Blatant Frecura -- January 25, 2016

Happy Duarte Day! I'm calling an official end to the two week email hiatus. Sorry! Everything's just grand here in Consuelo, it's just been fairly uneventful and I decided to use my mental exertions in other areas. So it goes! But! On to the past three weeks!

It might not be perfect, but it's home.

So we were in a lesson this last week with this investigator we've been teaching and we asked if she had prayed to know if Joseph Smith was a prophet. We'll call her Fulana. Fulana said that she had and that she'd received her answer that he was not in fact a prophet. After she prayed, she had a dream full of demons and in her dream, Satan himself came and told her (I'm paraphrasing here) that Elder Cuadra and I were crotchety old dandies and that we were full of cottonsnuff. Well crap. I was just about to weep and wail and rend my clothes, but luckily, before I could flex and shred my shirt into seven million immodest pieces, Elder Cuadra raised a finger and was like, "Hold on there, lass. When you prayed. Did you pray to God? Or to SATAN???!" Fulana about fell out of her chair. She choked and sort of quietly screeched, "God! I was praying to God!!!" And Elder Cuadra serenely said, "Well, if you prayed to God, then why did Satan answer your prayer?" Her eyes nearly popped out of her skull as she fell all over herself swearing that she'd been praying to God and not praying to the Father of all Evil and so I figured I'd take the moment and was like, "If Satan wants you to believe this is false, shouldn't you take a Book of Mormon break for about a week?" and she was like, "Yes! Yes! I'll read it all the way through!! Don't you folks worry!!" And she has been :) Haha, was it ethically correct? Maybe, maybe not. But dang if it didn't work.

So here in Consuelo, we've got a slight infestation of a thing called "frecas." A freca is a slightly unvirtuous daughter of God who missionaries can only appropriately describe with euphemisms. Around here, I'm quite the hot commodity among the frecas. Back in the states, I'm not the biggest

Pretty sexy stuff!

head-turner on the block, but here, my mud-brown eyes, pasty skin, and dignified rice gut are pretty sexy stuff.

Anyway, the other day, Elder Cuadra and I were walking down the street just after sunset. Off the starboard bow, a group of eight or nine frecas in varying stages of undressedness were walking past a nightclub. Suddenly, one of them eyeballed me and gave me a spine-shivering once-over. I pointedly looked away and started walking slightly faster. And then they stepped in front of us, stopping us in our tracks. The freca in front looked me right in the eyes and was like, "Hey, Rubio"- that would be me- "why don't you come crash at my place tonight?" My legs sort of turned to vanilla and I was like, "Uh, duh, gurr, blagh," and Elder Cuadra (who actually speaks English) nudged me and was like, "Don't say a word. Let's just bounce." So we awkwardly bumped our way through them and started walking away. Instantly their voices started complaining, "Awww, Rubio! Don't leave us hanging like that! We're nice girls!" And then, one phrase popped into my head. I didn't know if it was a spiritual prompting, but I figured it couldn't hurt. I turned my head to the side and screamed in English, "What's SHAKIN', bacon??!!?!?!" and Elder Cuadra about ripped himself a hernia from laughing so hard. We both chuckled around the corner. On the way home that night, we saw the exact same group of frecas walking toward us, but this time, when they noticed us, they just all stared at the ground and hurried past. Fist bump to Elder Cuadra. Awkward missionaries never die.

So I searched Missionary Moms FB page in search of photos of my
dearly beloved missionary and found only one...and he's stickin' his tongue out!!
At least he looks happy. :)

Just a short thought before we finish up here, and it has to do with salami. I really like salami, but it's been a long, long time since I bought a full salami. I buy a little chunk every now and again for some pasta or a sammich, but this week, I decided to buy the whole thing because really, it's more economic. And I was reminded of why I stopped buying full salamis. See, I like it so much that as I was walking past the cupboard, I decided to cut myself off a little slice. And then, the next time, I cut myself off a slightly bigger slice. And then, before I knew it, I measured the wrapper to the remaining meat and discovered that in just three days, I'd eaten a pound and a half of freaking salami. It can't be! I thought to myself. How is it possible? I only took tiny bits! And I was hit by a resounding truth. I ate salami. Because I had salami. Now...

