Week 55 - Christmas in Peru

Feliz Navidad!!!

Today was a wonderful day, topped by being able to speak with my family!!!  As a missionary, we are only allowed 2 video calls per year (Christmas and Mother's Day) so it made today even more special.   It was awesome getting to see everyone and to catch up personally.   What a special Christmas Day!

This week has been amazing here in los Baños del Inca. This week was Christmas and it was an incredible and spiritual experience. It was full of us visiting people and trying to sing Christmas carols, sharing messages about the birth of our savior Jesus Christ, and especially lots of Paneton. It is delicious. It has really been a treat helping people to remember about the birth of our savior Jesus Christ and remember why we celebrate this holiday. Christmas here in Peru is a bit different but when someone feels the Christmas spirit it really does not matter what part of the world you are in it is something real special. I wish everyone a merry Christmas back home and have a happy new year. 

Love,

Elder Vassau

Week 54 - It's beginning to feel a little like Christmas (and Rainy Seattle)!!!

Hola de Peru!!!

This has been one of the most fun weeks of my entire mission. Here in Peru Christmas and therefore Christmas activities are in full swing (despite a large portion of Peruvians who do not celebrate Christmas). This week started with a great family home evening Monday night where we enjoyed some delicious chicken ceviche. Ceviche is a super famous Peruvian food that is raw fish that is served after "cooking" it with nothing but lemon juice. I have heard it is quite delicious but as missionaries we are prohibited from eating it considering it is raw chicken. That being said we are allowed to eat chicken ceviche which although is cooked and is not fish it is still delicious.

On Monday night after our family home evening we got a call that President Calderon was coming up to Cajamarca to teach a zone training and host a zone wide Christmas dinner in a member’s house! Well my dear friends the elders from the distant Celendin branch (about 3 hours outside of Cajamarca) came and stayed with us all week as we enjoyed the various activities president had planned for us. Tuesday we had our interviews that we have every transfer. Then on Wednesday we had our zone training which was amazing. President taught a lot about the importance of having faith in whatever we do. If you do not have the faith that something is possible than you yourself are causing it to be impossible. It was an amazing and incredible motivational training, but the highlight of the week was our Christmas dinner with President Thursday night. All 22 missionaries from Cajamarca came to a member’s house in the city to share a dinner and Christmas festivities. We started off with some great Christmas music and President and his wife had bought a Christmas president for every missionary. After sharing Christmas presents President invited us all to watch a Christmas movie with him and the family (as missionaries we do not watch movies). It was crazy awesome. We watched the classic "It’s  a Wonderful Life" and I think everyone was dying of laughter and nearly brought to tears by the end. I think everyone was a little over emotional at the whole idea of the Christmas night and breaking out of the norm of the missionary routine to celebrate Christmas. After the movie we shared a nice Christmas dinner with Turkey. Turkey in Peru is a food that you only eat at Christmas. It was awesome. We also shared some special Peruvian hot chocolate and the famous Peruvian Pantone before returning to our areas. It was awesome to enjoy a true family dinner with the other missionaries and celebrate Christmas.

To make the week even better the ward had their annual Christmas party this past week where we witnessed a hilarious talent show filled with lots of Christmas themed skits and sketches. To top off the week today we went to a super cool rock forest here in Cajamarca where there are tons of cool rock formations, caves, stones carvings, and every an Incan sacrifice table.  This week was full of lots of fun and exciting activities but I think the very best moment of the week was seeing the Estela Medina family attend church with us yesterday. The family consists of the mom (Marina), her two sons (Arturo 20 and Victor 19) and her daughter (Diana 17). We have been teaching Victor, Arturo, and Marina for a few weeks now, and yesterday with the help of a member who owns a miniature bus the whole family accompanied us to church and loved it. This week we are going to teach them about the plan of salvation so that they understand that God wants their family to be eternal. Pray all goes well. 

Well this week has been amazing and this coming week is Christmas which gives us just that much more of an excuse to talk to people about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and all he does and has done for us. The littlest we can do to show our thanks is to share his love and message with everyone else. Christmas time is truly the most wonderful time of the year. 

Love,

Elder Vassau

p.s. My room is now decorated with a little Christmas tree and lights to help us keep the Christmas spirit going. Also big thanks to the best family in the world for the Christmas package 

Week 53 - 1 year Anniversary, Reategui Family & Milagros

Buenos Dias!!

