young man from Ciudadela and I. He's going to his mission in April
wild iguana. These things are all over here and they are huge. But this was the first time I saw one while I had my camera
Kids in a carnaval parade. We live in the second floor of a house right next to the parade route.
My new companion and I
Some kids from the branch in traditional carnaval masks
Well after all they transfered me this week, but once again it wasnt very far. I{m in a little village called baranoa thats outside of Barranquilla. Im actually in the same stake as I was in while in Ciudadela. Its funny because the mission covers 5 departments, which are like states. I{ve been in 3 areas but I still havent left the department called Atlantico. There isnt a ward here but there is a pretty good size branch. This week for example 62 people came to church, and they say that that is low for carnaval. Usually more people come I guess.
Mu companion is a peruvian named Elder Gabriel. Hes great since he is like me in that we both like to be exactly obedient. I guess the Lord decided I deserved a break from always having to fight with my companion about obeying. He is very well studied. The interesting thing is that we aer opening the area, since there were sister missionaries here before. So my companion and I are having to learn the area and get lost a lot. He only has been in the mission for 4 months so we are learning a lot together.
The city here also has carnaval, so we have been locked up for 2 days and we have 2 days to go. We took advantage of that to deep, deep clean the house. It was horribly gross when we got here, like hair everywhere since there were sister missionaries, lady hygiene products everywhere, trash all over the floor, it was bad. But now it looks good.
The branch here has some very grave problems. For example, in 2012, 52 people were baptized. But the sacrament meeting attendance stayed the same. The branch president is awesome. He is 22 years old and is a return missionary. He is in charge of the branch here and a group in another village. a group is like a branch that is too small to be a branch. he has spant a lot of hours with us already to help us get to know the area and the people. So we are going to meet with him to see what we can do. Here they have baptized so many people but hardly anyone stays strong. My companion and I have really felt that we need to focus much more of our time on the members less actives and leaders of the branch, instead of just baptizing a lot. I wrote a long letter about it to the mission president to see what he says. I just dont see the point in baptizing so many people if they all leave the church in a month. I feel like we need to strengthen the branch and then baptize the whole town.
Well thats all for now.
Love,
Elder Wilson
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