Honduras Gets Better and Better

WHO´S EXCITED FOR CONFERENCE???????? This girl is!! 10 hours of listening to the word of God! 10 hours of listening to the word of God in English! I can´t wait! 

The power in this internet cafe just went out... Oh Honduras.  But at least it´s back on now

In the CCM I usually just skimmed over the apostasy, but now that Im in the field I know that it is one of the most important things you can teach, especially when I´m dealing with a bunch of evangelicals. If people don´t understand the apostasy they aren´t going to understnad the need for the Restoration and that we are the only church with the correct authority. I am learing so much.

Teaching in Honduras is just like teaching in the south in the Bible belt with all the evangelicals and the baptists... It´s just further south and we´re speaking spanish.

We went  contacting and I got rejected for the very first time. "We´re catholics."

I told Hermana Zamora my middle name, Fay. And she said how cool that my middle name means faith. And at first I was confused but then I realized that although it is spelled differently (Fay and fe), my name means faith in spanish. Super cool, huh?

Hermana Zamora has really good english, but she does´t like to talk to the other gringos in english because she doesn´t like that she "doesn´t always understand."  So naturally, I said, "Bienvenida a mi vida!!!" I can´t even imagine what it must be like to not understand what the people around me are saying, wow, that must be rough. ;) 

Morning here smells different.

The sunsets here aren´t very cool, but I have woken up in the madrugada to take a bus somewhere enough times that I know for sure that the sunrises are maravillosas!!

I spent all week thinking "What is significant about March 14? I swear there is something!" Then Holdaway called and said Happy Pie Day!! Whew, so glad I figured it out.

For three months I have been saying, "Nada iglesia en ese tiempo fue la iglesia verdadera de Jusucristo." AND NO ONE CORRECTED ME!!! Finally a few days ago Zamora reminded me that it is Ninguna iglesia... She is so wonderful.

We have two baptisms set for the 29. Edgardo and Natalia. I am really excited. They are great kids.

We went to Tacoa for District conference on Saturday. The chapel there has two floors so I love the few from the second floor. You can see all the crappy tins roofs. I love Honduras.

On Sunday the conference was a broadcast to all the Central America. Elder Oaks and Elder Scott spoke. Oaks was translated, but Scott speaks fluent spanish so he just spoke. IT was an interesting thing to see. 

And finally, You know you´re in Honduras when: Elder Marsh says "That´s a nice tie." and Elder Passey says, "Thanks. I got it in my christmas package... last week."

Well, that´s all folks. Have a great week. Love you!

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

Ch ch Changes

 

We had changes this week. My new companion is Hermana Zamora and she is super awesome!! Exactly what I need right now. I would send a picture but this computer doesn´t have a USB port... She is from Costa Rica. At first she was pretty shy and I was kind of worried, but then we went to teach a family and she was super chatty, it is great. We only wroked together Wednesday night through Sunday and we stil taught 32 lessons!! We´ve done so much contacting this week it´s ridiculous! We´ve found some awesome people.

I almost got robbed on thursday. We were talking to some people on the side of the road, trying to fin the locksmith (our key broke it´s a whole other story) and these two eight year old on a bike rode up and tried to take my bag but I had it across my chest so it didn´t come off. The awkard part was the boy lost control of the bike and ran into the side of truck that was passing by. The guy is the truck, the little boys, the people we were talking and us all just kind of stood there awkwardly...The little boys didn´t seem hurt so the guy in the truck drove away, and wasn´t mad so the little boys just walked away. If it weren´t sad that those feel the need to steal from me it would be a super funny story.

I ate cow liver on Tuesday. It kind of feels like ground beef, but certainly does not taste the same.

My branch president asked me where I bought my pen and I told him I bought it at wal-mart in the U.S. and he didn´t know what Wal-mart is!!! We are not in Kansas anymore. Also, I had to explain what Harry Potter is to Hermana Calpa. 

Selvin and Elizabeth still didn´t get married this week. There are more things than I thought getting in the way of them being baptized. It just sucks because I know they both have really strong testimonies. Pray for them.

Hope you all have a great week!

Love, Hermana Odekirk

Week 13

We had baptisms on Saturday! Our investigator Manuel for baptized and two of the investigators of the Elders. IT was really great! It is so great to know all the blessings that they are gong to receive.

Unfortunately, Selvin and Elizabeth didn´t get baptized because they didn´t get married on friday. Elizabeth´s dad couldn´t come sign the paper giving permission for her to get married because he had to work that day and he lives two hours away. We are going to try again this week. Pray for a miracle.

I had my first real power outages this week. The power has gone out before but only while we´re asleep or in the middle of the day so it´s never been a problem, but this week the power went out at about six o´clock and the rule is we have to go home when the power goes out, so lit some candles and sat around in the dark. That happened twice. The good news is we were all told the power was going to go out staurday at six so we were super strassed about how to do our baptisms since we had them planned for six, but then the power never went out that day. Tender Mercy.