Life is sort of like buying full salamis. There are things that are fun or pleasant, like eating salami or maybe watching netflix or playing video games or reading trashy fiction, but that are also not the best thing for you, like the abovementioned items. Ideally, we'd be able to control ourselves all the time and save the dang salami for when we were actually gonna need it or at least not hurt ourselves with it, but most of us do not have that great of a track record. The message? Be careful with how much of a thing you put in your life. Because if you have salami. Then you'll eat salami.

Have a grand week. Don't be dumb. Have an adventure.

Love always,

Elder Dallin Johnson

P.S. My companion is a banana. (when he's asleep)

Well, now...I think he's enjoying his mission -- Jan 18, 2016

Kommandant!

I'm alive. I'm safe. I'm happy. I'm just a bit occupied today, hence the lack of much noise........

Loveyoubye.

Where Black Meets White -- January 4, 2016

Happy New Year! I hope 2015 was a grand one. My mission is the Dominican Republic Santo Domingo East Mission, 2014-2016. Folks. It's. 2016. . . Yep so that happened.

I think the hairy legs and the kilts
speak for themselves.

Last week was transfers. In a blaze of hairy-legged Celtic glory, Elder Leiter peaced out to El Seibo, and I received a real block of a missionary. Haha his name is Elder Cuadra (Cuadra means block) and he's a Nicaraguan who is three months of age.

Consuelo ushered in the New Year very quietly. Despite surprisingly little noise on New Year's Eve, turns out that the grand majority of the townspeople decided to start the year off right by getting smashed and wiping out all memory of

having started the year off right. We found our [fifty-year old bushy-bearded] colmado owner sitting on a cinderblock, smiling at a fence post. When we asked him how he was doing, he looked at us, squinted confusedly and began twerking. He was happy, I guess. Haha I'd say that in all, of the 38,000 Consuelans, roughly 37,960 were hungover. The other forty were the Mormons.

 

This tie is our family tie. I was trained by Elder Miller who was trained by Elder Burningham who was trained by Elder Robertson and back and back.
My name is finally ON THE TIE.

Ai, but here we are in 2016! What an adventure we face. I remember that last year, I wrote this big old four page entry in my journal about all the changes I'd gone through in 2014 and then at their request, 

I read it to the house. 

"The House", Elders Miller, Barlow,
Areas, and Johnson

Brother Barlow (that's so weird to think about it. Ew ew ew. I don't care if he's a civilian now. It's Elder Barlow) Elder Barlow just sorta looked at me and was like, "I did that too. This year. Well. I was in the mission."

Well, me too. But for all that the days blend together, I changed anyway (Elder Barlow did too, it was just a literary decision in juxtaposition, not a criticism, dang it).

Looking at that 2014 pic. Haha.
Almost couldn't stomach sending this. 
THANK THE BLESSED HEAVENS FOR
THE HUMAN CAPACITY TO CHANGE.
That is all. 

This time last year, I was a monolingual trainee trying to figure out how to be the smartest missionary alive. I wanted to grow my hair back out. I didn't need the nutrition facts to count calories in hardly anything anymore. I occasionally said naughty words when I encountered cockroaches and I wrote quite a bit about cockroaches. And I wanted to know how on earth I was gonna survive my mission.

Today, I've been a trainer. I ain't no pro translator but my

173 lbs. and holding

Spanish is only half bad. I no longer want to grow my hair out (although if I can get rid of my ruddy empty beard patches in the next eleven months and get a girlfriend before winter, I'm doing No-Shave November). I no longer count calories because I can eat absolutely anything and stay at a solid 173 pounds. Turns out my metabolism works just fine, I was just a slug haha. I never even want to say anything stronger than "BLAST!" or an occasional "GREAT BALLS OF FIRE!" I learned that wanting to be the smartest missionary alive is actually garbage, the point is that we should try to not rely on our intelligence; we're supposed to rely on God, if you can believe it. And these days, the mission is not a survival situation. If someone called me and told me a third year was in order, I would not be miffed in the slightest.

