Santa Rita Part Two- Morazan Week Thirteen

 YESSSIR THATS RIGHT WE WENT BACK TO SANTA RITA

This week was the first real exchanges I had and I went with the ZL uh oh good thing I got a heads up except he was a TOTAL TROLL🦧🦧

Elder Shanklin and the  Zone Leader

Fun facts about the ZL

-his biggest dream is to meet big time rush

-he wants a wife for Christmas (he goes home next transfer

-if he cant get a wife he wants a ps5 to play spiderman 2

-he always hits children in the head with a book of mormon

-oh and he's from Guatemala

Streets of Morazan

So basically dw about me I'm in good hands out here in Honduras WOOOO It was actually such a W day though. He knew how to involve me in lessons (unlike maybe somebody else I spend all day with) and I feel like I learned more spanish in this day than the whole month I been out here. He also thinks I'm going to be an AP one day so everybody send your prayers to stop that from happening🙏 Before the exchange he sent me a list of things he wanted to learn from me and I did it back. I said I wanted to enjoy the mission and oh man I think he took that to heart. We just went from members house to members house and SO MUCH FOOD it was a dream come true. We also went on top of this super high mountain and got some cool pictures AND I gotta watch this girl play roblox to end the night🔥🔥

The schedule for the day while with the Zone Leader

Elder Shanklins bed for the night

Besides exchanges this week was a draggggg I think my comp thinks I should be fluent in spanish rn cause he's gotten less and less patient with me not knowing how to talk to people but that's alright we got transfers in a few days so hopes are high🙏

A popsicle makes everyones day brighter

Spiritual Part (try not to skip challenge)

I don't know If I'm just tripping but I've never really considered that this is the EXACT same church Jesus Christ established during his life. Like obviously it is but we taught that so much this week it made me realize how much sense this church makes. We are "The church of JESUS CHRIST of latter day saints" and its crazy to me that when people here that from us they still are like nah somethings wrong here and turn us away. Ofc everybody needs to learn for themselves but i am so grateful to be living the things Jesus Christ himself taught🤝🤝

Elder shanklin

I Think My Penchanista Plays Poker-Morazan Week Twelve

 Guys stuff went down this week lets get into it

PENCHANISTA

So for those who don't know in Honduras we have a person who makes food for us when the members don't want to feed us (all the time in my area). So we pay her to make us food and TRUST its SO NICE to not have to worry about food. I just go to a house sit down and boom 4 baleadas on my plate its a miracle. Welp it was a miracle until this week😭

THE GAME PLAN

K so the elders in my house thought she was too expensive so we had a plan. We were going to bluff our way to a lower price. The plan was we say its too expensive for lunch and dinner (we were paying 1500 or about $60) and then offer we pay a lesser price for only lunch (700 or $28ish). What we really wanted was her to say "no no your fine ill lower the price to 1000 for both meals". Well that is not what happened. What I didn't know, and which I believe to be the only explanation, is that our penchanista plays poker because she read our bluff TOO GOOD. She said we can either pay full price or make our own food... welp at the bottom of my email is my first home made baleada if that explains what we decided😁

Dinner cooked by the Penchanista ^^

Elder Shanklins first homemade Baleada

Elder Shanklins kitchen.  Notice the bucket of water..
it has many uses: cooking, flushing toilets, and showering.

Besides that I really don't know what happened this week its just work haha. We started roasting marshmallows over our electric oven at night time which is a good way to relax after a hard day would recommend. But yah if anybody got easy recipes send them my way, I mean I did take up to Foods 2 in high school so I am basically a chef but scrambled eggs and baleades can only get you so far

Morazan, Honduras

Elder Shanklin and his companion

Somebody Find Me Dora Cause I Need A Map -Morazan Week Eleven

 

WELCOME TO THIS WEEKS GAME OF WHO DID WE JUST TALK TO!!!!

 

Was it an investigator, a member, or a random drunk person? Guess well never know cause I never know!

 

K but in all seriousness I am so lost here💀 you'd think after 3 weeks you'd pick up on some small things or start to figure stuff out but nah I'm still just following my trainer around not knowing what's going on. Right now we are in the mission home 3 hours from our area cause we have zone conference tomorrow and idk where I am  staying the night so WOOOOO🔥🔥🔥

This is where he ended up sleeping

 Going back in time tho, this week was just work work work, not a ton of success (at least that's what I think lol) We had the temple dedication on Sunday for the San Pedro Sula temple which was dope never been to one of those and only members can come (its broadcasted to the church building) so I finally could identify who the members where. I think there were 18 who came and elder Renlund spoke in spanish which was cool and imo (in my opinion) he sounded pretty good

 

SANTA RITA

K so after the temple dedication we found out we are going to stay the night at our zone leaders houses. I don't think this is allowed cause everyone in the zone came and stayed the night (like 12 elders) and they don't like when 4 elders share a house so whooops. ANYWAYS I gotta explore Santa Rita and it was so nice to see something new. I met a monkey who is apparently someone's pet and then found a sick river and got some pictures of it so enjoy

 

The pet monkey

Elder Shanklin and the river.
He said just before this picture people were jet skiing on the river.

K gotta be honest the mission has not been my favorite so far. Lots of challenges and just a different way of living in a completely new place. BUT shoutout to my boy Elder Crook from the CCM he shared a super cool talk called "A High Priest of Good Things to Come" by Jeffrey R Holland. Not knowing the language right now and everything has made the days not super enjoyable but in this talk Holland says how through Jesus Christ things will ALWAYS get better you just gotta hold on. Also gotta give a quick shoutout to all the support from everybody the emails mean so much love you guys❤️

 

Soccer for pday

Just some goats on the side of the road

Elder Shanklin