TRANSFERS: Just the Two of Us, Jamming with the Bishop

Tuesday, May 6 - Monday, May 12, 2025

Note from mom: Gabe decided to write a slightly different type of email this week, which I both like and don't like. I like it because it's more like an overview of what happened where he kind of summarizes everything all at once, but I also still like the day-by-day summary. So I'm just going to include both in this book! Basically this week, he found out he's staying with just Elder Jara in Cartagena (no new elders joining them in the piso), he's been teaching some people but none seem too serious, and he had a jam session with the Bishop, who they LOVE and seems really cool.

Here are Gabe's emails!

Okkkkk! New type of weekly email because mom said the other kind was boring.

1. Transfers

2. Teaching pool🌊

3. Members

4. Street contacting 

TRANSFERS!!!: Now in Cartagena it's just me and Elder Jara because the ZL Pires went to be AP and Elder Leonard went to be a tech Elder. So the other Elders living with us left to fill their spots. Then when we got transfer calls President told us it'll just be me and Jara here in Cartagena this transfer. Besides that the whole zone basically stayed the exact same. But I feel pretty good about it because we'll have more work to do if it's just us here in Cartagena. And I won't keep getting my pants stolen by Latinos. 

We have had the majority of the people that were progressing drop off the face of the planet for one reason or another. We ended up dropping a guy because he started flirting with us and then changed his profile photo to himself in a speedo😭💀. He would always give us crazy discounts on food from his store though. 2 candy bars that should be 3 dollars for .70 cents🍫. But we've found some cool people this week we are teaching now. 2 of them only speak English. One was a politician in  Nigeria but he wouldn't except bribes so the government tried to kill him🤯. He sent us the pictures💀. But we had a lot more lessons this week because it's just us two here. 

We ate with the Bishop and he's actually awesome. He can play anything on piano and only has to hear it a couple times. He also heard we hadn't had hot water for 2 months and within a week he found a guy from the stake who came and fixed the hot water🙏🙏. He's the best. We also ate with a member and her Husband who isn't a member; they're in there 70s. Jara made the mistake and asked why he wasn't a member and hoooollllyy. He told the most in detail story with the must vulgar words bro could find. He started explaining the story like a war veteran from WW2 with PTSD. He explained that when he was 14 years old he was one of the boys who cleaned a catholic cathedral. Then while basically screaming he told us about how he walked in on his pastor doing some very unholy things with a woman from the congregation💀🙏. The story was like 20 minutes and with a lot more detail. I learned too many new words. But that's why he's Atheist now. 

We've spent a lot of time street contacting lately and it's always a pretty funny experience to say the least. Everyone isn't to mean but the most common thing people always tell us is that they practice in their own way and don't need a church. But we know the lord will guide us to people who are ready. We just need to keep trying. 

Regular day-by-day notes:

Tuesday, May 6: This morning we had a lesson with Enma over videocall (recent convert Bradshaw and I baptized). Then we had a call for Elder Jara's training. We had a lesson with Lisseth, a women we met in the store of George. And she had never prayed before🤯. So we taught her how to pray and why it's important to pray. They we ate dinner with the bishop and it was awesome. His family is so fun. He's crazy good at the piano so he was showing us that as well. The bishop also sent a guy from the stake to fix our water heater🙏. Now we have hot water. He's carrying our careers. 

Wednesday, May 7: We had some good street contacts this morning. Then we had a lesson with Maria, her husband, and her daughter. It was interesting. They were kinda weird not gonna lie. But they seemed nice. They're going to pray about what we talked about, but not read the Book of Mormon (they can't read)😭. Then we had street contacting and found nobody BUT Miguel called us and we are meeting tomorrow. We'll see if he comes back after the crazy member scared him away🙏.

Thurday, May 8: We had a lesson with Enma this morning over videocall, which went great. After that we found some awesome people in the street. One guy came up to us and asked for our number and told us he knew we were a sign from God🤯🤯. Then we played volleyball with the ward and that was really fun.

Friday, May 9: We had District Counsel this morning in person with Elder Taylor and Elder Sircable which was great! We all ate Chinese food after and me and Sircable had a really good lesson with Jeff and his friend Daniela. We met Jeff the other day in the steet. After that me and Sircable did street contacting and meet some crazy Moroccans but found an awesome guy from Nigeria that speaks English.

Saturday, May 10: We finished up exchanges this morning, which went well, and then after that we had a lesson with Carmen in the church and a member named Lolo came and helped. Then we ate lunch with a member and her Athiest husband and he told us a wild story of why he doesn't believe in God because when he was a kid he walked in on his catholic Pastor doing very unholy things😭. Then we got ditched by one of our lessons, but had a great video call with and Indian guy and then a really fun youth activity.

Sunday, May 11: Church was really fun today. We had Kenny come for the first time and Carmen also came. Besides that though, we just street contacted and messaged members the rest of the day. Then I called my mom because it was Mother's Day (and the regular day that I call). At first she didn't answer, which I thought was crazy that my mom was ghosting me on Mother's Day, but then I called my dad's phone and it turns out she had just left her phone upstairs and didn't hear it ring. So we had a good Mother's Day chat with the fam.

Monday, May 12: We went up to Murcia for Pday which was fun. We ate a crazy amount of Dominos and then hung out for a bit before coming back to Cartagena. A member gave us Tortillas de patatas😄. Then we street contacted and found a man named Brian who's from England and says he's interested in learning more. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