Yes, I'm so grateful for 2015. It's been one of the craziest, slowest, fastest, gut-wrenching, smooth-sailing, terrible, greatest years of my life. It's hard to compare with any other year because it's just been so bizarrely different. There's been no apparent life progression, no crazy romantic stories, no 4.0 gpas, no new first days of school, very few crazy spontaneous moments. It's been a lot of walking, a lot of boring, run-of-the-mill lessons, SO MUCH CHICKEN AND RICE AND BEANS, and frankly, my mission would be a terrible TV show. But then, there have been quite a few special moments. It'd probably be a decent movie. I digress.

2015 was incredible. I can't explain what being a missionary is like to anyone who hasn't actually done it. I wish I could, but there are some things that words can't convey. Suffice it to say that I wouldn't trade this experience for anything else. 

The serial killer looking fellow there
is our branch president. 

Now, I don't know what 2016 will hold. I don't know how the final months of my mission are going to go. I don't know if I'll be able to stomach watching the 2016-2017 Chargers play (that's a joke, I'm going to watch them even if it means breaking out the paper bag as early as September). Heaven only knows if I'll ever be able to recover from awkward-R.M.-initis. But I'm excited to find out.

So what's that they saying on the street? 2016's coming at me?

Come at me then. Brah.

Haha.

With love,

Elder Dallin Johnson

It's a Sort of Segway -- December 28, 2015

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and that you all have a happiness and root-beer filled New Year! For us down in Consuelo, it was pretty chill, other than catching some of that upper-eighties Caribbean sun. Can you all imagine how much it would stink to have to shovel your driveway or worry about driving through snow or "being cold?" Haha! It's a good life.

My District

I feel like I should start a feature called Baking Adventures. Maybe something hip, like Kitchen Katastrophe (Citchen Catastrophe?). Pouch Cotato? I dunno. Either way, I reckoned that for a Christmas district meeting treat, we ought to have an apple pie and ice cream. It was actually a pretty great idea except, well, my apple pie experience is limited to eating them. But I had a recipe book, and I can sure follow a recipe! It was going pretty well, but I found myself up a crick when I realized that it called for apple juice concentrate and by jove, I haven't seen apple juice concentrate since the summer o' '14. But I figured hey. There's already apples in it. I just need to pour some sugar water over it! So I did.

Yeah, sugar water is not an appropriate substitute. The pie tasted like. Shortening. Flour. And very thick water.

I bought the ice cream.

Christmas Eve was a different type of day. The powers that be decided to give us electricity all day and all night, which was cool for about the first five minutes of our neighbors playing dembó so loud it was literally rattling our windows from two houses down. For the first time after fifteen months of wishing the power didn't go out three or four times a day, I was sitting there like, "Goshdangit! Can someone please shut off the blasted power?"

Anyhow, Christmas in the mission is a different sort of experience. For starters, people here start breaking out the word "cold" when temperatures plummet to the high seventies. "Just a sip or two" refers to seven or eight bottles of [not root] beer. A great part of the populace dresses up in dental floss and hits the clubs. All to celebrate the birth of Christ.

This is, of course, not the missionaries' Christmas. Elder Leiter and I went to the house of the Bermúdez family, a family that is part member/part investigator. We feasted together on chicken and spaghetti and a Coke knock-off. We cleared the plates and sang Christmas songs and assorted hymns. We then shared stories and testimonies, and there, there was such an incredible feeling.

We were thousands of miles from home. There with no familiar food, speaking in a foreign language, without our parents or aunts or cousins or siblings. There was no tree, no Michael Bublé Christmas music. There was no snow, no hot chocolate, no fire crackling in the hearth. There was nothing that I ever would have associated with the Christmas season.

But there was warmth. There was peace. And sitting there, singing "Noche de Luz" with these people who I've come to love so much, I felt like I was part of a family. I felt full.

