June 30 2014

HI Everyone!

Well this last week was definetly an adventure. After the crazy awesome experience with Luis we were ready to get Mariana ready for this week. On wednesday the first thing out of her mouth was ''I do not want to get baptized'', it freaked me and Elder Copa out but we fought hard and finally pulled out the reason she didnt want to be baptized and had a super duper spiritual lesson. We reinvited her three times and she said no but we didnt give up, the fourth time it was quiet for like 10 seconds and she finally sighed and said ''I have never wanted to be baptized, but based on what I feel I know I have to''. Yet another miracle, I am starting to feel spoiled. Luis is just awesome, his goal is to read the Book of Mormon twice before the year is over and he baptized Mariana. It was perfect... except for when I got emergency changed on friday... the day before the baptism.

So my experience in Oriente Quiteño came to a pretty unexpected end but more on that later. It just so happened that Mariana needed another interview in the mission offices on friday so we got to go down with her and Luis. She had her interview and everything went well, then I got to say goodbye to Luis and Mariana before they headed back to the sector with Elder Copa. It was super sad, I really didnt expect it to be so hard, but they told me to come back and visit at the end of my mission and I said I would do everything possible. I ran into some missionaries from my old district today and they told me the baptism went perfectly and that there kids are finally taking the lessons which never happened while I was there. That family is incredible.

Anyways I am now in La Colon zone, it is brand spanking new and everybody is opening up sectors. My new comp. is Elder Bustamante from Peru and we are the first Zone Leaders in Colon, he is so much fun and I am learning a ton from him. I have opened up two sectors on my mission but never a zone, it is kind of nuts and I havent gotten a whole lot of sleep in the past couple of days, but I am having fun! I have never been so close to the center of Quito before, these people are loaded!!

Anyways that was my week. And I turned 19! That was pretty cool I guess... I pretty much spent my whole birthday running around Quito in really hot buses and talking to a bunch of people on the phone while not really knowing what the heck I was doing, so it was a great birthday. Thanks for the present family! It is the only one I have gotten so far but thanks anyways grandma!

Elder Durrant