The tie that he's wearing is one that I wore while in college
What is up, y'all? Comin' straight at ya from the Garden City of Bengaluru and this. Place. Is. Nuts. Hahaha it is seriously like nowhere else in India. It is SUPER urban and INCREDIBLY diverse. I see literally every race in the world everyday haha. There is, however, still an incredibly dense population of Indians and, depending on where you go, elements of traditional India are alive and well. It is SUPER green here; not in the sense that the air is clean (because that is the furthest thing from the truth) but there are trees, plants, and gardens EVERYWHERE, it's rad. I love Bangalore. My companion is also a pretty cool guy. His name is Elder Shanmugam from a little village in Tamil Nadu called Erode. He speaks....a different kind of English haha but he's good. He turns 25 this month. Sadly, however, he is being transferred to Kolar Gold Fields this Wednesday to replace a missionary who, unfortunately, ran away and went back home. So my new companions are the other elders in our apartment: Elders Wakefield and Sunny, the former from San Jose and the latter from Delhi. You'll be hearing more about them in the coming weeks.
Primarily,
we travel by cycle (which is unfortunate for me). But cycling in
Bangalore isn't like cycling everywhere else, we are LITERALLY a part of
the normal flow of traffic, it's nuts. Plus E. Shanmugam is like Speed
Racer and I'm dying haha. If you wanna know what my life is like right
now watch videos of traffic in India. A small miracle happened this
week though, as we were traveling to one appointment. Unfortunately, we
were separated at one point because E. Shanmugam is a champion when it
comes to cycling the streets of India. I had no idea where this guy
was. I know how I would find him either because a) we only have one
phone and he had it in his possession, and b) I had no idea what our
phone number is because it's my first week, right? How can I know? So I
just said a little prayer and thought to look in my wallet. Turns out I
had a little mission emergency contact card with our assistant's phone
numbers on it. I then felt impressed to go ask a police officer
directing traffic nearby if I could borrow his phone (which is risky
because the police do NOT like Christians here). It so happened that he
was SUPER kind and helpful and let me borrow his phone to call the
assistants, obtain my companion's number, then call him to inquire where
he was. We were reunited within half an hour or so. Prayer seriously
works. God loves His children and watches over his missionaries
especially.
Also it was Bangalore's very first stake conference yesterday!! Super cool.
Anyway, super exciting week with many more to come. Keep the faith y'all.
Elder Tuscano
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