Well everyone, round 2 has come to an end here in Kunaland. Three months off in the islands of San Blas. This has been like nothing I've ever experienced before, and I'm sure that I won't ever have experiences like that ever again. A literal “once in a lifetime” opportunity.
Let me start first off by thanking everyone once again for all the letters and emails you sent to me during my time out there in Ustupu, very appreciative. Coming back from a 6 week period with no communication with anyone in the outside world, nor other missionaries but my comp, it's so nice to come back and receive all that at once, love overload! J
As I included in my email before, this second half of Blas was going to be spent with my new comp, Elder Paskett, from American Fork, Utah. He’s a cool guy, same amount of time as I had when I first came to the islands, so only one change less than me; and his Spanish is great. We’ve enjoyed our time together, and he gets to head back out soon, still not sure if the ones going off to Blas are gonna stick around and check out General Conference here in the city, or if they're going to head out there and then take a boat over to another island called Playon Chico and watch it there, we’ll see how that all unfolds.
We began this change by having miscommunication with the flight time. Got to the airport in Panama at like 5:30 am, thinking the flight was to leave at like 6:30, but nope! Turns out that it was leaving at 1:00 pm…so we got to wait in the airport for like 7 hours that morning haha; got some good reading in. But we were finally able to get on the plane and head on out there. Paskett was super nervous, as is normal, not really knowing what to expect because I didn’t really give him any details of what it was like in Blas, just wanted it all to really be a surprise, and I think it surprised him pretty well. There were a few things that we needed to do right off the bat, like buy Paskett a hammock and myself a new one. The one I bought a while back when I was in Veracruz is nice but super small, more of just a lounging hammock, and I wanted to get a nice Columbian made one that would be more comfortable to sleep in throughout the night and that I would be able to use post- mission. So I went and bought a nice one that’s like red stripes, kinda rainbow colored and it's big, fits me well, and it's held up nicely. Paskett on the other hand bought his at another store and for more money, and found out that it's smaller than the one I had bought, so he was a bit angry and still is. I think that he's gonna try and sell it to the new comp and buy himself a new one. I like mine a lot though, been through quite a few adventures here in the 2nd Kunaland change, like sleeping out on the beach, I'll talk about that a bit later, don’t you worry ;)
Right when we got here, the members were immediately asking us for things. Like, I had been on the island for about 5 minutes, when the Branch President’s daughter called asking to borrow my camera…haha, not a chance. But I was willing to accompany them where they wanted to take pictures. Turned out to be some little festival (there is a party there almost everyday for something they make up) for the centro de salud, which is just a health center; best hospital that Utupu has to offer the sick Kuna, haha. The party had dancing and crowning like a queen of the centro de salud, super weird, I called it the "Miss Ustupu Pageant". Took lots of pictures that first day, which I'm sure my mom will take care of putting new pictures up on the blog. So that first day, Paskett was able to be thrown into the island excitement and see what Kunas were really like.
This email for all you folks back home is going to be divided into 2 categories, weird/funny experiences, and spiritual experiences, but I've got to admit, there will be more of the first category I believe, haha. Ok, let me start by listing off some stories so you can all imagine and put yourselves into my shoes, or better yet, rolled up church pants and sandals! I saw the weirdest wedding ceremony out there that I've ever seen in my life. It’s a Kuna tradition apparently when a couple chooses to marry, to pick up the groom, a bunch of guys do it, carry the man into the hut, throw him in a hammock. Then afterwards, the bride-to-be is thrown on top of him, and then all the family members of them start to shake their hammock back and forth insanely fast, like a carnival ride, and they put like red hot logs underneath the hammock, and I guess the object of the bizarre ceremony is to try and start a fire with the speed. And boom, they're married ,haha. No documentation, no witnesses (expect a bunch of crazy drunk Kunas), that’s the whole ceremony. Pretty hilarious. Paskett and I had no idea what was going on. Before it all happened, like a month before, I heard that that was how it was done, but wasn’t sure as to specific details. Glad to be a part of the magic of love there. :) I think theres a 2nd part to the whole thing where the new groom goes off to the mountain and has to search for something specific, or obtain a certain number of platanos or something like that, (but wasn’t able to verify that one for all you guys back home.)
There was a big political revolutionist way back when out here named NeleKantule, and the people like honor him as a god practically. This change we had the pleasure in taking part in the 68th anniversary of his death, and the Kunas celebrated it with parties for like four days, leading up to my birthday. So I just told everyone that they were in reality celebrating my 20th birthday, haha. Anyway, all the kunas really threw together as far as a party was lots and lots of drinking what they call “chichafuerte” which is some drink that they make, bury in the ground for like 3 weeks and let ferment, and then take it out and get hammered. Also there is lots of their funny dancing and skits and little stands set up selling food and mola and stuff, pretty fun. For one Monday during the fiestas, Paskett and I went looking around trying to buy some food, but they only did it at like certain hours and stuff, got kinda complicated.
