Branding Cattle
Ya'aat'eh!
Sooooo.........guess what? I will be saying ya'aat'eh alot more
now. I am being shipped off to Shiprock, NM! Which is not a very deep
part of the reservation but hey it works!! We also got an email from
President Batt saying that missionaries on the reservation are required
nnow to spend 30 minutes a day learning Navajo from the CD's and
workbooks the mission is providing. It looks like i arrrived at the
exact right time! This is going to be a blast. I have gotten mixed
remarks when i told people i was going to Shiprock. The white people
were mostly like..."so do you get a bulletproof vest?" or " I hope you
get to carry a gun!" And the one Navajo man in the bishopric of 4th
ward said " be careful. But its a good place" So I guess i will find
out huh!? From what I've heard about Shiprock is that it is kinda like
the Garden City of the reservation. Quite a few people and its pretty
trashy but hey sounds fun right? My new companion is Elder Bunderson.
Haven't met him yet but I will tomorrow when I get down to Farmington, he will pick me up and we will be in Shiprock before Noon!! Good times a comin.
A cool story on my last day of work in Cortez on Saturday.
Elder Nielsen and I had a dinner appointment at 6 waaaaay out in the
boonies. I have memorized alot of these backroads and when people say
for example..."so get onto 145 take a left on empire right on mildred
left on Road L right on Road 25 get up to 26.4 and then take a right on
T, go to 28.35 and one more left on 29.7 and you'll be there" ya....i
can get there. It's good stuff. ANYWAYS we decided to do some tracting
out near our dinner since it was way out there. We got there about an
hour beore, knocked on some doors, nothin. Then our dinner calls and
cancels on us...dang but they gave us $20! so sweet! We decided to walk
up this one farm road and we came up on a scene that I usually would be
a bit hesitant to approach. There were 2 men outside underneath a
barn/shed thing with their shirts off workin on some big chainsaws. Ya
they looked very redneck. There was about 10 kids out runnin around in
the yard and some that were just sittin in a lawn chair in the yard. I
thought, i bet dad got this all the time. It looked like louisiana
backwoods people. I almsost said lets keep walkin...but i thought hey
if Peter and James and John and Alma and all those guys could walk up
right to the people that hated them and not get hurt....so can I, but I'm
not saying that they hated us, it was just an example. We went and
talked to them and they were really nice but they kindly refused and
said we dont want to waste your time. We left and kept goin down
another road and knocked some more. Nothin. We came back up the same
road towards our truck and I saw in the distance someone walking towards
us....I noticed it was a young boy probably 12 or 13. Then I realized
that it was one of the boys from that family out in the yard...and I
noticed he was carrying 2 water bottles. I made the connection and was
like nooo way....he came up to us and gave us the water. Then the
father who rejected us came up and asked us if we had eaten yet? We
accepted his invitation and they plopped 2 chairs down in the middle of
the yard. They brought out some hotdogs and said go at it. Everyone
else was eating as well, but while all the kids were runnin around the
mother sat and talked to us. Come to find out she was actually married
in the Mesa temple! Then divorced and 4 of the kids were hers and the
rest were cousins and nephews and whatnot. That was pretty cool. After
everyone got done eating...people started trickling in left and
right...within a few minutes there was about 15-20 people sittin on the
grass and in chairs around us in a semi-circle like we were a little
campfire. The father came over and said.." alright boys...I got some
questions for ya"...YES! It was awesome, it led into one of the
funnest, coolest experiences I've had so far. He was drillin us with
questions it was awesome! so much fun and we answered them to the best
of our abilities. Honestly i felt like I was being interviewed to date
one of his daughters or something thats kinda what the scenario was like
haha. We were there for over an hour just talking and we have a return
appopintment with them tomorrow at 6:30. Too bad I wont be there....dang.
Another sad but good thing. I have made very good friends with
some of the people here. Gay and Judy Balfour for one. They have treated me like I was one of their
grandkids.
The other good friends I have made are my ward mission leaders.
Bro. Pack in 4th ward and Bro. Smith in 3rd ward. I have spent alot of
time in both homes but the Smith family is awesome! They have a sone
named Conover who just left this morning to South Carolina for basic
training in the Army. He turns 18 when he gets there next week. I have
become very good friends with him and he gave me 2 blue ties for me to
take pictures of wherever I am and send them to him. I gave him one of
my favorite ties as well so hopefully we will stay in touch.
Thats all I've got! Goodbye Cortez!!!
love, Elder Christensen
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