Yikes, furless dogs?

 

 

Alright, sooo.... Here we go again. First thing, I gotta warn you. I brought my camera. But.... I forgot the chord. :P

So, with that out of the way, this week was pretty good. Hmm... Not sure what else to say. This is gonna be a kinda short letter. I have been studying the language pretty heavily this week. reading El Libro de Mormón and such. Only one week left now in the transfer. Elder Guevara is probably leaving, but I am most likely staying. I will probably stay for 6 months here, or 4 transfers. So, I have 2 more here. Probably. But we wn't know for sure until next Monday. Today, I am going on exchanges with my District leader again (Elder Huish).  So yeah. Also today was Zone P-Day. Hmm... What else...? Oh yeah. Dad asked some questions:

How many lessons do you teach each week?

  

   Not enough. Yeah, about 15-20. At least, recently.  We have been having trouble finding and retaining new investigators. And especially a hard time getting them to church. If you have any ideas, tell me!

 April 27, 2015

 

What is a typical day like for you?

  6:30 wake up, go running for 20 min, come back, shower and eat, study personal for an hour, companionship for 2 hours (1 is for training), and language for another. we finish study at 12, then eat lunch at our pension at 1, and then get ready and leave at 2. From 2-9(9:30 sometimes) we are out proselyting. (Teaching lessons or contacting or whatever it is we do). Then, we come back, plan our day (what we will study, appointments we will have, and which of our 10 ways of finding we will use), then go to bed between 10 and 10:30. Then we restart the cycle again. On Wednesdays, we have district meetings, they last from 11-1. And P-Days, we study till 10, take our clothes to the lady that washes them, buy our stuff, eat at 1, and do whatever until 3:30, when we go to internet to email. We generally leave at 5/5:20 and then get ready and at 6, our usual proselyte routine.

What is your favorite meal?

  Lomo saltado or Chaofa with Inca Kola.

What is the wierdest thing you've eaten?

   Nothing really. I was surprised to find that all of the salads are really really sour. They like to cover them in lemon juice for some reason. And there are some meals (like potatoes covered in a wierd sauce) that sometimes taste like dust, and other times are really good. it is just a leap of faith when you get one on your plate that it will be the good ones. But, it is never too bad.  They have a papaya juice here. It is weird enough, but not too bad either.

Seen?

   The stry dogs are super strange. They are EVERYWHERE. They are most of the time just... eh, whatever, another dog, but at other times, there are dogs here that are furless. I am told that they are a breed, but yikes. It is worse than those weird naked cats. Just strange.  But other than that, it is pretty normal here.

what do you like to read in the letters we send?

  Más o menos just the basic stuff. What is going on at home, how is everyone, what mission calls have come, or accomplishments of people. Sometimes the challenges that people have overcome. But if you are gonna talk about a challenge, there needs to be the overcoming of it too. i don't want to be sad during the week... :P I love you guys, and I want to know the good stuff.

Bueno, ahora es tiempo para Español. Mi testimonio y otras cosas que quisiera hablarles.  Siempre estoy feliz. Por lo menos, siempre trato a estar feliz. Practico el idioma mucho más que antes, y me siento que estoy mejorando. Mi gramática todavía no es lo mejor, ni mis palabras, ni mi habilidad se hablar, tampoco.  pero, siempre está mejorando. Poco a poco, estoy llegando a ser un mejor misionero. Quiero ser lo mejor. Quiero saber español perfectamente. Pero tengo que ser paciente. Ha sido tres meses (más o menos), y he mejorado mucho, pero hay más que puedo mejorar todavía.  Gracias por sus oraciones y esperanza. Y diga a Cameron Washburn ¡Felicidades! Y también a Shaun Sandstrom que tiene que decirme dónde va por su misión, cuando recibe.  Entonces, no tengo más a decir.  TENGAN UNA BUENA SEMANA!!!!!!!!!!!

Con amor,

El Élder Riley Jacob Olsen

Yeah! Another Week in the Life of a Missionary in Peru Lima West Mission!

April 20, 2015

OK, Where do I start?  This week was better. Way better. Um, I am gonna do the day by day thing again.

Lunes: P-Day. I got home from e-mails, and took a shower. I was SOO sunburnt. I have pictures to show you. >:) So yeah. I got a "burger", or a warm fries sandwich with a little bit of meat. Got a new investigator named Manuel. I don't know how promising he is.

