Heyo!
Another week another 10 hours of traveling so I can make a 15 minutes appointment to get a green card. :) I very much desire to stay in my area for a actual week for once. Sadly that won't be happening this week either, my companions and I will actually be heading to Barcelona this week for my companion's residency. This time by plane. So that's fun, seeing as this is the only possible way I'd ever see Barcelona as a missionary, I kinda lucked out with that one. :)
I spent my one year mark in Madrid, and then on a train for 6 hours so yay! We also had a bit of an issue with the train and had to switch to another train and ride the rails backwards for the final 2 hours. Which felt quite interesting. Happy one year to me! :)
We had two member meals this week and both of them almost put me in a coma. The first one was with Juanita, a member of the Cádiz Ward. I'm told it was very traditional Spain cuisine. The main one I've noticed so far being, tortilla de patata. Which slaps, and for all my Utah people, very much reminds me of funeral potatoes. :) Also Spanish rice, which I've never liked before; but I'm here to tell you the real stuff is far less atrocious. Also she gave me some lil snack for dessert that tasted just like sweet tarts ropes? So that was reminiscent. Also almost every member meal I've had here they've made incredible homemade bread. So yay.
Abuelo (or Manuel) is a member who is like 80 and lowkey a phenomenal chef. This man really made us a 6 course meal. I was so hyped at first, and then he just kept bringing out more food. We finished the soup, bread, and salad, here's some random piece of meat, finished that here's a tortilla de patata, finished that, here's flan (a very common dessert here that is the texture of jello), finished that here's some other dessert. I was exhausted and at one point had to say a prayer to push through. But Abuelo is so sweet, he's crazy hard to understand, because he's from here. But he tries to slow down for me. :)
People we talked to, and a rating of my understanding of their accents:
Rosaly, an amiga de Bolivia: she's super cool and I actually could somewhat understand her (5/10). We shared a brief spiritual message with her, and she seemed pretty respective. We'll see when the next time we see her is, we don't seem to meet with our progressing friends as much as I would like us to here.
Juan and Susi (Argentina): an adorable old couple that just got baptized a couple months ago. They're super sweet, and I can understand a bit of what they say...sometimes. Susi talks really quiet, and we always seem to be with them in crowded places. Still not that bad though, I can understand the general idea, sometimes. :) (4/10)
La familia Rodríguez (Columbia): Absolute legends. Kateryn, the mom, is a member, but the dad, Jesús, isn't and neither is their daughter María who is 11. They also have Emmanuel, who is 7. The women of the family are somewhat understandable, but the dad and little dude are practically spitting raps as they speak. They're such a sweet little family though, and are pretty close to being baptized! (4/10), (the dad, 2/10)
Rosa and her mom Érika (Ecuador): Hard to give a fair judgement, because they wore masks the entire time, but all in all, I've had worse. It also helped that we were teaching an actual lesson, and not just doing some kind of message were we elaborate on what "Hope" means to us. I can't follow things like that at all, but I semi-know my lesson vocab. We're teaching Rosa (member who is almost 8) the main lessons before her baptism next month; so I got to say the first vision in spanish, which was scary because it had been a minute. All in all, not to bad, but as usual not great. (5/10)
Obispo Sánchez y familia (España): I walked to the other side of San Fernando to talk with this man and his family, and then didn't understand a word. But that's okay. I also walked all the way there in rain boots (which rubbed the calfs quite intensely, because I'm out of longer socks) because I was told it was raining only to go outside and see one puddle and feel three drops of water. I don't know if I'm living in the plain, but so far I don't think the rain in Spain falls mainly here. Anywho, Obispo Sánchez thought it was pretty cool that I was American. Which seems to be a recurring theme here, they haven't had an American serving in this area since COVID started. He asked me if I was from "la fábrica" (the factory, code for Utah :)) when I told him yes he asked from where, I said Logan and this man geeked out about our temple for a while. And I understood none of it. (.3/10)
Sergio and su amiga (Cádiz): homeboy Sergio is a JA (YSA) here in Cádiz. Apparently every time we meet with him he brings one of his friends who isn't a member. What a legend. He's also way into tik tok and just over all a legend. He talks very southern Spain but slightly slower than most. So, (.9/10).
As you can see, when they're not from Spain, there's a chance. Haha. It's fine. The people get it to, when I tell them this is my first area in Spain the answer are almost always the same. If they're not from Spain they looked shocked and say something (in Spanish) along the lines of, "And they send you here?" And if they are from Spain they chuckle and say something like, "Well, if you learn to understand our Spanish, you can understand it all." I think they all like it that I don't understand a thing, it's like they all got a new pet for the first time in almost 2 years. :)
Better week this week, still crazy frustrated about Spanish, and trying to figure out how they do the work here. I just feel like I do so much less in a day here, but I guess I need to realize it's a different mission. :) Transfers will be announced by the next time I talk to y'all. So that'll be an adventure. I don't think Hermana Guerrero and I will be staying together, and we'll see if I even stay in the area. At this point I won't be surprised by anything.
♡/ Hermana Shelton
F O T O S :
1 - Sergio and his kinda referral of the day
2 - cádiz for the first time.
3 - i actually made it to spain with a tag :)
4 - view from the vacant piso in Madrid♡
5 - funny cause we're going this week
6 - the first course of many to come
7 - lunch w/ Juanita♡
8 - tortilla de patata !!!
9 - el domingo ♡♡♡
10 - lunch con abuelo!
11- we love a language barrier :))
No comments:
Post a Comment