Monday, December 8, 2014

Kuzcotopia! Complete With a Water Slide!

My first area is CUSCO!! Aaaahh. I love it so much. It´s beautiful and it definitely doesn't look like anything I´ve seen in America. And unfortunately, we don´t have a water slide. But there is this huge slide outside of our sector of Cusco that I desperately want to go to... Probably won´t happen, but still :)




Keni in Cusco - What a Beauty!!

So. What a week. Thanksgiving was fun. The food the CCM tried to make for us wasn´t my favorite, and didn´t taste anything like an American Thanksgiving, but it was still good! We had a great devotional that day too.

Something no one will tell you about going on a mission - or at least no one told me. After you leave your family and then proceed to spend 16ish hours a day in a room with 9 other people learning Spanish and the gospel for 6 weeks, you´ll cry just as hard leaving them as you did leaving your family. Once you´re ripped from your family at home, you build a new family in the CCM. I already miss those Elders and Hermanas like crazy. I´m just so lucky that 8 of the 9 are in the same mission as me! I´m sure I´ll run into them occassionally during the next 16 months.


(I'm assuming a group of Hermanas from the CCM?? I stole it from Hermana Russell's blog)


Hermana Russell and Hermana Hill (stolen from Hermana Russell's blog)


(Group from the CCM?? I'm such a thief! Thanks, Hermana Russell!)

(Kelly here: I've decided to not edit Keni's emails from now on. Before it was that she made a mistake or two, but now I believe it's the language struggle... so we're going to go with it). :)

My new compañera is Hermana Condie! She´s pretty much the coolest person ever. And she´s a gringa which is absolutely awesome because then I can actually ask questions and understand some of what is going on. I also read her blog before the mish and emailed her for advice, and she gave some of the sweetest advice and comfort for pre-mission me :) I don´t know if she remembers that, but it meant a lot. And now she´s my mom! So cool.


(I'm guessing this is Hermana Condie since she didn't label the photos)

I don´t even know how to sum up this week. It´s been such an adventure. Altitude sickness is a thing, people. I don´t love it. But, I only had it for a day or two and now it´s just difficult to breathe when I´m exherting myself or walking up stairs to investigators houses for the 6th time that day. I´m told that the breathing thing will get better in a week or two :)

(Kelly here: another MM (Missionary Mom) of a kid in Peru said that her son has been staying at the mission home because he is terribly sick because of the altitude. I have been worried about Keni but it sounds like she's had a much easier time of it. Thank goodness)

On our first day here, before we found out who our trainers are, they took us all to see the Cristo Blanco, and it was AWESOME. Once we found out who are trainers are, we took my stuff to our house, since it´s so close to the Mission Home, and then we all went contacting in this really gorgeous Plaza. It was so awesome. Then they took us to dinner and we had to say goodbye to all of our elders and Hermanas. That was hard, but I know that we´re all where we need to be in the mission!


Cristo Blanco

The food has been delicious, the other Hermanas in our apartment are just hilarious and so loving, and I´m slowly getting the hang of Spanish.

Oh, and yesterday Hermana Condie was stuck in bed all day with a bad fever, and at one point when we were both napping we woke up to a GIANT German Shepherd roaming around our room. His head was above mine when I was laying in my bed. I probably could have ridden him like a horse, he was so big. We´re not entirely sure how he got in, probably we forgot to lock the door and he pushed it open with his nose. But sometimes the dogs are sketchy here, so we weren´t sure if we should panic or not, but I calmly kinda led him out the door and locked it behind him. Definitely woke me up quickly from that nap!

I love the people here. We´ve met with a lot of less actives and members in the past few days and they´re all the sweetest people I´ve ever met. One member, Victor, is this cute little old man who can barely walk, and I can´t really understand yet, because Spanish. But we sat and talked with him for over an hour the other day and Hermana Condie told me afterward the parts I missed and he is just the cutest old man. He´s working on getting to the temple, and he´s lonely sometimes so he was just over the moon thrilled that we visited him. In our closing prayer that he offered, he said how grateful he was that we sat and listened to all of his stories and that we´re patient with him not being able to walk very fast, etc. I love him. He´s the best.


Photo: Compliments of Hna Condie's blog (she unknowingly "shared" it with me) (Kelly's a thief)

Read more about Victor on Hna Condie's blog:
www.amiecondie.blogspot.com/2014/11/meet-victor.html

We also met a less active named Carol the other day and she´s basically golden. She told us she had been praying for some help and guidance and then we showed up! She said that she already felt happier and more calm just from us walking into her house. She´s so cool, too. She´s a nurse here in Cusco, and she has two sons that aren´t members and she said she wants to come back to church and bring her sons with her! She´s so awesome and she was so kind to us. I am seriously in love with the people here. They´re all so perfect.

It´s been a really long week, but I´m so happy and so excited to keep working! Also, we´re doing some sight-seeing later today and I. Can´t. Wait. Cusco es mejor.

I love you all. I miss you all. Talk to you next week :)

Hermana Hill


(Not sure if this is her home or if she was excited about the Slug Bug)
(Probably the Slug Bug)

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