Elder Andrew Sheffield: I learned to make Tambarino juice

Arrived Nov 11, 2015

Love you more than… Pat pat hugs and "hammer hammer shake shake theres a fly in your eye"!! Happy (Late) Birthday Mom!!! Thanks for never giving up on me after all these years of being grumpy and stubborn. You are the greatest mom in the whole world. For your present you get the hugs and handshake but you’ll have to wait till a lil’ while for them.

Beach service project

This week in a wrap for me, better than expected. So I was super nervous for taking on all the responsibilities that come with being the experienced elder of the area. I was stressing that I’d have to show my new companion Elder Dickson the area and take the lead in lessons and everything, but it turned out great. I think that its good I’m worried about these things and stress a bit, but it’s also good that I get shown that it all works out and goes well. Elder Rojas and I looted all of our old zone leaders stuff that he left behind, I learned how to make Tambarino juice and learned not to pick green mangos.

Tambarino or as I call it "sausage fruit" is kin of sour but I can't really explain it.
Elder Rojas says that it is pretty common in Mexican culture as well and that they sell powdered versions
in Utah, that he would make all the time. Try and find some and taste it.

Elder Rojas new companion Elder De La Cruz is Dominican and pretty much our personal chef. We have been eating a lot more rice with spaghetti or chicken. We had a branch activity where Elder Dickson showed up all the tigres off the street how we really play ball. He played for Logan High school, and is pretty good. We showed our new companions the mercado and the Haitian border, which both just take a few minutes to walk to from our house. Elder Dickson isn’t helping my temptation to get a, excuse my language, “a stinkin waffle maker”! We’ll see what happens. Elder Dickson has a gift with joking around with the people and making friends with people really fast. I’m excited to learn this from him and get closer with the people, even just on this temporal part of the work.

Service in Monzenillo

Beach service project

We had a big service project at the beach in Monzenillo with the branches in our zone. It will probably be the last time since there is a new rule that missionaries here can’t go to the beach, except for occasions like this. We met some Americans from Wisconsin there and spent like the whole day there, which was a little frustrating and boring, but it was good. We found a new investigator, the daughter of an inactive who is the smartest ten year-old ever. She pretty much memorized the pamphlet and explained prophets almost better than I can. We hope we can reactivate the family and get her baptized. More of the inactives came to church this week but Jeffri and Andi still haven’t come more than once. They know a lot, but kind’a lack the testimony/desire which is sad and a little frustrating. Elder De La Cruz has spent hours cleaning our front and back yards and one day a lady walked up and asked if we had just bought the abandoned house haha, we are gonna do better with keeping things clean now. The owner of the Colmado that I call the Mormon corner has started asking us to come by and read the Book of Mormon in English with her to help her learn more and get a better accent. It is weird to read out loud and say prayers out loud in English. The other day we had a lot of left over lunch, so Elder Rojas decided to find the nearest Haitians and give them some food. We found some young boys and in the end we got a free shoe shine from it! Elder Dickson and I have gotten really close to the “cement of the branch” family and spent a while laughing and talking with them, they are gonna show us the area more and we are going to make birthday cake for one of them. (I’m really making it for you mom) Today we spent a while cleaning the house and talking of home and sports since Dajabon doesn’t have a lot of things to do. My new camera cord isn’t working today so maybe no pictures for a while, sorry I don’t know what’s up with my camera cord issues.

Ponderism/scripture mastery. The first one in Genisis. We have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the earth. God created us in his own image. We were physically made for this life. I sometimes use a Elder Sheffield parable of a jeep, jeeps are made to travel off road in hard circumstances. We too were destined for this life. Yes there are hard times but we were made to carry these burdens and not only carry them, but grow stronger. The gospel is for progression and so we get all these burdens to help us, to ask for help and work on our path to become perfect as He is. And the best thing about it is that you don’t have to become perfect quickly, the only way to lose is to give up. We are here to live life, slowly grow through struggles and all we have to do is continue forward until we are perfect! Que maravillosa es nuestro viaje aquí!