We still don´t have a phone. Most of the people in town haven´t had a cell signal in almost three weeks. It makes missionary work a wee bit more difficult.

La familia Castallón are some of my favorite people in Olanchito. The grandpa is ninety something and the grandma is seventy something. They are the sweetest people. ha ha Hermana Castallón told me that if I want to find a husband I have to go to La Ceiba because the men are better looking there than in Olanchito. They have two grown children and their son has 11 kids and they all live in the same house. I love it when we go to the Castallón´s house.

I have offically gained an inch around my waist. Now I actually have to start paying attention to what I eat and exercise in the morning and all that junk. Oh, well.

I am surrounded by people relaxing in hammocks all day long, but I never get to sit in one.

On Wednesday we had an acitivity for all the investigators of the missionaries in our ward and for the members, so they could get to know people and we could gain some references. We played soccer at the church and I realized that I love sports! All sports, soccer, pingpong, whatever, I´ll watch it. I sat on the grass (or the closest thing they have to grass) and watched and it was so fun. Also, it´s funny because even the latin guys who don´t really like soccer are still really good at it because they´ve been forced to play they´re whole lives.

The sister training leaders came on friday and we had no idea they were coming because we don´t have a phone. I went out with Hermana Hill again. It was really great. I learned a ton of stuff that I can do better. But I also gained a lot of confidence since I had to take the lead in all of the lessons we taught. It was a really awesome day.

Elder Real was going to perform the baptisms on Saturday so he was standing there in his all white clothes and his companion Elder Passey walked by and said "Daaang, girl." I laughed so hard I cried. The next time you see the missionaries remember that, yes, we are representatives of Christ, but we´re still just a bunch of punk kids.

Also, I learned the correct way to cut a tomatoe. The mission is making me a better person in so many different ways.

Have a great week!

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

This is Week 12!!!

So today starts my twelth week in Honduras. I´ve been thinking all week about how it´s been really fast but now saying week 12 sounds like a really short time.

Next week on the 5th are transfers. We are going to wake up at two in the morning and take an eight our bus ride to Progresso and then I´ll take an eight hour bus ride back to Olanchito with my new compañera. Super exciting! This transfer went by crazy fast. Before I know it I´ll be going home.

The conference last tuesday was really good. At one point he made a cool comparison to how finding a spouse is like finding investigators. You find them, then you teach each other, then you set a fecha, and you have to endure to the end. It was really cool, but it didn´t make me super baggy or anything (sarcasm hand (shout out to Sierra and Rachel)).He also talked about how all the latin missionaries need to learn english. Especially as a member of the church because conference talks and stuff like that just aren´t as good after you translate it. How are you supposed to feel the power in Elder Holland´s voice when you´re listening the translater? I´m so gratefull I speak english.

The bus ride back to Olanchito was super rough. The driver was just really stop and go. We were all feeling realy sick. The good news none of us puked. The bad news is I don´t have a super funny story about that time 18 mssionaries threw up on the bus...

Hermana Calpa and I went and got all the paper work ready for Selvin and Elizabeth to get married! The are getting married on friday and they are geting baptzed on saturday. I am so excited for them!!

We also have two other baptisms scheduled for this saturday. Natlalia, she is nine and she is awesome. and Manuel, he rocks too.

We are teaching a 17 year old girl named Victoria. She is so smart and has a thrist for learning. I think she is great. She didn´t comet to church this week, but she is so excited about the gospel!

At one point she was telling us about how she wants to travel to spain and learn to play piano and learn english and how she has all these dreams. I thought how refreshing it is to meet a young person who still has all these hopes and dreams. But then I realized, I´m a young person! I should still have hopes and dreams. Why don´t I still have hopes and dreams?? But then I realized I´m living mine. When I was in high school I wanted to go to Utah State, go on a mission, get married. So far I´ve done all that. Sure, I´d love to travel to europe or teach english in Asia, but then I realized (It was a long process of realizations) that if I spend some time traveling it will be wonderful but it won´t really bring me lasting happiness, only temporary pleasure. The things in this life that are going to bring me life long happiness are things like the gospel and getting marries and having a family some day. It´s not that I don´t have any hopes and dreams they´re just a lot more simple then they used to be. Life rocks.

1 Thessalonians 4:1-2 are really great. As a member f the church you know what you should and shouldn´t do, it´s just about making the choice that you already know is right. 

God bless carpet. Gd bless the U.S. postal service,  Wendy´s, Teva sandals, running water and correct translation. God bless the United States of America.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to be here. I know that this gospel changes lives and that it makes a wonderful impact on my life everyday. I can´t tell you enough how much I love this gospel. I hope you all have a great week.

