DOCTOR PEPPER CHERRY!!

This week was a week of miracles. Not really any miracles that have too much to do with missionary work, but miracles nonetheless. Let me explain.

This week was pretty normal as far as proselyting goes. We're starting to find new investigators like normal again, which is nice. We've had to spend a couple days this week basically contacting all day but we met some really great people. It kind of paid off and we ended up finding 8 new investigators, some of them with some decent potential. Nothing too special for now. We did set another baptismal date this week on a guy named Oscar. He's a friend of this member named Daniela Woodling. She grew up in Belen, but then married some guy from Pennsylvania, moved to the states, and had two kids. But she just recently came back to Bolivia with her 13 and 11 year old kids Abigail and David, and they're going to be here for like 8 months while their dad stays in the states working. So she referred us to one of her old friends, Oscar, who lives at the end of the street. He's a great guy, but he's trying to change his life from some alcohol problems he had in the past. But now he's accepting the gospel and even came to church on Sunday! Woop!

But the biggest miracle this week (from my worldy perspective) was a nice gesture from a member named Arnoldo that we eat lunch with. Him and another guy in our ward, Brigham, work out at a gym in this mall called las Brisas. After their workout one day, they were going through the super market in said mall when they stumbled upon a little green can. Brigham mentioned that a gringo would kill to have this can. So Arnoldo asked us about it. the conversation went a little like this. Translated version.

Arnoldo: "the soda came in a green can"

Me: "was it called Mtn Dew?"

Arnoldo: "I think so"

Me: "NO WAY ARE YOU SERIOUS????"

Turns out, it WAS Mtn Dew. He bought us a can and brought it to lunch the next day. He also showed us photos of the wide selection of imported american sodas they have there, including freaking DR PEPPER AND DR PEPPER CHERRY. I told the ZL's the next day and they both went and bought themselves an overpriced case of Mtn Dew. We are so deprived. Elder Carlson is also a pal and he bought me a can of DP cherry since las Brisas is in his area. It made me so freaking happy. It's been over a year since I have had Dr Pepper. I will be going to buy myself a case today.

You really do grow to love something more after you've been without it for a while. 

Love you guys! and I might love DP Cherry even more

Elder Bingham

also last week I found DR PEPPER BBQ SAUCE in Hipermaxi for 28 bs.
I'm a really happy man

turns out its really creepy when you hold your glasses slightly away from the face

HAY MTN DEW Y DP!

                                               my shrine to america on the wall by my desk 

Elder Bingham becomes a local legend

Well, transfers happened. And to literally everybody's surprise, I'm staying in Belen for a FIFTH freaking transfer. Like what the crap.  I have now joined the ranks of all the other missionaries the elders always talk about that were in Belen for way too long, like Elders Gabbitas, Villalobos, Cook, Francis, and Winger.  All week I've been hearing jokes from the members like "They'll probably give you a calling in the ward soon" or "when are you going to buy yourself a property?"  So I'm pretty sure everybody in Belen is going to remember me forever now. Hopefully for the work I've done here, but probably also for the fact that I was here for so long.

But hey on the bright side, I'm going to be able to see our investigators through to baptism! On Saturday we had the first of hopefully three or four this transfer. Our investigator Maria Fernanda got baptized! It was really stressful putting it all together. For some reason like nobody in the ward knew the baptism was happening until like the day of, and Friday a killer cold front came in. So Maria was super worried about cold water because Camba's are wussies when it comes to cold stuff. So we got to the chapel at like 5:00 (baptism was at 7:00) and started filling up the font. We loaned a propane stove from a member and a giant pot (probably like 30 litros giant) and started heating up pots of water while the cold tap water was filling the font up. Fun fact: the chapels in Santa Cruz don't have heated water in the fonts. Oh, Bolivia. We ended up throwing in like 5 or 6 pots almost full of burning hot water, and the font water changed from being cold to being what I would call "almost room temperature". Which was pretty significant progress. Despite all that, when she first dipped a toe in the water, she immediately started freaking out about how cold it was. Luckily we had a member there inside the font area persuading her to get in. Elder Buhler was going to baptize her, I was just standing outside silently praying that she would get over the cold water and just wash herself of her sins already. As soon as they opened the font windows, like three other members watching immediately started reassuring her like "its okay sister the water's fine" or "nothing is going to happen, you wont get sick" or "you can do it we've all been baptized the same way". Elder Buhler finished the prayer, I heard a scream, and then a SPLASH!!! Then she came up out of the water and started freaking out again. I let out a sigh of relief, did a little fist pump, and then went to the bathroom to wait for Buhler. It was a really stressful day to say the least. 

