Half Way There

Hello there everybody! How are you :) Well this week was a week.. ha I've learned a Lot.

First off I want to say thank you to everyone for their support, I just keep getting great letters from family and they really help so much! So thank you :) And especially thanks for the adorable valentine's chain I got from Rex and Celeste with everybody's scriptures!!! That may be the best letter I ever got.. Thanks :) haha It was funny though, I was like having a great experience reading them almost in tears because I miss you all and then I got to Dad's in Zechariah...about the food fight. It made me laugh pretty hard so thanks :) haha

So as far as some nice stories about our investigators...Susan is our one investigator that's progressing the most, but sadly she did not come to church again because she said they had no clean clothes to wear...what. ha So we're just really going to teach her boldly this week about how important it really is and hopefully she'll progress more, because she really is so prepared and the spirit is so strong in our lessons!! Even her husband who we can't really teach because of his job has been reading the Book of Mormon and sometimes when we pass by one our way home at night he yells out hello to us and is so nice. The gospel would help their family so much.

We also FINALLY got some new investigators! We got a referral from our members of an 11 year old boy named Francis. He's so nice but so shy! ha But we were able to teach him with his Grandma and had a really great lesson so hopefully as we teach them his Grandma can have a pull on his parents to get them to listen so it can be the whole family. But we haven't had new investigators in a long time so we're happy about that! :)

We also had quite the adventure this week in our house...we got TONS of maggots and BIG worms all over inside! So we had to flood our house and just clear it all out with our hose then sweep the water out and use fans to dry it all up...it took quite a while and was absolutely disgusting. But atleast it wasn't more dead rats :) ha I think I will be SO brave when I get home!!

On Monday we had Zone Conference which was absolutely incredible! I'd been having some hard days..actually here we call it our "mid-mission crisis" when you are excited that you're already halfway done and then realize you have do go through ALL of that one more time..haha But zone conference really was so spiritual and it made me feel so great :) However I was like bawling because Sister Mower got up and boar her testimony for the Last time since she leaves this transfer...she is definitely my best friend in the mission. She reminds me Exactly of Chelsey! And I tell her it all the time :) ha She's great, I'll really miss her. But then Sister Sperry came up to me after conference and pulled me aside and says, "Sister Benesch I've been watching you today, and I can tell something's a little off...are you ok?" So it's practically like your Grandma looking at you so lovingly asking this, of course tears just go straight down my face! ha It's been a really hard transfer to say the least..but actually she just sat and talked to me about how sometimes we need to be aware of why God calls us to do certain things, that as a missionary sometimes what we're called to do at one specific time isn't so much focused on the investigators aspect, but maybe more like a companion like in my case. So it was great to talk to her and just feel that support and have that nice reminder that I can do it :)

I've also learned something this week about missionary work. No matter where you serve on your mission-whether you have 1 baptism or 100, every single missionary learns to trust in Heavenly Father in a way that no one else ever will, unless they serve a mission. It's incredible the strength you receive just by trusting in Him. Missionary work truly is impossible for any of us to do, especially me, but I've realized that as I just trust in Him that it becomes possible and so so rewarding. Even though being a missionary is the hardest thing I've ever done, it's the Most rewarding!! I absolutely love it and wouldn't change this experience for anything. I'm so so lucky to be serving a mission :) I just need to keep looking for those people that the Lord has prepared...I haven't found them yet..haha But I'm trying my best :) I love you all SO so much, thank you for everything!!!

LOVE,

Sister Benesch

Little skinny wooden man

Hello everybody!!

 Hope your week has been great, ours was alright. Sadly it was a pretty slow week as far as appointments go, I have never had a hard time on my mission finding new investigators either until this week...I don't know if people were just busy or what. But we really tried our best and got a few good lessons in, then sadly no investigators came to sacrament.. ha So it was pretty hard as far as investigators go, BUT I have a few pretty good stories :)

The first one is from the subject line "What Happened?!" This is what Sister Criste said one morning as I showed her the front of our house. I went out that morning to get my clothes because they were dry, and there was a giant disgusting dead rat all chewed up, blood everywhere and disgusting cat poop Everywhere! It was terrible. So then us two cleaned it up with shirts over our noses so we didn't throw up and just pouring bleach all over the ground...it was quite disgusting. But I told her we're "mommy material" now :) haha So that was pretty gross...