This has been an awesome week here in los Baños del Inca. This week we visited a super awesome family and reference from the Reategui family. The Reategui family is super awesome. The husband, Pedro Reategui, works for a humanitarian organization from the U.S. called Aguila Condor. His wife, Melisa is a nurse who helps businesses with health standards. The two of them together run a community center/food bank for children here in Baños called El Bichito. They are just awesome and this week with Melissa and Pedro we visited a 12 year old girl named Milagros, who attends el Bichito, and her mother Elaina. They have had their fair share of economic challenges in life and Elaina is practically a single mom raising her 4 children here in Baños. Well we went to visit this family and it went amazingly. Elaina used to be super religious but over the past 20 years, because of various challenges, has really distanced herself from God and any type of church. Elaina and Milagros were super excited to recieve us and Elaina was saying how it is not a coincidence that the restored gospel of Jesus Christ has come into her life at this time. It is really quite amazing to see their disposition to come unto Christ. Her daughter Milagros (12) and Percy (7) are just the sweetest thing. After our second visit with the family, after Percy explained an encyclopedia's worth of knowledge about prophets, Milagros offered the sweetest prayer asking for God's help to find his true church so that they can follow Christ as a family. Her prayer I think brought tears to the eyes of just about everyone that was present. The family is awesome and they not only attended church this week and witnessed a beautiful primary program, a presentation put on by children, but they also have accepted a baptismal date for the 6th of January.  No better way to start a new fresh year than to get baptised. Sometimes God puts challenges in or life to prepare us for future blessings and that is very well what has happened with this family. Every challenge is an oportunity to learn and grow as children of God, to be more like Jesus Christ. Super awesome right?!?

Well this has just been an awesome week here in Los Baños del Inca (so called not because they are the bathrooms of the incas but rather there are thermal hotsprings here that the Inca/emperor used to bath). Last monday as a district we went to visit some small waterfalls in my area at llacanora. Despite the mosquitos eating my legs alive it was super rad. Here the rainy season is in full swing and we enjoy nice sunny mornings and rain or occasional downpours in the afternoon. It is pretty awesome here. 

Well I love you guys lots, until next week. 

Love,

Elder Vassau

Week 52 - Banos de Las Incas, Rain like Seatte!

Buenos Dias!!!

This has been an awesome week here in Baños del Inca (BTW in English this means Baths, NOT BATHROOMS of the Incas after all the hotsprings in the area). It is a bit of a change from my experience in Milagro. I miss Milagro dearly but I am so excited to work here in los Baños del Inca. Here things are much cooler with lots of rain, greenery, and lots and lots of cows. It is pretty funny actually.

The climate here is a little colder and from reputation the people are a little more reserved as well. This week we have spent most of the week visiting all the members here in Baños del Inca. Missionary work is never done only by the missionaries, rather it is a team effort with the members and the Holy Ghost. If the missionaries and members are working together diligently they will have the spirit with them and will be able to find all those people that our Heavenly Father has been preparing to recieve the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The members here are so cool. We pension with a sister here in Baños named Maria. By chance she happens to be sister Lila's (my pension in Milagro) aunt. Her husband goes by the name "Coringo" and is hilarious. Always trying to rob our stuff and talk about himself in the third person. It is pretty hilarious considering he is also the second counselor of the bishopric here. To say the least when we go to pension it is a very interesting experience. 

This week we have been working hard to contact and find lots of new investigators. We were looking over something called the area book this week, a record of past investigators, and we found a super cool family. Jaime Diaz (31), his wife Jovita, and his son Hans. Jaime has a brother who suffered a super severe motorcycle accident a couple of years ago where he broke his femur and was bed ridden for 2 years. This brother of his found the missionaries one day and after a few months got baptized, while he was still bed ridden. This same brother despite his slight cripple is now serving a mission in Paraguay. All of these happenings inspired Jaime to meet with the missionaries. About a year ago he was meeting a lot with the missionaries and was attending church regularly but what happened is the missionaries got transfer and the new missionaries lost contact with Jaime. Well after months without communication we made contact with Jaime who is now super excited to once again learn about the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ and attend church. He is super cool and attended the church this past sunday with his whole family. I know our Heavenly Father has been preparing him and it is no coincidence that we have found him after so much time. 

Well this week has been awesome here in Baños and in this district we are going to start working Miracles. Miracles come according to our Faith and Righteousness. If we make sure to always work with faith and righteousness God will do the rest in our lives. Another awesome, rainy, beautiful week here in Baños, and this next week is going to be that much better. 

Love,

Elder Vassau