This week has been an adventure!
I´m not sure where to start...so I will start with what went down Tuesday night.
We were all sitting in the church building (well us four missionaries and our ward mission leader) and we were having correlacion. We were talking about our investigators and what not when someone ran into the room screaming about a tsunami...earthquake...8.2..bla bla bla.
Well it wasnt really bla bla bla....I heard the word tsunami and suddenly my lifetime of nightmares ran into my head and I was in total panic mode.
All I was able to translate into my head (which was filled with images from Day after tomorrow and basically no logic or anything else) was thatv we had to go back to our house...Right away!
We ran. I screamed the whole way. Acting like a missionary was not exactly in my head during these moments. It was a long 10 min run in which we learned from random passerbys that there had been a huge earthqauke somewhere in chile...and we had huge tsunamis and possible earthqaukes heading towards us...they were planned to hit at 11:00. So we had 30 mins to bunker down in our apt.
I knew we were far enough away from the ocean that the chances of the tsunami hitting us were small....but we changed into our pjs quickly and sat between our beds covered in pillows....anxiously waiting for the first set of temblors. And we waited. And waited.
Got some chocolate out. Waited some more.
The hardest part was just having no idea what was going on. We couldnt look on the internet or the news...or radio..nothing!
Finally we fell asleep and if there was an earthquake during the night it wasnt strong enough to wake me up.
My poor hermanas that live on the beach had to evacuate their house in the middle of the night in the cold and climb up a hill. haha hmmm
Other exciting things that happened this week....oh yes. I found out I have little bugs living under my skin eating me from the inside.
Yes. I have received (or at least discovered..who knows how many I have) my first parasite. You know all that talking I have been doing about my endless bug bites...well.
For the last month it has gotten so much worse. I will wake up covered in blood in my bed. And then I will have itching attacks randomly. Where my body feels like it is literally on fire and I am almost in tears because my body just itches so much! I used to have these in the night and would scracth so much in my sleep that I would wake up with huge bruises. So we started tying my hands together in my sleep so I wouldnt be able to itch. Just like they do to babies!
I wont go into all the details...like how during the day I can feel little something crawling around on my skin...yet I would get so confused because I saw that there was nothing there. But then there would be huge bite marks....ohh so horrible
Anyways...went to the doctor finally about it and came to find out that I have scabies. I didnt know what that was but it sounded really awful. Who knows where I got it from. I kiss every person in my path and sit in some terribly dirty places. In case you dont know..scabies is a parasite of little bugs that burrow under your skin and live there...and bite you. And lay eggs under your skin until you have about a whole village of little bugs...living under your skin. I know, I know. I will stop. It is disgusting and there is probably nothing worse in the world.
Its also super contagious so the doctor had to come to our house and give us all a strong medicine to take. All the bugs inside me are supposedly dead. But I need to take the meds again in two weeks to kill the eggs they have left.
Am I giving too much detail?
Its okay if no one ever wants to touch me again.
But Im just very grateful I dont have to wake up in blood anymore or feel little things running all over me todo el rato.
Anyways!
Conference was wonderful, wasnt it? I chose to watch it all in spanish. It just made me appreciate all the english hymns so much more! I could not get over how white everyone looked! Wow everyone looked so pale! I was looking at the choir and was just amazed at the whiteness of skin!
I could talk about each talk...but will refrain. I know you all were righteous and watched it too.
Today we visited the University of Concepcion. It is supposedly one of the most beautiful campuses in the world....and I would have to agree. It was breathtaking. It was also super clean and I had a hard time realizing that I was still in Chile.
I went on a cooking spree this week and smoethered my companions with pancakes pretty much every morning.
Last week I read an awesome talk by Monson called something about seeing the potential or importance in others. Its oct 2012 if you wantr to look it up. But it talks about our responsibility to have the ability to see others as they could be. Everyone has so much potential. We cant even begin to imagine the potential we have...and the potential everyone has. I mean...each person here has the potential to create worlds! Just think of what people could become if we gave them the opportunity. If we had a little bit more faith in people...and give them a little bit more of a chance. We all know that if you want someone to be nice and honest and good..you have to believe they are that way..and treat them as if they were already that way. Sometimes that is very hard to do...but this week I really tried to do that. To really see others as God sees them...and see their potential. And I think its changing my mission..and my life.
Its getting me to go talk to the people who normally only whistle at us and swear..and getting me to go to areas that before I was pretty afraid of. And the results have been interesting...if nothing short of miraculous.
I think if I could learn one thing from my mission...and life..it would be the ability to see others as Christ sees them. And that includes myself too. If we all believed in our OWN potential a bit more..just think of what we could accomplish!
We were not meant to just be weak humans here. We have great things to accomplish!
I also thought this week...
Did I give up my life for 18 months to come here and just do small things....or to do GREAT things?
I need to remember that more often. And we all do.
Lets use our "4 mins" more wisely!
Love you all!
Have a great week!
Is it Easter this week? I dont even know
Hermana Orchard
We found a chinese restaurant last week...it just tasted like chilean food though haha but it was fun
Pancakes I made
Everywhere you go are just random piles of trash
Willfredo...my favorite man in the world
