Letter #56 - October 11, 2010

Dear Family and Friends,

Thanks for the emails this week. I heard from all five of you and it was so fun! I love hearing about what is going on in your lives. And thinking about cooler weather. It has seriously been an inferno her this past week. The rain has actually slowed down a lot and that has meant a whole lot of intense sun. I'm longing for a bit of a breeze from the mountains in Provo. I really miss the seasons changing. I've now gone nearly a whole year in Nicaragua and besides a bit of rain, the weather is always the same: hot and humid.

So I had a number of interesting experiences this week. The first one was nearly being struck by lightning. Seriously. We were walking along the street, looking at the clouds that were threatening to get us soaked, and a few big drops were just starting to fall. We had just passed by a corner where a bunch of guys were standing around who looked up to no good so when I initially saw the brilliant light and heard a huge crack, I thought they had fired off some kind of firework, as happens frequently here. But it was way to loud and way too bright to be a firework and the light raced into the ground. It was like 30 feet from us. We screamed and grabbed on to each other and then couldn't stop laughing about it for like five minutes. Whoa. I have never been that close to lightning.

The next experience was really embarrassing. Friday night we got in totally exhausted and finished up our numbers quickly because the Elders have been asking for them really early lately. Then I put my head on the desk waiting for the call and promptly fell asleep. A little while later, Hna. Cano tapped me on the shoulder. "ya hermana," she said. And in my daze, I got in my PJs, we said our prayers and I climbed up to my top bunk and went to sleep for the night. I was sound asleep when our renter came pounding on the door a little after 11 pm. "Las buscan!" he yelled. What on earth? I thought as I climbed down from the bed, not really fully awake yet. "quien?" I asked. "Los misioneros," he replied. And that's when it dawned on me that the call from the Elders never came and I had gone to bed without talking to them and they were now at the door to make sure we were okay.

So in my PJs, I went out to the main door and standing there was Elder Church, as well in his PJs, Elder Avila, the car of the AP's with Elder Gomez's head sticking out the window and two other office elders in the car. Oh, how embarrassing! I was pretty much horrified. We explained how we had fallen asleep and somehow not heard the phone and they were pretty tranquilos, but I felt way bad. When we got back in, l looked at the phone and we had like ten missed called. Even ward members had been calling. But the weird thing is that the first missed call was at like 10:40pm so that means that if the Elders called at the normal time of about 9:25pm, it never came in. I think something weird happened to our phone. Oh well, I'm sure basically the whole mission found out that the AP's had to come to our house to make sure we were in this week.

We also had some great experiences following promptings of the spirit. They strengthened my testimony that God guides us to those in need and those who are ready to hear the gospel. Thursday night, it was getting late and we had planned to just do some contacting before returning home. But then I thought of one of our investigators who wasn't home when we had tried to visit her earlier in the day. "How about we pass by for Ericka one more time?" I asked, "maybe now she's home." Hna. Cano agreed and we set off.

As we arrived at the house I thought I saw Ericka sitting in the back room, at the end of the dark corridor the leads to house, but when we asked if she was home, we were told she wasn't there. "Are you sure that's not her?" I asked, not wanting to give up so easily. "No, it's my grandma," said the muchacha. "And the other one?" I said, compelled to keep asking. "No, that's my aunt." Then she got up and began walking toward us. Her face looked dark and she had on heavy make-up around her eyes and a cigarette in her hand. She took a long draw and blew out the smoke. "If you want to come in and look, you can," she said challengingly, "I'm not lying. Ericka's not here." "No, that's alright," I said, "thanks." Then she surprised me with a question. "You've never seen me like this have you?" she said. I was taken back because although she seemed familiar, I didn't recognize her. "What's your name?" I asked, trying to remeber her. "you don't recognize me?" she said, turning her face to the light, "I'm Bianca."

Then it came to me that she was a friend of Ericka's who had come to an activity at the church about a month ago. We had taught her mom and sister a couple of times but not her specifically. "Do you know why I'm like this tonight?" she asked, and I could smell the liquor on her breath. "No," I answered simply. She then proceeded to talk for a good half an hour about an abusive relationship with her husband, and a father who after 30 years still abuses her mother, how she just couldn't take it anymore and how the day before, she had wanted to take her life. She planned to wreck her fathers car but to prevent her from doing anything, her brother in law had gotten in the car and when he finally calmed her down and she decided to turn back around to go home, she lost control of the car and got in an accident anyway. The worst part for her was that her brother in law got hurt and absolutely nothing happened to her.

