Ice Cream Peddlars

Right now we are in the heart of the rain season here in Mexico. Every day it is super hot and sunny in the morning, but right around 5:00pm, huge thunder clouds roll over the Eastern Mountains and it rains cats and dogs! Everyday I have to change my pamphlets because they get super wet in my backpack, but I protect my scriptures with a plastic bag. We also accumulate umbrellas every day that the members and investigators insist we take, but it is a little bit harder to remember to return them. We have 2 in the house right now that we need to take back to their owners. 

The church is very worried about mosquito transferred diseases at this time of year here in mexico ( even though I haven't seen a mosquito in a while). Sister missionaries are encouraged to wear pants instead of skirts, and the Elders can use Cowboy hats and sun glasses like the Jehovah witnesses. We also have to apply repellent 5 times a day.

 In our area we are baptizing pretty constantly, almost every week, and our ward was just divided into a  branch and a ward. We have a new bishop now who is on fire and is going to help this ward a ton. He was our ward mission leader two weeks ago so he also focuses on the missionary work more than other Bishops. Y para terminar una pequeña historia chistosa que nos paso ayer. 

Here in Mexico we normally use a public transport system called Combis. Combis are white Shum vans that have a little sign in the windshield which says the town, colony or place that it is going. So you stand on the side of any street and when the Combi you need passes by you stick out your hand and it stops for you. In the back there are no real seats, just 4 benches that go around the edge and that is where we sit...as many passengers that can fit inside the little van. When you want to get off you have to pass money through a little hole in a wall they put between the driver and the passengers. 

So yesterday we jumped into a super full Combi to come back to our area after reporting with the Elders, but it was not a very good Combi. After about 5 minutes of traveling the driver tried to go over a speed bump (here every street looks like oak street in Ashland, with huge speed bumps every half block to keep people from going fast). Our Combi got stuck with the huge Speed bump in between the two tires! We didn't high center, but the back tires just couldn't push the van over the top! Not wanting to lose his 8 pesos for each passenger in his Combi, the driver wouldn't let us get out!  So there we were, 15 Mexicans and one American in a little van bouncing back and forth trying to get over the speed bump while a huge line of traffic and honking drivers lined up behind us. I was dying with laughter! 

Then a garbage truck that was right behind us moved forward until it touched the van and abruptly pushed us over the top with a loud grinding sound. It made me laugh even harder! But then the driver of our Combi told the truck to please push us a little farther so that he could jump start the Combi because it had died! So there we go again being pushed by a huge garbage truck until the driver could pop the clutch! It was a funny experience but also very normal here in the Mexico City Southeast Mission! Elder Shumway

There is a man in our ward who makes ice cream every day, then sells it in the streets.

 One day he asked us to help him in the morning because his workers couldn't make it. 

 So as a service project we went early to make ice cream and sell it. 

We actually found more less actives this way than any other method I have ever tried on my mission!!!