Elder Sean Pearce's Mission: Fairly Exciting Week (and some photos)

Dear Familia,

Well this has been a fairly exciting week. Not too much happened Tuesday, but then on Wednesday we did service at a boy's school, which was fun, different than our usual service. More moving desks and tables and computers around, painting some rooms, cleaning. Then that night we were down in the elliptical, about dinner time, so we decided to go to Subway (about the only restaurant open in the elliptical) (I was pleasantly surprised that the cold cut combo was a $4 footlong this month (not advertised as such) at least at this subway). About five minutes after we walk out, we get a call from Elder Walton saying that we were late for an appointment with a family. We knew of no such appointment but we were just a few blocks away so we went. Turns out that due to a lot a bad communication, they were expecting all eight of us for dinner, and we were the only two to come. So that was fun, pretending that we hadn't just eaten, and trying to cover for six other missionaries. woooo...

Then Thursday started bright and early. Well dark and early. I never imagined when I went to bed on Wednesday night that I would be up at 3:30 hauling fire hose. We were awakened by some guy yelling that everybody needs to leave the building, the building is on fire. We could smell smoke so we decided to heed his council. We got evacuated from the building and then some firemen asked us to help get the hoses from the trucks to the building (because of the setup they couldn't park very close). Turns out that someone left the stove on when they left for the night. That apartment is completely burned out, with a little bit of damage to the adjacent rooms. Ours is totally fine though don't worry. The zone leaders weren't happy when we knocked on their door that early in the morning though. Ah well. Needless to say we had a nice restful sleep later that night.

Then at about 9:30 later that morning we got a call from the AP's saying that they were moving into their new apartment and asked for help. If they were moving into their new apartment that meant that Elder Bush and I would be moving into ours as well (they are going to two-man pads across the mission). So the other elders go to help the APs while Elder Bush and I pack our things. Then about an hour later we get a call saying that we aren't moving, the other elders are. So stop packing. Anyway long story short, all of Thursday was spent helping move people here and there. Fun Fun. But now we are now all in the same complex, just different buildings.

Then Friday we were able to get back in contact with Luis and Fior, which was really nice. We haven't been able to meet with them since the hurricane. Not too much happened on Saturday or Sunday. Church attendance was the smallest I have seen it though since I have been here. I didn't count but it couldn't have been much more than 50 people there, and it was the Primary Program, which usually brings people out. When I first got here we were getting over 100 every sacrament meeting. Then it has been slowly dwindling ever since. Well we will get that straightened out soon enough. And pretty much everyone is back from the hurricane so I'm not sure exactly what is going on. But we will start making calls and visits to the members and try to figure it out.

The Christmas phone call will be like before. Short call Christmas Eve to set it up. I probably won't send an email that day so don't freak out if nothing comes.

I think that's about it for this week.

Love you,

Elder Pearce