SHOWERING was LIKE a TORTURE CHAMBER...

Let's start with the bad so then we can get to the good.  Well this past week on top of my already bad
eczema and psoriasis, I developed a strep infection that covered my entire body (apparently it's not just a throat thing). Everywhere was red, crusty, sore, oozy, itchy, etc..  It was super painful to even roll over in my bed.  Showering was like a torture chamber.  I went to Guayaquil with Hermana Tanner, the nurse, on Tuesday to go see a doctor. (Let's just leave it at Ecuadorian med schools must be really sucky).  The next day I just sat in bed all day and had a mental breakdown. I just couldn't see how this disease was ever gonna leave my skin and I just lost it.  I cried all day.  Dark times, man. I'm still not completely healed (neither physically nor emotionally) but I am slowly trying to work my way out of it : )

In other news, despite the hellish parts of this past week, there have been some good parts as well! On June 14th, the 3 sisters we have been teaching, Lisbeth Aguilar Suarez, Dana Lliguin Suaraz and Yanela Lliguin Suaraz got baptized!!!  They are just the sweetest girls.  Ever since we started teaching them they were se accepting and so willing to follow Christ.  They live with their mom, step dad and other little sister in this tiny little cement-floored, 2-room house.  The bunk-bed where the girls sleep is in the kitchen, which is all right there when you open the door.  The girls' dad is in jail and they've had a really rough upbringing.  Their mom can't get baptized because she's not married. She wants to get married but she can't until she divorces her previous husband, which apparently she can't do while he's in jail.  So it's really just a super sad and unfortunate situation.

But the girls have been so much happier since they've started going to church and I hope that now having the gospel in their home will change the lives of this family for the better : ) Lisbeth is 15, Dana 11 and Yanela 8.  Their lil' sis, Brittney is 7.  Since  Lisbeth is in my Young Women's group, I've been working with her on Personal Progress.  She really loves it and has already passed off a couple experiences in Faith!  She is so awesome.

Well since I was barely able to move this week and was way depressed as well, not much went down.  But Hermana Nazer has really helped me through it.  She has been such a blessing to me and we really are like real sisters, or nanas, as they say here : )

So we had a funny fun experience the other day:  We walk up to this store to buy some pan de yuca, and there is a white guy looking back at us from the other side of the counter. (That doesn't happen in Naranjal).  So after we asked for our pan, I go "hey, you're a gringo." (But in Spanish)  But he said that no he wasn't; he was Ecuadorian.  But I just thought he was joking as there was literally no doubt in my mind that he was gringo.  Because it wasn't just that he was light-skinned, but he had gringo facial features, blonde hair, and had nice glasses and dressed like a gringo as well.  Heck, he didn't even talk like a Latino!  Like obviously his Spanish was great, but it wasn't a Latino voice.  So anyways, I kept insisting, like no, come on, tell us the truth.  Where are you from?  He kept insisting that he was from Guayaquil and I was just like well, I don't believe you. haha.  So finally I just said, "ok, you must have a gringo parent or something." He said no.  Grandparent? Also no. But I was still doubtful so I started to talk a bit in English. Ya, he definitely didn't understand.  It was so weird!!  haha.  So ya, we just invited him to church and then left, just dying of laughter the whole time over the false gringo.  Good times.

Things are moving along in Young Women's.  Its way hard to do the YW Program in this culture.  I planned a mutual activity on Saturday and no one showed up : (  Not even the other "leaders".  It was way sad.  But I just had them do the activity in class on Sunday to give them an idea of what it's like so they'll hopefully get excited and show up next week.  We made like diagrams of the Plan of Salvation with craft stuff and now they have to teach it to their family or a friend to pass off a Personal Progress Experience.  I hope they do it! There is so much I want to do with these girls but I lack the time, means and resources necessary.  But we're working on it.

Well despite the trials that this week brought, it also brought tons of blessings. I'm so thankful for this opportunity to be a missionary here in Ecuador and am so thankful for the trust the Lord has put in me. So I'm just gonna have to trust Him right back that all will work out in the end :) Thanks for all the love and support you all have given me, but I'm out of time so I hope to hear from you all next week!

As my dear brother Baylor always says:

BESITOS!

Hermana Abbie Harper

Eating super Patacones after the baptism