 

Martes: Nuevos meeting, part 2. Presidente Archibald is kool. And I got to see by CCM buddies again. It was pretty fun, and we got Papa John's Pizza for lunch. Yup. Taught a guy who we did Book of Mormon challenge with, and he is super kool. We taught lesson 1 right away. He was asking questions about why all religions contradict eachother and always preach about the faults of other religions instead of explaining their beliefs. So, he was kool, and he has a fecha for el 16 de Mayo.

Miercoles. Another training from Presidente, but just in our zone. Again, he is awesome. He is really funny, too. He has lots of good advise and input. It lasted till lunch, and then he was doing interviews. Ours were at night, so we had a day of work ahead of us.  We changed our area for mini-sión, and we were doing 10 ways. We got absolutely no success. Then we taught our converts from March 7.  We then went to interviews, and the interviews started running late, so we ended up staying until like 10:15. But it was all good. We went back to the room and slept.

Jueves: Another day of no success. Lot's of contacting and 10 ways, with recent convert lessons in between. So, it was not very successful. Anyways, yeah. Also, I read  a lot of jesus the Christ after daily planning. It is a good book.

Viernes: We got 2 news today. Both are kinda the same. They aren't the best, but we will see if they progress. A 18-year-old kid who just got his mission call to Trujillo Peru went with us. So, yeah. Friday.

Sábado: We were trying to catch up on 10 ways this week, so we did a bunch of contacting, and nothing happened. Then, we had to miss Mini-Sión for baptisms in our District, a place called Angamos. It is a way nicer builing than ours, even though ours is the stake center. It has a drinking fountain, which is almost unheard of around here. Haha. yeah. then we had correlation with the ward missionaries. I spoke for my companionship, about the needs of recent converts, less actives, and our investigators. i also wrote the progress record. I am so kool.

Domingo: A good day. We went to ward council, then to a recent convert/ less active married couple who hadn't gone to church for 3 weeks in a row. They went to church, but none of our investigators did. After, we went to go contact for mini-Sión. This day is supposed to be all devoted to contacting in mini-sión. So, we tried, and tried, and tried. Contacting all the people we had met over the week, and trying to get at least 1 new from it. President Archibald is convinced that mini-sión, when done right, is a sure fire way of getting a baptism every week. He pushes it soo much and makes it a must. But we weren't getting success. Nothing was happening, and we had done it the way he wanted it done, with the exception of a couple days due to meetings and baptisms. Elder Guevara said to me that it didn't work. President was wrong. But it didn't make any sense. So we decided to try just one more person on our list of people that we had met, and there... we found a family of 5 that was practically looking for us! It was crazy!!! Mini-sión works.  THANK YOU PRESIDENTE!! Yeah.

Lunes: I got a haircut. That is prettymuch it. Yeah. Haha. I'll send pics.

So, that was my week. Last week, my baptisms were: (Jenny) Martha Gamboa Meza, who doesn't actually have the name Jenny, but she likes it for some reason, and Fany Giuliana Luna Flores. They are friends, and single moms who have little girls. So, yeah. Not super exiting, but still is 2 souls that we brought to Christ. Also, we discovered this week that the guy we found a couple weeks ago, who claimed that we were an answer to his prayers, started to avoid us, and made his son tell us to stop comng by. :( But, I guess he just wasn't ready. Now to find more people.

Entonces, mi semana fue muy muy mejor que la semana pasada. estoy muy agradecido a Dios por ella. Estoy muy feliz por la oportunidad de tener mucho tiempo con mi presidente de misión, en tres reuniones y una entrevista. me gusta hacer Mini-Sión, y el consejo del presidente acerca de esa manera de encontrar. Bueno, gracias por ser buenas personas en Arizona, o dondequiera estén. gracias por soportarme, y sigan orando por mi, porque las oraciones realmente dan a mi ayuda y esperanza. el tiempo está pasando muy muy rápidamente. ¡Santa vaca! (Haha that is "Holy Cow" translated into Spanish. It really isn't a saying.) En dos semamas, ¡voy a tener solamente 14 cambios más! ¡No puedo creerlo! Entonces, hasta luego. espero y quiero que tengan una muy buena semana, con buena salud, y unidad como familias y compañerismos. gracias otra vez por ser los mejores! 

Hasta al 27 de Abril,

Élder Riley J. Olsen

2 1/2 Transfers in, Exactly 20 months left.