And as Christmases go, it certainly could have been worse.

With love,

Dallin

A Breviloquent Dispatch -- December 21, 2015

 

Hey! We had a zone activity today and we're just barely getting back, so it's just pictures today. We had a baptism this week and I'm super excited to just keep hitting it hard. I'm finally starting to understand what "getting lost in the work" really means. 

I love you all, hope you have great weeks and I promise- better letter next week!

Much love,

Elder Dallin Johnson

P.S. This has nothing to do with the pictures, but in case anyone's not familiar with their Aramaic roots, Peter is called "Simon Bar-jona." The word "bar" is Aramaic for "son of" and "jona" is the Aramaic form of the name "John." In other words, his name was Simon "Son of John." Yup. The King James translators didn't put it straight, but it's true. Before he was a prophet, Peter too was Elder Johnson. WHOOP!

The Flippant Contactor -- December 14, 2015

Hello family, friends, and random fourteen people from Russia who saw my blog this week! It's been a pretty good week in Consuelo. The sun is shining, the horses are clopping, and, well, I just love the word clop. Haha that's one of those verbs that's purely an English thing. There is no Spanish "to clop" and it's great. But I digress! Onward to the week!

So this week, we've been sick. Both Elder Leiter and I got some sort of stomach thing that's either the Christmas flu or the shady chicken some clueless gringo thought he had fully cooked. I mean, blood doesn't have bacteria in it, right? Haha yeah, if that meat were any fresher, we'd have been picking feathers out of our teeth and our neighbors woulda been very upset. Either way, we both had quite the intestinal issue that was mostly okay except we had to go to the bathroom every, oh, twenty-three seconds. Okay, so it was like twenty minutes, but it was bad. I actually handled it pretty well myself, but Elder Leiter. Well. During companionship study one morning. He. Ah. Welp. There's no two ways to say it. He messed his pants. Hahaha his face was so funny. I'll be honest. I laughed at him that morning. I laughed at him during planning. I'm laughing at him now. But luckily, he's good-natured and he's laughing too!

Grinding garlic with a mortar and pestle.  
Elder Leiter doesn't know much about cooking,
and, well, everything I cook tastes like onion,
peppers, garlic, and butter. Because.
Well. I put that in everything. But it's whatevs.

Despite any health issues though, he's still quite helpful! On Wednesday night, we decided to make brownies for district meeting. It was going very well until the time came to actually cook them. The degrees on the oven are in Celsius, you see. I was on the phone with Hermana Pérez and Elder Leiter came up to me and was like, "Hey, how much is 375 Fahrenheit degrees in Celsius?" Now, our phone has a converter, but, well, I was on the phone with Hermana Pérez and I was not about to wait two minutes to do the conversion, so I was like, "I dunno. It's five ninths, so..... I reckon it's like 250 or something?" Well, in case anyone was wondering, I am not a mathetician. They cooked at 250 degrees Celsius for thirty five minutes. When we pulled them out, the flavor only hinted at pencil lead, but the consistency was somewhere between pumice and beef jerky. Yeah. 250 degress Celsius is about 490 Fahrenheit. Oops.

Ah yes! That's the sole of my shoe which I
replaced last week. I guess you could say
my "sole" was rather "holey"... Bahahahaha!
Okay, sorry. That was bad.
I'm repenting, I'm repenting!!!!!

Anyhow, this Friday night, Elder Leiter and I were out doing our proselyting like good missionaries. We were going to our investigators' houses like we were supposed to. We'd done everything right that day. And all of our appointments fell through. Every single one. We tried contacting, but before long, it became apparent that we were caught in this netherworld of trying to contact in the middle of alcohol central on a Friday night. Not a good environment. Everyone who came to the door was either drunk, uninterested, or a girl in a towel. Needless to say, after about two hours of this, we were getting frustrated. We meandered purposelessly for a few minutes until finally, Elder Leiter just plopped down next to a tree and was like, "Elder Johnson, I need to repent. My attitude sucks. It's not supposed to suck. But this sucks." And me in my nearly fifteen month wisdom was like, "Well. Yes. This does suck. Scoot over." And I sat down. We sat quietly for a little while and then Elder Leiter said, "Elder Johnson, I think we need to pray." And I was like. Well. Can't really argue with a prayer. So we did. Elder Leiter bowed his head and said, "Heavenly Father, we're really frustrated. We desire only to serve thee. Please lead us to thy children who are prepared to receive us." And then we both opened our eyes and looked up.

