Monday, February 23, 2015

Que tal?


I know you probably already know whats been going on around here lately...more interviews. We just have one more week of those and we are DONE!!!!!!!!!!! :D yay!!!

We stayed here in arequipa tuesday and wednesday to do the interviews for some of the zones here in arequipa and thursday we left with president and his wife to siguas (a place about 2 hours outside of arequipa) and then on friday we were in Camana (about 3 hours outside of arequipa on the beach). 

the interviews went well. We are having some lack of excitement issues in some of the areas out in the boonies, but we are trying to get them excited and get them focused on what they need to be doing for their branches out there. kinda of a different work on the outskirts of the mission limits. so it was good to get out there and visit them and help them out with what theey are struggling with. 

Returning back to Wednesday...President and i have been talking for a long time now about the famous bull fights that they do here in arequipa. They are special, and only happening during special times of the years and this last week they were having one. it was rare to be in the middle of the week because they are always usually on sundays but we found out about it and president was like "LETS GO!" So on Wednesday afternoon, after our interviews in the morning, president took us and the whole office to the Arequipa Bull Fights! And it was probably one of the coolest things that i have done here in Peru. To be honest. We all bought cowboy hats and had a great time there yelling and watching the Toros go at each other. They were massive and it was fun to watch. i will send pictures. president has all the good ones on his camera and he hasnt given them to me yet, so once i get those, i will be passing those along as well. but talk about fun!

Thursday and Friday were good. The hotel in Camana turned out to be really nice and the driving didnt kill me as much..... being tired that is. 

Bueno, like i said we are having our last week of interviews for this week and then we have to be sending the old elders and sisters home and then we get right off rolling with another change. gonna be a great week i hope and i am excited to get to working hard. 

Our baptism that was supposed to be for today fell through. Fabricio left unexpectatley to Tacna to help out his grandpa and his health situations and then we left and we couldnt have any lessons with him. so we will be trying for that this next saturday. pray for us to find some more people to teach and pray for the mission that we can improve our numbers and foucs on what needs to be done here in Arequipa. I love the mission and the missionaries i get to serve. and i especially love the peruvians. they are awesome. 

and of course i love you guys. more than you know. 

have a wonderful week. be safe. look for more missionary opportunities and look to bless the lives of all around you. look for spiritual experiences and be true to the faith.

love you all, 

Weston

1-4-3 
by the way, i dont think i have ever been so happy. we had a wonderful lesson yesterday with an investigator who has accepted a baptismal date for the 21 of Feb. i am so excited. pray for him, is name is Fabricio. we are trying to look for another sister who is ready to be bapitzed as well (just cant find her) and we will be contacting a wonderful family on monday to start them on the road to baptism. pray for us!

 i love this work. today we have interviews again here in arequipa...so it will be busy. thanks for all your help. 

1-4-3
FEBRUARY 14, 2015
 
Happy Valentine´s day to you all!!! :)

I hope the weather has been great to you all over there because here, its been raining non stop all week long! i think yesterday we had one clear day but then today it came back to being all dark and heavy clouds. today we are going to the waterfalls outside of arequipa and i hope it doesnt do a down pour on us!! :) 

Anyways, we just got done with a baptism that some of the elders here in the office had this morning. It really made me excited because this next saturday we are going to have one too!! :) We have been teaching this young man named fabricio, his mom is a less active and him and his little brother arent baptized. so we have been working with the whole family to resuce the mom and to baptize the 2 along with the help of their active member grandpa from Tacna. in our lessons he has accepted everything, he has been reading and his mom has really opened up, something that she has never done with any of the elders. so we are excited. we are also teaching a lady named elena who we need to find and continue teaching! if we can just get her to understand the power of hte book of mormon, then we can continue on with her progress. i pray for her. keep her in your prayers as well. and then on monday we are contacting supposedly a golden family. so there is work to be done and im excited to get to do it. 

