A Baptism, An Earthquake, and Transfers

Surviving an 8.0 earthquake, a very special baptism, and saying good bye to President Li.

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Glynis here: We were expecting a letter detailing all about the earthquake and the aftermath. Unfortunately (or fortunately), Jacob was sketchy on the details. We are sure that he is very busy, organizing things for service, as well as the end of President Li's time as mission president. Hopefully, we'll get some more details this next letter.

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Hello everybody,

This week all started out on Saturday with the baptism of Braulio. It was awesome! We sang a special choir song for him after he was baptized, and he really liked it. A lot of the ward came to his baptism, which was really nice, and he felt the Spirit really strong there.

Later that same night, while we were fast asleep, the house started shaking. We didn't think much of it, but we stood up to see what was going on. Then it started getting REALLY loud! The windows were shaking and the shutters were hitting against the wall. It was pretty scary! It turns out there was a massive earthquake in a part of the jungle called Alto Amazonas, near Moyobamba, and it shook Iquitos hard! Everyone had to go outside to wait for further instructions.

That night, I got about a million phone calls from the Church area office and from worried parents about their missionaries, asking if everyone was ok and what was going on. It was a long night, but everyone was fine. It was a funny, and stressful, experience.

This week was also the first time doing transfers on my own. Luckily, everything went well, and everyone made it to their areas on time without problems. It felt good to see a plan pull through after so much thought went into it. 

Another thing that happened was the last conference of Presidente Li. We organized it all, and it was awesome! We sang "God Be With You Till We Meet Again" to him and his wife, and they started crying. I will surely miss them!

That was pretty much my week, a lot of stuff happened, but those are the highlights. 

Love y'all! Have a good week!

-Elder Neves