SECOND WEEK

The first week we were here we found two good grocery stores—Vons and Ralphs and a Target.  Ralphs is like Smiths Food King in Idaho.  They carry Kroger Brand and have the same rewards cards.  I thought I could survive the mission with those stores fairly close.  Monday we found Costco and a huge mall!  That was great!  They are not too far from us.  We found they are in Glendale just out of our mission but the President gave the older couples the okay to go there.  Since we had all our prescriptions at Costco in Twin Falls, this has worked great for us.  If I had to live permanently in California I would certainly choose Glendale over LA.

Tuesday night we met with Bishop Joya and he gave us some names of people to work with.  This ward has activities for everyone on Tuesday nights.  The primary was practicing for their sacrament meeting presentation.  The Relief Society does some kind of craft (very simple crafts mostly made of paper).  Quarterly they have a regular week day meeting.  The men are in meetings—don’t know what about.  The Young Women are always happy to have me come in.  They just have opening exercises.  So far they haven’t had any activities after that.  They wanted me to tell about myself.  I gave them a short sketch of my life and then said, you probably want to get on with your activity. They said they didn’t have one.  The mutual president told me their activity was basketball.  I thought possibly these girls were really in to basketball so I went to the cultural hall.  Not one girl was in there.  I think the president doesn’t know what to do.  How I wish we could transplant a few of you here.  They have 15 girls in their mutual.  Six were in attendance this week.  I hope there will be a way I can help them.  I can’t take over but they need some guidance and help-mainly some ideas of what to do (shadow leadership). These girls are terrific but they need some spiritual experiences and worthwhile activities.

Dale: While Connie was talking to the Young Women I was walking around the halls and came upon two sisters, one consoling the other.  The first seeing my Elder’s name tag said the other wanted a blessing.  We found an empty room and I ask about her problems in Spanish because, she spoke very little English. Turns out that she, being, 28 years old really just wanted some assistance in deciding to leave home.  I gave her a priesthood blessing and told her that it was time to move out.  In the blessing I also told her to stay close to the Spirit because the friends where she was moving were not members.

Wednesday night we met with the Moran family.  They are from Guatemala.  He had a good construction job until the economy got bad.  He now works as a dishwasher in West Hollywood.  Of course that doesn’t pay as well and he does not like having to work with the strange people there. He has to work weekends and can’t come to church.  He has not been able to attend for three months because of his work. They have an 8 year old boy and a 3 year old girl.  That little girl is so cute!  She just won our hearts.  They want so badly to be sealed in the temple.  Hermana Moran has had all of the temple lessons but he hasn’t had them because of work.  We need to see if Dale can give him the lessons.

Wednesday evening we had an appointment with Bishop Estrada but he wasn’t there.  His daughter was having a baby and there were complications.  We hope everything is okay. 

Thursday afternoon Kent and Leslie Cooper picked us up and we went out for some Korean food.  It was okay but I am sure there are better restaurants.  It was nice to visit with them as they have the same assignment as we do.  They shared some of their experiences with us.  They are from Gilbert, Arizona.  I am sure we will develop a great friendship with them.  They gave us some materials, “The Daily Dose”, for an English class we plan on starting.  We should be organizing it soon. 

Thursday night we met with the Garnica family.  They have 5 children.  Two of the girls I met in Young Women.  They are great girls.  We got acquainted with the rest of the family last night.  The bishop told us they were having marital problems.  He works construction and has a fairly decent job. He was the Executive Secretary to the Bishop but does not have a calling now.  She is from Honduras.  She doesn’t work outside the home.  The Bishop told us that she wants a divorce but he doesn’t.  We don’t know what the issues are but we hope they can be resolved.  They have really good kids.  I think we are going to have some family home evenings with them.  Hopefully that will bring more of the spirit into their home and having some happy times together will help them.

These great families live neighborhoods that before our mission I would have classified as bad.  I have found they really aren’t “bad or scary”—the people are just very poor.  The streets and sidewalks are dirty and trashy but the insides of their houses are clean.  They are good people doing the very best they can to take care of their families.  Most of the people are immigrants who are struggling to survive but happy to be here. We realize more than ever before how blessed we have always been.