You might be wondering, "What is that Elder Kniff, (or Gregg), what the heck are you talking about?" "Has he gone crazy already?" No, I have not. That my friends and family is the sound of my new authentic Panamá Indian Kuna flute, called a camboburgui, or something like that. A young man in our branch gave it to me because he had more that one and it's awesome, definitely a cool souvenir. It's like a woodwind instrument, like a panflute in Peru, and the Kunas do an authentic dance and everything. It sounds pretty sweet, made from different sizes and lengths of bamboo. I want to try to just go over tunes of hymns in my head and try to play them by ear on the flute, or flauta in Spanish. Like I'm trying to learn how to play Praise to the Man, or Loor al Profeta on it and it's sweet.
Anyway, Kunaland is going well, 2 weeks left. I want to talk about a couple generic Panamá things first though. 1st, super cheap amazing fruit, especially pineapple. When you buy it in the store, you're signing the lease to your house away, especially in the states. How much would one pineapple cost you all back home in America? Well at a street market in Veracruz, I bought 3 pineapples for a dollar! WOAH!!!!!! And they were really good. Pretty much decided that pineapple is my favorite fruit, by iteslf, just not in things like desserts, just pineapple by itself is wonderful. And street markets are the way to go also, things are always cheaper that way. Another Panamanian thing is the street dogs. I remember Max mentioning a long time ago in Honduras about the perros bravos, well it's kinda like that here too. Yes, every house has at least 2 vicious dogs that bark at a leaf falling off a tree, but that is one thing. The other is the STREET dogs. So gross. They are all wild, strays, and losing their fur and eating trash, diapers, whatever they can find in their home (the street). I've seen the ugliest dogs here in my entire life and it's sad, but no one does anything about it. They should all just be taken away and put down, because they serve no purpose, just cause more car accidents swerving trying to avoid them, haha.
But I don't want to talk all about that stuff in my email, these emails are for spiritual moments as well, and boy howdy, have I had a bunch of those this week...so listen up! Firstly, we had 3 baptisms this past Friday, woot! 3 jovenes of 14 years old, all awesome guys, Cristhian uno, Cristhian dos, and Kleiber. And yes, I do call them those names, Uno and Dos, it's hilarious! I told them that I was going to baptize them using those names also, haha. It was really great, it was originally going to be 5 people, then 4, but we got 3, and I am very grateful for my Heavenly Father for blessing us with those guys who are genuinely interested in the gospel and found the church through youth activities and Seminary with their friends who are members. I also had the pleasure of baptizing the 3 of them, on my knees...haha. We filled the font and sometime during it all, the plug came out and it wouldn't fill up fast enough, so I got to do the 3 baptisms kneeling, pretty crazy experience, but the Spirit was really strong the whole time, as these youth start their lifetime of blessings from the Gospel and the Church.
Now let me explain why the number of people went down from 5 to 3. One is Hermano González, remember him? The guy that works next to the church. Well we had been working with him a lot, taught all the lessons, and were acercándonos to his fecha. In a lesson about a week before his baptism, I got the impression that I needed to ask him if he was married, legitimately married. I asked him, and he gave me a roundabout answer saying that him and his "mujér, or señora" had lived together for more that 7 years, so "technically" they were considered married. SO, you aren't married, even if the government says you are, not in God's eyes you aren't. He never explained any of that when we taught and explained the Law of Chastity to him in depth, just agreed with everything and said perfect. Glad I followed that prompting, because since then, he's now working with our Branch President to try to speed up marriage papers and stuff so he can get baptized, but he has a lot more progress that needs to be made before that eternal covenant is made. It's so frustrating at times when people refer to one another as, esposa or esposo, when they are not actually married. I know we should've asked him right off the get-go when we started teaching him, but he has 4 kids with her, in my Mormon eyes I assumed that they were a happy married family, just not married. SO that's minus one of the baptisms, but we are working with him still a lot. I would love to see that man baptized in my time left here with all the experiences I've had with him, I just don't know if it's possible, government wise. Also, another one of the jovenes that we were teaching, didn't really show up, nor pay as much attention as he should of to the lessons we shared, so when it came to the point for our DL to give him the interview to be baptized, my DL said that he couldn't let him go through because he didn't know anything, and that we need to keep working with him. He's a good kid, just doesn't seem as interested as the rest. And now that we have these recent converts, I want to work hard with their families, because some are part-member families, people that are insanely inactive; got baptized off in San Blas where the Church is not strong at all. SO that's what I will be working on these last 2 weeks.
But yeah, great experiences. The best being this week, seeing, participating, and helping in the ordination of Hermano Lincoln, my blind friend, to becoming a Melchesidek Priesthood holder. Wow, that was amazing yesterday. I walk him everywhere we go, he always grabs onto my bag as I walk him to church because he can't see, and talks to me and tells me jokes, so fun, love that man. Well I walk him to the front and help him sit down, and then it was me, my Branch Pres, and the old Branch Pres as we put our hands on his head. I felt like Peter, James, and John when they did the same thing, ordaining to the Melchesidek Priesthood. The Spirit testified to me so strong that what we were doing was right, and we were all worthy Melchesidek Priesthood holders and had the right, ability, and honor of exercing that authority that He has given to us. I really do look for experiences like that every week for when I write these emails, and I'm sorry for you all that can't feel it the way that I do when it happens. But these simple words I write cannot explain how the Spirit testifies to oneself, expecially me, as a missionary, longing for the loving embrace of the Savior as I do His work. It was amazing everyone, amazing!
Fun story, yesterday we had two gringos in Sacrament meeting, actual gringos that live in the US. Utah more specifically. They were on vacation and stayed at a rich people hotel called Playa Bonita which is near Veracruz and they decided to come to the closest chapel they could find, which was our little branch. They were really nice people, and the guy ended up needing to call his "driver" to have him come pick them up, but his phone wasn't working. And he was asking me to translate and ask the Branch President to use his phone to call the driver to get him to come pick them up. It was a great experience because I really felt like these people depended on me, speaking Spanish, because they didn't speak a lick of Spanish. I was realizing, if I hadn't been there to help them, who knows how they would've gotten back to their hotel or been able to comunicate themselves. Great blessings of having a gringo missionary in a Ward or Branch to communicate with toursits, haha.
Well everyone, what a week. Every week is, even with a comp that you want to murder at times for acting like a child. I have so many things that make me realize that I have a Father in Heaven that loves me and cares for me daily, hourly, minutely, secondly.
2 scriptures for you as always, first is in Exodus 28:30, which talks about the breastplate with the Urim and Thummim which Joseph Smith ended up having to translate the Book of Mormon, cool scripture. And the other is for you all, neglecting, denying to learn Spanish, well I give you this! D&C 90:15, and see what you say to that, bwuahaha! :) I agree with Max completely, we're going to get back home and talk to each other in Spanish about you in front of your faces and you'll have no clue what's going on, it'll be great! You want that??? :)
Love you all, have a wonderful week, escudriñen las excrituas al diario.
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