The First FULL Week

Hola Muchachos,

What a weeeeek!!! This was our first week where we worked through the entire week. We had much success and worked a lot.

Monday: Normal Pday hoedown I would say. We bought peanut butter in Walmart so now I can have PB&J sandwiches. That night I went on a Intercambio (transfer) with Elder Naranjo (orange tree) to his house in Indeco. He has been on his mission since October and I was really excited to learn from him. We did our planning and everything and went to bed hoping the best for the next day.

Tuesday: That night I did not sleep well because Elder Burgess does not have a pillow for his bed. We went to play futbol for exercise with our district and Elder Fackrell our DL made us go into my house to talk. It was kind of weird because we were supposed to be exercising. But then he dropped a big announcement. He had been told that he was being transferred to Tuxtla for an emergency and that he was going to be Zone leader there. We were all shocked and sad because he is such a good leader. He gave us all chocolate and our district tie. And then he said his farewell because he had to leave in an hour. So Elder Naranjo went back to his house to get ready for the day. We studied really well than left for our day. Elder Naranjo’s house had like 50 oranges and so I had eaten like 7 by the time we left. But we went and visited a few people and visited a really poor part of their area. We taught a girl who got baptized on Saturday. Then we walked like 3 miles to another part of their area and had no success. So we walked back and visited a few more people. By the time we were done I was so tired, I’m pretty sure we walked like 13 miles that day and my feet were hurting pretty good. But I learned a lot from Elder Naranjo and It was a challenge cause we couldn’t talk in English. But good day.

Wednesday: Was a day of learning. I was in a bad mood in the morning and throughout the day, probably because I was so tired from yesterday. I wasn’t participating in the lessons very much or contacting at all. Then I decided to change my attitude and start working hard. Even though I did this Elder Prows was frustrated and angry about something. So we got back to the house and I asked him what was bothering him. He brought up a lot of concerns about me and it turned into a great companionship inventory. We got out all the things that were bugging us and tried to find a way to solve them. I had to let go of my pride and take all of his comments and because when I did this, it felt nice to hear what I could do better. He said that since, "I am such a good missionary, but when I’m disobedient, it sticks out like a sore thumb." So that was really nice.

Thursday: We had an excellent morning. I studied really hard and we had an amazing weekly planning session. As we started walking a member passed us who sells this stuff Called Nieve (snow) and he gave us some; perfect thing for a hot day. We went to lunch and as we were eating I hear Star Wars playing behind me. And I was like OH MY GOODNESS I LOVE STAR WARS!!! IT just made me so happy to hear something that I love so much. I told Elder Prows that "nothing else in the world besides the Gospel, moves such feelings inside me as much as Star Wars." lol I love Star Wars. After that we went on divisions with two members Roberto and Hugo. I was with Roberto and he is really funny. He plans on going to go on a mission soon. But he is a really good teacher and we taught one lesson and he explained everything so well. After divisions we had a total of 64 contacts. A La Mecha. We could have done better though we were kind of distracted.

Friday: These past three day have been days of change for me and my excitement for the work is at 100%. I wrote in my journal that I feel like Jonah and that I’ve been redirected to where the Lord wants me to go. Friday we contacted a ton and got a lot of new addresses. By ourselves we contacted 60 people. A companionship record and it wasn’t even that hard. We didn’t even talk to half the people that walked by us. We had a really good meeting with Angela an investigator. It is really cool to see that she trusts us and I hope she gets baptized on the date 11th of April. We taught this new family who is so generous to us. They went out and bought us a 2 liter thing of OJ. They have 3 liter things of soda here so when I get back all the 2Ls are going to look small. We went and visited Romeo who needs to be baptized. He is soo ready. He defends the church and knows it’s true. But he told us a story of when he lived in the US and went and bought a burger and it was huge because he just said yes to everything. Pretty funny.

