April 22nd-
Oh my goodness!!! HELLO!!!:)
It's still kind of surreal being here in LA, but I love it. I don't have a lot of time today because you have to reserve computers today, and it's kind of a mess, but I'll try and tell you as much as I can. The first day we had some orientation stuff, and had a quick tour of the visitors center(which is awesome by the way!) Then we went off to meet a recent convert, and I didn't understand anything well I still don't understand much of anything. For the first few days I was really tired, but I think I'll starting to adjust after only getting 4 hours of sleep last tuesday. I love street contacting, well at least more than knocking doors. We're in an area called Silverlake so everyone pretty much talks spanish. I've meet people from Guatemala, El Salvador, Mexico, and Honduras. We're "white-washing" this area because elders got emergency transfered so no one has been in this area for 3 weeks, but it's fun starting over but I guess I don't know any better. My training is Sister Cole. She used to be a VC sister but she got moved full-field for this transfer, and we're in a trio so she's also training sister Rudd. Everymorning we run 2 miles. The first day we went running, and got lost so we ended up running for an hour. Opps:) Then we do 4 hours of studying, and when we're done with that we hit the streets:) For the most part we have just been trying to meet recent converts, members, and trying to figure out who people are and papers we find in the area book. Everyone in my area has a car, sister cole is an amazing parallel parker. I'm scared for when I have to do that. This monday was beach p-day which only happens once a year. How lucky am I that my first p-day was beach day:) I was super happy that I got to play volleyball for a few hours.
Talking to people can be really indimidating sometimes. I'll see someone walking towards me and I'll think "I can do this!" Then I go up to them ask how their doing, and then nothing. I forget what little I know, and even in english I have a little heart attack because I don't know what to say next! But that's what I feel like I am constantly working on right now. Just doing it, so I've starting to practice/ role play with my comps and it's even scary then. If you think you have confidence then go on a mission:) Haha, but it's great, and I'm learning lots.
Last night we went to go meet a recent convert named Mabel. She is a single mom who has 2 teenagers who are kinda disrespectful and against the church. We could tell it just broke her heart, and we were able to talk to her for a little bit, and just share our testimonies and love God had for her. That was a really cool experience because she felt like a light of hope in the midst of turmoil.
Love your missionary,
Hermana Ford