Then another thing that happened this week was I decided to Finally start my new year resolution and exercise again every morning because all the members keep telling me I'm getting fatter..ha So I go downstairs and all my exercise stuff is not in its usual place...so I look around. Everywhere. Then I realize that Sister Pristopher had cleaned the apartment the day before and thrown it all away...I was a little angy... But I had mercy and didn't show it because she's a Pakistani and that'd just be mean to yell at her when she doesn't even understand. SO I had to go buy new stuff, but Now I'm working on it :) ha

Today was pretty good, we had a district activity at a really beautiful place called Echo Park, there was tons of beautiful trees and water and we had a good walk around and then I got some awesome souvenirs! I got this like wooden carved skinny man carrying a goat in a loin cloth...haha It really is cool I just can't explain it! So I was really excited about that :)

Other than that nothing much happened this week, I just keep trying to do my very best work despite the hard circumstances, because I know it's just for a short time and it'll get better. Thanks for all of your support I love you all so much!!!! Miss you tons!!!

Love,

Sister Benesch

Woah! Barbie Doll!

Hello everybody :) How are you?

This week was pretty good, I forgot to make a sticky note with stories which is bad because I get here sitting at the computer and can't remember anything, but I'll try my best! So we had a pretty busy week with no more holidays, but it was great because we were able to get our numbers up! Sadly we've kinda lost some investigators just because they're not progressing or keeping their commitments, so we're sad, but excited to find lots of new ones! I'm just sad because we have requirements here for baptism that they have to come to church 4 times in a row without missing, and so the investigator that I'm most excited about won't be baptized while I'm here because she didn't come to church last Sunday..but I guess that's just the way a mission is.

We've really been trying hard in this area to get the ward to work with us and they haven't really done much yet, so we took it into our own hands and wrote out our whole schedule for the week and passed it around, and we finally have a couple of the RS that are going to work with us! Yay :) Hopefully that follows through so we can really help the members be more involved in the work here.

We did get to go to a baptism on Saturday though for the daughter of some less actives that we're teaching so that was way fun! She turned 8 last year but her dad was really working hard to be worthy to baptize her, and he finally was and so it was so special to see the ordinance done and how much it meant to him. It was really hilarious though because the elders were trying to demonstrate to him how to baptize and it looked like they were done some hilarious dance with dips and stuff...I literally couldn't stop laughing all through the hymn! But it went well and the spirit was strong :)

Then last night was actually pretty special...Sister Patrus and I went to the stake center and she was able to receive her Patriarchal Blessing!! She was so excited and it was really special to her, even though afterwards she said she didn't really understand it..ha But I just told her when she gets the printout of it then she'll understand it :) So that was cool...then this morning was fun! Some missionaries in our zone went up and hiked in Timberland (something we've done before) and they left at 330 this morning, but we didn't go with them...because I didn't think it was worth it to wake up that early again when I've done it before..ha But they all came to our apartment after for pancakes and eggs and juice! It was probably the most delicious breakfast I've had yet on my mission :) Then later today we're going to sister Sheryl's to make a birthday cake for Elder Jones and have a birthday party later tonight at a members! So today will be a pretty great day.

The work has been good, not too much news yet because sadly not much progress..but a lot of promise and I'm excited to see what happens :) Sister Patrus is way nice and I love working with her..actually pretty nice compared to my last couple transfers :P Even though there is still some communication barrier we get by and have fun. So I'm doing great, I love you all so much, thank you for everything!! Hopefully I have more interesting stories for next week :) Oh, but I'm definitely learning to love Pakistani food, I'll have to learn to make it so I can feed you guys all kinds of different food when I get home!! Love you all! :)

Love,

Sister Benesch

haha A lady just walked by me saying "Woah. Barbie doll!" that's what everyone calls me here! Makes me feel kinda pretty I guess :) ha

Here's me and my nanay friends in the ward :) ha

And then some little kids we pass by almost everyday that always shake our hands with their dirty dirty paws...haha

But yes the kids way cute with his bike, what's funny is that right before that he had crashed and was way angry hitting everyone, so I pulled out my camera and then he got all happy!

and then the kids that are outside our house Every single day asking for junk. They collect it to get money for their families :( But they're pretty cute!! Sorry I need to be better at taking more pictures of things I do..

Pakistani Food

Hello there family, hope you are all doing well!! This week was interesting.. I got my new companion! Her name is Sister Patrus, she is from Pakistan, and although she is very nice there is a HUGE communication barrier. ha It's pretty hard, but atleast she's nice so we try and work through it :) Also Sister Criste's new companion is from Pakistan so we now have 2 Pakistanis in the house and there is Pakistani food for lunch every day! It's actually pretty good, I like spicy food more than I used to, however I will have to find some things to make my own lunch most the time now..

