The Adventures of My Life

Is everyone ready for another week of news from Elder Hardy?? Or does anyone really read this anyways? At least I got a confirmation from Dad…Anyways, hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! ~Well, I do have a few things to write about this week. First off, the change of the weather turning into a full-blown North Carolina winter. Today, it’s actually pretty nice. Hovering above 60 degrees, a little fog in the air, overall a nice day. But a few days last week were horrible, only reaching in the mid-40’s during the day the day and high 20’s and low 30’s in the evening…it was quite chilly. I had my trenchcoat, sweater, and suit coat on. So, I guess it’s supposed to be like this until at least February, which crashed my thoughts of this being a tropical paradise. Oh well, I guess I’ll just wait for the 110+ weather to come around. Oh and our roommate, Elder Laulu from Samoa, pulled a mean trick on us last week. Before it was time to turn out the lights for the night, he switched on the air conditioner during a cold night and then proceeded to wrap himself up in coats so he wouldn’t get cold. Oooh, it got so cold during night…Elder Staheli got up around 3 to see what the problem was and he said the temperature was around 45-50 degrees. So, it took all morning for it to heat up again…We weren’t too pleased with our Samoan friend!! We’ve got to think of a way to get him back!!

Okay, I guess I’ll rehearse to you what happened on my celebration of Thanksgiving. After morning study, or rather during our study, we went and played in the “Turkey Bowl” with some members. Basically what it is, and I’ve never heard of it, are members or friends that get together in the morning of Thanksgiving and play football together. So, we went over to the fields by the 9th grade center and played football for 2 hours with quite a few members…It was two-hand touch, as missionaries, we’re not allowed to tackle! Well, for a period of 2 hours, me and mis amigos forgot we were missionaries. It was awesome, I caught 3 touchdowns, some nice tackles (open-field 2 hand touch), and one interception returned almost the whole way for a touchdown. It really reminded me of my high school days and i decided I miss playing. I just felt I was on top of the world again Well, also I felt the pains the next few days in my body, which reminded me that I’m also not as in shape as I used to be, but me and Elder Staheli have actually started to run a little bit in the morning, and I’ve lost some pounds already out here, down to the 205-210 range. But it looks like Dad is going to overtake me soon here…

Ok, onto the activities of Thanksgiving. We went over to our Branch President’s house to have Thanksgiving dinner and seriously spent from like 12:30 to 6:30 over at his house. When we got there, we just sat around, played guitar and piano and talked. We also practiced our song that we are going to sing (us 4 spanish missionaries) at our Jose Smith/Navidad celebration. That should be interested, I am singing the base part. So we sat around for 3 hours, until all the food was almost complete. On the menu for Thanksgiving with the Caldarons, who are quite american-ized: Turkey, Ham from “Boston Market”, Mashed Potatoes, Diced Potatoes, Gravy, Bread, Green Beans, Corn, Salad, Sparking Grape Juice and I think that’s about it. It was difficult to use good table manners and not dive into the food…and it was interesting to see how american-zed they have tried to get it…but it still doesn’t beat what our family does! And another interesting thing was the dessert. Right after we finished, Ahorita, they gave us dessert. There was a store bought Apple Pie that another family brought over, an unfinished store bought Pumpkin Spice pie (which was good nonetheless), Brownies, Cookies and Ice Cream and no whipped cream. Definantely different from what I was used to…20 pies, all homemade, cream galor. I definately didn’t eat nearly as much as in the past. Oh well, we stayed there for a little while, until Elder Staheli finally told them that we need to get home because someone else invited us to go eat! So, we went over to Dora’s trailor and had a more hispanic style Thanksgiving. I guess they started eating in the evening, at the normal dinner time and they had an amazing 2 turkeys and Rice to go along with it and some orange soda. Now, that’s more like it! Well, i guess I have rambolled on long enough about my day! Now..i would like to now more about yours? What did you do…Go to Vegas!!! Looosers!!

Missionary Wise, it was actually kind of a rough week, we had a bunch of appointments fall through and we didn’t get as much done as we wanted. The highlight of the week was having 3 investigators at church!! Virginia, a lady we’ve been teaching for a while, finally had the chance to go and I think she had a good time. Hopefully we get her baptized soon, she is almost ready. We also had a former investigator just show up after not being at church for 2 and a half months and not being contacted. It was a dude I didn’t even know and supposidly, he got kicked out of his house and dissapeared. But he showed up to church and even brought a friend!! How crazy is that!! It seems like the non-members are doing more missionary work than the members. One of our former investigators, Virginia’s brother actually made an appointment with a guy he knows and he’s going to come with us to visit him! We got a referal from a non-member and he’s coming with us!! That’s freakin sweet, I wish more members would be like that dude. Also, we recieved some disapointing news, two of our best investigators are moving to Mexico in the next week. We found her about a month ago knocking doors and she has been our slogin for tracking lately, “to find the next Johanna among all of these apartments”. They were great, we got their address in Mexico (Their 2 kids under 18 live there), and we’ll be sending the elders to go see them. It’s hard to see them go..oh well..that’s the missionary life. Well, I think that’s about I have for all of you this week..if again, anyone reads. I look forward to hearing from anyone this week! Have a great Holiday Season!!