Saturday: Well we had another Intercambio, but this time it was with my ZL Elder Merrill (from Pokémon right) haha. So I was really excited to learn from someone with such experience. Elder Merrill is super funny but such a good missionary at the same time. Today all of our lessons fell. But oh well we taught a few people, and contacted a few. Elder Merrill gave me a challenge to go up to a person and the first thing I do was to invite them to baptism. So I went up to this one woman and said "Hola, Quiremos usted ser bautizado en nuestra Iglesia!" Translation for all of you who don’t know Spanish, Hello we want you to be baptized in our church. So yeah but she gave me a weird look and keep to herself. But then we got her address so all good. An investigator gave us a whole loaf of bread which was a miracle because we have like no food and no money. We then went and assisted an activity hosted by the other missionaries. We were flying to Hawaii in a plane and our plane crashed and we all died. So two angels (Elder Naranjo and Burgess ) showed us the Spirit world and the three Kingdoms of Heaven. Apparently the Celestial Kingdom has air conditioning. Then we went to the baptism and sang a song for them and left. That night Angela and her family had planned a big dinner for us and invited us six missionaries. They bought us these big pizza like things but loaded with different types of meat. SO good!! Then after I took a Tostada and put some beans and a lot of salsa on it. I didn’t know that the salsa was really spicy and was made from Habeneros. So I ate it and my mouth was on fire. So I said "Mi Vaca es en Fuego" and I meant to say "Mi Boca es en Fuego" So everyone started dying of laughter. Because what I said was “my cow is on fire” instead of “my mouth is on fire”. So yeah great day.

Sunday: Nothing really happened just your regular Sunday.

This week I learned that everything is about attitude and how you CHOSE to view things really makes a difference.

Me in a street!

The other Elders and I at the Baptism.

Our dinner with the amazing pizza!

Be sure to watch #Becausehelives Video and share it with everyone:

 http://www.mormon.org/easter?cid=HP_FR_3-27-2015_dMIS_fMRMN_xLIDyL1-A_with 

Love you All

Elder Pugmire    

Just One of Those Weeks

Well this week turned out to be crazy! It was a week of ups and downs. Let me tell you about it. 

To start this week off good, I bought my self a pair of soccer shoes. My new magic shoes. They are pretty sweet orange and blue for those of you who go to TimpView (a high school in Provo) so yeah. This week I only got to play in my magic shoes once and I improved like by 10 (placebo) So yeah that was fun.

 

My magic shoes!!

Story of the Week: Nothing special. A few minutes ago a guy walked in and went on facebook. He pulled up a picture on his sister’s wall of me and my companion and a girl we baptized last transfer. So that was cool.

Food: This week is a week I’ll never forget for food. I had the worst food I have ever experienced. It’s called Caldo de Pata, translation soup of legs. It was this soup stuff that smelled like cow bum and had long strings of stretchy squishy meat plus big chunks of cow stomach. I could only handle a few bites and after that I couldn’t bring myself to eat it. So gross, Elder Prows is a man and ate the whole thing. But the rest of the day he felt like crap. So we talked to other families about it and they said that the person who made it for us made it poorly and that it is "really good" if made properly. So yeah that was an interesting day.

Last Monday we had one lesson after P day and it was our best lesson so far. Not because of the content, but because that this was the first lesson where we taught equally. It feels so good to see my Spanish getting good enough to teach a lot in the lessons.

So on Wednesday I woke up and Elder Pows was not feeling good. So I went and did my exercise by myself made Elder prows  a lime drink and made him breakfast. So throughout the whole day I served him. Making him meals and cleaning the house. It felt so nice to serve him and do things for him. A year ago I would have complained and grumbled the whole day. But I can see the change in myself. Since I had a lot of time that day, I started and finished reading Our Heritage from the missionary library. It was really cool to read about our church and its history and the trials they had to overcome in the early days. So different from the trials of today. It was fascinating to read about the Prophets also and their childhoods and their focus of teaching as Presidents of the Church.

