Turn of Events...

April 06, 2022

This week was insane. I don't know if there is any other word for it so we'll just start there.

It started out so good, we had divisions with the other elderes in our district. Because I had to do a baptismal interview in Yaguaron and the other Elder had to do one in our area. Divisions were super fun. I got to go hangout with a new Elder that just started his mission 2 weeks ago from Chile, so that was super fun. We had a great time literally talking to everyone we could see and even making plans with this one family we found. They are going to teach us how to make homemade empanadas. So we went to do the baptismal interview for a lady named Magdalena. Magdalena is amazing she has wanted to get baptized for a really long time now and makes some serious sacrifices to get to church. She Is also 79 years old and cannot hear anything short of yelling. Ohh and she barley speaks Spanish, she speaks Guaraní. So it was super interesting getting to her house and doing the interview straight yelling at a 79 year old abuelita. Normally the elders use her grandson to help translate and talk to her but he wasn't there and because I'm American and my comp was Chilean neither of us know enough Guaraní do have an interview. So we asked the next door neighbor if she could come over and translate for us. She said yes and we had something along the lines of an interview haha. Super cool to be honest.

After that the next day we got back together with the other Elders back in Itá and ended divisions. They were able to do the baptismal interview for us which was awesome for a little girl names Jazmín who is the daughter if members but members that are super inactive. For the entire time that we were teaching her she told us she was 9 yrs old and her parents told us the same. I was reading over the Baptismal forum that they filled out during the interview and saw her birthday. She's definitely 8 years old and with turn 9 in November. Idk how they all thought shes nine but now I got to break the news to a little girls that she's not as old as she thinks. So because she's the daughter of members and 8 years old she falls under the responsibility of the branch. So technically they have to do the interview and all the technical stuff. But it's all good because she's still gonna get baptized and that's all the matters.

After that we had Divisions again with some other elders which was super fun. We found a bunch of people and taught them and also continued teaching a bunch of people we have already found. At around 8 at night we had contacted a lady and started teaching her. She didn't have any chairs so we taught her standing up which normally wouldn't be a problem. But idk why I felt super weird and could barely stand. We finished the lesson and went home. When I got home I just felt super weak and super weird. Didn't think much of it, hung out with the elders played some games and went to bed. Well I laid in bed at least but I definitely didn't sleep. I'm pretty sure I got food poisening or something like that couldn't tell you what it was but my body wanted everything that was inside of me to come outside, in whatever way possible... without going into detail we can just say I basically slept in the bathroom.

The next day was kinda rough I did not want to eat anything. Nothing looked appealing and I definitely could not have been walking around everywhere. But luckily it was our turn to work on Facebook so we went to the church and worked on Facebook like all day. Normally not a huge fan of Facebook but I could still do some kind of missionary work while I couldn't walk around. The feeling sick lasted for like 2 days and then I was good to go. We went down to Yaguarón on Saturday to watch conference together as a zone for at least one session and also help out with the baptism of Magdalena. Which it was a good thing we were all there because like normal whenever there's a baptism everything likes to go wrong. This time it was the water, there was no water in the church. So I found the water tanks which was super cool because they are in the roof of the church and to get to them there's like this fold down ladder thing that in the ceiling, the kind of thing you see in all the movies and always want to use to go into the attic. So I got up there found these 4 massive water tanks with very little water In them, after playing around with some pipes we got the water back but very slowly. There was no way it was going to fill up the font in time.

So we went out and asked the front neighbors if we could use their water. They said yes so we brought buckets, garbage cans, giant pots whatever we could find that could carry water. We brought it and using like 5 different neighbors filled up our buckets and walked them back to fill up the font. It worked and was awesome and the abuelita Magdalena was baptized. Super great day. Then we continued watching conference which was amazing as always. Some great inspiration and revelation for sure watching the talks.

Super interesting week started out great in the middle might have died a little bit but we ended on a great note. Definitely a week I'll never forget.

I love all of you guys have a great week

Elder Schofield