DAY 572: JUNE 25

Well, this was a pretty good week. We had a few people at church, which was great. We also had transfers, and I have a new companion, named Elder Gillett, he's from Utah. We are already getting along great and I can tell we'll work together really well. We had some cool experiences this week, starting with the World War two musuem, which was really cool. Definitely going to come and visit that when we come back. They had a ton of really cool exhibits and little movies, and now I know a whole lot more about the events and geography of d-day. There is really a ton to learn about it, and they really have done a great job with it. They also have a 4-d experience movie, called "beyond all boundaries" about all the different things that were happening at the same time in WWII. They were totally fighting out on the european front and the pacific front at the same time, which really shows that we have quite a bit of power behind us. It was also kind of a depressing movie. Well, not sure how to really cheer up the fact that about 53,000,000 lives were lost in the space of a few years.

We had some people at church, which is such a relief. We also did some service for a less active, Roberto, with whom we sing music sometimes. He needed his lawn weedwacked and a few trees pruned, so we offered to do it. And he said "well you cant do it right now." and we said "why not" and he said its because of our nice clothes we were in. Again we asked "why not?" so he obliged, and I got out there in my shirt and tie with a weedwacker and pretty'd up the lawn, while my companion helped him move some things around in his shed. Of course, there was no tree pruners to be found, so a kitchen knife sufficed. Too bad it wasnt a cutco.

We are going to teach the family we taught last week, Jared and Blanca, again tonight, they are doing pretty well.

Well, we've got to go, hope everyone is doing well!

Love,

Cam

P.S. To a missionary, love is spelled L-E-T-T-E-R-S

P.P.S.

811 adele st

New Orleans, LA, 70130

DAY 566: JUNE 19

Well, we are finishing up the transfer with not a whole lot of numerical success, but still some really good experiences and awesome people to teach. I'll try to condense a few experiences of the last few weeks into an email worth reading. The big news is on transfers- I am staying, and Elder Richards is going, which means I'll be getting a new companion. Quite a few Spanish elders are moving around this transfer, so we'll see what happens.

Last week I did an exchange with the other Elders, I went with Elder Lawson into their area, they have some cool people they are teaching, and we had some good lessons. These last few weeks, we have been getting referals from members right and left, which is just awesome, we've had 3 people in the last 3 weeks! One of them is Manuel, a friend of the Vazquez family, another named Carolina, a friend of the Henriquez family, and the last one is the brother of a member and his fiancee, named jared and blanca. They are all really cool. Last week we did an FHE in the Henriquez home, and after the lesson we played "do you love your neighbor", and they absolutely LOVED it. Laughing so much. Thats a great family game. Just last night, we went over to the Battle family's house to teach their brother and his fiancee, and we got to go across the causeway! I can now say I have been across the worlds longest bridge. How exciting! We had a good lesson with them, and, turns out Brother Battle used to be a DJ. And his son is just starting to get into DJ'ing. So we had some stuff to talk about, and I got to see his set up and jam with him a little. So much fun!

Last weekend we had a fathers day activity/fireside/dinner. It went really well, we had a dinner, and then a few members and the missionaries did a few talents/presentations. The missionaries did a little skit where two missionaries are in Africa and they run into a lion, and they run away from him and while he's coming they kneel down and pray that the lion will become mormon and not eat them. Then the lion slowly approaches them and kneels down in front of them and they say "look! the lions mormon!" then the lion folds his arms and says "Dear heavenly father, please bless this food that it will nourish and strenghten me..." and the curtain closes. Just a few minutes before the show, the member who was directing the activity came up and asked me to be the MC! Apparently she asked some of the other missionaries and they said, you know, Elder Cardon would be good for that. Thanks guys. Well, I had fun with it, told a few of my spanish jokes, and made the activity pretty fun.

Well, we've got to go, today we are heading to the world war two musuem!!

 

Heres some pictures from our last District meeting. The one of four of us is just my district, and the other one is both the districts.

-Cam

DAY 551: JUNE 4

Well, last weeks monday was memorial day, so all the libraries were
closed, and then we didnt have much time on Tuesday, so I just got a
few things, not a real update. So, I'll give some highlights from both
weeks. Last week I went on an exchange with the Elders in my district.
It went pretty well, we found some really cool people, and I got to be
on bikes for a little bit, they are in a bike area. Theres definitely
some fun stuff with biking, always one adventure or another. I got a
flat tire, so that was one adventure. Also, when I got back from the
exchange into our area which has a car, we were on bikes again for a
little bit. They give us a certain amount of miles we are allowed to
use, and we had used almost all of them, so we rode our bikes in the
afternoon and drove at night, and ended just fine.