That the area report for you, as for the mission report. The mission is continuing to progress. The numbers are rising and we are still interviewing everyone. This last week we got to interveiw tuesday wednesday and friday here in arequipa in the office and thrusday we left to go to moquegua to interview there. The elders and hermanas are excited and improving everyday. little problems here and there but not much. On thursday night i got ot get out with one of my good buddies and do divisiones with him, Elder Wagner. Had a great talk with him and got to teach a couple of lessons that went really well. Stayed in the hotel that night in Moquegua and listened to the rain and the overflooding river down below. kinda crazy that all of southern peru really has gotten hit by a ton of rain...but its like arizona, we need it! :) 

more interviews coming up this week and like i said, hopefully a baptism to end the week off. we will be traveling outside of arequipa on thursday and friday and saturday i think, so more fun stories coming your way next week. 

well i got to get going...love you guys a bunch. 

les amo bastante,



Elder Birtcher

1-4-3 

Saturday, February 7, 2015



 
I did survive this last week. :) We had our hands full all week with training conferences and with traveling and interviewing the missionaries. A lot of work still to be done...that is our job for this whole month of Februrary. 
As for arequipa life....its overcast now, and actually really cold. its been like that since last week. A sunny day here and there, but mostly heavy dark clouds and rain. On sunday, it POURED. it was a flood here in arequipa...kinda fun to go visiting people during the down pour. When we came back to the office sunday night to do numbers for the mission...haha we had jackets, ties, shoes, and socks all over the place drying out. got soaked. 
The schedule and businesses started fast as monday and tuesday we had the zone leaders and hermanas liders come to arequipa for our leadership council. And from all the comments and opinions...everyone really liked it. i was pretty happy about that. My comp and i were kinda struggling on how to present the info that we wanted to share with the mission. But the lord helped us out as always. He really puts words in our mouths at the moments that we need them! 
Tuesday afternoon we were busy trying to visit investigators and other recent converts (because it would be the only time to visit people ALL week long...kinda sad no?) but really didnt have much luck in finding those who we needed to teach. 
We hit the road for the rest of the week on Wednesday and traveling down to Ilo with President and his Wife to start the interviews. Met up with my old companion Elder Cornejo, didnt realize how much i miss that guy. One of my best friends. In ilo the interviews went a little longer than expected but great to see that the zone is excited and ready to work and ready to apply the things which we talked about with them into their areas. that makes me excited. we then had our lunch...at 5:30PM before going and doing divisiones with the Zone Leaders. The lessons that we had turned out really great and we finalized the 3 baptisms that they have coming up for this month. Got to stay in the grand hotel ilo for the night which is always fun! :) 
Thursday morning i got to work a little bit on some paperwork after breakfast, before leaving for Tacna. Bought a bunch of junk food for the trip over :) haha president and his wife are the best! seriously. love those 2 so much. 
Interviews on thursday went well i should say. the zone is doing well...we can always do better, but the zone leaders and the district leaders are ready to take it up a notch. During the evening hours, after checking into the hotel...i had some free time to visit my pentionista from tacna and a family that i love so much and i havent seen them in since i left my first area in tacna. its pretty amazing the feelings you get seeing old friends again. i love those people and i love tacna. haha i think i left half of my heart there in tacna when i 1st left and i was so grateful to find it once more while i was there. President took us out to eat at a super nice restaurant afterwards to end off the day. But i think the best part of thursday was the sleep i got that night! the grand hotel tacna changed out all their beds for new ones and i think i was so tired from everything that i crashed super hard. but i felt great on friday! :)
Started interviews off early on friday and that continued on throughout the whole day until about 5pm before we headed over to the airport to catch our flight back home to arequipa. 
so it was a go go go week once again but it was fun to travel and be with presi and hermana zobrist. sure learning a lot here in this position. kinda crazy how fast the weeks are flying by. pero, im happy. 
its just starting to rain now...so im even more happy. 
this next week we continue on with the interviews here in arequipa for some zones and its a possiblility that we leave to moquegua maybe weekend time...we shall see. 
know that i love you all.
i hope you all have a great week.
you are all in my prayers. constantly.
Weston
1-4-3  
 
 Elder Birtcher
 Asistente 
 Misión Perú-Arequipa

 
 
 
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