So we had no water, in our tank or in the facets. Only drinking water. So it was kind of cloudy outside. So I said a prayer that it would rain. I went outside and stood for 2 minutes and to my surprise it started drizzling. So I went inside and said another prayer. And went outside again. And it stated to rain a little harder. So I said two more prayers and said in my last for it to rain like a monsoon. So in about ten minutes it started raining HARD. SO hard in fact, that I was able to fill up my buckets from the waterfall of my roof. The power of prayer is real!!

Now I’m going to talk about all the blessings I have helped give in the past week. Since Elder Prows was sick he asked me to give him a blessing. So I gave him a blessing and said that by tomorrow morning he would feel much better. So the next day came and Elder Prows was so eager to go out and work it was really cool to see him recover. A few weeks ago we gave a blessing to one of our investigator’s husband. He had suffered severe burns from an accident in the kitchen, after putting water on boiling oil. He had a few 3rd degree burns and many 2nd degree burns. So we gave him a blessing. A few weeks later we returned and asked how he was doing. Our investigator said that he had made a miraculous recovery and in only two weeks all the burns were gone and only a small red mark was left on his chest. It was amazing to see this. We had two others blessing with similar results. Blessing are a wonderful gift from our heavenly Father and if you are ever sick, have pain, injured, in need of comfort, or any other reason don’t be afraid to ask some with the right authority to give you a blessing.

I would like to finish by quoting M Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the twelve Apostles. From his book Our Search for Happiness. He says when you "try to bring your life into harmony with His... you will find yourself wanting to do what he would do and responding as he would respond." Also "Whenever you attempt to put your feet in Christ’s footsteps" and "really concentrate on trying to walk the way he walked - loving, caring, serving, and obeying each step of the way, one day you'll look up and discover that His path has led you directly to the throne of God"

Love you all.

Love Elder Pugmire

 

My mission president and I 

Elder Prows 

Semana de Marzo 9-15th

Hello all,

What a weird and awesome week down here in Tapachula Mexico! This week was filled with many excitements and disappointments. Somehow it is still getting hotter, and with the humidity I feel like sometimes I’m in an oven. But that’s ok. Let’s start with the food.

This week I don’t know why but people just fed us so much food, this or my stomach is shrinking. But yeah we had this one lunch were they fed us such good food but there was soooo much and at one point I had to say I was too full to eat any more, so they made me pack like 4 pieces of brownies home. But that meal was really good. Dominos here also has this one type of pizza called the Honolulu. That is just Hawaiian but with bacon and Jalapenos. Aww soooo good!!! This week I also bought these things that are like ding dongs and hostess cupcakes but better called Pinguinos or Penguins in English I probably ate like 6 of those. Good week of food!

The yummy Pinguinos!

Story of the Week:

So we have this one member Frita who is 21 and was baptized in January. She has a 17 year old sister. So on Tuesday we taught their family and this guy we had never seen before was there and was pretty old we thought he was their grandpa or uncle or something. So we came back two days later to teach them. And so we asked who that old guy was who was there on Tuesday. Frita said "oh that’s my sister’s boyfriend" at first I was like what that can’t be right, but we asked again and she said the same thing. We asked how old he is and she said 43. That’s a difference of 26 years, redonkulus!! Yeah that was really surprising. Frita said that nobody in her family agrees with that relationship. So weird!

Last Monday night we were teaching a lesson to Romeo (who is our really close friend) and I felt the spirit so strong in this lesson. He is on the verge of being baptized and we invited him again to be baptized. Oh, his family was baptized like 3 weeks ago. So I was prompted to tell him that I know that he is ready and that if he trusts in the Lord and takes a small step of faith the Lord will bless him with more blessings than he can imagine. After I sent this, I think his confidence was boosted and he said that when he is ready, he will tell us. I hope that general conference will break the levee because he really like President Thomas S Monson.

So for the past few weeks I have had an ingrown toenail. And I was hoping that it would just grow out and fix itself but no, it needed surgery. So I got surgery on it, and had to take Thursday off. On Thursday I finished Reading the Book of Mormon from where I was. In one week I read half the book! The Book of Mormon is probably the only book in the world except maybe Harry Potter that I have read and taken so much time to think and ponder over. This was the first time I have read it without my head being somewhere else. In my journal this week I wrote my testimony of the Book of Mormon and I would like to share it with you.