Right in front of us was an orange two story duplex. I could not explain why, but my eyes were pasted to the door on the second floor. Before I could say anything, Elder Leiter eyed it warily and asked, "Elder Johnson, is it weird to go up to the second floor unannounced at 8:30 at night?" and I responded, "Yes. It's super weird. But I mean. What are they gonna do? Reject us?" 

So we went up and shouted in a friendly Saludos! (In case no one else noticed, I'm fluent in Spanish. That's so weird to think about. Sorry, I was just reminded that I ring doorbells by shouting "Saludos" at peoples's doors. Back to the story now.) We immediately heard a woman's voice through the door (spoiler alert: her name is Sugey- "Soo-HAY")and the following conversation ensued (it was all shouting, hence the exclamation marks):

Me: SALUDOS!

Sugey: Who's there?!?

Me: The missionaries!

Sugey: Missionaries? What consarn missionaries?!

Me: The Mormons!

Sugey: *pauses* You know this is a dangerous time of year and I can't let just anyone into my house! What do you want?

Me: *shrugs* We're here with an incredibly important message that could bring you eternal happiness!

Sugey: *pauses again* That sounds very important!

Me: Amen! D'you reckon you could spare five minutes for God to change your life really quick?

Sugey: Come to the window so I can see your faces!

*window cracks open*

Sugey: Dang, son. You're white.

Me: No kidding. 

Sugey: Who's that kid hiding behind you?

Me: My sidekick. So can we talk now?

Sugey: Yeah, come to the door.

We started to talk with her about the gospel, and to be honest, those ten minutes were some of the most beautiful of my entire mission. Sugey is the elect of God. She asked all the right questions. She happens to be the cousin of the branch president's wife. And just as we finished teaching that God was our loving Heavenly Father, she stopped us and asked, "Why on earth did you decide to jump a gate and knock on the door of my second story house at 8:30 on a Friday night?" And we answered, "Well. Because we were lost. And so we said a prayer. And God sent us here." 

Sugey's jaw dropped. And then she told us that she had also said a prayer that day. She'd prayed and told God that she felt empty inside and just wanted to feel His love again. And the second she said amen, two Mormon missionaries knocked on her door and told her that God's greatest wish was for her to receive eternal happiness. It was a miracle from all sides. We descended the stairs afterward, sat right back down by that tree, and we said a prayer of humbled thanks. 

Oh, and while we were there, a less-active member happened by her house, saw us, asked for an appointment to meet with us, and gave us a referral. And when we got home, we decided to stop at the colmado to buy some cheese to celebrate, and in front of the colmado, we met another less active who asked to meet with us. Yup. Yo testifico. (I testify.)

God loves His children. He hears our prayers. And He answers them. 

Have a grand week,

Dallin

P.S. We went to the temple this week as a mission. 

The MTC in the DR is adjacent to the temple and this was in the MTC kitchen. 
Yup. That's about right.  Translation-Top: In the MTC, Bottom: In the field

How to Train Your Greenie -- December 7, 2015

Happy Holidays! It's been Christmas here since August, but whatever.

So last week, the entire zone of San Pedro hopped a guagua and sashayed on off to La Romana for a zone conference. We were just cracking jokes and telling stories and having a grand old time and then we got there, ready to be spiritually fed, when we were met with rather grim news. Every missionary would be forced against their own will and good judgement to receive a flu vaccination. No. Nononononononononononotokay. 

