Rain, Rain, Go Away

Dear Family,

 

It has been raining so much in Chorrera! I have been rotating both of my shoes and my boots during the week to try to prevent trench foot. In truth, I think I am far away from getting it, but you can never be too careful. I was inspecting a pair of shoes this morning to see if they were dry and discovered what I think is a light mold growing on the tongue. The shoes are anti fungal so the insides were good. I was surprised by how quickly it developed since they have been laying inside for only about a day and a half drying. The rain is so fun because we get the chance to be cold in Panama, and we can walk around like gentleman with our umbrellas. I cannot believe how hard it rains here. We have had some really fun "shouting" lessons to be heard over the deafening rain hitting the sheet metal roofs here.

 

The power went out last night in our house probably because of the rain. It really was not a big deal because it wasn't hot enough to need our fans and my flashlight throws enough light to shower and get ready for bed. We just worry about the fridge sometimes and are careful not to open it until the power comes back on which it did this morning. I am having interesting experiences here seeing what life would be like with the most basic things I have taken for granted. I don't think I could have most of these experiences anywhere else.

 

We have always had the support of a lot a members here, but a few had their reservations for helping us because there were some missionaries here before us that did some terrible things. I think we have done a lot to change those feelings because they talk to us now and give us references. For the most part this ward is really awesome. The bishop likes to go out with us and meet our investigators. He has encouraged others to do visits with us too. He has mostly stressed that we try harder to go out with the mission leader whereas we usually just meet with them once a week. This week we set baptismal dates for two families and another lady we have been working with. There is nothing that feels better or gets the heart pounding harder than inviting someone to be baptized.

 

Throughout most of my mission there has been a reluctance in my companionships to talk about the Book of Mormon on the first visit, but we are doing a lot to change that. The sooner we talk about it, the sooner we can start using it, the sooner the investigators can start reading it, the sooner they can gain a testimony of it and get baptised. It really is a powerful tool in the missionary arsenal. The Book of Mormon is a powerful testament of Jesus Christ and if people sincerely read it and pray about it they can receive an answer that it is true. I absolutely know that the Book of Mormon is true and love reading and using it in my teaching.

 

I hope everyone has a great week.

 

Love,

 

Elder Whiting

[There was a little more in a separate message - added below.]

Regarding Elder Polera: 
I was crushed to hear that news
I will miss seeing him here
we grew very close in the mtc sharing the same room and being in the same district.

Diet:
blueberries sound delicious right now
i was always happier gobbling them down than picking them
we get our fair share of rice
There has indeed been a big push to improve our diet
including hiring cooks
but the cooks give us rice every day so I don't know how effective that was.

i love the rice
it lasts us a really long time
good carbs to work throughout the day
yes we get meat all the time
usually a chicken breast
i have gotten really good at stripping every piece of meat from the bone

 

23 de Mayo

Dear Family,

 

I was surprised that I was kept with my companion Elder Estrada another change since he has been here a while. I was reminded of the scripture in Isaiah where God says My thoughts are not your thoughts, and that His ways are higher than our ways.

 

The father of the bishops wife died this week. It was so strange because earlier in the week my companion and the bishop gave him a blessing, and then I blessed the home. He looked like he was suffering a great deal and had advanced stages of cancer. I had a similar experience in Tocumen. Death seems a whole lot more common here. It is amazing to see the comfort the knowledge of the gospel brings to those that lose loved ones. Everyone in the family has the assurance that he is now in a better place free from his pains. Yesterday, a sister in our ward gave a talk about how hard it was to lose her father because she was not a member at that time.

 

I have had a lot of joy this week helping people. The dangerous moments in the mission are when you have time to think about yourself. There is no better way to distract your thoughts than service. The people here are so grateful for even the littlest things we try to help them with. I feel like service is a very important part of the mission anyways. We cannot claim to be representatives of Jesus Christ if we are not always looking for opportunities to serve others.

 

This week I will begin teaching English classes. 35 people have already signed up and only about 5 of those are members. We have been brainstorming a lot of good ideas for putting a gospel twist into the classes. Of course, we will also invite everyone to church. I hope this will be a good missionary activity. It has worked in other areas.

 

That is all for this week. Thanks for all of your letters and emails.

