I'm just a missionary and I like to help

Before I forget- some things that you could send me is maybe some aloe vera cream, some more sunscreen (because the sunscreen sucks here ) and my camera case broke. I can probably find a cheap one here though. And ya I think that’s all I really need.

Well this was an interesting week. Not the most productive but it was pretty good. It just seems to go flying by, these last two weeks especially have just been super fast and I feel these next couple are going to go by really fast also. I’m really excited for general conference. I am going to try and watch it in english if I can because well honestly I get a lot more out of it when it's in english. Spanish just isn't the same for me. So that will be fun. This week we have a zone conference and the next week a zone leader meeting so there might not be a lot of work getting done here in the next little bit. 

Well one thing I did this week was a dog surgery. We were coming back from downtown doing some paperwork and a sister called us saying that we had to come fast so we stopped by her office and she asked us to help with a surgery. A fly had planted it’s larvae in the dog’s ear and we had to take them out. It was quite gross and smelled awful but I was up for the challenge. It was funny when the owner asked if I was her assistant or if I was practicing and I said nope I’m just a missionary and I like to help. That was a fun experience. Other than that there wasn't much that happened that was really exciting. 

Tuesday morning we got a call from the relief society president and she said there was an old investigator who called her and said she wanted the missionaries to come over and visit her. So we went over and it was really weird because we had gone to that house the week before and I asked her to come join us in the lesson but she didn't really seem to interested and was doing other things so I didn't really worry about it. So I was really confused when she called and asked us to come over and visit her. She has been having the missionaries over for a long time but had never accepted the invitation to be baptized. We taught her and placed a date and she accepted it. It was all really quite weird to me how she had changed her mind so quickly from even just the week before.  I guess that just goes to show that everyone has their own time and their own way and we can’t try to force it, we just have to be ready for when they are ready. 

Well my week wasn't really that exciting, we went to another waterfall again today and that was really fun. Hopefully next week I will try and write early so you guys don’t worry haha. Well thanks for everything. I loved the letters and the pictures. 

Love you guys, 

Elder Grigor

"The birthday of a young man in our ward. Since he got baptized

 9 months ago he has brought 9 friends into the church. 

We made him a name tag because he's basically a missionary."

"I did surgery on a dog. I had to take worms out of his ear. I could maybe see myself as a doctor growing up. The sister said it was an emergency so we ran over and she really needed help so I dove in with my gloves and apron. 

It was awesome!" 

"Sadly ants got into my mini eggs, I was quite upset. My easter package already got here so I opened it. I'm not very patient when it comes to candy. Ha ha!" 

Elder Grigor looks like he wants to eat that piece of bread.

 He must be hungry! 

Having fun on his p-day 

Cooling off at the waterfall

Elder Grigor and more missionaries doing what they can to cool off.

Communication is key

Hello Family

Well today I have my whole hour and a half so I am going to write a big long letter. Well I’m going to try at least. 

So before I forget my pensionista’s husband is really into racquetball and he loves ben-gay. A friend from the states brought it for him but he ran out and was asking if maybe you guys could send some in the next package. Also if you could send me a black sharpie that would be awesome. But just one is fine. I don’t think there is anything I need. 

Well this week was much better than the last week. We were able to get a lot more work done because we weren’t as busy with conferences and we actually had time to just work and be in our area which was awesome. So a little bit more about my area. Well we live in a pretty nice house and we have a little store right in front so every morning I go out to buy fresh bread which is awesome. I spend lots of money there haha. My pensionista’s are great. We have a lunch pensionista and a dinner pensionista. For dinner we eat with the members who own our apartment so that’s pretty nice having it so close and for lunch we eat with the 1st councillor in the stake presidency and they are so nice to us. I have loved all my pensionista’s. My area is basically all hill, the roads are made out of rocks. There are a few paved roads but for the most part it’s pretty rocky but my shoes don’t get as dirty as they have been in other areas. My ward is great, they help us out a lot! It’s a lot different than Uyuni was. 

