Win Butler asks us the question, 'is anything as strange as a normal person?'
The
world around is is FILLED to the brim with these normal people, people
that want to follow what the world has, and what the world tells them to
do. Now, you would think that maybe there's a chance that, being on an
island in the middle of the Atlantic ocean would give you the chance of
getting away from the world, but in reality, it's just about impossible
to get away from. All we really have to ask ourselves is, 'if we're
normal too', just as Win Butler asks.
And do we wanna be normal people? HECK no!
For
some reason, Maio has turned into normal people CENTRAL this week!
First of all, we knew that the 3rd of May party was coming up (that was
the one where people were going around dancing in the streets at houses
and asking for money and stuff), but we really weren't expecting for all
that happened to happen.
For the early part of the week, it
was all pretty normal business. Elder Martinez and I dropped Elder Stone
off at the very small Maio airport on Tuesday, and after he left, we
became the only two elders in the mission (or so we believe) to have an
island all to ourselves.It's pretty darn cool when you think about it.
Saying Goodbye to Elder Stone
We've continued to work with Louisa this week, keeping her on track, but
she had a friend pass away, so it became hard to find her for a few
days. We had her at church again yesterday though which was awesome!
We've also been working with Chano and Milcialita, as always, and eating
some dang good food there. One new development at there house is the
appearance of a baby goat, named Steve, who was born something like a
week or two ago, and they're housing him til he's strong enough or big
enough or whatever.
I thought it was so funny, I've never seen a goat as
a house pet before! Missionary-wise, we're continuing to work with them
to getting married, and one part of that was talking with them this
week about our own families. Elder Martinez and I brought pictures of
our families with us and talked about what they meant to us, the
examples that our parents have been for us, and how they've helped us
become the people we are today. There's been a noticeable difference
with Chano and Milcialita these past few weeks as they've really been
reading the scriptures and growing closing together. Maybe Steve helped
them too, who knows?
Towards the end of the week, the work
started to wash out a bit. On Friday, May 1st was 'Worker's Day' here
in Cape Verde, which meant NO ONE was at home, but they were all having
picnics on beaches at various points on the island. The night before,
however, was some kind of concert that happened to be held RIGHT outisde
our house, which was VERY loud, and meant that we didn't fall asleep
til about 12 or 1am. Let me tell ya, that 6:30am alarm sure came
early...
Then, on Saturday, all those 'normal people' who
happened to go partying were still a little stiff from the day before,
including a few of our investigators. One night, we ran into one of our
investigators, Iata, near the church, so we took him on a brief tour of
our new chapel and such, but MAN, Iata was more drunk than I've just
about seen anyone EVER. He walked into the church, saw a picture of
Christ and his disciples, and got all quiet, did the whole
Catholic-cross thingy, and bowed his head and started mumbling, and we
told him, 'hey, man, you don't have to do that...' but he just did his
thing, and when he was done having his moment, looked up and went,
'okay, I'm all good' and then we turned him around to keep going through
the church, when he saw a picture of the Second Coming, and he threw
his arms in the air, and went 'MY BROTHER', and proceeded to have
another moment. He ALSO kissed another picture in the church. By the end
of the tour, I felt straight up sick because of the alcohol on his
breath, like holy it was bad. I had to put my Book of Mormon to my nose
to cover from smelling it!
Sunday was more or less the same
deal, with people partying all over different streets. We decided to
pass by Nelson, who had told us earlier in the week he might me going to
the army, so we decided to see if he'd gone or not, but when we showed
up at his house, his mom sat us down, and told us he's gone straight up
rogue. Like, earlier this week, the guy had to be just about the
happiest guy on the island, like he was seriously glowing, but
apparently the past couple days, he's been stealing phones, selling
them, getting into drugs, hiding out in houses, like apparently the guy
has cops after him because so many people have gone to the cops about stuff he's taken from them, and this has just been over 2 or 3 days!
Elder Martinez and I were thoroughly shocked when we heard what was
going on with him. I'll keep ya posted on developments as they follow.
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