Week 59: Only one more week....

Yeah, I only have this week left of the changes. It’s suuupppppeeeerrrrr sad, I know. I cannot believe that these changes have gone by soo fast. It feels like just yesterday I changed companions, areas, houses, wards, everything but it’s been a good transfer, really. I’ve grown more than I thought I would and I’ve learned so many things here that Heavenly Father knew that I would need for my future. I’ve had to make changes to some things that I just know with all my soul that Heavenly Father knew I needed to make in order to fulfill my greater callings later in life.

Really it surprises me every time I reflect on the mission and everything that has happened and things I’ve learned and done that I just cannot believe that I can’t do this my whole life. haha. Okay it sounds like I’m getting trunky here. Sorry. It’s hard okay! haha It’s bc my companion is dying [Not really. It’s a term used for missionaries about to go home.]. She dies this next transfer so it’s all about preparing her to go home.

Well, to start out this week, nothing really happened. It was a week full of meetings. We as missionaries have something called 8 principles, I think that’s what it would be. But every 3 months we have to have a week of training. It’s 4 hrs every morning for 4 days. 1 hr of training of the principle and 1 hr of practices. it was a little exhausting but I learned a lot and we learned how to put a lot into practice for the area and plus I got to see a lot of missionary friends and the most important I got to spend almost the whole time with Hermana Frost. It was a lot a fun to see her for so much time :) I miss that woman haha

Other than that the only thing that happened was I got to go back to Arboleda for a baptism of an investigator that Hna Frost and I found our first week together in the old area. The funny thing is, she was in teaching for almost 6 months and all of our leaders were telling us to just drop her bc she wasn’t progressing. We both felt like we shouldn’t, so we didn’t, and now look at our amazing work. haha. Pero en verdad [but in truth], it was such a wonderful moment to see her get baptized.

Then on Sunday, FINALLY WE HAD AN INVESTIGATOR COME TO CHURCH!!! I DIED OF HAPPINESS. AND HE’S PROGRESSING WHICH MEANS THAT HE HAS A BAPTISM DATE. Really he’s an amazing guy. His name is Raul, 21 years old, and he’s studying, and he’s suuupppeeerr smart. But really, it’s like a given that he’s going to be baptized. it’s just a matter of time.

Later that night we watched Meet the Mormons with the ward. Only a few ppl showed up, but it was still really good. Honestly, I think I have that movie memorized in Spanish. Really, with how many activities we do with that movie, I’ve seen it like a good 10 times in the past 4 months, haha.

That ends this letter. Pics coming soon. Love you all soo much!!! Next week, you’ll have the details on transfers and what happens. Love y’all!!!!

Hermana Perryman

The letter is called the "DEATH LETTER" bc it has everything you need to do to prepare to go home. Info that you have to fill out to receive your plane ticket, etc. so yeah, in about 2 months I'll be getting one. Sad, I know :(

The letter is called the "DEATH LETTER" bc it has everything you need to do to prepare to go home. Info that you have to fill out to receive your plane ticket, etc. so yeah, in about 2 months I'll be getting one. Sad, I know :(

The letter is called the "DEATH LETTER" bc it has everything you need to do to prepare to go home. Info that you have to fill out to receive your plane ticket, etc. so yeah, in about 2 months I'll be getting one. Sad, I know :(

We found this mustache in the Bishop's office so naturally we decided to mess around with it and take pics, haha.

We found this mustache in the Bishop's office so naturally we decided to mess around with it and take pics, haha.

We found this mustache in the Bishop's office so naturally we decided to mess around with it and take pics, haha.

Week 58 Letter

Well... this week was pretty tiring to be honest but it was the type of satisfying exhaustion that you can only feel as a missionary. That’s what make this week so great.

This whole week we went to bed a little late bc we’ve been putting extra time in planning on how to reactivate and the efforts we can do. Then on top of that we’ve been getting up at 5:45 every single morning to do an hr of exercise with an 18 old member who wants to go on a mission but can’t right now bc he’s overweight. They told him that he needs to get his weight under control (this was like a yr ago) and finish high school. Well, bc he’s about to turn 19 they allow the men to go out on missions at 19 without finishing high school. So the only thing that he wants is to get his weight under control so we promised him to go running every morning to help him turn in his papers. So this week was fun, very exhausting, but worth it.


Okay so as you all may know, the ward here is suuuupppppeeeeerrrrrr duper tiny. One of the problems that we have is there are literally NO YOUNG MEN IN THE WARD. Okay there is one, but he’s inactive and we are in the process of reactivating him. I don’t know why but since the first Sunday here when I found out that there are no Young Men here it really stuck me and started to bother me. I just thought, what are we going to do here without any young Priesthood holding men?? Maybe it really has been bothering me bc I grew up in a ward where the youth were a big deal esp the Priesthood holding young men to help prepare them for their futures. So for these past weeks I’ve been praying and fasting for inspiration or SOMETHING to help the situation with the young men. So this past week, my prayers were answered.

