1/28/2019 Dog Food, Hot Sauce, and Crushed Bullets

Transfer news came: nothing changed in our district (besides the change of Davises to Steeles as the senior missionaries, which has already happened). Another transfer in Midtown. There's still a lot to do here, so I'm glad I get to stay here. 

Today was the best week for finding people to teach. Some of the roads we went to the past few days have been incredible. One road in particular, we were able to engage every single person we talked to in a good conversation and every one was open to us coming back and meeting with them. That road was super special. Everyone knew each other and many of them were family as well. There was just a happy atmosphere about it. Although one interesting man showed us his dogs, while entertaining, also a little concerning. He had 5 pit bulls. And he showed the first 3 individually (he would show us one, then bring it inside and bring out the next one, and so on). Then he brought us to the backyard and showed us the last two. He casually mentioned that one of the dogs, named Killer, was 10 for 10 in the fighting ring, but has since retired from fighting. Perfect record! He talked about how he fed Killer a good recipe in his early years for fighting: dog food, hot sauce, and crushed bullets... 

I've mentioned we ride the bus a lot. When we mention that to members of the branch or other people, they often remark that we've "probably met some very interesting people." And I guess they've always been right, but if you are serving a mission, you are meeting "interesting people" every day, so it's a given regardless of the frequency of our bus trips. However, we had our first experience I would truly consider as "wack." We get on a bus at 8pm or so that is heading in the direction of downtown. You know that feeling when you first get on crowded public transit where, once you enter, you lose all your senses except sight in your body's effort to find the first available seat? But then you sit down and as you regain your other senses, you start to realize that maybe you chose the wrong spot. I chose the wrong spot. Sitting in the back of the bus, I was sitting very close to a middle aged lady screaming, crying, swearing, and threatening a man at the front of the bus. Like she was talking about actually killing this man. Her date with this man went awry, from what I gathered. It was extremely awkward because it was a fairly crowded bus, so everyone's attention was on her. I was pretty relieved to get off that bus. 

We made it to the Crosstown Concourse for the first time this week. It's an intriguing place and I love it. It's a very old Sears Catalog warehouse building or something that has since been converted into what is essentially a city inside of a building (this creates the aesthetic of trendy with a dash of old neglected architecture that I really like). This massive building has apartments, restaurants, a health clinic, classrooms, lounging areas, a museum. I feel like someone could be born here, grow up here, go to school, get a job, and retire and die entirely within the confines of this building. Essentially it's a YA dystopian fiction novel waiting to happen. 

Also shout out to Uncle Mike on the rice. That rice is the best. Another bag of it was left from previous missionaries here so now we have somewhere around 25 lbs of rice. That's a lot of rice! 

Pics

1) 6 burritos for $6. Ate them all. 

2) Us at the Motel, about to go in. It was a great museum. Sadly, because of the many concourses of people, they had us rushed through, so we weren't given much opportunity to read the many things you could read about. It was still a great experience. 

3) an empty bus. A calm before the storm (this was the bus ride before the crowded one with the screaming lady)

4) The Civil Rights Museum at Lorraine Motel was free if you donated canned goods. The Mid-South Food Bank got some Bishop's Storehouse Cans.