HOBBITS

Hermana Ostler’s Update – March 17, 2014

  

Hello My Little Hobbit Friends!

Why is it that all the doors to all the nice houses are so tiny that I need to stoop to enter? I HAVE NO IDEA, but I shriek HOBBITS without fail, every time. 

Also. 

My companion finally admitted to me that she loved me. Haha. She kind of struggled with me for a little bit because she wasn't used to people making up songs for everything and pulling pranks all the time and talking in weird voices and laughing uncontrollably in lessons... and ... basically she just wasn't used to the usual Alex Treatment. I finally called her out on it, “WHY DON´T YOU LOVE ME, YOU FREAK?” It really was a great week because we finally just clicked perfectly. I just remember praying asking my Heavenly Father to just let us love each other. We got along perfectly well but I always felt that she just didn't love me that much. But something in the two of us changed this week and I can honestly say I LOVE MY COMPANION. When you understand someone, you get that maybe they are serious because shoot outs happened in her house, that she has fought hand to hand with horrible men, and that she just worked and worked and worked to protect her 9 siblings.... when you understand that, it just all makes sense. And then she can understand that I am the way I am because... well I will give anyone a whole bag of aguaje (dino egg fruit that grows here) if they can tell me why I am the way I am. Hahaha. 

Carnaval! Look at the pictures and the stories because it was the bomb. Green paint and dirty water thrown on my head by a mob of children. The best. 

I had one of the most spiritually powerful lessons of my life this week. We were teaching an inactive family, Fausto and Karen. They are both members but stopped going to church when they moved in together without getting married. We are now teaching their daughter Ambar. We were talking about the temple and the importance to go so their family can be eternal. The wife had expressed several times her grand desire to go. Her husband told me that it wasn't necessary, that he just wanted to have a happy life here on earth with his family. WOAH. I went completely ape, as my father says. 

I began to testify more strongly than I have ever done before. I don’t remember what I said but it basically was me pointing at each one of his children and telling him that he would NOT live with them again if he chose to willingly disobey the commandments of God. That he would lose his family, that he would be alone. My companion just had her mouth open like a dead fish by the end. But let me tell you, I spoke the truth. We are here to seal ourselves with our families in the Holy Temple. If we do not have that opportunity here on this earth, God will have mercy. But if we willingly choose to not be with our family for the eternities, we will lose them. We will lose the people we love most in this world.

I was filled with a Spirit so strongly that I could feel my very bones quake under the power of a holy indignation. I KNOW that families can be together forever. I know it and I cannot deny it. The family was sitting first row in church the next day. 

I love you all. I am so happy. Everything just makes me smile! I have learned to never complain and it is the best feeling ever. I have learned that everything is for our benefit and this life is to have joy! To be happy and just laugh and laugh because it’s all so beautiful. 

Love, Hermana Alex

CARNAVAL. We were walking to our appointments last night when I saw a giant mob of children, covered in paint, sprinting towards me screaming,"HERMANAS." Oh no. I began to flee but I was overtaken and attacked with buckets and buckets of paint and dirty puddle water. Then the little children attacked my compy, who was hiding under a moto taxi and then we watched all the little children dance around a tree, taking turns hacking at it with a machete (is that even legal?). We then watched the before mentioned tree fall to the ground and the children attacked the tree grabbing little gifts from the branches. I AM SO DOING THIS WHEN I GO HOME. We then got some good contacts and went home to shower. 

Typical Peruvian Missionary Experience. 

This is Norka. I love her. She and her husband are amazing. They have so many good questions and they just KNOW that this is the true church. BUT. She is married to a Swiss guy because she got married when she was FOURTEEN. Only in Peru... And her husband is also married, but to another person. The luck I have sometimes.

Poor Hermana Ruiz. I walked around the entire morning with her name tag on without her noticing.

Esto es Guerra is a really awesome game show that EVERYONE IS OBSESSED with here. Its basically people doing weird things like stacking cups or doing obstacle courses but they are all basically naked. This little girl is a big fan of Equipo Leon. This is their uniform. Classy?

Hermana Sheets. My long lost "our parents were best friends in college and we didn't know" buddy.