This week was
a nice change of pace for us. We have transfers this week so we spent this
whole last week transfer planning. It was a whole new experience with President
Morgan. It was pretty cool because we ended up with the same result but the way
we did it was a lot different. With President Clark he knew the people really
well and as we talked about who to put where he would simply say yes or no and
we would move on. We worked on it for like 4 hours or so each day and would go
through the whole mission 5 or 6 times before we were done. With President Morgan,
we sat down and spent 9 straight hours in his office the first day and we were
about 1/4 of the way through the mission. We talked in detail about every
person so he could get to know them a little bit better. At the end of the week
we still have a new board with lots of people going to new places and getting
new companions, but we only went through probably twice instead of the normal 6
or so. It has been really cool to see all of the differences between President Morgan
and President Clark in the way they run things, but to see and feel that it is
still run by the spirit and all the decisions they make are inspired.
We got to do a couple random
fun things this week. We had dinner at the mission home with the 4 sister
training leaders. We are going to have 6 next transfer and one of the 4 goes
home this transfer, so it was a goodbye dinner for her and we had a really good
time.
Saturday was our day off for the week and we
got the opportunity to go with the South Zone leaders to a soccer game. Elder
Terrazas is a huge soccer fan and the two teams playing were Real Madrid and
Inter Milan so he really wanted to go. We found an investigator to take with us
as well so it was a really fun experience. We got to see Christiano Ronaldo
score a goal and he is one of the best soccer players in the world, so that was
a once in a lifetime experience. The best part of the whole game was when it got
to be 3-0 for Real Madrid and the game got not so interesting anymore. We were
in the Edward Jones Dome and 55,000 soccer fans started to try to entertain
themselves. Mostly it involved random cheers in languages I couldn’t understand
and kids running onto the field and taking pictures with the players. Besides
the fact that Elder Terrazas decided to wear the rival team’s jersey it was a
great day. Lots of people yelled at him but I don’t know Spanish or Bosnian so
I didn’t have to worry about it haha.
This coming week is going to
be another insane one. I’m super thankful I actually got to sleep in the same
bed all week last week because we are going to be so tired this week. We are
picking up 35 new missionaries from the airport tomorrow and then sending 18 home the
day after that. I am not looking forward to Thursday at all. That morning we are taking
the returning missionaries to the airport and a lot of my best friends are in
this group. Elder Loveless and Elder DJ Anderson are 2 of the best friends I
have made out here and taking them to the airport on the same day is going to
be so hard. This is the group of missionaries that mostly became zone leaders
at the same time as me so I have learned a lot and "grown up" with
these elders so it’s going to be a rough one for sure. I was in the MTC with Sister
Crandall and she goes home this week too so I’ll take that as my official 18
month mark. I’m so thankful for the many opportunities that I am going to get
this week. Picking up the new missionaries and sending home the old ones is
always a great learning experience. I am so thankful for all of these cool
experiences that I get to have that very few other people ever experience. I am
so blessed to be out here doing this work and I love every day of it!
-Elder Banks
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