And then Sunday she came kind of late to the chapel for her confirmation and I was mad stressed until she got there. Oh Bolivians.

Well that was my week. Hope you're not all sick of my stories from this area by now. Should have some more good ones in the future. Love you guys!

Elder Bingham

one member here has a tiny motorcycle and I love it

hat same member hunted a Tatu! (armadillo) I never actually got to eat it though. Maybe someday

 our semi-successful water heating set up 

Maria's baptism!

face-to-cake smashing and lemonade

So this week actually went really well! This quite possibly will be my last week in this area since transfers are next week, so it was nice to finish it off with a bang. 

This week was Elder Sauceda-Leon's birthday. Maybe you remember how here in Bolivia they have the tradition of making you bite your birthday cake after you sing happy birthday, and then someone normally shoves your face in it. Last year, I was also in Elder Sauceda's zone on his b-day and had the pleasure of smashing his face in it. This year, I got to do it twice more! Once in his pension's house, and once in district meeting. He never even saw me coming in district meeting. I was sitting on the front row of benches. he looked around, thought the coast was clear, and went in for the bite. Then I leaped forward majestically and in midair slam dunked his face right into that cake. Best part, we got it on video!!! I'll try to send said video, its hilarious.

On Saturday, we did a district activity and made a bunch of lemonade to give out at the Zoo, which is in our area. It worked pretty freaking well and we got a lot of references out of it. The best part was that we had exactly enough lemonade to fill up 200 little plastic cups and give them out, which was extremely satisfying. The zoo was packed that day so it was awesome. There was a Jehovah's witness not to far away with a little stand where he was trying to give out books, but we were doing way better than him and he looked a little sad. We gave out all our folletos and lemonade! Thats the secret J-dubs! just give out lemonade! (also preach the truth and not apostasy)

As for proselyting, after 4 transfers in Belen, our area is actually having great progress! It feels so satisfying to have all our hard work paying off. This next transfer I'm sure Elder Buhler will have great success here with his new comp. Since President has basically told me already that i'll get a transfer. We now have 4 investigators with a fecha bautismal! One should get baptized this Saturday, and the other 3 are looking solid for August. The biggest miracle happened yesterday. We have an investigator named Yanira who has been going to church for a while now, but she never wanted to accept a baptismal date because she always found doubts about polygamy, Joseph Smith, etc. But yesterday in the lesson, I asked her if she had prayed and asked God about the BOM, and she said yes! And that she wants to get baptized!! Only problem is that she's facing opposition from her family. But she finally applied faith and made a decision! she has a date for August 3rd and we're really happy.

Well, I kind of forgot to bring my camera to internet today, but I'll send some of Buhler's photos from this week. Enjoy!

Elder Bingham

This was my sixth transfer in the mission as District Leader, and my sixth district! I'm really proud of these guys 

Zona Equipetrol!

 lemonade at the zoo

outside the zoo there was a freaking SLOTH just chilling in the tree! I love Bolivia

'MURICA BABY!!!

I hope you all enjoyed celebrating freedom 5 days ago. We did the best we could here in Bolivia as missionaries. Our celebrations involved listening to the motab version of "god bless America" on a loop, dressing in red ties and blue pants, going to TGI Friday's for dinner and eating the "cowboy triple meat burger" (god bless the food court in Ventura mall too), and screaming the national anthem at the top of our lungs when we got home. It's fun to have a house full of 6 Americans.