So sadly I don't have too many interesting stories, this week was pretty boring as far as the work goes. Now that the holidays are over we have way more working hours and have to fill lots more time so it's been a little bit long because a lot of people are still on vacation, so we're just spending a lot of our time street contacting and finding new investigators! No luck yet but I actually really like talking to people so it's not too bad. We don't really have progressing investigators but I have lots of friends wherever we go :) ha Actually we do have one investigator progressing!! Her name is Susan and she's the friend of Sister Pinky (my Favorite member here!) and she came to our ward Christmas party, then we taught her only twice and she came to all of church! She's so nice and humble, and she has these Adorable little girls that I love! I wish I had gotten a picture but I forgot..maybe this week! So I'm really excited about her and she really wants to be baptized, so hopefully this transfer! The only sad thing is that her husband gets home from work really late at night and we can't teach then, so we're trying to figure out how to teach him so that we can baptize them as a family...I'm trying to get my creative juices flowing! So I am really excited about her, and there are 10 more with baptism dates, so we have a lot of potential progressing investigators, they just won't come to church..that's the very hardest thing to get people to do here..so that's hard but like everything else we're working on it :)

Hopefully I get some more stories for next week, but I'm doing great and I love you all so so much!! Thank you for all of your support! Ingat kayo doon.

LOVE,

Sister Benesch

Happy New Year!

Hello hello, Happy new year everybody!!!

Well....let me just start out with I am a little tired so I'm sorry if this email does not make sense, but I got like NO sleep last night because this country doesn't just celebrate new years...it BLOWS UP. ha All night long we had fireworks and bangs going on that it literally sounded like bombs all night! Instead of sleeping we pretty much just watched fire works all night :) And then still had to wake up at 6:30 and I spent about 3 hours cleaning our house for transfers tomorrow!!! Also in the morning after the New Years eve parties the streets are no more...you can't see the street because of all the debris of fireworks and blown up things and there's throw up everywhere from all the drunk people...it's disgusting!!! But I cannot believe our training is over..it went so so fast! And I guess since you're wondering I'll just tell you, I spent a lot of time packing yesterday for...Sister Surio! ha I will not be transfering, I'll be staying atleast 6 more weeks here in San Mateo :) I'm pretty excited because I love this area! However to say that I'm nervous for the next transfer does not even come close to my feelings for the next transfer...My new companion will be Sister Patras and she is from Pakistan! I will be follow-up training her, and I'm excited because I met her once and she seems nice, however nervous because it's like known in the mission that being companions with those from Pakistan is hardest because they speak almost no english and no Tagalog...so it will be interesting! ALSO, Sister Criste will be staying in the house and her new companion is also from Pakistan! Needless to say our house may start smelling like curry and other delicious things like that ;) ha It will be a very interesting transfer! My district is about to become Hilarious..because our DL is Elder Barcon who is probably the strangest, most hilarious person I ever met who also doesn't speak that well in English and is just kinda...weird...ha and then us four sisters...it is going to be hilarious! I'll have tons of great stories I'm sure :)

We had a way fun service project this week, and although I sadly got no pictures, I feel so awesome! We cut down banana trees with machetes :) ha And then hauled them all into a big pile to light on fire! It was so so much fun, I knew that Zach would probably love it! However, the dirt that gets on you from the trees sticks to you and doesn't really wash off and so I was permanently dirty for a few days..but it was alright :) It was so fun!

As far as the work goes....sadly it really REALLY slowed down over the holidays. We had 10 investigators with baptism dates and it's like slowly going down to 0 because everyone got busy and it's just hard. Also, Daizel who we were so excited about apparently isn't coming back from her "Christmas vacation" at home so we won't see her again, and I'm pretty sad about that. It's so hard watching people receive a witness that our message is true, knowing how much it would improve their lives, and then they don't accept it. But I know that as long as I keep doing the Lord's work He will help me, I just will keep trying really hard and not give up! I've been praying though for help to learn Tagalog, but I think that was a mistake...ha Just kidding I just now have to be the one speaking to everyone and it'll be hard. But it'll be a great adventure :)

I love you all SO SO much. Thank you so much for all of your support, keep it coming because I'm really going to need it. But I know that I can do anything Heavenly Father calls me to do. I love you all so much!!

LOVE,

Sister Benesch

 PS Here's some pictures of our Chirstmas and New Years and a HUGE spider that I really almost peed my pants when I saw it...

We are so blessed

Hello Family!!

Well today my email will be a little short so that I still have some stories for tomorrow when I get to SKYPE you!!!! AHH :) :) This week was probably one of the weeks I learned the Most in my whole mission. Honestly I feel like I changed as a person just in a week..ha But I had some great experiences. Well last Wednesday was pretty hard, but I really felt Heavenly Father's love for me so much, and I realized just how much I need to rely on Him every single day. At the Christmas Conference I got to see all my friends!!!! Sister Miner and Sister Kalama will probably be my best friends for the rest of my life.

Also at Christmas conference we got to watch the movie Ephraim's rescue and it was INCREDIBLE!! I pretty much bawled through the whole thing..ha But it was so so so good. It amazed me how he was always so prepared to do whatever he could, and was always worthy to use that gift God had given him. Watching all that the pioneers went through crossing the plains made me so grateful for all I have here..because sometimes I feel pretty down but I see that I really am so so blessed.