I took lots of pictures this change, excited for you all to see them. That was one of my goals for this change, was to take more pictures and try to give as many details as possible so that you can all picture it well. We’ll see how well I do of that. So all those parties led up to a very momentous occasion in my life, my 20th birthday. Made me feel incredibly old. I spent it like any good American would by making myself a chocolate cake and dancing to no music in the dark with glowsticks. It was a pretty fun birthday, made a long video blog thing talking about how much my life has changed and what has happened in the past 20 years of my life. I made the resolution to film little videos like that every year on my birthday to thank all the great people in my life for all that they do, like all of you back home that are diligently reading this letter right now. Thank you all of you. Also, the week before my birthday, I decided that since I was out on the island, and like I told you all before, I was going to grow out my beard for a whole week, and see how disgusting it looked. It was pretty funny; grows in a lot faster than it used to, and I shaved it off after the week and kept a creepy 20 year old man mustache, that was funny looking for sure.
Our branch president out here, President Roy, is an interesting man. He kinda feels like he owns everything within the walls of the church and can use it at his pleasure. So he took the TV that used to be here, always uses the electrical invertor in his own house to charge stuff, etc. It gets pretty annoying at times when he comes over every day or sends his children over to get it, but oh well. Like Elder Goodson told me, the Kuna philosophy is like this, “What’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine”. Haha which is a good way to state it.
I talked about the vicious Blas ants in my last email, but they came back more powerful than ever for the next 6 weeks out there in Kunaland. I'm convinced that whenever there are tiny food crumbs left on the floor, they sound the alarm, ready all the troops, tell the king of their imminent attack, and then they send in the infantry, thousands upon thousands of ants appear out of nowhere. I think that this island is built on a foundation of ant hills. Paskett’s solution was pretty good though, using a lighter and a deodorant spray and making a makeshift flamethrower and burning them all. It is pretty effective and hilarious. We just went straight to the source and burned their little hole in the ground with that, and I poured boiling water in there too just to be sure, but they are still there, indestructible.
Our first pday out there, I made sure to take Elder Paskett out to the beach to get good pictures and have him see the beauties of Blas. I decided that I was going to try to really be Kuna and climb up a palm tree to retrieve a coconut. It was a massive tree, like 40 feet tall, so if I would’ve gotten to the top, it would’ve been terrifying to fall. Made my assent and didn’t make it more that a few feet and realized that I had no upper body strength and couldn’t get up it, but it was fun trying.
I said that everyone out there calls me Elder Espipi, or just Espipi, and Elder Paskett got a nickname as well; the first day and it stuck with him from then on. What does his last name sound like? Basket, so when they would all run up ¿igi be nuga? And he would say Paskett, they would say basket, and that turned into basketball, so he's known around the island as basketball. For Elder Arbon being a redhead, these people had never seen a redhead before, so they called him “kanirnono”, which in Kuna means "chicken head", because chickens have like red heads, hahaha, super funny.
This change I started understanding quite a bit more Kuna, or at least to distinguish a few questions and ask for things and have little conversations with kids. Very few people here speak Spanish, and the ones that do, speak it incorrectly and it just messes with your head. Like in Kuna, for a verb, they use the same form for each person involved. So they would do the same for Spanish, like “yohace” or “nosotroshace” etc, really frustrating at times. It made me understand how it must feel for the Latins who have to try to listen to us gringos speak their language when they sound terrible and know nothing.
Another thing that Elder Paskett and I noticed here was that none of the Kunas ever really show affection for one another, like kissing or hugging or anything. First I just thought I was crazy and that they MUST kiss, just in private maybe, but the whole time out there, I didn’t see a single person kiss, not ever teenagers. I'm convinced now that these Indians have never heard of what it is, kissing. And yet…there are tons of babies and little children everywhere…oh well, not going to focus on that aspect too much, just an interesting thing I figured out in Blas.