Another highlight of this week, on Thursday the assistants did splits with the DL's in our zone, which I am one of. We went out with Elder Snyder, who is the tallest elder in the mission, one of the few taller than me. He's from Salt Lake. Cool guy. Us three tall white people in shirts and ties were sure a sight. We actually had some really solid lessons that day and I learned a lot from the guy. With him we set a fecha bautismal on this cool guy named Darwin and found a couple new people. So if you thought we couldn't do any better, that night we had 7 Americans in the house. We played some pretty good basketball in the morning for exercises. God bless America.

But other than that it was a pretty slow week. We only had one investigator at church, but she's progressing really well and should be ready for baptism in a couple weeks! I'll probably get transferred before then but that doesn't matter. 

Anyway, enjoy the pics and enjoy all the great things about America while you're all there. Love you guys!

Elder Bingham

ps: god bless bolivia too, they need some serious blessings down here

pic 1-2: we did our best to dress up like america and snap some dope pics Wednesday morning. Enjoy

3: trio with Elder Snyder for a day

4: 7 americans in one house in Bolivia? NEW RECORD

5-6: me and Buhler found some empty path in the jungle at the end of our area and I really want to go hike down it someday. maybe next pday

we did our best to dress up like america and snap some dope pics wednesday morning. Enjoy

 trio with Elder Snyder for a day

7 americans in one house in Bolivia? NEW RECORD

 me and Buhler found some empty path in the jungle at the end of our area and I really
want to go hike down it someday. maybe next pday

"vengan otro momento estoy mirando el partido"

I feel like I heard that like about a thousand times this week. Nobody ever wants to talk to us when I world cup game is going on. I don't blame them too much, world cup is pretty hype. Sorry Argentina

But besides that this week was alright. We had some powerful lessons and really spiritual experiences. I'll tell you about one of those that strengthened my testimony a lot. 

So basically this whole week I was struggling to feel excited about the work here. It's been going really slow and we have very few investigators to teach. So I was feeling pretty bummed out for a long time and it was affecting our work. Freaking Satan. But then this weekend when we started our fast, I decided to ask Heavenly Father to give me the strength to be happy and work hard so we can have success. Basically the whole time while I was fasting, things didn't go too well. We had one solid appointment with our golden family, but then they didn't even come to church Sunday morning. In fact, none of our investigators did. I felt devastated. But when we went to finish our fast with the prayer, I basically said, "okay, heavenly father. I've done the fast. Now I could really use some blessings. Today I'm going to give it my all if you help me out. I'm going to work as hard as I possibly can, and if you can help me to be happy meanwhile and to feel the spirit that would be great."

After that, we had a great lunch with some members, went home, did a little bit of study, and then got to work! And we had an awesome day. In one hour just contacting I felt like we accomplished more than we had in a few days. Then we had a solid appointment with a progressing investigator (but it did go a little long, she spends way to much time on the internet looking up stuff about the church and had a lot of questions) and then found a family of three at night that were really interested!! Also the 23 year old daughter there told me I look like a model. So Elder Bingham's going to have snake-alert on high in future appointments.

So this week I learned a few things. One is that fasting works! Try it out sometime. Another is that Satan is a chump that makes you feel bad about yourself and you should kick him in his metaphorical face if you feel that way. Another is that knocking doors sometimes works well if you do it with faith. Another is that Elder Sauceda-Leon sleep talks and its really creepy. Another is that if you don't eat the giant bag of mandarin oranges that members give you they will grow really moldy and make your whole kitchen smell like vinegar. 

I hope you all feel learned. Never forget this valuable information.

Elder Bingham

we went to hard rock cafe last monday because Equipetrol is the coolest zone and it has american restaurants. BEHOLD THE JAVA LAVA BURGER

just me trying to be like jesus

Elder Buhler is a genius and tied this fan without a base to a chair

Elder MARISPINI

multi zone conference with the boys where I discovered that I have like 5 chins if I try real hard

coca cola is running a world cup promotion where you can turn in 4 specially marked bottle caps with 6 bolivianos and they give you a dope cup. We are suckers for promotions like this