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

I Miss Olanchito

Today I am writing you guys from the beautiful city of La Ceiba! We have a multi-zone conference here tomorrow, so we are spending the night here. Oh, and all the internet and phone signals aren´t working in the center of Olanchito so we came to Ceiba a little early so we could email. You know you´re in Honduras when: you just haven´t had a phone for the last four days.

I am super excited to be here in Ceiba! I love getting to see the differences in all the cities in Honduras. It is right on the beach. We went to the grocery store with some Hermanas and I mentioned that this is way nicer than the nicest strore we have in Olanchito and Hermana Thacker said this isn´t even the nicest store. And I went to the mall today!!! They have stores that aren´t just things sent here from the Good Will. And this city is big enough that we took a bus from the store to their apartment. We don´t have short distance buses in Olanchito. It is crazy! And yet I kind of miss my cute little, quiet Olanchito. IT will be nice to go back home tomorrow. 

Things I Haven´t Found Answers To:

1.Who wrote the Book of Acts?

2.Who gave John the Baptist the Arronic Preisthood? An Angel?

3. (and most important) What on earth is the difference between when you use an indirect object pronoun, a direct object pronoun, and personal A?? And people throw reflexive pronouns on the end of verbs that aren´t reflexive!! What is the difference between "vamos a ir" and "vamos a irnos" No entiendo. I´ve asked latins, gringos, todas and no one actually has an answer. I asked Hermana Calpa and I realized that I have a better understanding of spanish grammer than she does. I NEED HELP!! Please and thank you.

Your homework for this week is to use the word "coquette." Also, read Acts 20:9-11. Paul talked so long a man died!! Well, Paul brought him back, but still... Am I the only one that laughed when they read this?

I realized a few days ago how many miracles I´ve already seen on my mission. Like how even though Selvin Palacio wasn´t interested in our message, because of teaching him we found Selvin and Elizabeth! and they came to church yesterday and are preparing to be baptized on the first. Also, we hadn´t seen José for a week and half because he has school and work all day and he doesn´t have a phone so he is hard to find. On Friday night I specifically prayed that we would be able to find Jose on saturday even if it was just long enough to remind him about church, and on saturday we found him!! He was just leaving the house when we walked up!! Miracle! AND I found a bag of peanut M&Ms at the store! I made it last about three days and everytime I ate one it was like a little piece of heaven in my mouth. No one can convince me that our Father in heaven isn´t looking out for me.

In the song I am a Child of God, the part where it says lead me, guide me, walk beside me, I always thought was refering to God. I want God to lead me and walk beside me. But in the spanish version all the comands are in ustedes form, not usted. It´s plural, and I realized that it isn´t just God who needs to help lead children back to Him, it´s all of us. I need my parents, and my sisters, and my friends and my leaders to walk beside me through my life too, not just God. It means so much more to me now.

I hope you guys all have a great week! Watch the Olympics for me. 

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

I've been out over a hundred days!

So... later in the day last week I realized that captify actually is a word... Que verguenza!

One of our investagators gave us un Libro de Mormon this week... I think I´m doing missionary work backwards.

Elizabeth came to church yesterday!! She thought it was great and we are teaching her and Selvin again tomorrow. We found out that he wasn´t actually baptized, so we´ve made a goal for both of them to be baptized on the 1 of marzo. I am so excited! I really think they can make it.

On wednesday we went on splits. And it went really well. We taught Ariel and it was amazing. The Spirit was there and he was actually paying atention. We talked more about the Book of Mormon. Hermana Calpa and I went back the next day and read 3 Nefi 11 with him. I really think he felt the Spirit. But then our next lesson with him he was back to not paying atention and joking around the whole time. I don´t know how to work with this guy. Vamos a ver.

Also, while I was waiting for Hermana Calpa to come back from splits I chatted with a member for like half an hour!! In America this would be insignificant, but we chatted for a half an hour  IN SPANISH!! I can totally do this.

Olanchito is surrounded by mountains. The other day I glanced out a window and for a moment the mountains looked like Utah. It was super happy.

At District meeting all the Latins were debating which one of their countries is better, then all the North Americans just looked at each other and agreed that clearly they were debating over second best because the United States of America is better than any of their countries. I´ve never been more patriotic than in the last three months.

Also, thursday was my 100th day of my mission!! Woo hoo! We got ice cream to celebrate.

If you would like to experience part of my life google the song Loco by Enrique Iglesias or the song Darte un Beso by Prince Royce. The members and other people around town listen to those songs all the day long. Also the Le Gusta la Banana song.

I love Honduras, I truly do... but sometimes people ask me if I´m going to marry a Honduran and live here forever and I feel like someone just asked me why I have Bumpers number, "um........ uh...... uh........" 