We were walking past a basketball court when I thought I recognized one of our investigators but it was night time so I didn’t think anything of it. As we kept walking we heard "HERMANAS!" and surely it was one of our investigators and we walked into the basketball court to talk to her and to make a long story short, she started to introduce us to her friends so we started to talk to them all. They are a group of 12-18 yr old boys that a lot of them aren’t even studying right now and to tell you the truth, they seemed like a pretty rough group, just like how any other group of tattooed adolescent group of boys would be. So we started to talk to them and we invited them to play soccer with us this past Friday. To tell you the truth, I didn’t think that they would remember and that nothing would come of it. But Friday night rolls around and we are in the church bld and literally right on time at 6:30 they were there waiting for us and the group had gotten bigger! They had invited other friends and in total there were like 15 young men. So we played soccer with them for about an hr and then they left. The whole point to this story is that out of those 15 young men, we’ve gotten to know 5 that are actually really interesting in listening to us. We haven’t had an actual formal lesson with them, but this we have appts with them.

What I know and testify is that YES, Heavenly Father knows our needs. He knows that I am worried about the situation with this ward and young men. He knows that these young men need direction in their lives and that is exactly what the Gospel offers. Obviously I would just die on the spot if it turns out that we baptize all 15 of them, but my soul will rejoice if we bring just one to the truth.

So that’s about all that happened this week haha nothing super new.

Pics coming soon.

Thanks everyone for everything!!!

Love you all!

Hermana Perryman

So I decided to clean my ear this week with alcohol and this was the result. Disgusting right??? But I guess that's what Mexico does to ya haha.

I made this for my companion bc she finished 16 months in the mission.

We decorated our door with the Mexican flag and you can't see it's super well but in the square is like a pic collage (sorry i don't know how to spell that word...) of pics of Christ and the restoration and baptism. So if you didn't know that Mormons lived there, well now you do!

We decorated our door with the Mexican flag and you can't see it's super well but in the square is like a pic collage (sorry i don't know how to spell that word...) of pics of Christ and the restoration and baptism. So if you didn't know that Mormons lived there, well now you do!

Us resting after an hr of exercise with Marco that wants to go on a mission.

We found this random blue painted rock with a fish on it.

This was me after 1.5 hrs of soccer and basketball then volleyball. I was soo tired afterwards.

Hna Argueta breaking into the church air conditioning boxes to turn it on bc we didn't have a key to open it haha.

So Richard sent y'all a pic of his cell phone. Well this is what we use here in Mexico. This are one of the nicer ones haha.

Week 57: ¡¡¡¡¡TRECE MESES YA CUMPLÍ!!!! [Thirteen months have completed serving]

YA!!!! Yesterday it was official. I’ve passed a year and now have completed 13 months here in the mission. Crazy right???!!!! I’m dying bc from here on out its just downhill bc it goes by soo fast. Not even kidding you guys. It’s super sad to think about. I don’t like being one of the older missionaries here. It feels weird bc when I got here I would look at the missionaries that had time and I would think, man, they know a lot of stuff and they were so knowledgeable and smart and knew how to handle situations, etc. and now I’ve reached that old age, and man I don’t feel anywhere near that. Yes, I have learned stuff, but I still feel like there is sooooooooooo much more to learn that I just don’t have enough time to learn it all or experience it all! It’s sad to think about, but I’m super happy right now and I feel really content and having just a short period of time left it’s making me want to work even harder. You have to sprint and then keep going just a little bit more even when you’ve crossed the finish line.

So this week was pretty fun. It felt normal, we did all the normal things like teach and cry (hehe that was for you daddy) and testify, and be just totally awesome. We did have intercambios [exchanges] with the Sister Training Leaders. That was a pretty fun 2 days. I was with a sister named Hna. Janco who is going home in 3 weeks at the end of the transfer. She’s from Bolivia and we had a blast. I learned a lot from her and things that I will do in my last transfer when the time comes.

We had Stake Conference this past weekend so that was fun. One of the things that we have started to do now is transmit the service to the individual church bldgs so that the members don’t have to travel all the way to the Stake Center. The funny thing was that in Tuesday I got a letter from Pres. Burdett giving me an update on the stake news and the temple. He explained to me that they did that as well in the last Stake Conference and that they had a lot of success, which made me happy to hear.

Hmm... Well with my ward here... It was a little bit of the opposite. So we hit a low record of church attendance yesterday. We had our Stake Conference and literally we had 5 members show up to it and it was even transmitted to our church building so it’s not like they had an excuse of not being able to travel to the stake center. It was pretty chafa but were working on that. At the same time, I am learning soo much on the power and the need of fasting and fast offerings. Never have I ever felt soo impressed as a missionary to fast and pray so much for an area, then the one I’m in right now. I’ve had this impression for these past 3 weeks working here, but never expressed my feelings out loud and the cool thing is yesterday, I received a blessing from my District Leader that finished his mission today and the "theme" you could call it, was about the power of fasting and prayer and how this is the way the Lord communicates with me. It was something very special to hear and to receive a testimony that The Spirit brings revelation. That Heavenly Father does know my hardships here and that he’s listening to me. It was pretty great :)

In the letter he had sent a pic of the temple and wow!!!!!! It is soo beautiful and literally every time I think about it I cannot wait to go home and go visit it. That’s the first thing that I want to do when I get home is go visit the new temple. I’m soo excited to see the many blessings that it’s going to bring to the saints in Indiana.