                             My Testimony of The Book of Mormon

The past week as I was reading this book, I have come to gain a true knowledge that this book is divine and that the prophets and scriptures in this book are true. No other book in the world is as correct or contains as much of the gospel of Jesus Christ than this book. This story in this book also is fun to read and leaves you hanging at each chapter, but along with a good story are scriptures that have changed my life and can change yours. There are ways to be a consecrated missionary in here just like Ammon and Alma. I know that this book can change your life. I know that The Book of Mormon is true and that Jesus did appear to the people named in this book and that this book confirms that he is God’s first and beloved son and that He is our redeemer. I know that this book will change your life. If you haven’t read this book, read it; if you have read it, read it again. In my journal I also included the testimonies of the Prophets. It is a pretty cool spectacle.

On Saturday night we went to some less-actives’ houses. We were talking and gave a lesson. They made Elder Prows sing a hymn for them and it was nice because he is really good at singing. At the end they said I had to sing a hymn. And I was like nooo I can’t sing. They said that if I sang for them that they would come to church tomorrow. So I sang Ye Elders of Israel. It was terrible; the words in Spanish are different than English so I messed up a few times and my voice cracked once. Very embarrassing. And guess what, they didn’t come to church. So that’s ok. We had 4 investigators in church and had 110 people there which exceeded our goal of 90 that week. Exceeds Expectations! Let’s go.

What A good week. I Know this Chruch is true with all my heart or else I wouldn’t be out here. I love you all.

Love Elder Pugmire

La samana de Enfermedad

This week will forever be stuck in my mind and is possibly the worst week I will ever had on my mission.

Let’s start with last Monday.

Well last week Elder Prows somehow lost his wallet so we were probably not going to be able to buy groceries for that week. And I don’t have my own personal debit card, so my mother found a way to send me some money for me to use. So I wanted to jump at that opportunity and have food for this week. We had just enough money to get to Centro where I could pick up money. We paid the Taxista, but the place we went wouldn’t let me get cash out because I didn’t have my passport which is in Tuxtla with the Assistants. So we were already in debt to the Taxista and so we said we could pay him at the other place and so he drove us there but at that bank we had the same situation. So now we were in deep and didn’t know what to do. We eventually called our District leader and had the taxi drive us to them and our district leader paid our large debt for us. So we got that resolved, but no new groceries for this week.

So the next day I woke up with a really sore throat and a very very congested head. So I slept in for an hour or two. We went to lunch and then came back and I slept a long while. Wednesday was the same pretty much; my congestion got worse. And we tried to go work in the night but that just made me very tired. Thursday came, and I still felt the same. So we decided finally to go to the doctor. He told me I have Grippa which is kind of like the Mexican flu. So he prescribed me a little bit of medicine to help me out. But then Elder Prows decided to get help for his ingrown toe. So the Doctor did a little surgery and bandaged him up. So we couldn’t work for 2 more days.

Friday, I spent the day sleeping and cutting pictures out of the Liahona to glue into my journal, just to spice up my journal for future visitations. So yeah. I decided that I want to finish the Book of Mormon for the first real time. The other times I have read it, my head has been up in the clouds and stuff. So I started reading if from where I was at like Alma 30.

Saturday I felt much better with just a runny nose. We started working after lunch and had a small lesson with a certain carlos. Nothing other than that happened.

Sunday was great and we had a girl at church that received the gift of the Holy Ghost in Sacrament and I kept on reading the Book of Mormon. We gave a blessing to this old women and she was very grateful for us.

So that’s basically  the week for you.

Any questions I would love to answer them,

Please submit them to one of the following

Alexandra Pugmire

Eric Pugmire

Lynnelle Pugmire

I would like to share a little article out of the Liahona with you, It is from the First presidency message a while back. It is by President Uchtdorf. It is titled Always in the Middle, here is the link: https://www.lds.org/ensign/2012/07/always-in-the-middle?lang=eng

It talks about how we are always in the middle and as a missionary we should think that we are always in the middle and we can contribute a ton no matter how new we are.