Now. It's not the vaccine. I'm not afraid of vaccines. Heaven knows I'm one of the most well-vaccinated human beings on this planet. I'm a kriffing vaccine sanctuary. See, you know how every now and again, you have to get a physical or something and the doctor's like, "Ah, by the way, Mrs. Johnson, I see your son is a bit behind on his hepatitis G and also, we have a deal today on the meningacoccal excruciatis vaccine. No one's actually gotten that since the Dark Ages, but it causes blindness." My mother (out of the love of her heart and because she's a saint) has always said -and I'm paraphrasing here- "Oh yes, please shove a sharp foreign object into my innocent son's body and pump him full of this neutered bacterium. Or virus. Whatever." *smile*

I have been vaccinated against meningitis. You know what meningitis does? It causes cervical cancer. CERVICAL CANCER. For those of you not very familiar with their human anatomy and physiology, I don't have a cervix. But on the other hand, I'm not a carrier of meningitis anymore. Yippee. She also tells me I've receive Gardasil. I don't know what that does, but dang it, I've got it.

No, I just have a problem with the needles. They make me want to rip my nose hairs out by the roots. Not that that would help anything, it just seems like an appropriate reaction. So I tried to dodge this malignant flu shot. Everyone else went in the door to the left with the unvaccinated, and I slipped in between two other elders and went into the door to the right. My brilliant ruse was actually working until the doctor waltzed into the chapel and was like, "Has everyone here gotten the vaccine?" I sort of slouched down and then some wise guy was like, "Hey, Elder Johnson hasn't gotten it!!" I was busily pretending nothing existed, but then everyone started staring at me and the guy was like, "Don't worry, Elder Johnson, it won't hurt. Even the sisters did it." Ha. Ha. Ha. If that guy thinks shaming me in front of two zones and over a dozen sisters is gonna get me strapped to his table. Well. He's right. I got the shot. Goshdangit.

And for the record, the word "kriffing" is a Star Wars curse and is NOT considered profanity in our galaxy. 

(As the maintenance manager of this website, I feel to clarify some things. First of all, contrary to the oration of a far superior writer than myself, meningitis does NOT cause cervical cancer. Meningitis is when organisms invade the membranes and fluid surrounding your brain and spinal cord, creating inflammation, which in turn causes headaches, fever, vomiting, mental cloudiness, and sometimes death. Suffice it to say that Dallin shall not be subjected to said illness as a result of my enthusiasm for subdermal innoculation. It is true, however, that he is immune to cervical cancer, resulting from a precautionary encounter with Gardasil. And so it is. Read on.) 

Anyway, in other news, I'm training! My son's name is Elder Leiter, and he's great. He played hockey and sang in choirs and such and it's all very awesome. Fun, too! If our neighbors spoke English, they'd probably think we were a pair of Cockney drunks with an Irish roommate, but as it is, they just think we're idiots.

But training is sometimes an adventure. We contacted a guy in a colmado and this lady comes up and listens for a while. She seemed nice and all, but she was definitely a. Um. Woman of the night? Anyway, she piped up all of a sudden and was like, "Hey, do you guys receive visits in your house?" Elder Leiter, bless his Spanish, piped up and went, "No, but we can come to yours!" Hahahah that was a fun situation to correct.

And then we were walking in the street and there was a guy playing the saxophone. Elder Leiter wanted to compliment his playing, but he mixed up the words and said, "Hey, guy. I just wanted to tell you that you are dang good-looking with that saxophone." Haha at last, after nearly fifteen months, the language gaffes of the week aren't mine!!!!

Also, since we're working like animals, we walk quite a bit. My seasoned feet are used to it, but Elder Leiter's are covered in blisters. Haha part of me feels bad, but another part is secretly very happy that he's so beat up. Every blister or evening where he's so tuckered out he falls asleep right in his chair is like a point for Elder Johnson. Haha I'm such a great dad.

But in all seriousness, Elder Leiter actually has quite good Spanish for only having three weeks in the field. He gets the point across and he teaches with the Spirit. I really feel lucky to have him as a companion.

So that's us! Things are going really well. We have eight baptismal dates and things are only looking up. Oh, and it's eighty-five degrees outside :) Keep it real and have a grand week!

Love,

Dallin