6 Months--Week 24

April 17, 2023 

Hola Todos!
Tomorrow I'll be wrapping up my first 6 months on the mission. I'll be honest it's been a fast 6 months but I feel like all I can remember is living in Paraguay. Time just doesnt work the same here.
We got our transfer news this morning! I will be staying in Amambay again. I'm not disappointed. I also can't imagine a missionary life outside of Amambay because all I've known has been Amambay... but anyhow, I was expecting to stay.I'm grateful, I've really come to love the people here. They're my friends!
I'm also super grateful for the connections I've formed with other missionaries here. We went to KFC for lunch today with our district (Of the 4 american restaurants in Paraguay: McDonalds, BurgerKing, and Pizzahut; one of those also happens to be KFC). It was a bittersweet moment eating american style chicken and seeing some of my buddies for the last time for a long time. I love them all so much and it really sucks to see some of them go. We only meet up twice a week for 6 weeks but I still feel like I've known all of them for years! I'm also super sad to see Elder Smith head out of Amambay.
Elder Smiths headed out to the Boonies of la Paloma. Some giant area near Brazil. I'm not quite sure who my new comp is, I just know he has less time than me because I'm now the Senior comp of this Amambay/Centro... HYPE. This is going to be interesting and I'm actually pretty stoked! After surviving this cambio nothing scares me. I'm not worried too much. Yet...
I am worried about being a good example to my new comp. I want to be the best missionary I can. I should always be trying to be the best missionary I can be, but these last few weeks I've gotten lazy just trying to survive. I dont want to just survive... I want to thrive. I want to show my next como how to thrive.
Thankfully this week was considerably better than last week. We did a little bit more thriving than surviving. Thank you for all the prayers and words of encouragement! Im super grateful to have so many awesome people on my email list bro!
We didn't do much more teaching than this week compared to last week but we did manage to place a fecha with one of our amigos. His name is Juan Manuel. He's 18 and an absolute chad (as in cool and chill). He has high functioning autism but really wants to learn more and be baptized. We should have a baptism this next transfer! I wish Elder Smith would be here to see it.
It feels strange that I'm going to be able to see the fruit of our labors. It's usual in most missions for several sets of Elders or Sisters to teach someone before they're baptized. Most of them will never get to see if those they taught get baptized or accept the gospel. I'm grateful for the blessing of being able to see some fruits of a lot of labor. I'm grateful that we can see someone make a powerful covenant with God and be walking the path to finding the love of the Savior and their true potential as children of God.

Hope yalls are absotuteably vibing! May the force be with you! We'll rest when we're dead!
Ready for a nap,
-Elder James Tanner

Emotional Fortitude O'Meter
I'm a wi'tl tired sir - 5/10 Painted ponies that go up and down on the carousel of time
🎠🎠🎠🎠🎠

1. Fruit and donky
2. Had some lit intercambios
3. Fecha with Juan! (With elder Smith and Draper)
4. Elder Smith, Elder Head, Elder Draper
5. Elder Smith pounding a nap at 7am
6. Last district photo 🥹








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Die You Stupid Ants--Week 16

Image
2/20/23 Have any of you noticed that a lot of my subjects have nothing to do with my email? ¡Hola todos! As predicted last week a lot happened this week! It was super busy and it definitely was an experience. Tuesday in particular was pretty eventful! A dog peed on my shoe and my bag and 30 minutes later the Bishop's 3 year old son almost choked to death on a piece of meat! It was crazy! The first part of the day was a little more chaotic but it ended really well. Two of the young men accompanied us for the latter part of the day. There was one lesson in particular that was really good. A few weeks ago we got a text from a guy who asked if he could talk with us. We visited him and he let us know that his daughter had been married in the temple and he wanted to know why he couldn't enter for the marriage. We planned a lesson and went over with the young men for our first lesson. We got there and talked for a while and answered his questions then started to exp...
Read more

It All Changes--Week 42

Image
August 19, 2023 Hola todos!    The world took a bit of a shift this week. We all thought I'd be in the same area this next transfer, but here we are! Ive been transferred! Sort of....      I'm still in the office working as a secretary but Presidente closed our area. We're whitewashing an area called Trinidad B and sharing a house with the AP's. It's been a crazy shift! After I finish this email we're moving ourselves into our new house.     I was sad to hear we were closing Mburucuya (Bur-roo-koo-yah) but deep down I'm grateful. It was sad to say goodbye to some of the awesome members but the work was really, really slow in our area. It only took a few days and a couple hours a day to do everything in the area twice.     Trinidad B is our new area and we hear there's a lot of things to do! That excites me. The AP's say it's possible to have 4+ lessons a day easily. That's something I haven't had to this point in my mission. Ive had to f...
Read more

Come at me, Bro--Week 22

Image
April 3, 2023   Hola Todos! I hope everyone had a wonderful conference weekend. It truly was a banger and a fantastic way to wrap up the week and recharge our spirit to do the work! We did have some more interesting things happen this week. We spent some more time in Centro which was an interesting change to say the least... One night after a crazy long lesson we met an absolute nut job while waiting for a bus. We were in downtown Centro near the 'Chaca'. The Chacarita is one of the most dangerous and crazy neighborhoods in Paraguay. But it's not just the area, it's the surrounding area too! Sitting waiting for a bus (in the dark), we were approached by a random dude of 60'ish who declared himself to be a 10 year veteran of the US military (he didn't speak a lick of english). He wanted us to help him get to the US so he could learn how to make weapons which he could then use to invade and attack Brazil. Could we please help him! We told him we w...
Read more