The Adventures of Elder Collin Grant

Welcome to the Adventures of Elder Grant. Freak ... where to start. Well this week started off normal, like any other week. I had a nice P-Day; ate some delicious food; and then went into the house. We left to work and got rejected then went home to sleep. This is when all went crazy. So, I got a text from the zone leaders that was like, "Hey Dude! You need to go be in the house of the zone leaders in San Marcos like right now. Your "kid" (training companion) has to be in Guatemala in the morning. You have to leave at 2:30 in the freaking a.m.!" So, we packed up or at least my companion did and we left, into the cold night, making our way to San Marcos. We arrived in our wonderfully chilly destination.We knocked on the zonies' door and they came and asked, "Why are you two here?" Turns out our zonies had told these zonies nothing. It wasn't too long until I found out we had to go to the Capitol, without clothes and all that junk.

So, we get to the bus terminal and there are no buses there. Why? Turns out my zone leaders told us to leave because they wanted to sleep in. (Not funny) The bus was in my area. So, we waited for a bus in the middle of the night, freezing to death. Then just for funzies I decided to get really sick and I puked all over the place. Ya, that was cool! Finally the bus came and I felt like I was going to die. But on the bright side, supposedly, I was going to come back that night so I wasn't too worried about the whole clothes situation. But, I was wrong.

We started making our way to Xela and the bus decided to flip because the moron driver was going super fast down a pass way worse than the Jackson Pass. How do I know that the bus was flipping? Oh not much, just that I woke up in the air with everyone screaming and I see the road outside my side window coming at my face super fast. But, luckily God was like, "No! Collin won't die today!" and touched the bus and put it all normal. I was super mad at the bus driver and demanded my money back. We got on a different bus that didn't charge us. WOOT!!!!

We made it into the Capitol finally and I saw my buddy Elder See from the CCM. We talked, laughed, I puked, and had an all around good time. So anyways, my kid was there for Visa stuff. Then I got really sick. I started blacking out and puking lots. They called in the Church doc, for all of Central America, to check me out. Basically what he told me is, "YOU CANNOT LEAVE TODAY OR YOU WILL DIE!" Pretty cool right? So I stayed the night in the Capitol. Ya know, garments that have been on you since Monday don't smell too hot when it is Wednesday. We asked the Church Office what we were supposed to do. (At this moment I have Elder Segard as a companion because our kids were going to be in the Capitol until Friday.) We asked them here, "Where do we go?" and they said, "I DUNNO, stinking dummies." So, Segard and I were like, "I need garments because I smell like death and I cannot go to the hottest part of our mission without any." They pointed to us where the Office of Mission North is. (Don't you love how his Spanish is affecting his English.)

Well, this sparked a little gear in my head and I was like, "Hey! Whoa! My best bro, Ky Trupp is there right now. I'll go there." And we went and, yes, I saw my best friend, as you have seen by the pictures. (check out the previous post) [This is a little segment from Elder Trupp's letter home: "We also had a special guest come to the office this week as a surprise. Not many of you know him but the ones who do know that a certain Elder Collin Grant is one of my best friends ever. So it was good to see him. I think that helped me a lot, as well, to see a familiar face from home even if he smelled bad cuz he hadn't showered for a few days in travel from Retalulehu to the capital. But it was good to talk about mission stories with him even though we're still on our missions haha.] This was an awesome, once in a mission experience. And now I have no companion and I will be training again this Wednesday because my kid went to his real mission. And, I am the zone leader for this week.

That's my story. Hope ya'll enjoyed it!

Con amor,
Elder Grant

A Sweet Reunion

This is Robin. I am sure that Ky and Ky's mom wouldn't mind me sharing these pictures on the blog. (Collin will definitely want them.) But, somehow and somewhere, these two best friends, Elder Collin Grant and Elder Ky Trupp were able to get together in Guatemala. After Collin got his call to Retalhuleu Guatemala, Ky received his call to Guatemala City North. They were so excited to be in the same country. But there was a whole mission, Quetz, separating the two. Ky left about six weeks after Collin and their hope was that they would see each other at the CCM. But, it didn't work out. Collin left a day or two before Ky arrived. He was able to leave a little message behind for him, however. I don't know who was more sad about that, the Elders, Collin's sisters, or their moms.

Today, I received a text from Ky's mom letting me know that the Elders had been together. Ky's P-Day is Saturday and so he sent the letter and pictures today. Here are the pictures that were sent. I can't imagine what a joyful reunion it was. I wish I had been there to see. Just thinking about it makes me all weepy. I can't wait to hear about it from Collin on Monday.

