Hello Ventura!

Hello everybody!

Well, unfortunately the internet keeps crashing on my computer, so I have VERY little time, so here I go!

I love Ventura!  It's the closest place to the ocean that I have been to, so it's really humid here, and I'm not used to it, but other than that, it's great!  So, you know how I was whitewashed into the area here with Elder Tufts?  Well, it turns out, my whole district was white washed into Ventura, so everybody in the district was just trying to figure things out this week.  We're getting it down. :)  It's so much fun whitewashing, and it provides an opportunity for the area to be refreshed and started again on a clean slate.  It happens occasionally.  Elder Tufts and I get well.  He's from Bountiful, and Elder Nelson is from his home ward!  He's been out 2 transfers less than me.  Elder Hall is also in my district, so it's been fun to be around him again.  Elder Navarrette is also in my district, and he's Elder Hall's companion.  So yeah!  Two of my former companions are now companions!  (We all get along well)

The ward here is really small, and it's another one of those, what I like to call, "California wards".  Basically the bulk of the ward is composed of 5 or 6 large families that live in the same ward that have relatives that live together in the same boundaries.  Bro. Packard is our Ward Mission Leader, and he is on top of it!  He's a lot better than Brother "Pile" in Atascadero haha.  This whole week in the evenings we went together with the other elders that we share the ward with, and have met people on the ward council so we can build trust.  The 4 of us sang "Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise", in the combined 3rd hour, and we sounded great!

So, I have another story to tell.  We were walking to our area, and we saw a homeless lady on the side of the road, and we waved hi to her.  She started to talk to her, and she just gave us dirty looks and basically ignored us.  We awkwardly walked away, and we realized we forgot something, so we said hi on the way back and she actually started to talk to us.  She asked us if we wanted a snack, and we said sure, expecting a granola bar or some crackers.  She pulls out an expired can of peas and told us that we had to sit down and eat it there in front of her.  She gave Elder Tufts a plastic knife and me a plastic fork and we had to scoop out the peas and painfully eat them.  She started talking to us about bugs and trees, and we tried to change the topic, but it didn't work so well.  Elder Tufts ate mostly the stuff at the top of the can, and then he handed me the green mush at the bottom.  I didn't want to be rude, because it was some of her food that she kindly gave to us, I had to eat expired peas mush in front of her without making any faces.  We offered her a Book of Mormon, but she said no, so we shared a scripture about the Atonement and we said a prayer with her.

Let's just say that things didn't end well later on...Another mission story.  Check.

Anyway, President and Sister Castro have left the mission as of last Saturday, and President and Sister Felix have arrived.  We haven't seen him in person yet, but we probably will soon. 

We have an investigator named Lily that is super interested in the Gospel.  The sisters started teaching her shortly before we got here, and she's been to church the past two weeks.  Her boyfriend is also a less-active member, so we have an instant in there.  There's a couple of other people, but other than that, it's back to the finding!  Fun stuff.  

The computer keeps crashing every time I try and upload a picture...better luck next week.

I love you all!  Talk to you later!

Elder Harper