   I mentioned a little bit ago that we got a referral from a member,
and we have been teaching them, quite a bit, they are really excited
to have us there teaching them. its a family, they have a son who is
18, and they want him to be in a better environment and learn more
about God. We've taught mostly the parents, because the son is almost
never there. They have all kinds of questions, which makes teaching go
really slow, it seriously took about 3 lessons to cover the plan of
salvation. But, they really like having us over, and they invited us
over for lunch, we ate a marisco soup, it was kind of weird, it had
crab and shrimp and yuca in a coconut broth. It was pretty good,
though. Hispanics I guess are too cheap for fancy crab-cracking tools
like we have back home, so busting open the shells for the meat is all
done with teeth. I was worried about breaking a tooth or the crab claw
biting my tounge or something, but he had it down to an art, and could
do it real quick.

   Other exciting news, we met a lady that said she was Jesus's wife.
She could also talk to cats. She told us to bring her around with us,
because she was a good testimony, Jesus healed her.  Howabout that.

   So this week, we had a pretty good week, it seemed to be a little
slower, just because we didn't teach as many lessons and stuff. Theres
some weeks where it really just gets out of your control, and your
numbers are bad no matter what.

  The english Elders decided to have a creative finding activity, and
we did a car wash! No joke! We stood out on the street with some
posters that said "free car wash" and it was suprising how many people
didnt turn in. But we had quite a few people come in, gave them all
pass-along cards and invited them to church. It was pretty fun. We of
course washed ours too :) it was a pretty fun break from "normal"
missionary work.

  Well, like usual, I have lots of cool things to write about, then I
get here at the computer and I can't think of anything. So hopefull
thats enough.


Elder Cardon

P.S. Heres a picture of the car wash!

May 21 Pictures

Heres a few pictures!

Me and the Powells, me and the Barro's, and with the Pahaumbas. The
Pahuambas just got sealed last week!

-Elder Cardon

P.S. In case you miss your favorite missionary, on LDS.org they've
uploaded all the conference videos since '71, and that includes the
music! You can hear an awesome choir and catch a glimpse of me in the
april 2009 priesthood session.
 

DAY 537: MAY 21

Well, it was a pretty good week, we had some cool experiences, and
zone conference. At zone conference we watched a video about airplanes
on an aircraft carrier, about the precision they need to land and
takeoff, and how everyone has to do their job exactly and be exactly
obedient to all procedures or something will go wrong or someone could
wind up really hurt or dead. He made this a comparison to our
missionary work, how we need to be so exactly obedient, or we really
could lose the spirit or have our work compromised in some other way.

   We had a cool service opportunity last week, we helped a less
active with his computer a little. He had an electronic keyboard that
he needed to hook up to his computer to do some recording, and some
help getting the recording program working. My companion and I both
having done home recording, we were obviously the candidates for the
job. So we got it all going, including walked to McDonald's to use
their wi-fi to download a driver, and then recorded a hymn or two. He
was so grateful, and then gave us the number of one of his friends he
wants us to go visit!

  Another instance where we saw the power of music was with a
less-active who we visited, we ended up singing some hymns for him
with his guitar. He hurt his hand recently so he couldn't play, but
was really happy to have us sing and play to him. We sang "how great
thou art" and he said "thats the one they sang at my baptism! And he
sang along with us on all the chorus's.


   I'm in the big city of New Orleans and its a really cool place. My
grandma sent me a few questions about it, so here they is:

How much of the city has been reconstructed?

Just about all of it. Its been almost 7 years, so its really all about
back to how it was. Theres still plenty of shabby-lookin areas, I cant
tell if they were like that before or not.

Is there a lot of homelessness?

Yup. Apparently this is one of the homeless capitols of the nation.
Alot of homeless people, many of them surprisingly young, will hop
trains over here to be in the homeless community thats here. Random
side story: a couple months before my mission I was driving from
California to Washington by myself, and I picked up a hitch-hiker for
some company. He said he had been hopping trains around and that his
next goal was to hop to New Orleans. I said I was moving to LA in a
few months. He aksed what for and I explained, and turns out he was
raised Mormon. So they come from as far out as CA. Crazy!

Are there still needs for help in fixing the damage done by katrina?

Doesnt seem like it. If I didnt know about it, I wouldnt have guessed
that the whole town was underwater a few years ago. Though one cool
remnant is on many of the houses there are still black x's drawn in
spray paint, which is what the rescuers used to mark that the house
had been checked for bodies.

In the ward where you serve, are the members old time members who have
lived there a while, or are they people who have been relocated?

Well, many members remember katrina and talk about their time before
and after it, and it sounds pretty nasty. Alot of members are recent
converts, and dont have a complete understanding of the gospel, but
are still excited and happy to be in the church.

Are people looking for spiritual messages to help them?

Well, of course thats what they need, but they just dont realize it.
Its really tough sometimes to people reject the thing that will bring
them so much peace and joy! basically saying "No thanks guys, I'm
looking for happiness". Well here it is! But, theres people that do,
and its really great to see them accept it.