We spoke little, but we spoke of the Savior, of the atonement, of hope. We sang "I am a Child of God" huddled there in the dark corridor and hugged her as she cried. She told us that we were her angels and that she knew God had sent us to her in her moment of need. She said she couldn't imagine what would have happened if she hadn't stood up and approached us to talk to us. We gave her the pamphlet of the plan of salvation and made an appointment to come back the next day. I left feeling a little amazed at how the Lord works and how he had sent us to listen to her. Pretty much all we did was listen but as she told us that she felt more at peace, that she felt hope, I knew that the Lord had used us that night, to lighten the load of one of his precious daughters. How grateful I am that the Spirit had guided us to that house and even though Ericka hid from us (because I'm pretty sure she was there) the Lord had someone else in mind when He sent us there.

Being a missionary is the best thing in the world - lifting the up the heads that hang down.

I hope you are all healthy, safe and well. Learning lots and seeking the Lord. I love you endlessly.

Love, Hna. Crosland

Letter #55 - October 4, 2010

Hey everyone,

I spent all my time writing an email to a girl that is coming to this mission in a while so I'll have to just give you brief updates. I am still in Cuidad Jardin but I'm finally training! It is so fun and my new companion "hija" is Hna. Cano from Guatemala. She's a cutie and really great. More about her later. Conference was wonderful and inspiring and I got to listen to all four sessions in english. What a blessing. The prophet is true and so is the gospel. Mom, thanks for your email and even though you feel like you don't express your thoughts well, you never cease to inspire me. Really. And my card doesn't expire until July 2012. I love you all so much and I'm sorry I couldn't write more.

For more reading material you can read the email I sent to the girl coming out... here it is:

Alicia,

Congrats on being called to the greatest mission on earth. You are in for the adventure of your lifetime. Okay, first to answer a few of your questions.

1) Temple clothes – leave them home. They’ll rent them for you in Guatemala and Provo.

2) Long sleeved shirts - I have a couple and I hardly ever wear them (like never). I did serve in the coldest area of Nicaragua and in that area. I was always borrowing sweaters that were heavier than the ones I brought. If I were you, I’d bring a couple light sweaters that you can put on and take off as the weather changes during the day and one heavy one for when you get sent to Jinotega.

3) My favorite skirts are the ones that I can wear any shirt with, that are a little bit longer and a little bit wider. Longer because you are going to have to sit on all kinds of things out here to teach people including rocks and stumps and curbs of sidewalks that are low to the ground. And wide because it doesn’t restrict you when taking big steps and getting on and off busses. Basically bring clothes you feel cute and comfortable in. Think about doing yard work in Sunday clothes when making your choices… ;)

4) I wouldn’t bring boots but I would bring a rain poncho (something plastic and cheap will work just fine) and an umbrella that is easy to carry around with you for the rainy season.

5) Don’t worry about getting enough clean water. In every apartment there are big 5 gallon jugs of agua pura and the mission pays for them to be delivered. Also in the MTC you’ll get a water bottle that filters any water you put in it.

6) I brought my personal debit card and yes, there ATMs (cajeros) everywhere that you can use. You’ll get a debit card from the mission as well where you’ll take out your monthly misisonary budgit.

7) Medications – bring a bunch of tylenol or ibuprofen or whatever your preferred pain killer is. Also bring anit-itch cream or allergy medicine. Also diarrhea medicine and something for stomach aches. Really you can get pretty much any kind of drug here over the counter, like stuff you need a prescription for in the states. And everyone here will tell you about a million different drugs that will help with whatever you might be suffering with. But for that we have a mission nurse. I would also bring a nail clipper than can handle and cut out ingrown toenails. Don’t worry about being sick. You’ll feel yucky and you just deal with it like a champ and then it passes. The Lord really takes care of His missionaries.

Well as far as other stuff to bring, I love my mountainsmith bag. It has a shoulder strap and a waist strap. I would just get one size bigger though. I got the small one and the médium one would have been better to fit PMG more easily.

