So it’s been raining nonstop here for the past week, which, while it is a nice break from the heat, has made doing missionary work a little more interesting.

Also, we are e-mailing from the Apple store right now, and a random man just barely came up to me and said, “Let me take picture with you,” and then took a quick selfie with me and then walked away without saying anything else. Life is always interesting here, that’s for sure, ahaha! Someday I’ll find all of these random pictures of me…

It’s fruit season and our fridge is full of mangoes, guavas, lychees, pears, and a whole bunch of other things, as well as some things that I don’t know how to say in English. I love the fruits here!

Where to start? This week we taught a potential investigator that we had met on the street and gave her a chapel tour and then taught her the restoration. She was so nice and accepted everything that we said, although she still had a lot of questions and things that we need to teach more in depth. After the lesson, though, I don’t know how else to explain it, but I was just so happy! There is just such a feeling that comes after teaching someone the restoration for the first time that I love so much!

We also met with a less-active, and he was telling us all of the stories from his life and was at a point where he was telling us about how his father got cancer and then both his dad and mom passed away. At this point he was quiet for a moment and then looked over at Sister Branch who was passed out in her chair! She woke up really confused and then we all waited in silence for a moment until the brother laughed and then we all did as well. Luckily he had a really good attitude about it all, although my companion felt terrible! Luckily laughter and a good attitude can heal almost anything and so things turned out just fine–and made for a good story 🙂

Mary kind of disappeared for a few weeks after we had just given her a baptismal date and she had promised that she was going to come to church. I finally got ahold of her and had a 30-minute conversation where I found out that she doesn’t really see a point in meeting with us or getting baptized anymore because she figures that she can sort things out on her own without the church. As I was talking to her, I had the feeling that you might have as you are trying to talk someone out of jumping off of a building. You feel really helpless because you’re all the way at the bottom and as much as you would like to help them, the only thing that you can really do is talk to them and try to help them see why they shouldn’t jump. I was able to resolve some of her concerns, but she is still unsure about things. I ended up promising that I would go and visit her to get a haircut as a way to bide my time, so hopefully we can talk to her then! I would chop off all of my hair if it meant that we could talk to and help her! (but I mean, hopefully I won’t have to do that, haha)

With all of the rain this week, a primary song has popped into my head. When I was younger I used to always ask if we could sing “Give Said the Little Stream,”  which was a favorite of mine. It talks about how even though it’s just a little stream of water rolling down the hill, all of the grass and flowers grow greener and greener from the small but steady amount of water that it gives to those close to it. It’s a good reminder to me that even though we may not feel like what we are doing is making a big difference, through our steady and consistent effort there are those who are watching us and gaining energy from us. And it also reminds me that the rain is a blessing and something to be appreciated as it brings life to the world! So let it rain!

Have an amazing week! Remember that any effort, no matter how small, can have a great impact on someone else!

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