Well, I'd love to hear from y'all again soon!

Love,
Elder Cardon

DAY 530: MAY 14

Well, as you all know, I got transferred, and I'm in a new area! In the big city of New Orleans! I'm really excited. We have a huge area, covering from the Mississippi river up to lake Pontchartrain, almost all of orleans parish. I am in the same ward that I was before when I was in Metarie, so I saw some familiar faces and was excited to be back. I am also with a new companion, named Elder Richards, He's from arizona. So I just talked to most of you on the phone yesterday, so I guess theres not a whole lot of new updates, but... Yeah.

We live in a cool little neighborhood, which apparently was pretty bad before katrina, but is a little better now. Though someone got shot in a house across the street last weekend. So yeah. My new address is 811 Adele st, 70130 New Orleans, LA. Check it out on MapQuest or something if you want. We had a fun last p-day in Baton Rouge, played kickball and Frisbee at the park, and packed. then played some music at Roberto's friends house, his friend (whos a member) took a video of us two playing Nearer my God to thee, with one verse in spanish, one in portugese, and the third together in portugese, it was pretty good. She added me as a friend on FB so that she could send somebody back home the video, but I think my little sister forgot the password to my account (I had her change it before I left so I wouldn't be tempted to while out here) or something.

Well, I'll write a longer one next week, I promise. Email me some questions about the new area or whatever!

Love y'all,

Elder Cardon

P.S. Here it is again, the new address:

811 Adele st

New Orleans, LA

70130

Pictures May 8

Roberto's Baptism

Grillin'

Jammin with Roberto

DAY 524: May 8

Well, this week was pretty fun, we found some cool new investigators. Other big news is... I'm getting transferred! I've been here for 6 transfers, almost 9 months. I'll miss the branch, and some of our investigators, but I'm excited for the change.

Some of our recently found investigators are named Eduardo and Juan, and also another little family, whose kids are really excited about what we have to teach them. They have 2 kids, probably 13 and 10, a boy and a girl. We went there last night and had a cool experience with them, we knocked on their door and the 13 year old son answered. We asked if we could come in and he said he was playing xbox live, but his dad came and let us in. We sat down in the living room with the dad and had a prayer and started reading a chapter in the BOM, and right after we started the son came in from the other room with his Book of Mormon and said "Where are we?" and sat down to read with us. Without us even asking!! That my friends, is a miracle. Their daughter came out a few minutes later. I think the kids can really tell that we have something for them, but I'm not sure how much its getting through to Carlos, the dad. But he's a DJ, so we of course had something to talk about.

Eduardo and Juan are nice to teach because neither of them work, so the usually-dead hours of 1-4 in the afternoon can be filled with some lessons. Eduardo had an accident at work a few years ago and was in a coma for awhile, and still has some problems, he gets dizzy and headaches really easily, even from just talking and thinking to much. We met him from when he called us from one of our translation flyers to help him at the doctors office for an appointment. Juan doesnt work because... Well I dont really know all the details, but what I know is that he asked me to tell him what a paper he had got in the mail said, and it was from a pre-trial probation officer, declaring the parishes which he could not leave. So its probably related to that. But Juan had some awesome questions after reading, even "Who were the Jaredites?" so that was really cool.

We had the baptism of roberto, the brazillian, he's doing awesome. The baptism was pretty fun, but was started with some stress. They recently remodeled the bathrooms and baptismal font area, and re-did the plumbing in the font. Before, it would fill in about an hour. So, the other elders showed up about an hour early to get it filled. Well, the new piping didnt quite fill it as quick. So when we got there, it was just a little above the shins. we found out the drain wasnt all the way, so one of the elders took of his socks and shoes and rolled up his pants and went in and pushed it in further. But we were still behind, so had to do something else. So we went to the kitchen, and just like most churches, theres about 10 pitchers. We had plenty of missionaries and 2 sinks, so everyone grabbed 2 pitchers, filled them both, and went back and forth from the font to the kitchen and added more. That was helping, but wasnt quite enough. There was a 5-gallon water cooler/dispenser thing, but no more sinks, so I grabbed it and took it to the shower in the changing room, positioned it properly, and filled that, and dumped it in periodically. In the end, we had a good baptism, they only had to do it once.

We went over to his house for dinner on Sunday Night, and got to play some awesome music with him. A total blast! We had the other missionaries and everyone over, I grilled up the carne asada, Tanya (The brazillian lady who is friends with roberto) made this really good dip/topping- it was like brazillian pico de gallo. We had 2 other members over, and Roberto and I entertained them all, it was super fun. He's one I'm really excited to visit when I come back here (or to brazil).

Well, I've got to get off to other things and finish packing for transfers (its just astounding how much stuff you can collect), so thats all for this week.