Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Photos


wedding

hermanas of Tahuantinsu


modern mall


September 22, 2014

hey everyone!! thanks for all the emails!
 
this week C & H got married!  it was such a fun day and they were all so happy.  i sent a few pictures so hopefully you can feel a little of the excitement we felt that day.  the next step is to prepare and  for baptism.  if everything works out as planned they should be baptized in october! 
 
this week i was thinking about things that i love about peru.  there are definitely things i dont like (cultural differences, weird beliefs, tardiness) but there are also so many things i love about peru.  so here are a few:
 
-the food here is super good! (very fattening and diabetes waiting to happen with so many carbs but very good haha).  they are very proud of their food and spend hours in the kitchen every day preparing lunch.  
-also there are little tiendas on every street which are like little mini stores where you can buy whatever random thing you want.  they literally have everything. 
-the people are really friendly and they wave or say hi to everyone that passes by. 
-in peru there is beach, jungle, mountains, snow, and desert.  they have it all.  
-there is so much old culture and families have traditions that trace back to the incas
-the people here are not focused on material things and they dont really care about their appearance.  they have their focus on different things.  instead of being focused on clothes and phones and cars and houses, they are focused on family and religion.  everyone believes in god here. 
-also the church is fairly young in peru so almost everyone we talk to that is a member is a convert.  they have such cool stories of how they were converted and the reasons they are in the iglesia right now.  
 
there are so many more that i cant think of right now but i really do love peru.  and i am so grateful for this oportunidad to live her for year and half and experience the crazy peruvian culture!
 
les quiero mucho! estoy muy agradecida por este oportunidad de ser misionera y experimentar la felicidad que este evangelio brinda.  y también que puedo compartirlo con ustedes un poco por medio de mis emails!   yo sé que dios no ama y que este evangelio es verdadero.  yo sé con todo mi corazón que las familias pueden ser eternas! les quiero mucho!
 
xoxo hermana murdock  

Monday, September 8, 2014

Welcome to my Peru!

knocking on doors!

welcome to my Peru!


a typical Peruvian house

washing by hand

September 8, 2014


This week i had a really humbling experience.  my companion and i gave service to one of the old ladies in the ward.  every wednesday we have time to give service.  so we planned to help one of our investigators but they weren't home.  so we decided to walk around and find something to do.  so we decided to knock on the door of one of the members house.  and she was home alone doing laundry.  she is allergic to laundry detergent so her whole hand was red and had a huge rash all over.  so it was the perfect opportunity to give service! here in peru the people live in very humble circumstances and they do laundry by hand.  it is a very long and hard process and its super hard on your back and your hands.  and the water is freezing! but my companion taught me how to do it and we spent the next 2 and a half hours doing the laundry.  and then we hung it out to dry but there is no sun and there is a ton of humidity so it takes days to dry.  it was a very humbling experience because i just realized how blessed i really am.  most of the world does laundry by hand.  in other parts of peru they wash their laundry in rivers with rock or with a scrub board.  i really feel so grateful to be serving here because i am learning so much about what really makes people happy.  its not the material things that bring happiness.  those thing are unnecessary.  its families, friends, and the gospel that make people happy.  it was a great day and my companion and i both felt super happy to be giving service and helping this hermana.  she was so thankful for our service!!!
 
C & H are doing great! this week we recieved their partidas so they were able to register for the wedding and are now trying to do all the other paperwork they have to do before the wedding.  they are both super excited and a little stressed but everything will turn out great! 
well thats all for this week.  I always have so much i want to say but just dont have the words to explain everything.  my english is struggling a little bit haha.  but i hope that you can feel my love and excitement for the work.  i love being here and i am a really going to try to use these last 4 months to work hard and teach like crazy.  
i love you all!!

Photos of Lima








September 1, 2014

hello family!
 
i am sending a bunch of pictures of downtown lima.  it was so awesome.  it really looks like europe.  it was great to get out for a few hours and experience lima haha there is so much culture it is so interesting.  lima was founded by spain so there is a lot of catholic history with tons of huge churches.  i definitely want to go back one day to be able to see more.  
yesterday we had a miracle.  we had 6 investigators at church!  we really are so excited for this month of september because we have some great investigators who we can see have big potential.  and i should be a professional wedding planner!! C & H are getting married!! C is an inactive member who was baptized when she was young in arequipa and then she moved to lima and stopped going to church. H had never really heard of the church and didnt even know that C was a member.  but they live like 4 houses away from us and are friends with my pensionista.  so we started visiting them awhile ago and became really good friends with their 2 little kids.  C is pregnant so they are expecting aother baby in january.  We challenged them to be married and they told us that honestly no one had ever taught them that people should get married.  they really had never been told that marriage was important.  but after a family night with the bishop and another with our pensionista and her family, C & H have decided to be married on spetember 19th! so now we are in the process of finding their partidas de nacimiento and all that fun stuff.  but luckily this time i know a little bit more about how to do it.  C & H and their 2 kids all came to church yesterday! we were so excited.  
 
we had 4 other investigators that came also that are progressing towards baptism.  we are hoping that they will all be baptized in september but we also know that the adversary likes to convince people that following heavenly fathers plan is not what they should do.  so keep them all in your prayers!! 
the weather is finally starting to warm up a tiny tiny bit haha.  now sometimes the sun comes out for an hour or so.  it makes me so happy!
well thats all for this week! i love you all.  have a great week
xoxo hermana murdock