Letter 2/25/13

Ok so I want to share a story about giving people blessings. So a few months ago with my other companion Elder Salvador, we were walking home at like 915 at night and we HAVE to be in our room at 930 or we will get struck by lighting or something, idk. Anyways we were walking home and we we´re like a good 25 minutes from home so we were like getting ready to run, and out of no where a sister in our ward saw us and asked if we could give her a blessing. So we were like... Well we can´t say no so we went into her house and gave her a blessing. She was basically begging us so there was now way we were going to be like ¨"Oh sorry we have to be home right now or else". So we finish the blessing and it´s like 925 and we leave the house and we start booking it. Also in our city after about 830 at night there is no buses no convis nada. So we´re booking it and we run by this house with a taxi parked out in front. And we run by the taxi and out of no where this guy pops up in the seat of the taxi. He sees us and he´s like "Elders!!! Need a ride? Where you going?" We´re like ummm yeah! So this guy that was sleeping in his car and woke up as we ran by is a return missionary and saw us and felt the urge to help us. So he drives us home all crazy fast because hes the only car out and we make it into our house at 929. It was awesome.

Then this past week with Elder Lozano we were in the city Pocollay. Which is like our second area. It´s also like a 30 minute walk from home. So we were walking home at 850ish and we we´re walking fast because we had a lot to go. Then the mother of one of the investigators we were teaching saw us and starting yelling "Hermanos Hermanos!" So we go over to her and she´s crying saying her son who we have been teaching needs help fast. So we run over to her house and we see the son out front and he´s crying of pain. So we ask him what´s wrong and apparently he was gluing something in his house and he glued it wrong and he ripped the thing he was gluing up so he could re glue it and as he ripped it the super glue he had flew all over the place and a bunch of it got into his right eye, and he couldn´t open his eye and was dying of pain. So we have him start flushing out his eyes while the rest of his family is looking for his brother who is the only person that can take him to the hospital. So as we are helping him wash his eyes we ask if we can give him a blessing. So we give him a blessing and a few minutes later he´s calmed down a ton, so his brother comes and we all leave. So me and my companion are walking home and it´s like 920 and we have at least like a 35 minute walk home. So we start booking it again, and out of nowhere a convi pulls up behind us. This convi was the 3A convi and it is NEVER out past 830. Never!!! So we flag it down and jump in. So we are riding home and instead of going to the regular bus stop it keeps going and drives up super close to our house and we make it into the house at 929. It was crazy because convis and especially that convi are never out past 830 and it was 920 and on top of that it basically drove us to the foot of our house.

So yeah that was my awesome story for the week. Well I gotta go. Thanks sooo much for all the letters and the support. Oh these pictures are of me and my companion last week. Well I gotta go. Love you all!!

Love Elder Russon

My companion, Elder Lozano

Letter 2/18/13

This week was kinda sad. So many people just completely shut me and my companion down these last couple days. I feel like I´m becoming such a better teacher but at the same time not as much success and we´re running into more adversity. We have been working really really hard. Our numbers are way higher than they have been in weeks before but I don´t know we have just ran into a lot of problems lately. I was reading the BoM today in Moroni 7 and there´s like 100,000 crazy awesome scripture in this chapter especially about faith. So I wanted to share this chapter with you all. I also love Moroni 7:33. Through faith everything is possible. So just remember that if you have faith and if you are asking with sincerity and for important things that you sincerely need Heavenly Father will help you. Well I love you guys a lot. I´m doing good out here. Time is moving pretty fast. It´s crazy how much has already passed. Well I love you guys thanks so much for writing me and all the support. Oh and technically I could write you guys letters but it costs about 4 bucks for a letter so If you guys want to send me a few extra dollars I could send some written letters to you with some more details about everything. Love you all.

Love Elder Russon

Letter 2/11/2013

Holy cow I got like 30 emails this week. And last week I only got like 3. Well I obviously haven´t been able to read them all. I only read a little of everyone's letter then I spent about 30 minutes of my 45 taking pictures of all the emails so I can read them later. I have no idea what most of the letters said, but I´ll write about my week and read them all later today.

Okay first on my wish list for my next package. No rush don´t worry. By the way I still haven´t received any packages because the Office can´t send them to me without my Power of Attorney or whatever so that´s taking forever. But So I would love some type of exercise band with like handles and is relatively hard to pull. There´s really not much we can do for exercise and I want to do more. Also some gel soles for my  heels specifically would be awesome. 

Glad everyone is having fun. Saw all the pictures you sent me. Can´t wait to hear about the Peruvian restaurant. I think the food in America is more foreign to me than the food in Peru, so also I can´t wait to try some American food.

Not much happened with me this week. The days are really flying by though it´s pretty crazy. I´m a lot more used to my companion now, and we get along really well. Oh the other day we were teaching with a member and it was like 830 and we were in a convi driving back to our house and he didn´t need to be with us any more. So I was thinking and then it popped into my head I should probably tell him he´s ,free to go, before we pass his house and he has to walk extra far. So i yell across the convi "Roy! Está libre". Which means you´re free to go. So like right after I said this every person in the convi all in one motion turned their heads at me and looked at me like "what in the world". Roy (the member) is also looking at me like what? And I turn to my companion and he´s laughing sooo hard. So I just sit there for the rest of the ride thinking to my self "what in the world did I say". So after we get off i ask my companion what I said and apparently It´s like a phrase you use if you´re like a cop and releasing someone from prison or if you´re holding someone hostage. So I guess everyone in the convi thought I was holding him hostage or something. Also he paid for our convi fare so that didn´t help my cause either.