The members give us lunch on the weekends and this week it was time for the bishop to take us out. And he is very rich especially for Bolivian standards. He has 6 cars and next week he’s going to pick us his new 0km Ford Eco Sport from the dealership. So he took us downtown to a nice buffet is his Toyota highlander. That’s the nicest car I’ve been in since I’ve been here. I honestly felt like a missionary in the United States. I ate so much food it was ridiculous, and it was so good. I don’t even know how much it was but he took us 4 missionaries out and his whole family. It was really awesome. 

Also this week we did two surgeries. There is a member in our ward who needed help castrating two cats. First we castrated a male cat and the next day a female cat. It was quite cool and really easy. Luckily I didn’t puke up my lunch. It was quite an interesting experience. 

This week I also had an exchange with one of our district leaders Elder C. in my area. Although I only had a little over 2 weeks I was able to find my way around pretty well and didn’t get lost which was great. It was a great exchange and everything went well. We got lots of work done and were able to find a few new people to teach and everything went great. Also with my companion things went a lot better. I was trying to talk a lot more and communicate and I noticed that we didn’t have as many problems as we were having before. Talking really makes all the difference. I’ve especially noticed that this week. Communication is key. It might sound weird but I love reading marriage articles from the Ensign because they always have great advice on how to get along better with your “companion”.  I’ve been trying to put some of the council to use and I’ve seen a difference. 

And about you guys coming to pick me up I’m still not sure yet. I think it would be really cool but I’m not sure. I asked the president in my email this week so we’ll see what he has to say about that but it’s something I’m thinking about. 

And that was basically my week. Hope you guys have a good one, loved the pictures. Love you guys, talk to you soon

Elder Grigor

A few more pictures from Elder Grigor's trip to the waterfall 

Fun loving missionary and a beautiful waterfall 

Love this one! 

We could all use this nice green scenery right about now! 

The only way to cool off on a hot day in Cochabamba

A tiny piece of his shirt managed to stay dry

The minor cat surgery...poor little guy! 

The Lord is there for us at all times

Ok so I am going to try and write really fast today. We went up as a zone today to a waterfall which was really cool. The only uncool thing is that some kind of got lost and we had to wait for them for quite a while to find their way back and now I don’t have much time on the internet because we got home pretty late.  But I’m going to try and write lots. So ya that’s what we did today, it was really fun but it just didn’t work out how we wanted it too. But I got some cool pictures and they were some fun memories. 

Well last Monday we couldn't leave the house after 4 o’clock and same with Tuesday. So we just stayed in and hung out with some other elders and then played monopoly. By the end of the day on Tuesday we were all dying of being inside so much so we went out and played basketball beside our house which was really fun. I love basketball. But those days were kind of boring, I watched all those movies that you sent me for christmas. Then on Wednesday we had a leadership conference all day. All the zone leaders from the mission got together and we had a big meeting with the president and the assistants which was really good. I loved it a lot, I learned a ton. A part I really liked was when the president spoke about the 4th watch. It's in Matthew 14:22-32 and how the Lord is there for us at all times and in all places and how he usually waits until the 4th watch so he can see our faith and a whole bunch of things concerning that scripture, it was awesome. After that we went and spoke with the stake president to plan the stake conference and what we were going to do. So Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we did not get anything done at all. Thursday we finally had time to work but in the morning we had to plan and then in the afternoon had to go to the offices and we lost some more time. My companion also hasn’t been feeling that well so when we had some time to work he just wanted to lay down and rest a bit so we really didn't get much done. Saturday the stake conference went well. I think our little part went well, we actually only had to do it for one hour so that was much better. Then on Sunday they had a special conference for all of Bolivia. It was stake conference everywhere and Elder Nelson, Elder Rasband and Elder Pino all spoke, oh and Sister Reeves. It was a great conference and everyone really enjoyed it. 

