One of my favorite people -This is a little old woman that is crippled and is the slowest walker I have ever walked with. But she is a faithful member and walks the ten or so blocks to church every week without fail with her cane. We had a family home evening with her this week and filled out some get to know you questions and then talked about how its harder to love people you don't know so you should get to know them better. We found out during this time that her birthday had passed and that she spent it all alone without anything. We ran to the nearest tienda or store and found sliced chocolate cake. They pack everything in those tiny tiendas. We sang happy birthday to her and ate cake. She was the happiest person in the world.

This week was great. We are keeping busy as always. We had a ton of people at church again this week, found a great new family and have three baptisms on Saturday. Things are going great and the weather has been really nice this week.

The new family that we are teaching is really awesome. Their house is a museum of all sorts of jungle animal skins and they have parrots too. Its like a real museum that people pay to go to and look at things. I felt right at home with all the animal skins and  the father and I hit it off really well because he is a big hunter. We taught about the restoration with them and they said that they think this is what they had been looking for. They came to church on Sunday too as a family. We are super excited about them.

Hello Huancayo - here is a picture of my city.  The zoo was on top of a hill.

Another picture of Huancayo

My Peruvian cookbook is coming right along. Whenever I like something I ask my pensionista to help me write down a recipe. When I get home you should be excited because by then I will be a master of everything delicious that is Peruvian. These people are super good cooks they don't usually measure anything and they cook pretty much all natural because they don't have very much processed foods here. On Thursday we made pachamanaca with one of our investigator families. Its about as natural as things get. Its meat, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and abbas (giant pea things). You cover it with a bunch of leaves and herbs and stick it in a hole in the ground to cook it with rocks for about an hour. It was super delicious after you get over where it was cooked.

I was a little sick in this picture. but thats what it looks like

 pachamanaca

I could talk about food forever. I always want to talk about food because I'm always starving. I don't understand it because I eat a ton. I feel super bad because my companion is really concerned about her weight and has gained a lot here in this area and I am eating 7 times as much as her, am always hungry and I am losing weight. I don't understand how my calorie expenditure can be that much higher than hers but it is. I eat more than I have ever eaten in my life. I need to gain a little if I go to Cerro because everyone loses weight in Cerro.

I was a little sick this week. Just a little advice, don't be sick here. Its not super fun and the people do weird things when you are sick. I was starting to feel sick and my pensionista insisted that I sniff this cotton ball with alcohol for about a half hour. Other rules of being sick are that you don't shower for at least five days or change your clothes. Don't worry I fought that one. Also its against the law to drink anything cold or room temp or you will die. They think its really terrible.I was really dehydrated because all they would give me is hot things and hot liquids aren't absorbed as well in your body as room temp (random fact from exercise physiology). I had to sneak water. But the blessing of it all is that despite all that I took medicine and was fine after a day or two. 

We had a lot of little miracles this week while finding people. I don't know how it happens but my companion and I will feel a need to turn back and go back to a house and knock on a door. Or cross the street to talk to one person or we will both see the same person in a crowd of people on the street. I have learned that reality and availability of revelation is very real. 

this is just a normal meat market that we pass by a lot

Another blessing of the mission is that I realized I have learned to sleep though anything and everything. When I got here it was really hard for me to sleep. The dogs barking all night, the cat screaming that will someday get killed by those dogs, the baby crying in a home near us, the random orchestras late at night and the tamale guy with his megaphone cart at 4am in the morning yelling TAMALLLESSS! When I get home I'm sure I won't have any problems sleeping ever again.

With Llamas - Last pday we went to a zoo in Huancayo

At the zoo - I think this is a hawk

I think one of the greatest things of all I have learned in Huancayo is the simplicity of the gospel. These people here are very simple and often very uneducated. I spend a lot of time during the week trying to make the message more simple so that people will understand and be able to respond to my questions. And I have learned that it is. The truths and doctrines of the gospel are simple. We can either follow gods way or we can go some other way, whatever other way. And if we follow the Lords guidelines through faith I know that we are blessed.

Have a great week everyone. Thanks for the birthday wishes. No place I would rather be this week than teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Con amor,

Hermana Rhoten