Ay ay ay‏

Hola!
Just in case you all don't know... ay ay ay translates to wo wo wo in the scriptures. I promise I am actually learning lots and important things! Less than one week here in the CCM! Crazy. Exciting. Sad. I have amazing comps. I have learned so much from each of them and itwill be hard to leave them, but luckily we are all going to the same mission.

Okay, so two days ago we went to the plaza to contact people again. It was a little bit different this time. Not that many people wanted to hear from us. My latina comp was Hna Mendez, which I was very happy about. She's fantastic. The last person we talked to actually didn't speak spanish, only english, so I started talking to him and my poor comp had no clue what was going on. Well, time went on and he just kept on coming on to me. It was terrible. I would just turn it around to our message. We got his contact info and he said he was interested in our message, but wanted me to be the one to teach him, which is not possible and wouldn't happen anyhow. We just walked away, but I felt so gross afterwards. Not the most awesome end to that experience, but honestly I learned a ton from the whole trip and know what I need to work on. Two elders had accidently contacted prostitutes, so they ran once they figured it out. And there was a group of men that said they were born-agains and just kept on bashing on the elders. The elders said they would try to walk away, but the men would physically pull them back. VERY different experience for everyone, but no one had a negative attitude at all, we know our message is true, we are trying to help people, and we know the Lord will guide us. It's very reassuring to know that things like that will for sure happen, but we have the choice to let it affect us negatively or not.

Spanish is coming along. It's fun to look back on how my spanish conversations went about 7 weeks ago and how they are now. It's amazing. I still know NOTHING... don't worry. But I have definitely progressed. The only way this is possible is through God. I know this.

So, last week a missionary that had been serving in the dominican republic came to the mtc last wednesday night. She's not even in our area, but came to guatemala because the medical is apparently better here. They believed she had a brain tumor. She was way out of it, just slept the whole time. She was in our room. Hna Searle (my forever comp) is a nurse, so she was in charge of watching her for the night.They got here at dinner and her appointment at the hospital wasn't until noon the next day. She only speaks spanish, so it was going to be interesting. I'm trying to keep this short, because there are a lot of details, but Hna Sosa (one of my amazing teachers) came up and they asked her to stay with Hna Reyes (the sick missionary) and Hna Searle. Hna Reyes loved her, she even started calling her mom and joking. We got to be there while she received a priesthood blessing. It was all in spansih, but the Spirit was so amazingly strong. Hna Reyes ended up asking Hna Sosa to stay the night and she did! It was crazy. We all tried helping out. Miracles: forever we have been trying to figure out why there were only four of us in our room and only n. americans. We were sad that we didn't have any latinas in our room (6 to a room).Well, we had 2 extra beds - 1 for Hna reyes, 1 for Hna Sosa. There is no way that could have been planned out. AND we have two nurses in ourroom. It was amazing.We heard the news two days ago: it turned out to be a parasite. They removed it, but we're not sure how long recovery for her will be. Hopefully she will be able to go back to her mission. Good thing: it wasn't cancer of any sort. They had been planning for her to have to stay with the mission doctor for three months (she has absolutely no family support - only her boyfriend on a mission, and her stake president - who has been paying for everything for her) and she probably wouldn't be able to go back. But this is better! Crazy. Amazing.

I have so much to be gratefull for! Thank you to all of you for youremails, support, love, and prayers!

Con mucho amor
Hna Marin