita equals more than 8 months as Hermana Park! Still feels like I just landed in Peru. 

We are busy preparing Raquel for her baptism this Saturday! She has had an unbelievable amount of doubts and her husband wouldn´t wait for her because he wanted to get baptized NOW so he got baptized in November (Mateo!) And then she just decided it was time, but she wanted to keep it a surprise from the ward! So she had the Bishop announce it in Sacrament meeting at the end after Mateo gave his first talk on humility (which he rocked!) and she just smiled and the look on Mateo´s face was PRICELESS. So our recent convert will baptize his wife :) 

The weather is warming up, the rain is gone, so that means it´s time for carnival! Just 2 weeks away when we spend 3 days locked in our house! (hope my companion is nice!) But people are already starting the traditions. We´ve got people dancing with baskets of fruit on their heads, squirt gun fights, and best of all the water balloons. It´s just another reason I LOVE Bolivia. Yesterday we were walking down the street, and there were a bunch of kids playing, and their dad yelled ¨Look at the queens! Get them!¨(They use the word queen a lot, reina, just in every day conversation.) So we were running from a group of 10 kids under the age of 12 pelting us with water balloons! We´ve also gotten them thrown at us quite a bit, but these soccer players don´t have good arms! 

We had 2 wonderful conferences this week, Tuesday with Presidente with more preparation for Wednesday! The conference, that we got to watch in English! The leaders of the church spoke about how we can Teach Repentance and Baptize Converts. We learned so much. The things are SO SIMPLE. Missionary work is so simple. We over complicate it! I am excited to be able to apply all that I learn now, and in this next transfer! :) 

The mission is wonderful. Bolivia is perfect. The people are angels. And I hope everyone is reading their Book of Mormon :)

Love, Hermana Park

PS. Yesterday the stake brought in pop for the relief society and told us to all drink it as fast as we could so that they could return the glass bottles. From the stake, or a sneaky trick from another church to kill us all with poisoned pop?

Màs Cristo

Last Monday we had an activity with the hermanas in my zone! We each brought a weird piece of clothing that we found in our apartment from a past hermana, and it got miscommunicated to Hermana Antonio from Peru, so I got a really cute skirt! haha 

I made a tree to put all of the mittens that everyone sent me on, and I promise it looked a lot cuter before it fell down and I had to use an unbelievable amount of tape to keep it up. But thanks for everyone who sent me one with a cute note! :)

The Bishop´s family, and Roxana and Jonny´s family last night in the family home evening! :)

It was a great week! As the sister leaders we were able to study with every companionship individually then inspect their apartment! Life in Bolivia is a bit toasty lately. Someone send some snow my way! 

Last night we had an adorable family home evening at the Bishop´s house with a family we are teaching, Roxana and Jonny. The Bishop gave the lesson on how we are all children of God, and they had never really thought about that before. It was a wonderful night and we had so much fun with them! They are learning that when they read The Book of Mormon, everything goes better, because they stopped reading for a while and basically everything went wrong in their lives that week. I hope that you can all really delight in reading the Book of Mormon. I promise that life goes better when you read! :) Like we tell the people we teach, at least 5 minutes every day. It´s better to read a little, than nothing at all! 

Next week is Christmas! The time is literally flyyying. As you all get all cozy with your hot chocolate and cookies and finish Christmas shopping, think of what gift you are going to give to Jesus Christ. Will you be more patient, more loving, read your scriptures more, dedicate all of Sunday to Him? Heavenly Father gave us Him as the best gift we have received! I hope we can all repay the favor and make this Christmas more about Christ and less about us. What´s really interesting is that in Spanish the word màs means more. So make this Christmas màs Christ! I love you all! 

Love,

Hermana Park