Elder Hardy

!Que Tengan un buen dia de accion de gracias! Yeah, for Thanksgiving, we’re going to be eating at the Branch President’s home in Apex. Should be some good food…we’ll see what is cooked up, I think they’ve lived in the United States for a while. He’s actually from Dominican Republic I think. But nonetheless, should be a good cultural experience. It’s been fun to see what the normal meal for Hipanics is. It’s pretty typical that people think they eat burritos, tacos, beans..etc. all the time, but in reality, I’ve had a lot of variety…stew, chicken, rice, beans (of course) and other things. This last week, we were feed really really good, only had 1 or 2 nights where we didn’t have a dinner appoitment. Also, we had a couple nights with unbelievable good food, nice authentic mexican cooking..hmmm. One other thing that hispanics love and are known for is their chili. Every meal, they offer hot sauce or have some chili, it’s great. And of course, to avoid being made fun of or being called a “gringo (foreigner)”, we have to partake! It’s all good, I haven’t had any overpowering experiences yet. But Elder Staheli..a few weeks ago experienced one. We were at an investigators house and they weren’t home. They had a garden full of these small green chilis and Elder Staheli decided to try one out….BIG MISTAKE!! Haha, he took a little bit, spite it out immediately and threw the chili. He also touched his nose with some of the juice. His mouth was on fire and his nose was steaming and he could barely talk as we ran to a member who lived nearby. The chili he ate was a “chili de arbol”, and he ended up being okay after our member treated him…it was a great fun time for me and the member!!

The work is moving along here. Except it has gotten unbearably cold in the last few days. I think on Friday, the high was around the mid-40’s during the day and was near freezing at night (I know that’s a pretty nice day in Wyoming!). But, I heard that weather is similar to this pretty much all winter. So, I don’t know what I’m going to do untill it gets nice again! But it’s kind of funny because I see all of these native North Caroliners with their heavy winter jackets on and freezing! And, also it’s very cold for all of the Hispanics, they hate being cold. That usually means in the house, it is 90 degrees. Just this last week, we went and visited a recent convert/less active and I was sweating so bad in their apartment…sooo hot. Also, I had to give the lesson all by myself because I was on exchanges with an English missionary. Actually, my first time all by myself in my own area doing spanish work, so I was pulling a solo act. It was cool, at all the doors that were opened during tracking..it was all me! It went pretty well, I’m getting to the point where I can understand alot of what they are trying to say and speak back with a limited vocabulary. I’m still working hard though!

We have some great investigators, we’ve been blessed teaching quite a few families who we see pretty regularly. Just these last few weeks, we finally taught like 3 of the husbands and 2 of those are really interested. One of the couples we are teaching are from Mexico, named Johanna and Fernando. We started teaching Johanna after finding here while tracking. We taught her a few times outside of her door, and she wanted her husband to hear. Well, he was sick and tired of the same message from the other churches and really didn’t want to listen. She finally convinced him to listen and we went over and during the first half of the lesson, he was pretty skeptical. But, when we started teaching about the Restuaration, he started to get very interested and definately felt the spirit. Well, now things are going great with them, he accepted to be baptized. But..they couldn’t get to church, like that rest of our investigators, because Johann came home late from work. That still seems to be our one problem. We can only get one-part member to church every week, Sandy and Santiago. Santiago is a member from Mexico and Sandy is not a member, but want’s to be baptized. She has a little word of wisdom problem that we are helping her with and they are not married either. But they are planning on getting married soon. Marriage is a huge problem here for the hispanics, because you can’t get a marriage certificate unless your a citizan, so we have to ask everyone if they are officially married because a lot of times they aren’t. We even bumped into a member who just got here 2 months ago from Guatamala and has been a member for about a year. We thought it was his sister who was living with him..but we were wrong. I don’t know if the Law of Chastity was ever taught to him…anyways…

Well, I’ve been chastised a few time on the length of my letters due to the problems that sometimes occur, but I will try to a better job writing a little more and about everything going on. Have fun everyone this holiday season and don’t forget about me!