Lots of personal time to think and contemplate life out there, and things like that come to your head about all the things that Kunas have probably never done in all their lives. How many of them have never seen or driven or ridden in an automobile? How many have never eaten a cheeseburger? How many have never seen a street sign? How many have never even left the island in their entire lives? I think lots of these people have never been to the city, never seen a skyscraper or been stuck in traffic. Just within the last few years, they built a cell tower out there, but before that, who knows how these people communicated with their family in the city, lots don’t have TVs or any electronics. Interesting little luxuries that us as Americans have grown accustomed to so long ago that it's simply second nature to see a house with like 4 TVs and 3 cars. San Blas must also be one of the only places in the world where walking around in a towel anywhere you go is A-ok. I come back from taking a shower and walk right through all the people there for church on Sunday and they just smile and wave, so hilarious! Can you imagine if I were to walk through our chapel back home in nothing but a towel? People would scream, haha.
In the church there's like a little backyard with lots of platano trees, and when I was with Arbon none of them had any platanos on them, but with Paskett there were lots. He and I decided that we were going to make a traditional Panamanian food called patacones, which are fried and flattened plantains, amazing. Family, if we can get our hands on plantains back home, I am going to make you all quite the feast. Look around at the grocery stores, see if you see any massive green plantains or ones that are yellowish and I can make another recipe called plátanos de la tentación, which are sweet fried bananas, really good. All they are are fried plantains, but they end up tasting kind of like French fries, but better. I've really learned to appreciate a good meal out here in Blas, because you don’t come by them very easily.
It rained a ridiculous amount out there this change, and because of all the rain we got, it made the drinking water really filthy, At first it was generally pretty clear and not too bad to drink, but it got to be like a brownish color, and I was still drinking it. So as you would imagine I got pretty sick and had diarrhea for over a week straight and lost a lot of weight, but I'm better now. We still had to use that water to bathe, but that’s not too bad because you're not drinking it when you shower, especially from a bucket shower. We found out that there was a guy who sells purified water off near the center of town, just have to bring your own gallon jugs and he fills them up for a quarter, so I started doing that and it helped completely.
I decided that a little missionary “San Blas initiation” is that for each missionary to really feel like a Blas elder, you need to fall in your hammock. I did it like the first week of this past change, rope snapped, and I fell right to the tile floor. That was a nice way to wake up in the middle of the night...crappy rope. Paskett fell a few weeks ago, but he was already pretty close to the ground, so it wasn’t a far fall. I guess Arbon fell too in his first change out there before I got there and he was up way high and landed flat on his back, that must've hurt pretty good. Lots of funny weird adventures out here, and I really feel like Nephi and all the other prophets in the Book of Mormon when they wrote “and not a hundredth of the things which I say happen can I write upon this record” because there are so many other things that happened daily, but I can't remember them all, or if I wrote them all, it'd be a book.
Now it's on to more spiritual experiences and testimony growing experiences, what I'm sure the majority of you all would rather hear than weird, funny experiences. First off, we were blessed this change to have a baptism of a boy named Josué Hernandez, who coincidentally, had just come from Veracruz where all his family lives. The 1st and 2nd counselors in Veracruz are his uncles, and I loved the 1st counselor back in Veracruz, awesome guy, return missionary from Guatemala named Ina. Josué is a good kid, and it was nice to teach a person that actually knew Spanish well, being that he was from the city. I got to be the one to baptize him, and we did all the baptisms in San Blas out in the ocean, just like all the other Nephite missionaries. Like Alma and Amulek did to the Lamanites. It was so awesome, I really felt like Alma baptizing in the waters of Mormon when we walked out into the ocean. Apparently, the people on the island call that part of the ocean, “playa mormón” because baptisms are always done out there; holy water, haha. It was a really great experience and I'm glad I could be a part of it. For some reason, that baptism made me appreciate and look forward to very much when I will be able to have the blessing of baptizing my own children someday. When we went out into the water, that’s all I could think about, being a father and baptizing my children. I think it's because I had just turned 20 and I felt older and really started thinking about my future and what the Lord has in store for me. That is something I'm really looking forward to doing, baptizing my own children and seeing them make and keep covenants someday.
