I'm Dreaming of Wet Christmas!

Holiday Greetings from Puerto Maldonado, Madre de Dios, Peru! Hope everyone is having a wonderful week. I'm a little tired today, due to the fact that our neighbors in the next level of our building just got a new puppy, and it was up barking nice and early this morning. I ended up actually going up and threatening it I was gonna punt it off the roof if it didn't callarse. It didn't, but I also didn't punt it off the roof.  

So, remember all the appointments we had lined up for this week? Well, the investigators didn't. Haha. This week was kind of a pain, cuz we would go out and work all day long, and we had like 2 days this week that NOTHING happened haha. But, this week has been very very wet. It was raining all the time this week it seems like haha. So, the nice thing is, it hasn't been hot. But, Saturday, it rained really hard. Houses were flooding, and a lot of the streets too haha. I'm not talking a little bit of water, I'm talking, a raging river, complete with big rapids, was the roads haha. Kids were swimming in the road. It was pretty intense. But, with all the rain, my comp and I have been falling left and right. It's been pretty funny. My comp turfed it HARD yesterdayin a ton of mud, and on Saturday, I fell and almost was completely submerged by water haha. My scriptures were saved fortunately, so other than that I wasn't that upset, just laughed.  

I would like to talk about 2 of our investigators that we are working with, just to load em up with prayers from home. Benedicto, Juana, and Alex, and then Rosa are still doing well. Rosa came to church this week, so that was good. But, we have 2 investigators that I feel good about. The first is Maria Martinez and Pedro. Maria is kinda older, but not like, super old, and Pedro is 13. He's from Brazil, so he speaks only a little Castellano. They are progressing well, and we had an AWESOME lesson on the Book of Mormon this week with them. The other is Jessica, she is a young mother, and we're gonna start teaching with her husband this week, but she is progressing really well. She can start to come to church when she finishes up her college this week. I'm feeling real good about the both of them, but we'll see. 

This week, President Harbertson came with his wife and we had a Christmas party! We had pizza and cake (Yup, I put back on all the weight I've lost I think), and then an AWESOME Christmas devotional. I cried. Like a baby. And I'm totally fine with it. It was seriously awesome. But, also on that note, Elder Garcia and I have finished up our Christmas Box. We took it out for a whirl last night, and taught 2 lessons with it. THey were super impressed, and the Branch President came with us for one of the lessons, and afterwards was like, "Elders, that is super dope. We're gonna schedule some family home evenings with our friends and you have to come over and blow them away with the Spirit of Christmas". Okay, maybe not exactly his words, but I think some parts were lost in translation... I'm really excited to keep using it. 

So, President Harbertson gave us a Book of Mormon for Christmas, and a challenge to read it, but to mark every time it says the name of the Lord, and when he is speaking. It actually is quite surprising how much I'm marking! Truely, this book is another testament of our Savior, Jesus Christ! Anyways, I'm having a good time. My comp and I are always laughing and enjoying ourselves, even when we're soaking wet, but we still can teach with the Spirit, so it's great. Loving life haha. I know this church is true! Hope all is well back home! 

Con Amor,

Elder Richman

The pictures are of lots of stuff, our Christmas decorations, our visit to the bridge, our Christmas box, me getting ready to go trapse in the rain.. haha. Enjoy!