Trial by fire...

11/1/10...Hello,

Well, this last week has been pretty nuts! I named this email "Trial by fire..." because that's what I feel like this is. I've been put into an area that I don't know anything about with a companion who is looking to me for guidance and council yet at times I feel like I have no clue. Being whitewashed into and area and training at the same time is not something I thought I would be doing on my mission. Oh, being "whitewashed" is when they move both missionaries out of an area and put in different missionaries...sorry if that's unclear. Anyway, I've been busy trying to get things organized and helping Elder Morris learn all that I can. I'm happy to say that things are moving along nicely now. I've definitely been praying with extra fervor the last week or so, and Heavenly Father has been blessing me.
Those first few days were pretty strange. I felt so out of place. Funny story...I sleep on a full sized bed. So, throughout the night I move a lot and get all turned around. Haha there have been a few times where I'll go to get up in the morning and the room is so dark that I don't know which way I should go to get out of bed. I would keep sticking my feet out and bumping them on things. I'm happy to say that I finally figured it out, and I'm not having that problem as much anymore.
At times I catch myself thinking about Ocala. I wonder how the new are Elders doing. I really hope they are taking good care of things. I did my best to make it a smooth transition for them and to make sure things were organized. I hope it worked out. I definitely miss the people down there.
Elder Morris and I get along really well. He has a great attitude and is very smart. He's been learning quickly. We've been able to find a few new investigators and they are pretty neat. One of them is named Misa. It's like Lisa, but with an M. It's a miracle we found her. We went to see a potential investigator that the last Elders had left for us. When we were walking up to her door a little girl was walking up at the same time. As we waited for the potential investigator to answer the door we asked the little girl if her parents would be interested in hearing a message about Jesus Christ. She said that her parents wouldn't, but her grandma might want to. The potential investigator didn't answer so we went to this little girls house and talked to her grandmother. Her grandmother wasn't interested, but her older sister was. Misa is the little girl's older sister. She came to church yesterday and enjoyed it. Things are going well with her.
Elder Morris and I have had some fun experiences. They're things that I've gotten used to, but are a real eye opener for him. I'm not really going to go into detail, but I will say that the ghetto part of town is very different haha...
The apartment we live in is pretty small. It's got two bedrooms and one bathroom. The bedrooms are...cozy. We share with two other Elders. They are Elder Bagley and Elder Camp. They're great. We have a lot of fun. There is a park across the street from our apartment and last night while we were leaving to go to dinner there were people LARPing there. LARPing is Live Action Role Playing. If that doesn't clear it up, LARPing is essentially when people dress up like knights and go fight each other with big foam swords. I never expected to see anything like that out here. I got a good chuckle out of it.
The ward here is great. The members are all young. I would say the majority of them are in their mid-twenties to mid-thirties. Yesterday when I went to our meeting before church I was shocked. Most of the leaders couldn't have been more than a few years older than me. They're very friendly people.

Love Always, Zach