The week before that was Fast Sunday and I woke up with a personal revelation. I had a thought, as I was reading "Jesus the Christ", reading all about the life of our Savior and hearing all His parables and teachings. I had the thought, the Lord lived 33 years of His mortal life, and didn’t once commit a single sin, never had an evil thought, never said a single rude word or judged falsely His fellow man. 33 years without a single sin, and yet, how many of us can't make it a single day without sinning? He made it 33 years, and because of His infinite sacrifice, we have the gift of repentance because He knows that we all fall short of His perfection, and yet He taught “what manner of men are ye to be, perfect, even as my Father in heaven is perfect.” It was a really cool thing to think about, and I shared my testimony on that, thinking that we all need to try harder at trying for that unattainable perfection that the Lord showed us. We can't be perfect of course, but we can do our best to try. There isn’t a better example of a person to aspire to be like than the Savior. I was able to read and finish 3 wonderful books, some for the first time, and another for the 2nd time in the mission. I read all of the Book of Mormon again in English, and it is 531 pages of awesome. This time reading through, I was so much more interested and entertained by the stories and learned a lot more. I came to the conclusion that it is just such an easier and more entertaining read than the Bible. They are both wonderful, essential scripture that we have, but one of the many advantages that the Book of Mormon has over the Bible is simply that it is more entertaining. I as the reader did not want to stop reading while I read it this time, that’s why I read it in less than a month. So many stories that is just didn’t capture the magnitude of, the first time reading through it. Like King Benjamin's speech or Abinadi's appeal to King Noah and his priests. Those are both amazing speeches, and I recommend that you all read them, better yet, just read the whole BoM. It is impossible to fully appreciate it and understand everything after one read, and I am a witness to that. The Lord designed it through His prophets for it to be necessary to read over and over throughtout all the life of the person.
Out in Blas, I also learned to love and appreciate all the more the music of the Church like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Especially For Youth soundtracks. MoTab is amazing clearly, and there is such power in the songs and hymns they sing, it's impossible not to feel the Spirit listening to them. The EFY music is really good too, good singers, too bad I never went to EFY when I was younger. Also, I was able to read a life changing book called the "Miracle of Forgiveness" by the prophet Spencer W. Kimball. If you haven’t read it yet, do it now, no demorenustedes. It taught me so much about the need to repent and the power and love that one receives through the power of repentance. I came up with a quote after reading that book, that repentance is like a pair of glasses. When we sin, we become blind to the commandments of God, because we willingly disobey them. Repentance allows us to see the error of our ways, and make a once blurry path, clear and straight. “Once I was blind, but now I see. Once I had spiritual cataracts that had me feeling like I was crawling in the fogs in the dark, but repentance is the glasses that lead you to the straight and narrow.” I reflected a lot on what Kimball says in his book, and it really kicks you in the butt and makes you realize that sinning is NOT ok, and even the little things that we all do, can be incredibley detrimental to our spiritual health and progression in this life and the life to come. It’s a must read everyone, I highly recommend it if you haven’t already read it, and even if you’ve already read it, may I refer you to what I said about only reading important books once, haha. There were 2 other quotes from that book that I loved that I want to share with all of you. First one is “Whether you think you can, or you can’t, you're right”. Which I love. It's so true, you are the only person that controls what decisions you make in life. If I believe that I can do something, generally I will take the necessary steps in order to accomplish such thing. But if I believe that I can't do something, I won't motivate myself and I won't go anywhere. Next one was this: “Incomplete repentance never brought complete happiness”. Awesome also. You can't go at repentance half heartedly, the Lord sees right through that. He knows the intentions of your heart and knows when you are repenting insincerely, or you aren’t taking the necessary steps to receive His infinite forgiveness. If sins need to be confessed to both the Lord and to the bishop, do it, because if not, that’s what He meant by “incomplete”. You cannot receive complete happiness in this life, and therefore in the next life, if you are not completely repentant. Amazing book, I learned a lot, and I advise you all to take a look at your lives and see what you need to change, or what isn’t in accordance with what the Lord wants us to do in this life.
It was all a really amazing experience out there, I learned a lot about myself and the crazy Kunas. Cool story to end. The last Sunday off in the island I got to be Presiding Branch President. Not really something that you think you'll do during the mission, but it was a nice little surprise. Our BP had an emergency at his work and his one counselor was off on another island, so he came early in the morning to tell me that he needed me to direct all of Sacrament meeting and pick someone to teach Sunday School, haha. So I planned out the whole thing, made sure the speakers were there to speak, chose people to say the prayers, and directed the music, like i did every week, nuts. And the funny thing was, a little girl came to church like super early and gave me a dime and said "Para Jesús" and I made her fill out a tithing form and I put her dime in an envelope and closed to all up and put it in the BP's office, haha. Probably not protocol taking the girls tithing, but technically I was acting Branch President, so...oh well :P
Just some of the fun things that Blas has to offer the crazy gringo missionary! Everyone was really nice as I left the island, giving us food and saying their goodbyes. It's a weird feeling knowing that I'll probably never see any of those people again, even if I come back to Panama, because going off to Blas again would be a bit tricky.
To end, I want to talk a bit more about my hammock. Paskett and I played a game called Bumper Hammocks, super fun. We tied rope to the walls and then we swung like as high and fast as possible and try to knock each other out really hard. Violent hammock game but it's really fun, and I got a pretty good video too.
No comments:
Post a Comment