President Uchtdorf explains it a lot better.

Love you all,

Elder Pugmire

A cake that a member bought for my bithday.

Here is a mango that I cut (thanks dad for teaching me that)!

Burgers, Birthdays and Brethern

Hello All!

What a week!!!!

Last Monday, for lunch, we went to a place called Carnivoros. They make lots of burgers and meat stuff. Well for the month of February, they have a special, called the  "Cardiaca". It is three layers of amazing burger, sausage and bacon, with four pieces of bread. So my companion was trying to be a man and bought one and got our district leader and his companion, my good friend Elder Clark, to buy one each as well. Well, Elder Prows died after eating half or it. Not literally, but he was so tired and had the meat sweats. Elder Fackrell got 3/4ths of the way through. But Elder Clark, finished the whole thing. What a man!!

For some reason this week our numbers were down this week, it might have been cause we were gone for two days. Or just because it was a bad week but oh well.

We had two baptisms this week!!! Yay. Their names are Mirenia and Romeito, his name is Romeo but so is his father’s so that is like Jr. So they are our favorite investigators and finally decided to get baptized about 2 weeks ago. It was the loveliest and spiritual baptism I have ever been to. Elder Prows performed the baptisms for both of them. After a few talks were given, by members and a word of welcome from our Bishop, I did the same thing Laura Coray did for my brother at his baptism. We bought Romeo a towel, and I told him that this was his baptism towel. And that it is white to represent his purity at that moment and that every time he uses it to remember his baptism and the covenants he has made. His mom Mirenia was crying and the spirit was so strong. Romeo the husband said that he could feel the spirit and wants to get baptized this month. 

This week I turned 4 3/4ths. Yay one quarter away from 5!!

My birthday down here in Mexico was far different from anything I have had in the USA. I received two things for my Birthday, one the Word of God, and second my first card from my family.

So a few weeks ago, we were told that Elder Dallin H Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles was going to be coming down to Tuxtla and to talk to all the missionaries. So the day came. We had to get up at 12 in the morning and take a 6 hour bus ride to Tuxtla. We arrived and I got to see all my friends from the MTC. It was so nice to see Elder Giles again. But we all went into the stake center and sat down and waited for Elder Oaks to arrive.

The second he arrived and walked in to the room, the spirit was magnified in me 10 fold. He is a true man of God. We took a picture as mission with him and then formed a line to shake his hand. This is probably one of the most exciting times of my life, to meet an Apostle. It is right up there with getting my mission call. Well we sat down to hear him talk.

He had no talk prepared but just talked about what the spirit said was right. He’s pretty funny and has a super deep voice. He talked about the Gospel culture, and the family. He had a super funny quote. He said "You elders from North America specifically, ... If you don’t go home and don’t take marriage seriously then you’re not half a man. And all the English speakers were like “oooooooo,” because he has a translator. But all the Hermanas were like burn. But yeah he emphasized marriage. He also talked about what to teach people who are investigators and less actives, and that is the next ordinance or the sacrament, and why it is so important to us.

I think that getting to listen to Elder Oaks was a great birthday present.

After listening to Elder Oaks, we were supposed to go buy food, but none of us had enough money to pay for a taxi and there were no ATMs nearby, so eventually a member who works at the Plaza of Sun offered to take us there in his van. This was such a big miracle for us, since we hadn’t eaten since our last dinner. I know the Lord puts people in our way to help us.

On the way home it was an 8 hour bus drive. I was feeling kind of down and stuff for some reasons, but then my zone leader, Elder Merrill gave me a card from my dad unexpectedly, and I was so happy to receive it, because it was the first to receive on my mission.

Those are my two birthday miracles.

Thank you all for the Birthday wishes I miss you all.

Love,

Elder Pugmire

Those cardiaca burgers!!

\Here is Elder Clark and Elder Fackrell in front of the front of  Mcdonalds.