September 15, 2014: The Rains Came Down and the Sewage Came Up

September 15, 2014: The Rains Came Down and the Sewage Came Up

Let me explain to you how this happened.

So we've been teaching this super awesome girl, Ximena, who first just came to church by herself when her neighbor Marili got baptized a few weeks ago. She's been reading the Book of Mormon during school and made us a pie one time, that's how legit she is.

Side note, we've been having some super insane rain storms all week. There was even a tornado warning for a while here in the Hidalgo area. We had to hunker down during that.

So we're all stoked for her baptism on Sunday. We get to church and start filling the baptismal font. We then go and greet people as classes start. After a while, Elder Christiansen and I go back to check the font and turn off the water, only to find it yello, oily and disgusting. The look of shock on his face was priceless. So Elder Lindsay and I get put in charge of solving the situation.

We decide trying to drain and refill the font, to see if it was just a fluke. So we formulate a plan. First, we confiscate the women's restroom because that's the side of the font the plug is on. I grab a couple of garbage bags and step into them so they're covering my legs. I awkwardly hop down the first few steps until I can reach the plug with a broomstick. Elder Lindsay is taking pictures of me the whole time. We're trying as hard as we can not to laugh or freak out because la Sociedad de Socorro (Relief Society) is having class right on the other side of the font doors.

I manage to get the plug open, I think, but nothing is happening. "Well, I guess I have to go deeper and mess with it with my feet," I figure. So I hop down the next step. It turns out the garbage bags are not quite tall enough. I start to panic as, with water slowly pouring down my legs, I waddle over and start stomping all over the drain. It's definitely open and definitely not doing anything.

This whole time women and girls keep going into the bathroom just to see Elder Lindsay standing at the other end saying "Lo siento, un minuto." Eventually the other Elders come through on the men's side to see me climbing out of the font with soaking pant legs, and we're all trying so hard not to fall apart laughing. They throw me a pair of baptismal pants to change into before we go home to change. On the way out, looking like I do in the picture, I can only imagine what's going through everyone's heads. Nobody in the church knows what's going on.

Also, this entire time, the new A/C system in the chapel isn't working whatsoever.

We later find out from Hermano Martinez that sewer water was seeping up through the drain because of all the rain. And there's no fixing it. We try to see if we can make it happen at another chapel, but it's too late. We just postpone until next week. But como quiera, it made some great stories to tell.

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Later that afternoon, while running in the rain from the car to the church for stake choir practice, I slip right in front of the door and land quite comically on my butt.

So to recap: Rainstorms, sewage, trash bag, swimming, changing, cancelling, slipping.

On a Spiritual note: "The Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done."I love y'all, dawgs.

Elder Dylan Young