Hasta Proxima Semana!
Elder Hardy

PS: I just recently found out from my roommate that GARTH FREAKIN BROOKS HAS A NEW CD! WHHHYYY MEEEE!!! Anyways, it was a Wal-mart ad and only like 25 bucks for a 6 cd-set…so I wouldn’t mind Dad, if you go to Wal-mart, buy me the set out of my savings/whatever and add it to my shrine so when I get back I can see it sitting on my bed! Nevertheless, I shall return to my mission

Ok, this should be a quick message, I just lost my entire email I had just finished..again! We had a good week, broke our companionship high of 23 lessons and spoke to alot of people. We truly are being blessed for our work, even though we only had one investigator at church yesterday, we have lots of good investigators, who just aren’t progressing yet.

Missionary Life is good to me, thanks family for the package, I added all the food to my food storage and most of it is gone except for the green beans (go figure!). I really don’t have much to say, just because of the time limit, because I spent all of my time on my old unsaved e-mail.

I would like to hear from some more of you all, if you have time, just drop me an email so i can see what’s going on. Oh man, the Holidays are coming up so fast..Thanksgiving is only like a week away!! I wish I had some of Mom’s pie!! (Hint Hint: I heard Pie travels well in a box across the country). Well..I gotta get going

Hasta Luego!!

Hey everyone, Greetings from the Tar Heel State! Wow, I feel like a totally different person from last week, I think I have finally gotten over my 2 cases of the Cold and I feel great!! How was everyone’s Halloween (o Noche de Brujas por aquellas que hablan espanol)? Mine was pretty miserable, I was actually in bed the whole evening. But we actually had a decent week, ending up teaching 19 lessons…not bad for 2 missionaries who were feeling a little under the weather.

Well, my first transfer period has ended and I wasn’t transferred, so I’m in Cary, NC for another 6 weeks! Our actual area covers the whole city of Cary and a little bit of Raleigh, including the campus of North Carolina State. The Zone Leaders reside in the student ward there and I went on exchanges a few weeks ago up there. It was pretty sweet, I actually didn’t get to prosilyte on the campus, which I hear is a good thing…talking to all of the college aged girls is sometimes a hard thing to do for missionaries. But I’m hoping to get some memorablia or something from NCST and something from all of my areas. I’ve actually already bought a Duke blanket..hehe, just because sometimes they don’t provide a bed sheet. Yeah, this area is really cool, especially now with all of the fall colors and the leaves from the tons of trees. It’s pretty good temperature right now, in the mid 70’s but could get a little chilly soon.

We have a pretty good pool of investigators…but none of them are progressing right now. It’s so hard to help them fulfill their commitments and keep their appointents. It’s actually recommended to see them everyday, but sometimes it’s difficult to see them once a week. That means lots of tracking when appointments fall through. I think we’ve finished off a couple apartment complexes and a huge trailor park…yeah, the life of a missionary…it’s sweet, isn’t it? Just the other day, I think I saw my first shipment of illegal aliens while we were walking through a trailor park. Two huge vans pulled up, both chuck full of hispanics and blankets and clothes and stuff. One opened up, a guy hopped out and went into a trailor and then the vans took off again. One of the drivers also had a beer in his hand…hmm, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen so many illegal things happen in place. It’s kinda funny though, because I bet some of our investigators are illegal aliens and we’ve already had a few that have dissapeared on us. And I saw somewhere that President Bush and the US are really starting to crack down on immigration…NOOO…WE NEED OUR HUMBLE MEXICANS!! Seriously, most Americans won’t even give us a chance to give our message but hispanics will listen to us even if they are busy or talking on the phone. That’s why we need to be careful not to force them to hear.

Well, Thanksgiving is coming, the 2nd one I won’t be present at. I’ve figured that it will be 4 years between the 2 Thanksgivings I get to spend with family..that’s unbelievable! But time does go fast out here, by the end of next transfer, I’ll already be out for 6 months! My shirts are already beginning to turn a different color and I already have a rip in my suit pants. Oh..the signs of experience. Elder Jensen has already told me I don’t act like a greenie and I seem to be more experienced and weathered then greenies. He is leaving Wednesday to go back home, he’s reached the end of his road, so that means something. But we get new missionaries, so I’m no longer the one of the newest missionaries to the mission.

We had our stake conference this last Sunday, Elder Robert Orton of the 2nd Q of the 70 came, it was pretty cool. President and Sister Mabey also talked, they should have been given more time…but I found out in the next Ensign, they coming out with the 20th anniversury DVD of Mr. Krugers Christmas!! How sweet is that!! Anyways, I got to go to the Recent Convert meeting that was held by Elder Orton. It was awesome, he asked to the converts what first attracted them to the missionaries and there were some pretty cool answers. I guess you don’t really notice how much you can affect someone. That’s why it’s important to be a good example always…

Con Amor,
Elder Hardy