April 13,2015

Yeah, I was bored a long time ago (Like the beginning of last transfer) and figured out what day my last transfer ends. It is December 13, 2016 that I will be leaving. I can't believe It has already been 3 1/2 months! It feels like... 3 1/2 months! Wow. Just kidding. Time flies. exept for this week, which, besides the very first week of the CCM, has been the longest one so far. There really isn't a lot to talk about.  All of our fechas failed this week. We are starting from ground zero. We didn't even find very many people. This week was not very good. We didn't do a lot of study (however I did read the first 10 chapters of Jesus the Christ), and it really showed how much success can change. Study is a HUGE deal, and is definitely necessary to have success. It prepares you for the day, and helps you recognize what is important when teaching. Also, excercise was a lacking element of the week. It also is very important. So, this week was bad in terms of success and drive. we were unprepared. I guess the Companionship of the month got us full of ourselves, but we have learned our lesson. Next week will be better. Way better. 

 Today, however, was really... different. it was District P-Day, and we went to the beach, kinda.  Like to the Ocean, where we just kinda sat there forever. the waves at this beach were HUGE. Bigger than the ones I've seen in Hawaii and California, anyways. BIG waves. I am sunburnt. :P Forgot sunscreen. Haha, and I thought I was gonna die on the hike back up mini-sahara. That's not actually its name, but you will see why I called it that. It is all sand.  Wow. yeah.

I got some letters sent to me from the 11-year-old scouts. They have some questions for me. Let's go and answer them. :)

From: Jackson Gray

  "I was wondering what it is like to serve, could you tell me?"

        Jackson, the mission is awesome. As a missionary, you meet a lot of people, and all of them are cool. You get to be friends with everyone, especially the ones who you serve. It is a lot of fun, and there are a lot of ways to make it fun, like games, competitions, and jokes. It is a lot like having friends at home. But it is a lot of wor, too. Every minute of every day, you are trying to learn how to help more people, and make more friends.  As a missionary, you want EVERYONE to be happy forever, and it is sad when they don't want the same, so you want to be like Ammon, and make friends who trust you, and will understand what it means to be happy for eternity. I hope I answered your question good!

From: Garrett Gardner

  "How is Peru?"

       Awesome, poor, and dusty, with lots and lots of hills and sand. :)

  "Do you have a house or an apartment?"

       I have a room in the second floor of a mamber's house. Not really an apartment, not really a house.  It is really small, and we only have a fan to stay cold when it gets hot. It is really awesome though.

  "What do you eat?"

       Chicken, rice, more chicken, more rice, sometimes fish, more chicken and rice, salads, some beef and rice, rice, and to top it off, Inca Kola, the best, yellow, kinda fruity, Peruvian soda in the world.

  "What do people wear?"

       The same thing as you, down to the English written on their shirts. And sometimes, a straw cowbay hat like the pioneers used to wear. The old people dress more like mexican cowboys. Yeah, and the missionaries wear a white shirt and tie, with a nametag, church pants, and black church shoes.

  "How many people have you met?"

      A LOT.  LOTS AND LOTS. If you want a number, maybe 200ish, but not all of them know me. ;) I say hi and meet everybody that I can.  That is what you should do in 7 years too.

Also, one of the scouts asked me about peru for a school project. Some ideas for him are to look up the following places, and then tell me about them, so that I can know, too. :)   

 Cuzco, Machu Pichu, Incas, some lines on the ground or something, and just... I don't know... everything. I don't know a lot about this place yet, oh and the best meal here is called Lomo Saltado. Yeah, also served with rice;)

I hope I answered all of the questions. I couldn't read 2 of them, because they were scans, and in light pencil. So... yeah. Thank you scouts!! You're awesome!

I had 2 baptisms this week. I will send pictures. Now for mi testimonio (en español, obviamente.)

esta semana no fue lo mejor. Yo sé. estoy comprometido para ser mejor esta semana siguiente. La misión es lo máximo, pero también es muy dura. Si no trabajamos duro, no vamos a tener éxito. Algunas cosas de las más importantes son estudiar, ejercer, y encontrar. Para tener éxito, y ser un misionero exitoso, tiene que hacer estas cosas, y seguir las reglas muy bien. Sé que esta iglesia es verdadera, y que Jesucristo sufrió para nosotros. Gracias a que Él vive, podemos llegar a ser mejores personas, y ser perdonados de nuestros pecados y imperfecciones.  Tenemos que seguir en Su camino, y hacer las cosas que son importantes a él antes que hacer las cosas importantes a nosotros. Gracias por ser los máximos. Les amo mucho, y quiero que ustedes tengan una semana muy muy bien. ¡Hasta la próxima semana!

