PROTESTS, PROMPTINGS, AND GOING ON SPLITS

(EMAIL SENT JANUARY 18, 2016)

Shumway Crew,

Sounds like you are all doing super great!! McKay is going to start working on his mission papers ... SOOOO EXCITING! And Mom, that is so cool that you got called to speak during sacrament meeting! Tell the ward I love them and that I say "HI"! Honestly ... I can’t believe how fast time has flown either. IT BLOWS ME AWAY!!! In one week I will be on my last mission transfer.

So this last week kind of just feels like a blur ... it went by so fast ... and I honestly don’t remember most of it. Here is a quick rundown.

It was a pretty crazy week in our area because there was a huge protest in Talara. It was called EL PARO. It was a pretty much the whole city that went in strike against a company here. It is a gas company and so the whole city didn’t drive any cars that day ... meaning no motos, buses, or taxis. It was like a ghost town! The people created fires in the streets, poured bags of bricks area, and threw bottles on the ground so people didn’t drive. In the end there was a huge march down the street. Apparently the company has been hiring workers from other countries and not using those who live in Talara. So everyone got mad and had this huge protest. Kinda crazy!

But the miracle of the protest is that we found some great contacts. Everyone was walking in the street so it was PERFECT!! And one family in particular stood out to us. It was a Dad and his two teenage kids. We passed by and literally I felt something tell me I should contact them. My comp felt the same but as they walked by they were walking pretty fast and we decided not to contact them. I felt bad for not saying anything and felt like we needed to contact them. I looked at my comp and I said we need to go back. So pretty much we CHASED THEM down ... running down the street and contacted them. We presented ourselves and said we share a message about families! We asked if we could stop by sometime and they said... TOMORROW morning! They seemed really interested and cool. SO ... we passed by the next morning ... and man ... THEY ARE INCREDIBLE. The daughter said she has a friend who is Mormon and has always wanted to know about the church. They asked us many questions and we shared a little about the restoration. It all went great until they told us they would be going out of town for about a month. But they gave us their number and we gave them ours so hopefully they call us. It is sad because they seemed so ready for this message, but I know that Heavenly Father works in mysterious ways and there is a reason we taught them right before they went on vacation.

Also this last week we had many visits with our hermanas. We had visits with our sweet hermanas in Sullana and the upper part of Talara. We are their hermana leaders and stopped by to see how they are doing in their areas and if there is anything we could do help. In Sullana we watched their weekly planning and took a few classic selfie pics. The two hermanas are Hermana Lang and Hermana Garcia. They are so cute and it was cool watching how they plan. Later this week we met with the hermanas from Talara Alta. I got to spend the day with darling Hermana Richan. Sadly ... NO PICS. She is from Utah and was in the group of Hermana Bryce and Hermana Thomas. And probably the sweetest person I have ever met. I got to know her area, and we got to spend a day teaching together. It was great! Her Spanish is incredible for only having been here six-ish months.

The bummer was we couldn’t find many investigators this week, but we did find Angelo! And he says he feels its true, and is going to pray for his baptismal date. He is doing great! Also, we found Ortencia and she now accepted another baptismal date for 20 of Febrero. Our other investigators it has been DIFFICULT finding them ... but this week hopefully we will! No one came to church but NEXT WEEK for sure!

It was more of a crazy hectic week ... but I don’t even remember most of what happened. But the great thing is we have another week full of new memories!

I LOVE YOU ALL!!! Have a great week and keep on being the great people you are! I pray for you all every day!

Keep on keeping on,

Hermana Shumway

We visited some of the sisters that we are leaders of ... they are just superb