Five For Fighting

January 28, 2019

Hola!

This week went by pretty quick. Villafranca is treating me pretty well. It's kind of crazy, I have met or seen a surprising amount of people from this ward before. The bishop gave a talk in La Seu when I was there, two other members from the ward have attended church in Andorra in the past, yesterday we ate lunch with the aunt and uncle of a past companion (he showed me a couple photos of them almost exactly a year ago), I know all of the family of a member here from my time in Badajoz, and the mother of a recent convert in La Seu--who is a recent convert herself--just moved down here to work for a time.

We're dealing with a lot of recent converts at the moment and we have a few people that we are trying to work with, but most amigos have complicated/unique situations. It's hard to actually teach them even though they are interested and some even come to church every Sunday. I'm getting to know people little by little. It's kinda hard because everyone is spread out among the different pueblos in our area and we don't always have the most efficient ways to get to them.

I believe Elder Peterson and I are getting along just fine. He's a bit of a goof, but so am I. It's fun. He has a good hold on the area and all the schedules and backstories that come with it, and has a solid relationship with the members.

I don't have too much to report from the week. My last Monday in Burgos ended up being pretty full. We passed by Johanna in her shop in the morning because she preferred a face to face farewell. After that, we kept cleaning up the Area Book in that area for a bit and made some calls until it was time to eat lunch with Rosa and her family. After that we studied for a bit, visited ya boi Cipriano for a little bit, and then we headed on over to Nuria's place. When her mom, Teresa, learned that we as missionaries tend to move around, she told us to let her know when I go so we could eat dinner together. For this reason we went. I'm honestly astounded. We are practically two strangers, and they let us into their homes and treat us like royalty. This is one of the few moments where a missionary gets to witness Spanish hospitality--a thing that I'd only heard stories about before Monday. We spent a good while talking, laughing, and eating Spanish food with the whole family. Teresa made sure that we kept eating the whole time and insisted on feeding us more whenever there was a natural pause in the conversation. They had a lot of questions about the missionary life and American culture. I'm still appalled at how that worked out because it felt like we had been meeting with life-long friends even though we've just seen them one or two times a week for the past two-ish weeks; However I will not complain about a warm, welcoming environment and a full stomach. Especially in a place like Burgos.

On Tuesday I endured the 6 hour long train ride to Barcelona. I almost did not make the train that morning, but a miracle got me on in the nick of time. It also helps that the train normally runs a little behind. I got to Barç around 2:45pm, met up with my companion and the elders of Cornellà, then we went to La Sagrada Familia to eat at Five Guys. It's so expensive here, but I felt a need to treat myself. 

From there Elder Peterson and I took our train to Vilafranca, and he is where I will be for another five weeks. My area is much more than Vilafranca itself. The ward also covers the surrounding towns. It makes things a little difficult because everyone is spread out among the pueblos and we don't always have the most efficient ways to get to them. We also have a nice, brand-new chapel, complete with motion-sensor lighting and a soccer/basketball court on the grounds.

I'm getting to know people here little by little. It seems to me that we will be spending a lot of time on busses and commuter trains. Nothing really was too special about the rest of the week. Just the usual first week in an area stuff: Meeting members, meeting recent converts, trying to visit people who we're teaching, eating a 2kg kebab, passing by some people and calling others, etc, etc. I should enjoy my time here.

I like what I'm doing. I know this is the Lord's work and I really hope that I can give the best of me as this chapter of my life starts to come to a close. 

That's about it for the week, folks. Have a good one!

Elder Jensen :)