Taking it to the big city...

Hey there!!  25 days till christmas!  I can’t wait to call you all!

Well, I did get transferred.  I am now in Piura, Piura! More or less the central part of my mission.

Now, I am in Miguel Grau 1 (my area), in the Zone Algarrobos (the mission office is in my zone).  I am with two missionaries right now.  My real companion is Elder Cortijo (from Lima, and has one transfer left) and another missionary (Elder Salcedo, Ecuador) is chilling with us for a bit.  I have known Elder Cortijo for a while, and he is a really cool guy.  I am super excited to work here with him.  I am still Zone Leader, and my zone is basically the capital of the mission.  Pretty cool.  This is the land where there is “Chile’s” “Papa Johns”, the Peruvian WALMART, and basically everything else you could want.  Super excited to keep on working here in this new area.  From what I can tell is that it is full of sand and wonderful members.  I’ve never really served in a big city, so this is a new adventure for me. 

So I guess I will just continue on with what happened this week.

This week was relatively relaxed.  We were working and having a good time as usual.  I loved my time with Elder Mulford, he is a great guy.  We worked hard, and witnessed a few small miracles.

Saturday, we started from the first off the morning....We started cleaning the baptismal font, and helping a couple of missionaries to move.  Then we went back to wait for the transfers....and they never came....Since we are so far away from everyone, we usually get them early, but this time, for some reason, we had to wait a while.  We waited and waited, and just started working regularly....At around 6 we got the transfers.  The baptism of Ana was at 7.  So in the hour, we had to go buy the bus tickets, then come back....(See Lexi, sometimes everything kinda falls on your head all at once, and then you just have to take it one step at a time.  We got back to the baptism, just in time, and we had a really spiritual awesome baptism!  So cool to watch Christian baptism his aunt.  They really are a chosen family.  I love them so much.  The baptism was wonderful, and Ana will be a wonderful member.  After that, we went to go eat some Peruvian burgers....which were actually pretty good.

Zack with Ana that was baptized by her nephew Christian (who was baptized last month.)  Zack adores this family.

Sunday morning was an adventure.  Our sacrament meeting started at 10, and we had ward council at 9.  We went to half of ward council, then at 9:30, we left running to go pick up the family Laban Galvez.  We went, and they actually attended church!  SO cool.  As we helped them get into church, we realized that we needed to go pick up another less active (M. Monja, who I have talked about before.)  He has been less active for a while, and is a RM, so he is talked about kind of like a legend in the ward....Just a crazy hard smart dude.  So at 9:55, we left running...I kid you not....Running.  We ran from the church to the opposite end of our area.  We ran under that hot blazing sun for like 5 minutes, sprinting.  So funny.  We got to his house, and we were just sweating like crazy....They told us to not wait for them, but we insisted on going with him, and we ended up taking him to church.  It was really fun to walk in to church with two new families. And one of them the legendary Monja. Super funny.

Later that day, we went over to the Familia Romero Nava to have lunch.  They had prepared my favorite Peruvian plates, and we spent a nice time with them.  For almost two hours we were there.  Then it came time to say goodbye....Wow that was so hard.  There was no one there who wasn't crying.  Super hard time for me. I just love them so much.  I really feel like they are my family, and it was almost as hard for me to leave them as it was for me to leave you all.  But...as I left their home, I just felt successful.  Not in a cocky, prideful way. Not at all.  Just a pure, charitable, loving way.  I reflected over my mission, and was really overcome with a comforting feeling, that I am doing the right thing, and that I am making a difference. 

That night, we also said goodbye to a few more people, then I started packing my bags.  I am pretty sick right now, with congestion, sore throat, and so many aches and hurts.  So, as you can guess...the 5 hours in bus was a really, really long 5 hours...

Well my new room is an awesome room, we’ve got couches and all.  My area looks pretty cool, my comp is an awesome guy, and I am just ready to keep on going...after a quick nap of course.

Thanks for everything!  Love you all.  I hope I answered all of your questions...

Elder Bradshaw