Just tell her to come get me!

Hey howdy hey, that's me, I'm on a yo-yo!

This week has been what the kids these days call "jam-packed". Quite a few things happened. One might call it "a classic" for all of the crazy things that happened, one worthy of bringing up in conversation again and again.

It started off like any other week. It was so typical, in fact, that I should've picked up from the start that something was afoot. 

Let me lay the scene for you.

My companions and I were driving to English class. Our district council meeting had gone a few minutes over, so we were cutting it a little close on time. Because of this, when we saw a yellow light, we had the thought that perhaps we should speed through it, so we could make it to English class on time. However, like the good, law abiding citizens that we are, we decided against doing this flagrantly disobedient action. So, we stopped, just as the light turned red. We sat there for a few seconds, waiting for the light to turn green, when, out of nowhere, we hear the screech of brakes and tires skidding across the road, hear glass shattering, and feel our car jolt violently, with a force that, had we not been wearing seat-belts, would've sent us reeling in the car. After several moments of mild shock, we realize that we had been hit. Thankfully, none of us were hurt. When we get out of the car to assess the damage, we see that this man hasn't just hit us. Oh-no, he has done something much more prodigious! It appears that he ran into a car behind us, and bounced off, bouncing around, hitting car after car in an almost pinball-like fashion, until his vehicle, now completely totaled, slowly skidded to a stop in the intersection. In total, five cars were involved in the accident. Nobody was injured in any of the cars, thankfully. But wow, was that a scene to behold. Luckily our car wasn't the one whose window broke. At first, inspecting the damage, it appeared to be extremely minor, a popped tire and some slight denting and scratched paint on the fender. But the devils in the details, as they say in Babylon. Upon closer inspection, we see that the rim itself is damaged. We call around, seeing if any of the nearby auto shops will fix it. No luck. So, we slap the spare on, and decide to take it to the service station at the dealership the next day.

When we go there, the people are really nice, and they said they'd have the wheel fixed in a few hours. So, for the day, we became bus missionaries. That was a good time, let me tell you. The dealership calls us, as promised, a few hours later to let us know that our car is done, but with one issue... The bent rim was not the only damage. In fact, the car's axle itself was bent (which is why, presumably, when we were driving it after the crash, the steering wheel was at a 45-degree angle, even though the car was going straight). So, they deemed the vehicle as "not safe to drive." We didn't let that stop us though, since we had to drive to Oakland. Luckily, when we were there, we were able to switch out our car for another "loaner car", so that we can still have something to use while ours is getting fixed. All things considered, the crash certainly complicated everyones lives. Oh, and yes, we did have to cancel English class.

On a happier note, we taught another lesson this week! The guy we taught last week was too busy to meet with us (although he did come to church yesterday, which was awesome), but we got another referral that we taught. He was referred to us by some of the sisters serving in the visitors center (the Oakland temple has a visitors center, not dissimilar to the one at temple square. I'm pretty sure all the sisters in my mission spend at least some time serving there). So we taught him there yesterday. He seems to be super solid, and our lesson went really well. I still didn't say much, but at least I was understood when I did speak this time. It was a different kind of lesson, because it was my companion and I as well as the sisters who referred him to us who were teaching him. We were trying to sort of "pass him off" to us, since he lives in our area, but for some reason he's pretty adamant about going to the Oakland branch. President Durham says that we have to get him to go to our branch, since that's the one he's "assigned to" or whatever you call it, so I'll keep you posted on how that goes. For now, I'll just leave it at that he seems to be very receptive, and he already sort of has a testimony of the truthfulness of the scriptures. It's amazing, the spirit that was felt in there.

Well, that's all for now, folks. Bye.

-B(J Raji)en

P.S. "I never saw such cauliflower carnage! Worse than the great slug bight of '52, when there were slugs the size of pigs."

P.P.S. Oh yeah! I completely forgot to write about the most important thing! Today we only have a half p-day (which is why this letter is coming so early) because we're going to the temple tomorrow! The Oakland temple is currently under renovation, and has been for over a year. If you have a temple in your mission, missionaries are usually allowed to go once a quarter or something like that, but since they've been renovating it for so long, many of the older missionaries have not been able to go for quite a while. So, our mission president got special permission from the area 70 for us to leave the mission and go to the Sacramento temple! They've been taking one zone at a time, and this week is our zone's turn. So, tomorrow, our zone will be hopping in a little bus and driving over there to do a session. It'll be a great time. I even printed off a name to do. So, yeah. I'll tell you about it next week.

P.P.P.S. "I have pewsonawy enjowyed miwikiw wip on quite a few occasions."

Photos

1- us with the zone leaders after exchanges

2-4- a few pictures of us with members

5- the damage to our car