So that’s about it for this week. Sorry for keeping it short, but pics coming soon!!!! Love you all soo much for the many prayers and support I have received these past months. Y’all mean the world to me!!!!!!!!!

Con todo mi amor de mi alma [with all my love to my soul],
Hermana Perryman

Look who I ran into at the cyber here in centro!!! MY ONE AND ONLY FROSTY!!! Man I love her to death, I really do.

This is my District Leader and his companion yesterday.

Today we visited this couple serving a temple mission bc they are going home next Sunday. They are like the grandparents of the mission, we love them a lot! They gave us a bunch of food to take home!! It was pretty sweet.

Week 56: Week 2 down!

Well, this week was a little... hard to say the least. Number wise, wasn’t that high, but at the same time, the Lord definitely blessed us with results at the end of the week.

So to start off with it all, nothing super major happened this week, except for the awkward thing where I’ve randomly developed the habit of snorting when I laugh. Or maybe I’ve always done that and no one has ever pointed it out to me. Lame. But... awkward to say the least. haha

Well, this week, Hermana Argueta and I really developed a lot together. we’ve become super close and I’ve grown to love this short little Guatemalatecan. hehe. We’ve both made some major goals for her to get her up to the states to start studying and we are working soo hard on her English. She already knew a pretty good amount. Not a lot to where she could have a whole conversation, but that’s our goal. So what’s been really weird is talking a lot of English, but very slowly so that she can come to learn to understand. One of the major goals that we have set is to get her to the states for Christmas. So there may or may not be a Guatemalateca in the house come Christmas time, haha

So in an appointment this week, I had my first real bible bash. It was.... very weird but powerful at the same time. So usually with the ppl here if they disagree they will just say, okay, we don’t believe the same things, but I’m still willing to listen. That’s just bc here the Yucatecans are just plain nice and respectful. But with his man, oh boy was he feisty. He was mainly going at it with my companion but the whole thing was whether the Sabbath Day is Saturday or Sunday. And then it turned into whether or not Moses saw God. It was pretty funny bc we strait up proved him wrong with his own bible, but bc he was just so hard hearted, we still said that it wasn’t true. Basically, it was unproductive bc we didn’t get anywhere with him, but it still felt pretty powerful to testify of the truth and the importance of the Book of Mormon bc the dang bible is confusing sometimes and doesn’t contain the full gospel. We can only obtain the full gospel and full understanding if we have them BOTH.

Another thing that happened to me was I met an old lady from Canada that’s living here in our area that is part of some religious group that opposes the Catholics or something like that. Well basically, she speaks little Spanish and I contacted her in full English. Weird bc it’s been FOREVER AND A DAY since I’ve talked to someone about the Gospel in English and it was definitely super hard to do. But basically she shot me down hard and bashed just about every belief I have. and I definitely got a little mad (not in front of her, but afterwards when I was explaining everything with my companion) bc when I testified of the BOM and other principles she straight up told me that my own testimony isn’t mine and isn’t true bc what the church leaders do is brain wash us all to think the same. Weird right??? But yeah, basically I was like DANG! SO THIS IS WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO SERVE IN THE STATES, HAHA. That’s is probably the very first time in my whole time here in the mission that I’ve been shot down and bashed at. Pretty cool huh? That’s one of the many things I love here in Yucatan that everyone is super nice, trusting and just all around loving and welcoming.

So I have some good news! Our pdays have changed! They are now and forever will be like so: wake up at 6:30 like normal, exercise, and study and then at 10 we start our pday until 6 pm and then we go back to work. Amazing right??!!! As to what is has been: 6 wake up, get ready bc you have to leave for District Meeting that starts at 8 until 11. Then from like 11:30, bc we always run over time and get out late, to 6 we had to clean the house, wash the clothes, by hand, and that freaking takes FOREVER!, and then go buy food, oh but wait, we don’t have a car so we have to walk 15 mins with all the food, and then we have to write in our free time, there’s like only 1 hr but you can’t really do anything bc there’s travel time you have to put into account with the busses bc there’s nothing to do in your area.
So yeah, needless to say we are all super happy bc this morning, by 10 we had everything done, and we basically had all day to do whatever. It felt suupppeeerrr weird and the best part about it all is pday is totally stress free! Normally you are running around worried the whole time about the time but today we had soo much free time Hna Argueta and I were just wondering around Centro [center] wondering what to do with our lives, haha

Well, that’s it for this week.

I’m doing just great, perfect actually, getting used to the hotness and living it up here in Mérida!!

Love you all! pics coming soon

Hermana Perryman

These pics are a mix of us playing in our hammocks, me holding a dead dried snake, it was disgusting bathtubs. and then today we went to this monument thing that's here in Mérida and took pics. pretty cool huh?