"Well, today for p-day we took a trip as a zone to this place like an hour from Cajamarca called La Granja Porcon, which has a zoo in it, so, that was kinda fun. I was way weirded out because the whole drive there looked so much like Oregon, it was ridiculous. Except the trees were shorter... Psh, everything's shorter in Peru."

Home.

I feel like I had a whole ton of random things that I wanted to tell you this week, but, I probably should have written them down in a list or something, because, I don't remember them. Soo.... I'll be lookin' through my journal to see what kinds of stuff I can tell you about this past week...

Ooh, first of all, I actually got mail this week! A batch from April 28th (that is so long ago!!), and another batch from May 12th. So, that's weird, because there's a missing week. But, I guess it’s okay. There aren't that many weeks left that we have to deal with this (I freaked myself out the other day when I realized how few weeks I have left of my mission...).

Well, today for p-day we took a trip as a zone to this place like an hour from Cajamarca called La Granja Porcon, which has a zoo in it, so, that was kinda fun. I was way weirded out because the whole drive there looked so much like Oregon, it was ridiculous. Except the trees were shorter... Psh, everything's shorter in Peru. Anyway, it was a whole lotta fun. Not so much for the animals, but just bein' with the other missionaries. One thing that I don't know if it’s good or not (but I enjoy it) is that in this zone there are a ton of North Americans, and so we talk a whole lotta English on p-days. Probably good practice for a few months down the road. I got pretty burnt on my neck. Possibly it will hurt pretty bad tomorrow. Maybe.

AT THE ZOO

"This was the most American thing I could think of doing with this llama...offering it Mountain Dew."

Today Hermana Celia made us tacos too. YUM YUM YUM! They were very Peruvian though. Not exactly what I was expecting. But, I still have a few packets left of Taco Bell hot sauce that you sent me for Christmas, and I put some of that on there, and it tasted sooooooooooooooo Taco Bell. PS, yesterday Elder Martin and I were talking about how much we miss Mexican food. I MISS MEXICAN FOOD MORE THAN BASICALLY ANY FOOD (except my fave burgers). You know, Crunchwrap Supremes, Cinnamon Twists, Mountain Dew Baja Blast. That is some quality Mexican food right there. Also Elder Greene made me jealous the other day because he said that before he came to the mission Taco Bell released Doritos Tacos. I WANT THEM.

This week was rough (do I say that every week?). We are just not having any luck getting into houses these days! Not even with people who we set appointments with! This week started out good. Tuesday we rocked it with a solid four lessons. That's maybe not super impressive depending on where you are, but for us, that was a big deal. Plus, it was only a half day of work because the entire morning we were in our zone meeting. So, that was a good way to start off the week. After that the week sorta went downhill. It was still one of our better weeks, but it should have been so much better! Saturday and Sunday killed us, we taught basically nothing on those days. One fun thing about this week was that we had a work visit with the ZLs. Elder Thomson came to my area with me and Elder Trochez went off to who-knows-where with Elder Martin. That was a fun day. It was a fairly good day work-wise too. Though we only had two lessons with investigators. Had some good visits with members too who offered to go out and visit people with us one o' these days. Rad. Man, I would really love to have a gringo comp. I want that to happen.

I have not been sleeping well again. I don't know what's up. Everyone says it’s probably stress, but I'm not stressed. In Picsi I was stressed. Not here! So, I dunno what's up. I have been very tired all week because of it.

We went to visit our ex-mission leader the other day (we just got a new mission leader). It was an lol visit because he just started talking about music and how his favorite music is hardcore and metal. Haha. Gotta admit, I do like talking about that stuff, but, probably not the most productive visit we've had. It was just a few minutes though because it was late and his little boy was sick, so we didn't really get to talk about anything important.

Ooh! When Elder Thomson came to work with me for the day, we pulled out our ward list (which is super unorganized and super out of date) and started looking for members that we don't know to go visit. Well, best thing ever, we found a member who's name is Adolfo Hitler, and we were like "we have to go to this guy's house." So, we knocked his door, but, nobody was home. Sad time. What kind of parents names their kid Adolf Hitler?! (Actually, didn't that happen no that long ago in the US? I totally remember hearing about that.) I hope to find him one of these days.

This week I went to go interview a kid named Cristhian for baptism. Interviewing kids is the funnest, and easiest. Passed. Got baptized on Saturday. Really funny kid. He's now a member of our ward.

Here's a nice slice of journal entries from the week:

06/05/13

Its mega late... Bleh. I'm super tired.

06/07/13

My body is exhausted, and I don't know why. My bed has never felt so comfortable.

06/08/13

I'm dying of tired. I have to go to sleep right now.

06/09/13

And thus ends one of the most tiring weeks of my life... And not because I worked especially hard. Just because I am not sleeping well.

Lololol my journal.

Ooh dewd one day Limhi made us BANANA BREAD. He makes us all kinds of things that don't normally exist in Peru, because he's a chef. One day he's gonna make chocolate chip cookies. I haven't had one single chocolate chip cookie in all my time in Peru. I'm pretty sure that's an unforgivable sin or something.

Speaking of sins, in Peru, we totally do not keep the Word of Wisdom. What about that whole "eat meat sparingly" part? We eat meat for breakfast, lunch, dinner, desert, snack time, second breakfast, etc. here. It's stupid. And I love meat. But it's stupid.

Had another sw33t lesson with that guy I told you about before, Herbert. We taught s'more about the Plan of Salvation, and he just always loves everything we teach him. He's reading a whole lot of his Libro de Mormón. He's so rad. Came to church with us again this Sunday, and came to Cristhian's baptism on Saturday. During the lesson we invited him to get baptized on June 22nd. He said he wasn't sure, but that he'd think about it and pray about it. I dun' even care bro, if he doesn't get baptized on the 22nd. Because if it's not that day, it'll be some other day. He's for sure gonna get baptized. He's awesome.

Well, that's a lot of scattered thoughts I just had about how this week was. Fairly normal. We have some good people we're teaching, but they all have some problem that prevents them from going to church or getting baptized or doing anything.

Anyway, that's pretty much all I got for this week. This e-mail is kinda all over the place, but whatever. I sure hope I get more mail this week! Though I've grown accustomed to not getting any. We shall see tomorrow I suppose. Thanks for still remembering that I exist! Even if it takes over 9000 years for your mail to get to me!

I miss you guys a lot! I will see you soon! See ya!

-Elder Victor Paul Hemsley

Here's some more pictures Victor sent this week (you can see the rest by clicking on the slideshow at the top of this blog):

"This flag is super authentic.  Peru is king of quality."

"Legit play structure at the zoo."

"Goin' down this sick slide with Elder Lattin. Somehow I turned into a midget."