Also this week I think I got hit with death as I call it...when I get colds here it is like ridiculous..It literally feels like there is cement in my nose and my cough sounds like I have whooping cough or bronchitis or something..it's terrible! But we just keep working and I'm getting better slowly :) I get rashes on my hands too which is pretty weird...but hey I figure it's just one of those other perks of serving in the Philippines.

Also some news on our investigators...we have one named Daizel that is like our best friend! Actually we were going to drop her, but we decided to go back one more time before Christmas and we were talking to her about some of her concerns, and found out that she really does want to get baptized just had heard some rumors about the church so we talked about it and she accepted a baptism date!!! We were Shocked and so so excited!!!! This really is God's work..I am so excited :) Well family I love you so much..I finally opened my Christmas package!! THANK YOU!!!! Literally all the beauty products...probably the Best gift I could ever get. I actually feel Clean now!! ha Maybe I'll try to make it last so that before I come home I can try to clean myself and not smell too bad when I get home ;) Thank you so so much!! I love you so so much, and I cannot wait to talk to you tomorrow!!!!!!!! MERRY MERRY Christmas I love you so much!!!! :)

Love,

Sister Benesch

 Merry Christmas from the San Mateo missionaries!!

OH And do you see the American, Elder Jones? I found out he was best friends with Chris in elementary!! ha Do Holly and Rohn recognize him? It was pretty cool to talk about my family with someone that knew them :)

And then the other pictures is the little girls of the Tripoli family (my Favorite family I've ever met in my life) and this was our Christmas with them...I seriously cannot explain the feelings of love and gratitude I had as we celebrated with them...they are so so grateful for the little they have, and they're willing to give it all. Man I love the people here!!! Love you :)

Christmas Caroling

Hello family!!!

Well sadly I'm trying to SQUISH my email into short time we have today because we got to go to the TEMPLE!!!

And we're busy...so I'll try to fit in stories but sorry if this one is a little shorter!!!

First, I want to tell dad my big news of the week! One memory I have very vividly is when you were trying to teach me to take pills and I just couldn't, so you yelled at me. WELL This week I hit swallowing 5 at one time! So that was an accomplishment :) Anyway...besides that, this week was pretty good! We've had a ton of meetings and activities so we haven't had a ton of work, but it's been fun. Actually on our one full day of work this week we were able to teach sister Grace and her family again and it went Great! We found her so prepared, then she was just kind of dying on us...it was so so sad to see Satan immediately attacking and taking her down, when we knew their family was ready. Then our schedule got busy and because she was no longer progressing we didn't go to her, but we did this week and she was So excited to see us! She told us how much she missed us and how guilty she felt that she hadn't gone to church because she knows that this is the church where she needs to be. She promised to come to church and begin reading the Book of Mormon, and we also were able to talk to her about getting married to her husband so that she'd be ready for baptism, and when we told her it'd be free at the church she was SO excited!! The spirit was so strong, and I really do know that she'll be a member. It'll be hard, but I think she's getting stronger now. I'm so grateful :)

Also this week we were able to start our Christmas Caroling! As a district we go to each other's areas different nights and carol with Santa hats and it is So much fun!! We have been able to meet a lot more people that we hadn't before, actually tonight is in our area so hopefully we can get some great new potential investigators!! OH and speaking of Christmas..I got the Watt's package this week. Tell them thank you so much!!! The pajamas are adorable :) I love you people :)

Alright so for the last story...tomorrow is our Christmas conference with the mission and I'm SO excited!! Us four sisters have planned out our dance...and it's going to be awesome!! Me and Sister Surio start out singing lines to the little mermaid song all changed up...sounds like this "I've got bug bites on my arms a plenty..I've got heat rash and fungus galore. You want lice in your hair? I've got plenty! There it is, I found one, nope there's more!..." and so on. ha And then Sister Bautista and Criste come in with You Don't Know You're Beautiful and we all start dancing...anyway all of it put together is awesome!!! It'll be hilarious. I'll send pictures for sure :) I'm really becoming a real pop star! haha Just kidding :)

And I guess one more fun fact...every once in awhile there's TONS of cats all crying at the same time, and one morning I asked Sister Surio "Do you know why all those babies are crying?" hahaha I obviously need more experience with animals.. anyway. I'm learning a lot here :) I love you all so much. I know without a doubt that this church is true. I had an amazing experience in the temple today and I know that the name I went through for accepted the Gospel on the other side. This is God's kingdom here on earth. I love you so much!!!

Love,

Sister Benesch

PS. these pics are...The BEAUTIFUL waterfall we went to last week, me and Sister Surio in our Adorbs christmas hats, and us at the temple this morning at about 5:30 :)