 

Love,

 

Elder Whiting

Ohana 16 May 2011

Dear Family,

I suppose I have already reported about Tuesday and my temple trip, so I will go on ahead in the week.

On Friday we have an activity called Ohana which means family in Tongan or something. A ton of people including investigators showed up, and everyone had a really fun time. We played a bunch of simple games like duck duck goose and musical chairs, and then the missionaries put on a talent show. Elders Dawson, Estrada and I danced Shakira's "Waka waka" and won the competition. We painted our faces and made ribbon skirts out of pom poms. The stake president spoke after the show and gave a really good message about missionary work. He had all of us stand up front and thanked us for putting on the activity and for everything we do here. We all felt pretty good. We were really nervous at first that the activity was going to be a disaster because no one showed up at 6 when it was supposed to start, but everyone started showing up at 7.

On Saturday we had a service project early in the morning to clean the stake center. Most of it involved cleaning up the mess from the activity we put on the night before. I really miss vacuums and the convenience in cleaning they provide. I was in charge of white boards and the stage.

We have changes coming up this Wednesday. I am almost positive that I am staying here. It is likely that my companion will leave, but he could also stay.

The "rescue" ended this week and was really successful. We have met a lot of the less active members in the ward and also nonmembers. Even though the activity is over, the members are still really animated about visiting their friends and others in the ward.

Love,

Elder Whiting

Happy Mother's Day

Dear Family,

Thank you so much for taking the time to chat yesterday. I had so much fun seeing everyone and hearing the voices of everyone. I did not know skype had a conference video call feature. I saw everyone signed in and thought oh no who do I talk to first and how are we going to share this time, so I was really excited when I saw everyone pop up. I can hardly believe how much the little ones are talking now, and I had to swallow a bit when they told me they love me. The first thing a lot of people say to me here is "oh you must really miss your family", and I always think, yeah you are right. I really love my mission though, and I am trying to make the most of every day.

I had the pleasure of doing my first session inside the temple here in Panama. It is a smaller temple than most, but it is absolutely beautiful inside and outside. It has been a while since I have gone, so I was surprised that some minor things have changed. I felt recharged after going to the temple. I really miss the regular attendance we were allowed in the MTC after going today. Three zones were there at the temple, so we had to wait a little bit longer for them to get everything ready for us. The session was in Spanish, so that was an interesting experience. They use the vosotros form of Spanish that is typically reserved for the scriptures and in Spain, so I was straining a bit.

Anyways, we do not have a lot of time to write today. I hope everyone has a great week and had a great Mothers Day.

Love,

Elder Whiting

2 May 2011

Nice Tri-colored Heron in this beach picture.

This week has been really rainy. These next four months are supposed to pour. I have been really going through umbrellas here. They are not the best quality, so they break a lot. I also have a bad habit of leaving them places since I am not used to carrying one.

We had our zone conference on Thursday with Arrejan and Chitre. I had fun talking with my trainer Elder Voss and saw Elder Monterosa who was in the MTC with me. It is always interesting to see the statistical reports in the mission and in each zone. Our zone had one of the highest baptism date statistics. President Ward showed some of the pictures of the toes of the Elder that had a ping pong table fall on him inbetween sessions. They looked pretty messed up, and I was not surprised amputation was opted.

I have already said this, but I will say it again that the bishop here is amazing. He has planned a rescue program to visit the goal of 100 families that have left the church during the week of May 8 to 14. He has everything organized really well and has mobilized practically every able-bodied person in the ward. We are excited to participate in the plan and anticipate a lot of success in bringing people back to church. With families that have been away from church for longer periods of time, there are often children that have reached baptism, priesthood ordination, seminary, and institute age.

In the missionary preparation class we participate in, we received pupils that we are going to mentor. We are going to help prepare them in any way we can and some are even going to come study with us in the mornings.

We were teaching a lady that lives on the far outreaches of our area a couple days ago. My companion told me that she went to conference, so we were really eager to find her, but did not have any luck until recently. She is one of those awesome people that are completely prepared to hear and accept the gospel. After the lesson, she asked a blessing on "our current prophet". We were blown away. We have only taught her once. So, of course, we are really excited about working more with her. It is so fun to find people like her. Have a good week.

Zone Conference in Chorrera