Whiter than Bob Ross

Wed, Aug 12, 2015

Hey hey hey, 

I've been with the same companion for 3 months and I'm going at least 6 more weeks with him. When you are with a companion for that long 24/7 you get to know them real well. You talk to them a lot. Sometimes you run out of stuff to say. I decided to come up with a little game to keep us entertained. The game is called, "Who is the whitest?" I was inspired to create this game one day when Elder Wallace and I were walking down the street and we saw a white person. We both looked over at each other and asked almost simultaneously, "What are they doing here?" It made us laugh because we forgot for a little bit that we were white, which is probably the way the world should be if we are being honest. The game consists of us asking a question and whoever gives the whitest answer receives one point. The person with the most points at the end takes the crown. Some of the questions include things like:

-What is your favorite flavor of hot chocolate? (If you say pumpkin spice you automatically get a point.)

-How many episodes of Full House have you seen?

-If you were a food at a pot luck dinner what would you be?

Honestly there wasn't a ton of crazy things that happened this week so I thought I would make a top ten things I love about serving in The Bronx. Just like a list David Letterman does only probably a lot less funny.

10. Ball is Life

 9. The background music. There is constantly music playing as you walk down the street. It comes from cars. It comes from the swarms of people hanging outside of the barbershop. It comes from portable radios placed in the front basket of little kids bikes. Everywhere. 

  
  8. Coco Helado. There's little stands set up on the corners that sell a little piece of the Celestial Kingdom. Coco Helado is like Sherbet with class. 

  
  7. Elder Ave. There's a street in my area named Elder avenue. Hehe. 

  
  6. Singing at the Bronx center every week. We go to a rehab center and sing to the patients there. It's always a good experience. 

  
  5. "Aks". No need to pronounce ask the way it is spelt. Just say "aks" it does the trick.

  
  4. Street Art

  
  3. The Watermans. The senior couple here is incredible! They take care of the missionaries 
      super good. 

  
  2. Diversity

  
  1. Bearded Ladies. The fact that I've seen women that grow better facial hair than half of my 
      companions is pretty cool. 

 

Elder Ave for the win

Haha it's fun. On the real though, the diversity here is great. It's one of my favorite parts about New York. It's just kind of funny that we are beginning to forget that we stick out like sore thumbs. 

New addition to my area
It's cool seeing the guys out there painting this modern day Mona Lisa's

Church or Bakery? So confused!

I just want to let you know that living the Gospel does in fact bless your life tremendously. Elder Wallace and myself went to see a less active member of the church the other day. The rest of her family aren't members. She began to unload a bunch of problems going on in her life. It was about 2 hours of us listening to her with us saying very little. This is a situation that we come across quite often. For some reason as soon as we put on our missionary name tag certain people think that we are also qualified therapists. Which I'm not knocking on them for that. I'm glad they trust us enough to talk to us. 

We hear people's experiences and struggles all the time. Their lives often seem bleak. I have sympathy for these people. I really do. But for the case of many and especially in the case of this less active member, most of the problems that they have going on right now would be solved or maybe never even happened had they been doing what they had previously promised God that they would do when they were baptized. 

Living the gospel doesn't mean you won't have any problems in your life, but I can promise from firsthand accounts that it prevents tremendous pain. It solves a lot of already occurring trials as well. Just live the gospel and it will be alright. Everything will be alright, and if it's not? Everything will still be alright because it's in Gods hands. 

Have a stellar week. 

Elder Tyler J Johanson