To prepare, read PMG at least once through before you enter the MTC and memorize the order of the principles in the first three lessons. Then just get used to making small talk and talking with everyone! It was hard for me to just go up to random people sitting outside their houses and generate a conversation. Talk to everyone. The faster you get used to talking to people and making conversation the better and more comfortable you’ll be on the mission. I don’t know how your spanish is, but I think I can say that it will be a struggle for you at first. The Guatemala MTC will help a ton. I’ll try to make a list of good phrases in the next few months to give to you when you get here.

Also if you are musically inclined, bring arrangements of hymns and other church music. They are always in need of musical numbers for conferences and church meetings. Um… suitcases. I have one enormous one and one small one. I wish I had two médium ones. And don’t pack them both way full before you leave. Leave yourself some space. And maybe bring a simple back pack as well. I’ve had to pack for just one or two nights because of staying the night with some other hermanas and I wished I had something small to pack clothes in for just a day. I left my hair straightener home, but I would bring it if I could od it again. It’s nice to be able to fix yourself up nice for the conferences. Oh, that reminds me. Have one or two nice outfits for the conferences, like a cute suit jacket and matching skirt. Something sophisticated. You’ll get sick of feeling grubby, and the conferences are your chance to look nice.

Other things

- Travel pillow (or room in suitcase for a real one)
- More garments than they tell you to bring (like16 pairs)
- Travel iron
- Little compass because the directions here are crazy
- Two laundy bags, one to keep dirty clothes in while your clothes are being washed. A lot of time we live out of our suitcases. There aren’t places to put the clothes.
- A wallet to keep in your bag and one to keep the rest of your Money and personal debit card in in the house. Okay, that is all I can think of for the momento and really all the time I have today. If you have any more questions, feel free to send me an email at Michelle.crosland@myldsmail.net. See you soon!

Hna. Crosland

Letter #54 - September 27, 2010

Hey everybody,

Thanks for all the messages this week. It was fun to hear from the Crosland Clan. Sounds like you are all doing awesome, except for Amie's mouth contraption (ouch!). Mom, thanks for sending the music. I haven't had a chance to look through it yet, but I'm sure it will be awesome.

The rain is still going strong. It rains every day but it actually hasn't been super strong. There were some hurricane warnings but mostly for the Atlantic coast. And there has been a little bit of flooding in various parts of the country but nothing here.

I'm also feeling back to normal. After the fever went away, a nasty rash, that turned my skin red and spotty and made me so itchy I wanted to die and crawl right out of my skin, plagued me for a few days and made it extremely hard to concentrate on anything, but now I'm feeling good.

So changes are this Wednesday. I'm thinking Hna. Tunche will go and I will stay. But we'll find out tomorrow night what is to become of us. We went shoe shopping this morning and finally found some in Payless (where else?) which is actually like the posh shoe store out here. I also bought two pairs of no show socks and some shoe polish. So a huge thanks to grandma and grandpa from both Hna. Tunche and I. We are looking stylish and feeling snazzy in our new shoes.

This weekend we had the baptism of Ivania. She is the niece of one of the ward members and is 8 months pregnant. She is living with Hna. Montano and has been to church a few times, but we had never been to teach her until this week. She is super sweet and humble and accepted the lessons and the challenges to keep the commandments and we were able to baptize her this weekend. What I have learned about having baptisms is this: they are simply gifts from the Lord. We can do all we can and work our guts out and some times it just seems like no one is willing to change, and then all of the sudden, the Lord puts someone in your path who is prepared, who is humble, who wants to make changes in their life, and you are just lucky enough to be there to teach them.

I feel like I almost have nothing to do with finding these people. We are out in the streets trying to find people all day and to help the people we have to progress, but really all we can do is be as obedient as we can and work as hard and as smart as we can and then the Lord does the rest. He takes our effort, and although it usually didn't get us anywhere, he does the rest and gives us someone to teach and baptize. This is truly the Lord's work. We play such a small and insignificant part, but we need this experience. I am so grateful for the people that the Lord has entrusted me with and for the tiny role I have been able to play in their lives, to help them learn eternal truths that can save their lives.

I hope everyone is excited for conference this weekend. I am WAY excited, even though I'll probably have to listen to all of conference in spanish, which just isn't the same. But that's okay. Okay, I love you all. Thanks again Grandma and Grandpa for the new shoes.

