You call that a protest?

Hey everyone this week was pretty slow so there isn't too much to report on. Last week we went and did a little shopping in the street markets here. It was so uncomfortable haha. My companion and I were saying that it's going to be weird when we go back to the states and no one stares at us or tries hard to flirt with us. Anyway, I'll share one conversation just for y'all to get an idea. So I went to buy a rubix cube and first thing the girl asks is if I dyed my hair. Then she asked where I was from, how old I was, if I came there often (literally), what parts of Huanuco we are in, where our church was, what we do, etc. So yeah, it's lots of fun (not).

Then we had some slow days until Thursday where there were protests/riots. So we were supposed to be careful that day. My companion and I stayed in for most of the day but we would still walk across town to get to our pension for meals. We got bored after a while, so we went out to explore the riot. And by the way, they suck at protesting here. It's not like in the states. Here they tried to block off roads but did a terrible job. I wanted to jump in and help, just to show them how to do it. Like a lot of the roads had a bunch of rocks in the roads but not enough to really block the roads, so cars would swerve around the rocks. And then on the bigger roads they would burn tires on the road. But in one spot there was a tire burning on the road and then other tires burning on the side and not on the road. Also they let the fire burn out and then the police just walked by and took the tires off. But people kept protesting until lunch where they then took a lunch break (I didn't know was a thing in protests) and then the cops had stopped everything by then. Also something funny was that we asked people why they were rioting and a lot of them said they didn't know why haha, they just saw others doing it and joined in. So that day was interesting. My companion taught me how to solve a rubix cube and I can now solve them in 2 or 3 minutes.

Then Sunday we had a fun activity where our district put on a small 5 minute theater for seminary. I was a student who wanted to sleep and not go. Then satan wrecked me the day I didn't go. So the next day I went to seminary and we learned about the armour of god. As the class went on I gained more and more armour then I fought satan and wrecked him. So I guess for my spiritual thought it would be for you guys to read your scriptures, pray, keep the commandments, serve others, and do the things you need to do to have the armour of God on you. You never know when Satan will attack, but he always does and he likes to do it when we are our weakest. So we need the armour of God or else we may get wrecked. So please attend your church meetings, take the sacrament, and be good people!

And now to end, I want to share a little with the passing away of Elder Brennan Conrad. The verses from Alma 28:12-14 come to mind.

12 While many thousands of others truly mourn for the loss of their kindred, yet they rejoice and exult in the hope, and even know, according to the promises of the Lord, that they are raised to dwell at the right hand of God, in a state of never-ending happiness.

13 And thus we see how great the inequality of man is because of sin and transgression, and the power of the devil, which comes by the cunning plans which he hath devised to ensnare the hearts of men.

14 And thus we see the great call of diligence of men to labor in the vineyards of the Lord; and thus we see the great reason of sorrow, and also of rejoicing—sorrow because of death and destruction among men, and joy because of the light of Christ unto life.

It is so sad, but I know Elder Conrad took the great call mentioned in verse 14 to labor and help man learn of God and avoid the plans of the devil. There is no greater reason to rejoice than to see a young man be worthy and make the decision to serve a mission and help out fellow man. I know he was welcomed back into the presence of God with a big hug for his work. I know this is the true church of God and that we have a light that needs to be shared in these dark times. Please share that light and help others out!

Love,

Elder Corbett

Hi I'm ____ and people think I'm weird

Hey everyone!

This week was slow but went really well. Our area has been struggling lately so we spent a lot of time going around and rescheduling appointments with everyone. There hasn't been a whole lot of progress this week, so I'll tel you about a couple different things that happened.

So this week we received a reference for a lady who lives in this place called El Valle. I had never been there before but one day we decided to take a car and go out to visit her. It turns out El Valle is a little town about 40 minutes from where we live and we realized how giant our area actually is. El Valle is 40 minutes away on a straight road with no stops, and then you keep going on that road for 45-60 min and are still in our area. There are a lots of clusters of houses but its hard to visit them so we don't know how much work we will be able to do there.

For Valentines Day our ward did a karaoke activity. It was fun to see a crazier party side of the members. And then on Saturday we had a fun activity with the ward for carnivales, which normally consists of balloons being filled with water, or powder, or paint, etc. and being thrown. But since it was at the church we just had water. But it was fun because we basically just had a giant water war with the ward. Too bad carnivales are only celebrated in February.

One thing that might make you laugh, is that the sisters have an investigator who they feel uncomfortable around so they gave us permission to visit him. So we went in to talk with him and one of the first things he said to us is that people think he's weird haha. Then he showed us his classical music and how he loves Vivaldi. He also loves to look at greek style statues which was a little strange. Then he told us that he does push ups in the back of his store for 4 hours every day. So yeah, his name is close to the word abnormal so we just call him abnormal.

Anyway that's about it for this week. It's crazy how true the church is. Some different people have tried to tell us our church is false for different reasons and my companion knows so much and can whip out any bible verse to burn the person. We lovingly burned some inactive members this week with Ecclesiastes 3 verses 1-8. They kept telling us they didn't have time to read the scriptures or anything. After that verse they changed and really want to give time for God. So that is my challenge to y'all ;) There is time for everything, even if you are busy please pray and read your scriptures!❤

Dog Count: 336 for week, 6629 total🐶

1)Left to Right: Clavito the Payaso (clown), Elder Moore, me, Pimpin the baby clown

2)Everything the light touches is our kingdom (view from El Valle)

Kotosh

Hey how is everyone?