A Better Week

This week has been a ton better! We have worked hard with little success. But the members now know that we work. We will just keep plugging along. I am super tired today. Another Elder and I have been doing squats at the gym and it is taking it out of me.

My area is super tiny. Supposedly there are lots of people but I haven't found them yet. There is a lot of commercial crap here. It is pretty modern, I guess. There are a lot of old old cars here and when I get back to the States, my mind will be blown. That is in awhile and doesn't really matter to me right now. I am not sure what people do for a living here. In our ward there are 150 people. We only have about 79 attend on a regular basis. I am not getting eaten by bugs except fleas and I am slowly, but surely, killing them.

I am pretty happy right now because my "kid" is super cool even though we are complete opposites, we go to the gym each morning that helps with the stress, which the is a ton of right now. But it's alright and we will keep working hard. We are planting seeds and might not see the results. It would be kind of nice, however. I think the Lord is teaching me that times can be rough but you can't give up. You just have to keep working and working and working.

On Saturday we went to the Bishop's house to talk to him about members. He is a super good guy and always wants to help us. He works like a dog. We planned a lesson with him for Tuesday. Then he offered us food but we said like "Hey dude! We are fasting!" And he was super surprised because we were fasting last week, too. We have been praying, as a zone, for some baptisms and are sacrificing all that we can to help realize that goal. He was super impressed that we would do that. At Ward Council we talked about twins that may be a good prospect. We are going to use the ward to help with them. They said they were willing to help. I am much happier about that.

My spelling is going down the drain but my Spanish is coming up and getting better and better. Sometimes I think in Spanish which gets me all sorts of confused. That is the report.

I love you all tons!

Elder Grant

Discouraging Week

This week has been pretty discouraging. In one day we had 43 contacts and got rejected on every single one. I have also learned that the members here are a bit "different". I have decided to call this week "The Week of Apostasy and Rejection." I have learned a ton. I learned that the members won't help us so we are going to need to step up even more. That helps me become a better missionary. Part of the reason we have had trouble this week is that the Stake President has told the members not to work with us. He would like them to wait like four months to talk to us. That has totally killed what little motivation we had here in the ward. I love P-Day because it gives you a chance to relax and regroup for the week. And, we may have found a somewhat positive newbie. That is good.

This week a drunk guy gave me food which was really nice. Ummm ... I only threw up a lot yesterday. Not sure why but I'm good now.

I'm excited for Jessie. That is an awesome mission but this mission totally kicks butt more. Missionary work is growing and we are excited about the new mission in Coban. That is really cool news.

My new house is super bomb. It has a toilet on the roof which makes me laugh! I froze a few nights ago because it rained. That was terrible!

I'm glad all is going well for all of you. Keep kicking butt and being awesome. Keep up with the goals, Mom. They will help so much, especially the study!!! Don't be lame members. HELP THE MISSIONARIES!!! I love you all!!!

Con amor,
Elder Grant

I'm a Dad!

I have got some news...I am a DAD!!! Yep, that's right. I am now training. Holy crazy, right? My kid is a Latino so it will really help me with my Spanish even though it is doing pretty good. Training is definitely something new. We have been together for four days. He is super formal, and you know I am not. His name is Elder Sanchez from the Capitol here in Guate. He has a few things to learn and I hope I do a good job of helping to teach him. We have had some interesting talks. He comes from a very different background than the people we are teaching. And we are teaching, just not much. We are teaching a way super awesome family that straight up rule. They have no money and are very humble.

In our change meeting, I got to see many of my newbie friends. We are all training now. It was good to know that we are all striving to be obedient and work hard. We have been working super duper hard, in this area, to get some success but the members are still quite reluctant to help. It is definitely more difficult than San Isidro. I love working but sometimes you work until you drop only to have nothing to show for it.

We are changing houses, today, to a super nice house that is cheaper. We are going to live with the Zone Leaders which will be a party because they are sure cool. It also has a a nice court to run in so my companion can sleep while I exercise. I have gained a ton of weight here in the mountains. We don't sweat and they feed me a ton. I am sending pictures. I am waiting on an sd card reader. Oh ya, I went to the temple again. BOOM!!! Super Awesome. The pictures are of Xela and the Xela temple and of me, after doing service for like 19 hours, carrying bags of ... Dirt! I figured Uncle Wayne might like to see the pics of Xela. The Xela temple is so pretty and the city is massive.