Con amor,

Élder (Riley Jacob) Olsen

 

"Selfies"- Elder Tapia (de Perú)

 

Fany Giulianna Lana Flores

(Jenny) Martha Gumboa Meza

The baptism. crappy pictures, but a great service with a good turnout.

The Mini-Sahara

I am so kool. and that was a big boat.

 

The Week that Everybody Calls "La Semana Santa"

April 6, 2015

Ok, so first thing I wanna say: Dad, your mission capital was "Holy Sunday". I wanna say that it is lame, but then when I think about mine, "Lime", I take it back...

This week... hmmm....

I don't like this keyboard, the SHIFT sticks...

Here we go,

Lunes: P-Day. Yeah. After 6, we went to Carrezales, a neighborhood in our area, to contact.  We found someone who told us that we knocked after he had been praying for God to show him the correct path. It was pretty kool, and he was super open to us.

 

Martes: Last day of March. Not much happened... :P A lot of rejection and failed lessons. But whatever.

Miercoles: WOW We got into 4 different houses, and met 9 new people. That's awesome, but most of them aren't going to progress, so yeah. Still!  Most people here are convivientes, which means that they live together, unmarried. Most of them have like 4 children of varying ages, and simply don't care about marriage, they find it too much work, and very unimportant, so it is hard to find people willing to change. Anyways, it happens sometimes, so we just need to find those people who are ready.

Jueves: 2 new investigators, who are pretty good. :) We had a pretty good day, and gave Carlos (the guy from Lunes) a fecha for May 2 with his son. A pretty good day, just not much to report.

Viernes: Zone conference. Yeah, pretty good day, too. A couple more new investigators. We invited EVERYBODY to conference. EVERYONE. It was actually kinda fun to hand an invitation to everyone.

Sábado: CONFERENCE. I thought I was gonna have to watch it in Spanish, but all the Gringos were able to watch it in ENGLISH. Yeah, that's right. :) :) :) :) So yeah, and I really liked Linda K. Burton's talk in the morning. I also liked all of the Priesthood session. I can't remember what session was the dude from the 70 who talked about music and dancing, but that one was great, too.  We had 5 investigators go to the sessions. One of them went to ALL 4 (a girl). She went with her convert friend's family. She is getting baptized this week, with another of her friends, Fany.

Domingo: Another 4 InSac (Investigators in Sacrament meeting). Yeah, pretty good. I liked the guy who talked fast. His talk was kool, and then Holland's was AWESOME. I thought about Brady being the brother who is catching me. (Because the brothers were 11 and 19, and we are 12 and 18...) Yeah. AWESOME talk. Super cool.

Lunes: P-Day again. :) We played Monopoly with a return missionary. He won, but I was second place (if that means anything :P) Elder Guevara lost bad. haha.

So, let's answer some questions. First, my district. Their names are... I don't know. I really don't wanna type out all their names... Sorry, Dad. :P  Oh, and Dad, the water is nothing. We get big 3 gallon boxes of water every month, and I have a filter water bottle that I can use from the sink water if we run out of the water we recieve. I should have explained that. Yeah. We have special water bottles with filters, so don't worry, I stayed hydrated. And, I can't buy my special awesome pens here, but there are the dumb normal ones, mom. Oh, and the 2 talks that were spoken by Spanish speakers on Sunday, I watched in Spanish. I understood them, but it is better in English. It is definitely getting easier with spanish. I found that I can understand Gringos when they speak better than I can understand native speakers :p But it is definitely improving.

Entonces, gracias a todo por su amor. Estoy agradecido por ustedes. Quiero hablar en Español para confundir a ustedes. >:) Me gustó la conferencia general mucho. Fue increíble. Esta semana fue lo mejor hasta ahora, y puedo sentir sus oraciones. Dios está bendiciendo a mi por ustedes. Por favor, sigue orando para mi. Los oraciones hacen una diferencia. Dios escucha a sus oraciones. Sé que eso, por lo menos, es verdadero. Dios me está ayudando. Dios siempre quiere escucharles. Continúen estando las personas que pueden estar. Les amo mucho. Tengan una semana fantástica.

Just these 2. Oh, I forgot to mention. WE ARE COMPANIONSHIP OF THE MONTH!!! For March. And, I got a kool pin for my tie, so on Saturday, I took a picture of me looking super super good. I really am El Guapo (the good missionary version)

Gracias y Les Amo Mucho,

Elder Riley Jacob Olsen en La Misión Perú Lima Oeste