February 29, 2016 - gringa gritando

Ricardo and family

Hi family! :)

Ricardo got baptized on Saturday!! Yay!!! I'm so happy that he could make that decision, and to hear his testimony at the end was so great. And so excited for them in one year to be sealed in the temple!! So grateful for eternal families! And I'm so grateful for the hand of the Lord that we have seen in these weeks, with all the miracles we've seen. I know that without the Lord's help we seriously can't do anything here, that the Lord really is in charge of this work, and we need to be obedient and have the faith and be willing to work to be able to see these miracles! And I am so grateful to be with these people I love in Costa Rica. 

And this week was good. I don't really remember much of what happened, really.... but, I love learning from the members here about missionary work! There's one member here, Brother Jesus, who is incredible with spreading the gospel. He got baptized seven months ago, and then he gave a reference to the missionaries of a family, and they got baptized in November...and last night we did a family home evening with those two families, and Brother Jesus invited his neighbors, a mom and dad and three kids, and we watched Not Only a Stonecutter, and they loved it, and we're going to visit with them on Wednesday night, and we're super excited!! And so many members here are so good about spreading the gospel. There's a high school teacher here, who she like talks about the Book of Mormon with all her students, and Utah all the time, and we ran into one of her students this week and he was like...yeah, I'll come to church, my teacher is cool and she talks about the church all the time! So we're hoping he'll be able to come next week. And just people here are so great! and it made me think about...I didn't do anything before my mission really to spread the gospel. And I felt kind of bad. So I want to invite all of you to think of something you can do to spread the gospel more, because I know that there's so many ways to spread the gospel with people in school, people in work, people in the grocery store. And these members who spread the gospel all the time here really are the happiest people I know!! Anyway so yeah. I have lots of goals for when I go home.

I know this Church is true!! and that God loves everyone of you so much! And I love you!

Love, Hermana Moon

Hermanas and Ricardo's family

Note from Barbara - she said she didn't remember much of what happened that week, but we learned through the grapevine of some excitement and here's what she sent when we asked the next week.  

Okay. Story for all who want to hear!

So we were walking in a place where we always walk...there's no way to avoid it! It's called Santa Paola, and yeah, there's a lot of punks who just do drugs who live around there. Anyway. We were on divisions, I was with a new missionary, my comp was with another one (divisions we have all the missionaries come to my area...yeah. it's a thing President likes.) so my cop was doing a family night with Ricardo and his family  in Santa Paola, and me and Hna Tejeda had nothing to do really, so we did a new lesson up there, then decided to go...although all we wanted to do was go tot eh family night :( anyway.

so we walk back, we were talking about how she was adjusting to missionary life, so we were walking kinda slowly...bad on our part. And, she had her phone in her hand. another bad! anyway. all the sudden someone grabs her hand and starts shaking it, she screams, I turn and look and there's a man with a creepy cloth mask on his face! so I start screaming. and we scream and scream. super loud. sooo the robber got scared haha and ran away. but we were scared...there was a car and she told me she thought he was with the car haha. so we start running adn running, we were like five minutes away from our house, and just crying. anyway. buut it wasn't 9 yet so we just went by a members house. and then we look and we see the car!!! so we freak out. but it had just been a menos activa who saw us who was worried about what had happened. so all was fine. but we were just shaken up...I mean I've been robbed before, but it was just the mask that was so scary!!!! it was like a movie, not real life haha.

then other side of the story. people go tell ricardo that someone assaulted the missionaries!!! so he goes and runs out, my comp starts freaking out, they run out and like EVERYONE in santa paola had heard us screaming haha and had all left their houses. aaaand now everyone there is SUPER mad at the guy for robbing women who couldn't defend themselves.

aaand now, even like two weeks later, we still have people asking us if we were the ones who got robbed in all of Guacimo..so embarrassing haha... and , everyone says that they're mad at him, and that everyone is here to protect us haha. even all the other drug addicts and punks who live around there. haha. it's kind of funny. and now the elders just always say when they're there, have you seen a gringa gritando around here?

so we are fine! and we have friends in all places! so we're not too worried now. and we know to just scream and scream!  But thanks for your prayers and everything :)

"hump" day - thanks Elder S. H. - she's been out 9 months!

and from an elder:
OK here is S's version of the story: "Yes they got assaulted but it wasn't any sort of real danger. I think the thief was more scared than them, because sister moon's got a good screaming voice. They're in good hands too and, actually, nobody wants to mess with them anymore after that. The guy never came back because the whole neighborhood wanted to kill him."