Well, I need to be obedient and write Pres. I love the mission! WOOT!! And I love you all.
..
Con amor,
Elder Grant

Update from the Mountains

I apologize for not writing very much lately. So, I will at least try to do a better job. So this week has been pretty rough on me because I haven't had many baptisms. Then we had interviews with President Maravilla, which are basically the best things you can ever have, and we talk for a bit and then he said, "Dude Grant, I know something is up!" I told him how I was feeling down and I didn't feel like I was living up to what I should be doing. And then he said something that blew my mind. He asked, "How many people did Abinadi baptize?" And I was like, "As far as I know zero." And he said, "Right! But he converted someone who became one of the greatest missionaries ever, at least his son did." He said not to worry about the numbers. And, I have made so many changes. I was never a spiritual person before nor was I very sensitive to the Spirit. But that has all changed. I cherish my study time. In fact for me it is a treasure. I learn so much. It also helps my Spanish because I only read in Spanish. I tried in English and it is so much harder for me to focus and marking scriptures is so much fun. I am doing a really fun study right now. I am marking every time the one of the names for Christ is used. It is very powerful to see how much the Book of Mormon testifies of our Savior. It testifies a ton you know.

I live in a house that is really nice. It has three floors but we only use the bottom floor and the terrace. The terrace is where I wash my garments BY HAND!! Dang straight. I wash them by myself by hand. I do have a cook. In fact we have two cooks. That is awesome. I am having a hard time focusing on P-Days because we have to do so much. We usually have family home evenings with a family somewhere but tonight we have three. They are all from 6:00 to 9:00 and then we have dinner after. We are going to be running like crazy.

One cool thing that happened is that we went to the Paca which is just a bunch of used clothes. I found a Boy Scout shirt in my size so I bought it for, yes, 8 quetz (like $1). I used it this morning when we played "el ball" which is a really dumb game but we love it because we are sports starved. I will teach you to play it when I get back. It is so dumb but so funny.

This week there was some guy that invited us into his house. We found out that he is a member but like way off the path. He apparently talks to spirits. He knows that the Church is true but he is crazy. He is really nice but I am pretty sure that he is possessed or something. He told us some crazy story about death and angels and other things. He cracks me up but he gives great references. I am all good with him.

Thank you for the package. I am super pumped! The candy is the bomb. I have it hid in my house
because American candy here is better than gold. I scored a free dinner because I gave out some Redvines to some people. I love the pillowcases. Dad's comments cracked me up! The hoodie and sweats are great, too. I just have to find room for them. I might have changes again. We have changes on Wednesday and the next week and then three weeks from then. Finally after that changes will be back to normal.

Could you please send me Kyle and Sam's address? I would love to write them. I can't wait to see pictures of their baby. I sent them an email of names that I figure will work like Coddlewocks and
such. All the names are unisex.

I had better go. The Church is true. I had cake today so basically it has been a great day. Well peace! Oh ya. On the weird side we found a family that is positive. WOOT!!!

Con amor,
Elder Grant

This week was better. We actually worked with members and now have some newbies which is a miracle. It used to be that newbies were never found but that is changing now. It's going to be a long process. We should have some success in a while. We found out that one lady we are working with may not be married. We just have to do some record checking. Wahoo!!! for another family. That means more sealings and happiness! Really, the temple is one of those things that is a huge blessing here on Earth. We are all sealed to an eternal family and all have the ability to do so when they get married.

In my area there is just us and nobody else. But in my zone there are 12. Yes, I am in Sacatepequez or however you spell it. To answer your questions, Mom, to stand in holy places you just need need MTFUBAFC (pronounced matfoobafc) which means "Man the Freak Up. Be a Fearless Champion". I understand it is really hard to stand up for things you believe in while you are surrounded by those that don't understand. And really, that silly saying has a lot of significance in it. Think about it. If you are confronted or challenged about your beliefs, just man up and tell them without any excuses and BAM! they will respect you. It is hard but the right thing to do. Mom, please use MTFUBAFC in your talk. It would make my month! An example of this is one time we were teaching a lady who was pretty hostile towards us and normally I can take that and I'm a chicken. But this time I was like, "No, I know that all these things are true. And yes! I have always been chaste and never touched drugs or alcohol." She didn't have a response. Now my old companion, in my old area, is teaching her. Hahahaha so basically you just gotta stand up!

Grandpa E is going to be a great leader. He works super hard and I know he will work super hard there too. And, you're welcome Grandpa Messick. I am glad that I have the opportunity to write to you guys. Thanks for all the support that you give me as I serve. Thanks for being a great pair of grandparents!!!

Love you all. Don't forget to write.

Cn amor,
Elder Grant