Being a missionary is the best thing in the world - receiving the blessings of the Lord.

Love, Hna. Crosland

Letter #53 - September 20, 2010

Hello everybody,

The highlight of the week was definitely the baptism of Luis, Suyen, Carlos, and Kenneth on Saturday. Just in case I haven't mentioned, Carlos is Luis and Suyen's eight year old son, and Kenneth is the son of a member but he just turned nine at the beginning of September so we taught him the lessons and he was also baptized this Saturday.

It was great and we had the support of quite a few members. Then they were all confirmed in church yesterday and it was really special. The only thing that made the experience less than perfect is that I started feeling pretty sick during the baptism.

I guess I have to back up a little bit.

Last monday I finished up my week of the terrible cold, but the very day that I started feeling better, Hna. Tunche got sick with a bad fever, body aches, and diarrhea. Well, Saturday she started feeling better and Saturday night, all of the sudden, I started feeling hot and shakey and since then I have felt pretty bad. Today the fever is less but I feel really dizzy and weak. So basically as a companionship we have more than two weeks of being sick and who knows how long it's going to hold on, whatever I have now. Hna. Medina has been so sweet. She is totally our mom here. She told me not to tell you that I've been sick, but I just had to. When you don't feel good, you just want your mom. And if she can't be there, at least she can know how you feel. So mama, don't worry. I'm going to feel better soon.

I miss you a lot right now. Like Daddy said, the trials are to polish us and knock off the rough edges. Well I've still got a lot of rough edges and the Lord is trying to polish me.

This week we also had a really great conference with Elder Don. R Clark of the Seventy. It was wonderful and very inspiring. I felt humbled and inspired to do better and I wrote down a lot of good points on how to improve. I know that the Lord loves us and is mindful of us. He wants us to succeed and He gives us many opportunities to do so. Let's make the most of everyday and give our best. And even on the hard days when our best effort doesn't amount to much, the Lord accepts it and makes up the difference.

Being a missionary is the best thing in the world - shall we not go on in so great a cause?

Love, Hna. Crosland

P.S. I will try to find some time to look for a new pair of shoes. It probably wont be until next monday because today I just need to rest. But tell Grandma and Grandpa thank you and that I love them a lot.

EDITORS NOTE:

HAPPY ONE YEAR TO THE HERMANA! A member made her a cake to celebrate.

Letter #52 - September 13, 2010

Dear fam and friends,

This weeks email is going to be short and sweet. I don't have a ton of time today. But I did have some really wonderful experiences this week that I wanted to share, and some frustrating ones that make the sweet ones all the better.

On Saturday we weren't having any luck with finding the people we had planned to teach. But finally we a lady named Flor let us come in and start teaching her. We are teaching her son Kevin and we had taught her as well one time before but this time, Kevin wasn't home and it gave us the chance to answer some of her questions. She started asking about the Book of Mormon. Basically it turned out to be a really frustrating lesson in which she was totally closed to accepting anything we said and just threw one objection after another at us. I felt like we actually did a really good job of answering her questions and objections and showing her how Heavenly Father's plan all works together so perfectly. I even felt the spirit testify through me as I bore my testimony of a Loving Father in Heaven and the book that he prepared for us in these last days to clear up all the confusion that exists in religion. But she was super closed to taking anything into her heart and at the end wouldn't even accept the invitation to read part of the Book of Mormon to find out for herself what it contained and if it was true. That always hurts a little bit. Not because we were rejected, but because she will never know what kind of happiness and truth she could have had. I love the Book of Mormon with all my heart.

Now, contrast that experience with yesterdays testimony meeting where Bernarda, our recient convert of about a month ago, got up and bore a sweet and simple testimony that she is so grateful to have discovered the true church, and that through the reading the Book of Mormon, she knows that the church is true. Wow. That was probably one of the sweetest moments I have had. It is so hard to get people to read the Book of Mormon out here, members AND investigators. And hearing her testify of the Book of Mormon from the pulpit yesterday about made my heart burst. She has gone through a ton of trials since she got baptized, but she has been faithfully reading the book of Mormon and it has made all the difference.

