Sister Wilson in DC North: Men's Bathrooms

This week has been a long one! It feels like ages ago we Skyped home! It's been pretty good though, Bola got back in town a few days ago so we're seeing her tonight! YAY. Last night we had Why I Believe, and the former senator of Oregon came and spoke. We ushered the first half, so we didn't get to hear him speak, but apparently it was good haha. It's been HOT. If any of you were wondering, it's hotter here right now than it is in Phoenix or Jersey. WHY MARYLAND. Holy goodness it's been warm. And with the yummy warm, humid weather comes mosquitos and other darling bugs. I have about 16 bites currently, including 2 on the bottom of my foot. Gotta love Maryland. Lol. It's been fun.

I wish I could just walk around with a go-pro and just record my whole mission because MAN. HAHA. What a good life this is. So Monday night. A recent convert in the ward had us over for dinner, which was pretty good, it was Mexican so MMM. Yum. Anyways. Have you ever had those moments when you've maybe kind of had to go to the bathroom, but not super bad? Then, out of stinking nowhere disaster strikes, and you're about to go to the bathroom whether you want to or not? Well, disaster struck when we left their house. We got in the car, and almost simultaneously it hit us. Sister Kohler and I looked at each other with panicked faces, and immediately started yelling "GO GO GO GO GO". Pedal to the floor, we squealed away (because in our panic if didn't occur to us to just go ask the girl that fed us if we could use her bathroom). The closest public facility to us was a Taco Bell about a half mile away, so off we flew! 30 long seconds later we were bolting into the Taco Bell. But wait, the women's bathroom was occupied?? PANIC. Without a second thought I busted into the men's bathroom (which thankfully was NOT occupied). RELIEF. Sister Kohler runs in after me. While she was thus relieving herself, I was standing down the little hallway a bit waiting. After a minute or so, a big, tattooed, angry looking New York man walked in. He kinda shuffled to the bathroom, you could tell he had to go too. But wait, it was occupied! I started to giggle realizing sister Kohler was in there. Angry New Yorker was waiting outside the door. As time passed it just got funnier and funnier, sister Kohler was going to walk out of this bathroom to face this angry man that had to pee. I pulled out my iPad at this point and pretended I was looking at something funny because I was just having fits of laughter. Time moved on. Situation got funnier. Hid around the corner because I couldn't get myself under control. Hear the door unlock. Laugh harder. Peek around corner to see her little foot and skirt emerge from bathroom. Almost pee my pants (again) laughing. Angry New York man looks at her, looks at me, looks back at her, looks back at me, makes the NASTIEST face, and says "oh. THATS nice." Then shoves past her into the bathroom. We. Were. Dying. We ran out of there faster than we ran in. HAHAHAHA.

After that ordeal we decided to stop by Betty's house to see how she was doing. We get there just in time to see her driving up to the house. We get talking to her, and she shows us her latest buy. She had just gone out and bought a little tin foil cake pan looking charcoal dish thing. She also bought charcoal and lighter fluid. She had just gotten it in her head that today she was going to make hamburgers. So we stayed to help her out, and ended up having a little BBQ with her (good thing we did cuz she was about to pour the whole thing of lighter fluid on top of these pre-soaked coals). Come to find out Betty had never had a s'more, so we run to grocery store behind Taco Bell to get some stuff for it. In the less than 10 minutes we were gone, she had chopped the hamburger meat into squares and put it on the grill. They looked like little black meatballs by the time we got back lol. She has also "toasted" (lit on fire then extinguished) the bread she owned. So basically we had charcoal for dinner. Charcoal and ketchup. BUT Betty had her first s'more, and loved it! She ended up eating 12 marshmallows lol. She was SO excited about this BBQ we had, I've never seen her so lit up! So she invited us back the next night and we did it all again (except we took charge of making the burgers and left the marshmallows in the car lol). It was so good. I LOVE Betty. She wants me to come back and live with her for a while when I get home, and I agreed! She actually said she was going to give me her house when she passes away because she has no other friends or family and her son isn't the greatest. LOVE HER. She's absolutely nuts but man. Lol.

The rest of our week has been pretty good, we saw Jusu a couple times, had some great lessons there. He won't be getting baptized until at least October, he's going back to Sierra Leone in September so he can settle some stuff there first. He was in parliament there. He's a big deal apparently! :O But he's super bomb. Love him. I'm really scared I'm going to go serve in Potomac or Kensington with a bunch of rich white people because they're tough haha. I love my little Africa! Some pretty exciting news, they're starting an Amharic branch in the next couple months! Woo! SO COOL. I really want to be in that program, but we'll see what happens haha.

Online has definitely had its ups and downs this week haha. On Tuesday we got a really tough chat, it was this man, member of the church, served a mission, married in the temple, active temple recommend holder, has kids,and he is in the bishopric. And he's leaving the church. His whole chat was basically "hey, my sister is your age and I don't know how to tell her. How would you have your brother tell you?" It was really hard. I don't have a problem when people on the street reject the message, or just rejection in general, but that was really hard. It just breaks your heart. We went and got Costco pizza and ice cream after shift because we needed a little pick me up. But man, then Saturday evening happened!! WOW. We have the BEST new investigator. His name is Luke and he's from the UK. He came on chat asking about this Book of Mormon thing that his friend gave him. Turns out his friend is atheist and got a BOM from missionaries or something way back when and if just sat around his house. Luke (he's 18) said he had always been so interested by it, and finally asked if he could have it. He has no religious background, wasn't even sure what the bible was. But he said he just couldn't put the book down! We read the introduction with him, and he said his first prayer ever with us. Then he prayed 2 more times because he said he just felt so happy and peaceful! He's SO COOL. UGH. Moments like that make all the poopy days worth it. I love being a missionary and experiencing that with people. It's incredible to me how we can feel the spirit through the phone or computer. I absolutely love it.

This week has been long but definitely exciting. The weather is hot and humid and the bugs are killer, but I love it here. Never been anywhere more beautiful. I love being a missionary, and I love my savior. Have a blessed week!

Love you all.

Sister Wilson