So my first real week as a zone leader was kind of really busy and there was hardly any time to go out and teach which meant awful numbers. They were probably the worst numbers of my mission but I think we are going to improve a lot this week. We don’t have any meetings that I know of and we should have a lot of time to work. At least I hope that we will have a lot of time to work. It’s been kind of hard on me this week because I really like to get out and work and when we can’t for different reasons it’s really tough on me. But I know that it’s going to get better. I have high hope’s for this week. 

I have to end now because I’m running out of time.  

Love you lots, talk to you next week. 

Elder Grigor

Playing Monopoly when they had to stay indoors for "Carnival"

Elder Grigor with his Zone 

A bus full of Missionaries. Elder Grigor is at the very back

It was "really hot"so Elder Grigor had to do this......

Love our missionary!!!!! 

This picture made me laugh out loud. So good. 

Back in Cochabamba- nice to be "home"

Hello Family

So I will answer the questions first. 

It is great being back in Cochabamba, it kind of feels like my home and I was away on vacation in Uyuni. I loved Uyuni and I’m kind of sad to be gone but I’m also super excited to be back. I am fairly close to the mission home, probably like 10 minutes away in a taxi. Where I live is called Pacata Baja. It’s kind of behind the christ statue. So we are pretty close to the center of things. My trip to Cochabamba was pretty long. We left Uyuni at 10:00 pm on Monday and got to Sucre at 5:00 am in the morning. Then we slept for a bit and got ready to go to the airport. I think our flight was at 10:00 am in the morning. It was the first time I had flown into Cochabamba in 10 months, it was really cool. And yes this time the missionaries were in the airport waiting for us. There I met my companion Elder G. from Lima, Peru. He has been out for 22 months in the mission and contrary to what I heard he is a great missionary who works hard and isn’t too trunky yet. He thinks he will be leaving this transfer to go "die" in another area but who knows. It’s possible because I have had a ton of companions already. My place is just a small room next to a members house. Well they have a big nice house and beside is our little place. We just have a bathroom and a bedroom basically, I took a few pictures, I will send them in a later email. I wasn’t able to take many pictures because I ran out of room in my card. So I deleted a couple old pictures just so I could take a few. And yes I do have to wash clothes by hand again. 

I do know who Elder H. is, we are from the same group that went into the MTC together. He started here in Villa Graciela and he was in my zone in Alamos for 2 transfers. I’m sure that I sent home pictures with him in it, when all the zone is together I’m sure. I wan’t the first Canadian to go to Bolviia but I was the first Canadian to go directly to the Lima MTC.

Everything is going pretty great here. The area is nice, we’re kind of on the hill, well my area is all hill basically so my calves have been pretty sore this week going up and down hills all day but its great. It’s probably the nicest area that I have been in. There are lots of nice houses and the members are great. They really want to help us in the work. It was kind of hard to do a lot of work this week because of the transfers, and we had to go to the office and then go pay the electricity bill for the zone and just a bunch of things that took our time away but it should get better I think. This week we won’t be working so much. Today and tomorrow is "Carnaval" so after 4:00 pm in the afternoon we have to be in our houses and can’t leave. Then on Wednesday we have a leadership meeting all day. Thursday and Friday we will work I hope, then Saturday we could possibly have a baptism in the morning. Then Stake Conference in the afternoon and another session at night. The stake president asked me and my companion if we could direct the priesthood meeting and center it all on missionary work. So we have 2 hours on Saturday to teach basically. I’m pretty nervous for that but it should turn out pretty well. We have a busy week coming up but it should be fun.

And well that’s was pretty much my week.  Oh and I got the package that you sent. I think it’s the one you sent for my one year so I didn't open it yet. I wanted to ask you first if I could or not haha. Well I hope you have a great week. 

Love you

Elder Grigor

Elder Grigor and his new companion Elder G. 

Elder Grigor's humble abode. 

Love the Canadian Flag. 

Elder Grigor's small bathroom. 

That shower is interesting!!!