The other sweet experience was with Luis and Suyen. They didn't get baptized this saturday because Suyen still had a lot of doubts and is worried about her family totally rejecting her if she gets baptized because they are super catholic. But we trudged through a hurricane to get to their house last night and it was well worth the bath. When we got there, dripping wet even though we had a huge umbrella, Suyen said she had some news for us. She said that they wouldn't be coming to church anymore and that they were going to stop receiving the lessons... my heart skipped an entire beat and a half. But then a sly smile creeped across her face. Just kidding, she said, we're going to be baptized on Saturday the 18th, for sure. Wow! I wanted to jump up and shout and dance, but I settled for giving her a big hug. This family is really special. I feel like if they were the only ones that I got to teach and baptize in my whole mission it would be worth it.

Well time is up, but I just have to say that being a missionary is the best thing in the world - the bitter makes the sweetness that much sweeter.

Love,

Hna. Crosland

Letter #51 - September 6, 2010

Well hi everybody,

How are ya'll? It sounds like it was an exciting a spiritual week. Congrats to Will on his patriarchal blessing. That will be such a guide for you in your life if you read it often and work to fulfill the requirements for each blessing promised. And three cheers for Ali, all the way up there at BYU-I! I'm so happy and excited for you, and I can't believe that by the time I see you again, you'll be a seasoned veteran at the whole college thing. Wow, time is flying. Thanks for the uplifting emails mom and dad.
I love reading them. They are a great source of strength to me each week, a recharge of energy.

I have had one of the nastiest colds of my life for the last four days and it is still going strong. But I have been amazed at all I can do, even while feeling very sick, with the Lord's help, and it hasn't slowed down the work. I hope that it doesn't hold on much longer though. I don't think my nose will make it. We had stake conference this weekend and it was very nice. It almost felt like the church at home. We had 7 investigators there, including Luis and Suyen, Erika, and Oscar. I don't know if I have
told you about Erika. She is the wife of a less-active member and she has a baptismal date for this saturday along with Luis and Suyen. As of now, I think they are on track. We watched the Joseph Smith movie with L and S yesterday at the stake presidents house and it was really awesome. Oscar is a 20 year old kid that we are teaching who always has a new rumor about the church for us to clear up. He's progressing and I think in a few weeks he will get baptized as well. Mijaly and Yolanda have been really hard to find still. But we made an appointment with them for tonight and we'll see how it goes. I hope we can rescue them. It will break my heart to lose them.

Hna. Tunche and I will be companions at least until Sept. 29. We work pretty well together, despite our differences. Actually it's our different strengths that really make up for what the other lacks. Almost daily I am grateful for something she did that I didn't think to do that turned out to make a big difference. But I should be better at telling her that. The changes actually come out to be nearly exact for my 18 months because of the three week extension, March 17. And I think I'll be able to choose if I want to come home then or at the next change which would be at the end of April. But I have been thinking that I want to jump right into the spring term of school so I'm thinking march.

It seems this week that I have been thinking about a lot of things. For one reason or another, I've been really contemplative. Before my mission I used to think that it wouldn't matter to me if I got rejected every day and hardly anyone would listen to us. I was so sure that just "being a missionary and preaching the gospel" could be enough and that if I had any success in terms of baptisms, it would be icing on the cake. But that was before I started to love the people here and desire their salvation. Having "success" to be able to report numbers still doesn't matter to me, but knowing that the gospel can truly save someoe and to have them not be able to open their eyes and see it really hurts. It's not a hurting for myself, I ache for them. I want so badly to help but so many don't let us. But we have to push forward and do the best that we can. Baptism the the key.

I was also reading a talk that Paige gave in church some months ago and sent me this morning. She spoke about love. And I started really contemplating the subject. It seems on my mission that I've discovered just what an amature I am at love. I used to think that I had it all down, that I was so capable of loving everyone. How naive I was. To my surprise and discontent, Christ-like love has been something I've struggled with here. That purest of all love should be the true motive of all we do. But how many times have I looked for and found other motives to keep me going, worldly motives, shallow motives. Why am I so easily annoyed and discouraged? Is the charity in my heart truly so thin and unsubstantial?

