Week 12 - I woke up with a massive cockroach right next to my head.

I'm running out of greetings dangit.

What's going on everyone!?

I woke up with a massive cockroach right next to my head haha. One night one crawled in Elder Flint's ear and he freaked out hahahah.

This past week was a little slower but then started to pick up. We've found out that doing service keeps my comp. motivation (and me) to keep working hard.

Something I've learned for only being out a few weeks is that you need to find things out about people you teach to identify their concerns so then we can teach them principles according to their needs. Something I've been striving for is getting them comfortable enough to where they just talk so we don't have to ask them direct questions. When we run out of doctrine to teach in that moment, we often to turn to questions. When we teach and teach, they usually talk about what they feel prompted too which is awesome and is a goal for my mission.

Yesterday we were asked to speak in a 'group' down in Columbus which is 3 miles from the border. There was a grand total of....9 people there including us! hahah awesome. It's a spanish branch to so no one knew how to sing english hyms so it was kind of a solo. It was a little strange having sacrament right next to a white board in a classroom but it was good and the spirit was there.

The church near Mexico where we spoke to a total of...7 people.  Awesome.

Not much happened this past week...hmmm..one day we found 3 new investigators and then taught 5 lessons which is pretty good for Deming! Our man above blessed us greatly.

One day some lady came up to me and talked to me in Spanish for like 5 mins....I barely understood anything she said. The whole language barrier makes me angry sometimes as it bugs me that we can't teach them a message about the truth because....we don't speak the same language. Going to try my best to learn Espanolaao.

I got done shaving one day (yes, I shave) and heard my song "High Hopes" being played....I started singing along before realizing what was playing. I went in the kitchen and my comp. was just sitting there listening to it hahaha. Awesome.

Our entertainment in Deming on pday haha

Next week because my comp. will be going home in two weeks, we're teaching the 1st lesson....on helium....hahaha. We figured it's not really apostate, so we felt okay doing it. Although it won't go on youtube for reasons hahah.

Being in Deming has taught me a lot, not just for this service, but for my life. Patience is a virtue. Holy freakin' crap. We've heard a ton of different stories about "mormons" from people who have been through some anti crap. We've heard that mormons believe that plural marriage is okay and then their wives go to different planets to rule, or even that we pray to Jospeh Smith, Deming keeps surprising us with things. Whenever we talk to someone, tract, or street contact with the very few people that we have outside, they are almost always apart of a religion. Since there's 57 freakin' churches here, everyone usually attends one of them. We've gotten pretty good at going over the apostacy and why there are so many different churches, but it'll be different when people haven't any idea about religion. I love the people here in Deming, but am excited to serve where there's more people! It's not slowing the work down at all, but it's just made it clear that I'll do anything it takes to not live in a small town hahah. Oh gosh.

The coolest members, the Barentines!  We helped them move to Texas...sucks they left.  They remind me a lot of Christy and Ben haha.  (He really did say this...swear.)

We have border patrol stops a lot, and we have a blimp that flies around that's apart of the homeland security so we're pretty much being watched with whatever we do.

We've also learned that Gansters love us hahah. You can tell a true ganster by what they think of missionaries - they don't mess with us because they believe we sort of walk with God so they're scared to do anything to us. We have a few 'Gansta' friends who were in the 'blood' gang who are pretty sick haha. One lives across from us haha, he's awesome.

One of our appointments fell through so we only had a few mins before the next so we went and played a prank on the Spanish Elders haha. We put bouncy balls in their beds, my comp. took a dump in their bathroom, and we put a cup of salt on their door so it came down on them hahah. They went to the temple that day (we get to go this Friday) so we took advantage. We thought of many cruder things to do....but we are missionaries, not college students haha.

Well it's time to go the driving range with a member which I've never hit a golf ball in my whole life..should be fun haha.

Church is true yo :D

Pretty sure my brother's on his way to China right now. WTF.

Love ya'll!

-Elder Hales

-Iglesia de Jesucristo, de los Santos, de los ultimos dios..I think.

Lata!

D&C 130: 18-21.

-----

About two hours later I received an email from one of the ward members in Deming:

My name is Edward and I am a member of the ward that your brother is in right now so I took them to the golf course to hit some ball on his PE day which is today. attached is some of the pictures that I took.

You have a very special brother. I new that the 1st day that I met him. He is being well taken care of with meals and just being loved for the work that he is doing.