What else... Oh well I don´t know if I wrote this yet but English is soooo hard for Peruvians to speak. For example they can´t tell the difference in work and word. But every single non English speaking person in the mission is learning English. It´s hilarious because everyone is trying to learn it but they say the words soo funny. I have so many funny stories with them trying to speak English  So be glad that you all speak English already because it is sooooo hard for them to even say the word "work" correctly. I'm sure they think the same about me.

We´ve also been teaching this 13 year old kid lately. He´s awesome to the max. We gave him a book of mormon and taught a very little lesson about baptism to him. And the other day we were talking with his neighbor and apparently he´s like telling his parents he´s going to get baptized. He´s so awesome. Also we stopped by his house to see if he read and he read like 3 chapters more than what we left him and he´s been drawing like crazy good pictures of Jesus in his spare time when he´s bored. Yeah he´s a champ it´s awesome. Also we´re teaching his friend and now his friend is also starting to keep his commitments. Both have been committed to baptism and it´s all because he started reading the Book of Mormon.

So yeah I can´t wait to read everyone's letters. Sorry I don´t have much to write about today. I just didn´t have much time and not much really happened this week other than our awesome investigator Jose Gabriel. Well thanks soooo much for all the letters and emails and pictures and support. Oh also I couldn´t send any pictures this week my computer wouldn´t let me but it´s ok because I didn´t have any new ones anyways. Oh also could I get put on Oliver´s email list if possible. I really want to see how he´s doing. Well I gotta go. Love you guys sooo much. Hope everyone is doing great. Keep me updated with everything back there I love to hear how everyones doing. Well gotta go later!

James 2:14-17

Love Elder Russon

President and Sister Fernandez

Letter 2/4/2013

Hmmmm what to write about this week. Oh yeah. YOU CAN´T JUST TELL ME ABOUT THE SUPERBOWL PARTY AND NOT TELL ME WHO WINS!!! (This is a response to Nancy's email where she only told him about the party and nothing about the game.)  Ok soooooo First off so I don´t forget again. The food in Peru... The food is interesting. I pretty much eat everything I´m given. Usually when I get spaghetti though I ask my companion to eat some of it. Don´t know why but I do NOT like it at all. And it has Davey´s green sauce on it too, just can´t do it. Don´t know why. So my taste buds. Haven´t changed all that much. If anything they are just more dull. I don´t really like any of the new foods. I LOVE fruit though. Like crazy. We get fruit every lunch and it´s DELICIOUS, especially bananas. I do actually like fried rice a lot more and scrambled eggs. I have nothing against chicken. It doesn´t taste bad at all. Just harder to eat with all the stinking bones. My favorite food (besides Paneton, my addiction from Peru basically a fruit  cake) is still rice. I get rice with 99% of my meals. This is not a lie or over exaggeration  Rice with every meal. Every breakfast I get 3 rolls with some warm juice or sometimes oatmeal in a glass. Then I get a feast for lunch. Then for dinner I get a smallish meal. Every since I got here the meals have been getting smaller and smaller. OH I REMEMBER. I do like a new food. PIZZA. So my first day in Arequipa I ate Pizza with the President. I ate like 30 slices. I hadn´t eaten in like 24 hours but it was delicious. Especially with some peppers on top. Ohhhh man it was good. To bad there isn´t a Pizza shop within like 2 hours of me...

Ok so my new companion. Well first off. My first companion was Elder Salvador. I loved him he was the best. We had so much fun together. I was sooo sad he left. He was too, but he´s doing work as a Zone Leader right now. My new companion is Elder Lozano. He is giant. Well in the eyes of a Peruvian he is. He´s like an inch taller than me, but he´s pretty big, not fat. We get along pretty well. Our companionship isn´t perfect, but hopefully we´ll warm up to each other soon. I´m definitely learning things that I didn´t learn with my other companion. He´s from Peru also. Oh funny fact about all male Peruvians that I´ve encountered. They love to use perfume. They´re obsessed with it. It´s hilarious. So these pictures are from our baptism this week. His name is Jorge Louis Terrones Sanchez. I don´t know how but he had been attending church for 10 years and never was baptized. Then he attended a baptism last week and starting reading the BoM and after that he told us He wanted to get baptized and he knew the BoM was true. He´s awesome. He drives taxis. His taxi is called the ElderMobile because after our lessons he always drives us around town to wherever we need to go.

I´m super glad everyone is doing good. Can´t believe Mikey is almost 15 and Sam is almost 13. I´m extra happy about Davey also. I know that my prayers were answered. I´ve been praying for Davey so that he could be more prepared for his mission, and the fact that he went on splits this last week and liked it is a testament to this. Because I know for a fact that the Davey I knew NEVER would go on splits. So I´m very happy that Davey is starting to become more prepared for his mission.

So yeah what else. Um well tell me the stinking score of the Super Bowl.

Love Elder Russon