I think that we can study the pinciples of the gospel and tributes of Christ all our lives, and we should, but we really don't learn them with our hearts until we are put to the test. All my life I have studied the gospel and I have a lot of knowledge about it. I have read about thousands of examples of love and charity. And now I am here with the opportunity to put that knowledge into action, to somehow get it from my head to my heart and I feel like I fail 9 times out of 10. We don't learn until we are tested. It's easy to love your best friend and serve her. It's easy to love your family especially when you are very far away from them. But loving complete strangers, and people you haven't even met yet, enough to sacrifice so much, to go out and work when you are sick and tired and have nothing left to give, except the shred of charity you pull up from deep within your heart, that is something of a challenge.

I hope I am learning to love, despite my failures. And perhaps it is through my failures that progress is being made. No, not through failing, through the courage to pick myself up and keep trying. Let us cultivate charity and not be discouraged when our capacity to love is tested and we don't quite measure up yet. We are little children and cannot bear all things now, but must grow in grace and truth... and I would add charity.

Being a missionary is the best thing in the world - try, try again.

I love you all with all my heart.

Love, Hna. Crosland

Letter #50 - August 30, 2010

Hey you guys,

Sorry you missed the email last week. I don't know what happened. I actually did send it, so it must have just gotten lost in cyber-space. So, we have a little problem in our one-room house called low water pressure. Here's a fluid dynamics problem for you. When you have one water source that is being directed to varias locations and someone is washing while another person is trying to take a shower, what happens? Basically, the water dribbles out of the shower head and sticks to the wall most mornings.

So trying to get yourself wet is kind of interesting. It's like this, I stretch up my arm and place my palm against the wall where the stream of water is coming down, more or less making a bridge so that the water is directed down my arm and onto my shoulder and from there to the rest of my body. This is method number one. When we have a bit more pressure, there is the good old make-a-cup-out-of-your-hands method and then splash it on your body (think ELF in the shower). But my favorite is when we've got a good sprinkle going and I get all lathered up and then all of the sudden, not a single drop is coming out. Luckily it usually comes on again in a few minutes, but the moments spent standing in the shower wondering what I'm going to do if it doesn't come back on are entertaining.

Well, the best news this week is that Shilo got baptized! Mijaly and Yoli still aren't ready and I'm actually pretty worried that Mijaly is loosing interest. He hasn't let us teach him all week. But things are going really well with Suyen and Luis. Tonight we are going to teach them about Family Night at the bishop's house. The activity we had for the baptisms this week went pretty well. It was all centered around the vision of Lehi and the tree of life. We watched a little video to get started and then everyone followed the iron rod (a rope covered in tin foil) around the church, facing various temptations including a discoteca and a room filled with candy. Finally, everyone ended up in the room with the baptismal font where a lovely christmas tree represented the tree of life. Haha. It was pretty funny. Then we had the baptisms. I attached some pictures of the activity and Shilo.

Preparing for the activity

The rope covered in tinfoil--I mean the iron rod . . .


Baptisms

Getting baptized is super fly

Shilo

Today we splurged and bought betty crocker cookie mixes at the grocery store (la colonia). It was like heaven eating cookie dough, and all the latinos just stared and looked at us like we were crazy. "You are going to get so sick from eating that" they said. But I assured them that I have been eating cookie dough since I was born and that nothing would happen. Hna. Campos wanted the cookies to be done faster so she turned the heat up as high as it would go, but luckily, elder iverson saw her do it and quickly turned it back down. It made me laugh. Cookies are just not a latin american thing. But they turned out good. We also watched The Mountain of the Lord on the big screen in the church. It was awesome. I think I've seen it once before, but it really hit me how much the saints sacrificed to build the Salt Lake Temple. It also made me miss the temple a lot. We also watched part of a church video but in Portuguese and I was stoked when I realized that I could understand almost everything. Portuguese is so cool. I want to learn it when I get home.

Daddy, I'm glad you are happy with your eye surgery still and that everything went well. And I love hearing about your ward and what you are doing with them and how the family is participating. It sounds like your day of rest yesterday was a little like one of mine... not at all restful. But when we are in the service of the Lord, He promises us a rest that will be eternal.

I love you all dearly.

Being a missionary is the best thing in the world - and it never ends, keep working hard to spread the joy.

Love, Hna. Crosland

P.S. I can't wait to meet my new niece in a few months. I hope everyone is taking good care of Paige and Mikey. And good luck to Ali-bug with starting school up at BYU-I. I know you'll be great Ali, you're starting an amazing new chapter of your life so live it up to the fullest! And Will, just know I love you and I'm always thinking about you.