This one will be pretty short, but this week was a lot more normal so that has been good.

Last Monday we went to this famous place in Huanuco called Kotosh. It is an ancient temple and has these famous things called the manos crusados or the crossed hands. I was super excited to go but it was the biggest let down ever haha. We showed up and the so called temple is this tiny roofless house made out of rocks. And the manos crusados are tiny and also replicas (the originals are in a museum in Lima). But it was cool to hear about the traditions there and people say that there is a certain part of the temple that takes you to the third dimension haha. I'll send photos for you guys to see for yourselves.

Then the rest of the week was a normal proselyting week. But the weekend was crazy as Saturday we were told about transfers and found out my companion was leaving. So then we went around saying goodbye to people and he had to pack all of his stuff. It was sad to see him leave, but my new companion is Elder Moore from Atlanta. He is a really cool guy, so I'm excited for the new transfer.

Also Sunday we went to this popular park as a district and did a contacting activity. It was super funny because the park is big and really crowded. There was a preacher there that a lot of people were watching and he was healing people haha. We would just hear him yell over a microphone ¨Sanate Sanate Sanate¨ which he was commanding the people to be healed haha. Also in the park there were a lot of people who were obsessed with gringos. One lady told me that she wanted me to meet her granddaughter, and she also wanted to use my blonde hair to knit. Then another girl wanted to take a picture with the 3 gringos there because it was her birthday. So that was fun. We got to meet a lot of interesting people and also found a lot of people interested in the gospel. Sadly none of the people in the park were from my area. But it was still fun to go around and talk to a bunch of people. But that's about it from me this week. I will give the dog count next week, and I hope you all are doing well in the snow ;)

Love, Elder Corbett

Photos from Kotosh - The crossed hands on the left are supposed to be male and the crossed hands and the right female, but we couldn't see any difference. Also the last photo is a mountain line you see from Kotosh where the line matches up with the knuckles of a fist.

Don't Live with Crazy People or You'll End Up Homeless

What up everyone!

I'm not going to lie, the past two weeks have been pretty crazy. Two weeks ago we were supposed to have an emergency change. But the day before we found a super nice room to move to, and things were looking good. So my companion called our president and asked him to let him stay. President agreed to let him stay. Then the rest of the week we got everything packed and ready to move on Saturday. The move went well and the new room was looking nice. The owner doesn't trust anyone and since missionaries are trustworthy, she dropped the price of the apartment to half-price so we could afford to live there.

So Saturday we moved, and the lady who owned the apartment turned out to be a crazy person. I won't go into too much detail, but just know she was crazy. One time when we were going down the stairs in the morning to leave, she was hiding behind a door to an apartment that she doesn't live in. When we passed by she came out from behind the door and scared me so bad haha. I wonder if she noticed that I jumped a little. Anyway she got crazier and crazier, and didn't like the contract we gave to her to sign. Then she took our key to the house away... That was Thursday morning. After 5 days living there, we were literally homeless. Which by the way isn't super fun.

So Thursday we went out all day looking for a new room, but without any success. Luckily the zone leaders have extra beds, so we were able to go sleep with them. It was just a little rough since all of our stuff was locked away in our old apartment.

But luckily it got a little better Friday. We did a service project in the zone leaders area and painted a member's house. Then after lunch we kept looking for a place to live, and we finally found one. We could see God's hand in it so much. We had asked about this house before, and they told us no. Friday we decided to try again, and again a lady told us no. But when we were walking away, a different lady called for us from out her window and told us that she actually was renting out rooms. This room is the perfect size and our church is literally around the corner so it's the perfect location. Then later the room got approved, and Friday night we slept with the zone leaders. Saturday we moved again. So now everything is back to normal and now I can sleep without worrying that I'm living in the house of a crazy lady.

With this experience I want to share 2 thoughts. The first is that with whatever big decision you make, pray to see if it's right and then meditate and listen to find out if it's right. Before I had been praying for us to find a new room. And then when the lady called us to drop the price, I just figured that was the answer to my prayer. I wanted my prayer to be answered right away so I took the first good option as my answer. I didn't take time to pray and meditate to see if this was the right answer to my prayer.....Or else I would've thought and questioned why no one else lived in her building, why she was dropping the price for us, why she wanted us to move in as soon as possible, etc. I just saw that it was a huge room, she was going to let us use her ping pong table, etc. But now I've learned and I will think and ponder more before I act.

The second thought to go along with this is one of my favorite scriptures which is 3 Nephi chapter 13, verses 31-34, which says: Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient is the day unto the evil thereof. When I had the mindset that I only have my Book of Mormon, my backpack, and the clothes on my back but that's really all I need, I was fine. I wasn't stressed, because I knew everything would turn out well in the end, and that God would provide. But when I had a different mindset of where I am I sleeping tonight, its pouring rain and I have no jacket or anywhere to go, I don't have a towel or shower sandals to shower with, I don't have anything to brush my teeth with or do my hair, etc.....I was stressed out, and it wasn't a healthy kind of stress. But with the first mindset the physical petty problems weren't problems for me. So if y'all don't want stress, have the first mindset and realize that if you are keeping the commandments and trying to live a good life, God will always provide a way for you. Anyway, sorry this email was super long, but I hope that since it was more of a story this time, that it didn't bore you out too much. I Love y'all and hope you have a great week!

Dog count: 215 for past two weeks and 6293 total 🐶🐶🐶

Photos: 1)Me and my good friend Elder Lambert whose from my group

2)Super cool jello someone made which had a really realistic rose inside it

3)Funny mural