So there is an article in the Liahona this month about how to have good communication with your spouse. Even though I´m a missionary and clearly I´m not getting married anytime soon I read it. Then I realized that every other missionary read it too. Que baggy! 

But anyway, there is a part where it talks about how you should schedule a time regulary to talk how you communicate and your other problems, basically you need to have weekly Companionship Inventory!! Just the missionaries do every week during weekly planning. I would just like to point out that no matter who you are the principles in Preach My Gospel will help you. 

The gospel is true. Change is real. More importantly the Atonement is real. Have a great week.

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

You know you're living in Honduras when.......

Sorry guys, this is a long one. Prepare yourselves

You know you´re living in Honduras when:

1. you and the other missionaries buy a 63 year old woman an axe for her birthday.

2. the horses eat from garbage cans on the side of road in the center of town.
3. your investigator says, "Sientanse." and you look aroud for a chair and all you see are a stump and a cinder block.

4. the lady at the panederia gives you a spoon with your donought.

5. you see a woman walking down the street in heals, talking on her cell phone with one hand and holding a live chicken with the other.

7. for dinner they fry a fish whole: scales, eyes, everything, and then give it you.

8. Elder Curtis says just now, "Is captify a word?" and Hermana Holdaway says "Yeah, that´s a word." Non of us remember how to speak english.

This week went by super fast. And I totally feel like Sister Harris when she gives the lesson every month in Relief Society, "Where did the month go?" We´re already in febrero!!

Let´s talk about Alejandro. We were teaching a bunch of guys sitting outside their house. We were teaching about baptism and all of a sudden this 60 year old guy´s eyes get really wide and he says, "I wasn´t baptized! Will you baptize me??" uh, Yeah!! It´s great, but I worry that he´ll just go inactive after a week if we baptize him. We certainly need to teach him more. He doen´t really have an understanding of the gospel yet. I just need to remember that my purpose is to bring others unto Christ and strengthen people´s testimonies, not to baptize people.

Now let´s talk about Selvin. On friday we were walking down the street and this guy rode up to us on  his bike and asked us to teach the godpel to his wife. I don´t even need to go contacting invesigators come to me! I´m such a great missionary!! ha ha JK  His wife overheard us giving a lesson to their neighbor and she liked what she heard. She tried to come over and talk to us but we left too quickly so Selvin was really excited that he saw us walking down the street. Turns out that Selvin was a member when he was kid. He told that he was baptized, but he brought us the certificate that he has it was actually for a receiving a name and a blessing when he was six. We are looking into if he was actually baptized or not. We have to wait a little bit before we can baptize Elizabeth because the two of them aren´t legally married yet, and they can´t get married until Elizabeth turns 18. yes, you read that right. She is 17 and he is 30 and they´ve been living together for 3 years. whatever floats their boat. They didn´t come to church yesterday so I am really excited to go talk to them tomorrow.

Jose didn´t come to church yesterday, but othe than that he is solid. We told him to read 2 Nefi 31 and he not only did it but he read all the way to Jacob 1! and had tons of questions for us! Super pilas!! I¨m hoping he´ll get baptized on the 22. He is such a sweet kid.

ALSO!!!!!! I just learned where the boundry of my area actually stops!! It is right by my house! Not a billion cuadros north like I thought!  We´ve been super stressed about where to eat lunch. Most missionaries study at their house for an hour after lunch because it´s hot, but we can´t do that if we´re working a half a hour away from our house. If we could work closer to our house in the morning, find a family closer to feed us, study for an hour, then go up and work in La Conquista my life we be so much better!! I talked to Hermana Calpa about it and we are going to go cantacting Libertad Sur tomorrow morning. I really hope this can bring a solution to our problem.

The Denny´s wrote me a letter entirely in Spanish and I understood the whole thing!! Aha, chiqui! Also, thanks to them for keeping me posted on USU´s win at the Poinsetta Bowl. Go Aggies!!!

Apparently my mission has reached it´s limit of sisters, so we aren´t getting any more anytime soon. This means it could be like eight months before I¨m senior companion or a trainer. Que triste. Oh well.

Chapter 6 of PME is amazing. I´ve been reading a lot about having Christlike love this week. I´ve never been the type of person that instantly loves people. I´m really picky about who I spend my time with. If you bug me then I don´t want to be around you, it´s that simple. You can´t do that on the mission. I think this is one of the biggest ways I¨m supposed to change while I´m out here. I need to learn to love other people. Everyone needs to read 1 Peter 4:8 (make sure to read the footnote) When you have Christ like love for others and for yourself it prevents sin.

Well, that´s it for this week. Sorry I wrote a novel. Love you all. Hope you have a great week. Find something to smile about today.

Love,

Hermana Odekirk