"Wendy's, Pizza Hut and KFC!" November 19, 2012

After 6 months of being in the same area I finally had Transfers! I have decided to pack up and take my skills to South Beach...actually I was called to be in Choluteca East in the area Lìmon de la Cerca. Its so hot down here, I forgot how hot and dry the south is. I'm with Elder Ruiz from Mexico, he's cool I was hoping that I would get sent here. We are also in a trio, I thought that it would be terrible, but it turns out that it's with Elder Cuque from Guatemala. I know him from when I was in Sagastume, his area was next to ours. He's going home on Dec 19th so he's just going to stay with us for a month. Our house is really nice, we live in a gated community with a guard at nights (hes a young army guy who was converted 8months ago). We even have AC! Also something else that is nice about my area is that we just got a brand new building put in. Its huge! This is also my first ward that I have been in, usually they're branches. I'll be sure to send pics next week.

The only downer about the area is that I have to wash my clothes on a rock washboard. yeahh.... not really looking forward to it.

Oh by the way we have places to eat here! Wendy's Pizza Hut and KFC. Finally!

After this area I only have 1 more!

"Lemon leaves are quite refreshing!" November 12, 2012

Man, this week has been a headache, I never thought that I would go through so many back up plans! We went to visit our investigator Azucena to teach her and talk to her about her baptismal service. We got to talking and she told us that the only time she could do it would be at 9 in the morning. We thought that it would be okay, because that means we would just have to have one of the District Leaders come over to interview her and her kids Friday. Well, that fell through because it turned out that our DL wouldn't be able to make it due to transportation problems. He didn't come until Saturday morning at 8. That went well, we all made it to the Chapel at 9 ready to start but our sketchy ward mission leader forgot to assign talks and was looking for someone to talk. We told him to forget it and that he is going to have to do it. This guy is always snaking out on us. If we ask him to prepare something, he always finds an excuse to get out. Including yesterday! He had gotten a family home evening all planned and told the branch where it would be held. Only 30 min before he was asking if we were there at the house of the investigator of the FHE and if people were there. There were 11 members there including the district president. We waited and waited for him to show up but he flaked out. We even tried to call him but he turned his cell phone off! So we whipped out a lesson with the sisters and taught James chpt 3. The part that made me made the most is that as we were walking up back to our house, he passes us on a street with someone in the front seat. He totally ditched us. Anyway, lets get back on track.... The service went beautifully and our investigators felt amazing. Afterwards Azucena came up to me and shook my hand and told me "thank you". I think that was the first time that anyone has actually ever come up to me after and said thank you. It helped me realize the importance and the excitement that she had felt that day. I'm so grateful that I have been given this opportunity to serve a mission. There couldn't have been a better time to leave at the time I did, because if not, I don't think I would have ever met them.

Something that I noticed that always seems to happen when we teach about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the reverence and the silence there is when we teach them the first vision. We always quote the journal writing that Joseph Smith recorded what he saw that day. It doesn't matter if the chickens outside are making a bunch of noise and running in and out of the house, but when it comes to that time, it always goes quiet. Its like every single living thing stops and listens to what we have to say..."Vì una columna de luz, mas brilliante que el sol directamente de me cabeza. Al reposar sobre me la luz, vi en el airre...." and by that time everything is silent. I sat thinking about it and it hit me.

Yeah, so we went out one day to visit our converts that live out in toward the mountain. I had to use the bathroom, so I asked them if I could use it. When I opened the door, it was a toilet without a seat. I turned around and asked them if they had any toilet paper and Rafa stood up and went over to his lemon tree and said "Lemon leaves are quite refreshing".... its a good thing he has a good sense of humor.

"warm, bubbly...and disgusting!" November 5, 2012

Hey family just so you know... we only have 8 more fast Sundays until we get to see each other!! pretty soon after Christmas it ll be 6 more!

This week we didn't get back to our area until Wednesday night after our ZL consejo. We had bought an apple pie and whipped cream in Tegus before going home so we could at least celebrate Halloween in some way. It was really good, it made me "baggy" to want to eat it with the family!

We went up to our convert, Familia Amaya's house to go visit their son while he was working. He goes twice a day to milk the cows that he is in charge of. Its only two of them for all of the 30 cows that they have. We watched them and how they would do it. Every cow had its own name. When it was their turn, he would call them by their name. Some of the names were Mendoza, Pan Blanco, Carra Blanca and Regalo. So he would call out, "Mendoza Mendoza Mendoza!!" and it would come walking out of the crowd of them with its calf and stand by the fence to be milked. They're smart! I got to milk one, it was interesting. I even brought a cup with me so that I could try some fresh milk. I pulled it out and the guy shot it straight off the udder into the cup, It was really warm and bubbly...and disgusting. I don't think I will every drink a glass of milk again! EVER! Only in my cereal, that's all.

All of our investigators are doing fine and are ready for their baptisms this week! It'll be fun.

"Day of the Witch" October 29, 2012

Sadly, as I found out last year, Honduras doesn't celebrate Halloween or "Day of the Witch" as they call it here. We talked to a leader in the church about a Trunk or Treat activity or doing a festival at the church this day but he said that here everyone takes this day seriously like a bunch of witches and magic goes on this day and everyone is scared. My companion, Elder Barrera, told me that they celebrate Halloween in El Salvador and do a festival in his ward. I guess it's just the cultural difference. But not that it matters, we have to go to Tegus tomorrow for our ZL Consejo on Wednesday. So we have a chunk of our week taken from us.

We are still teaching the family of Azucena. They are all learning, especially the little ones. They love to sing himnos and tell us about what they learned in primary. We passed by this week looking for her but she wasn't home! Every day that we passed by, only her kids were home. They told us that she was busy running around to different pueblos doing errands. We were a little worried that she was just hiding from us but we were able to find her on Saturday. She told us to excuse her because she had been gone the whole week and she told us (we didn't ask) that she didn't want us to feel like she was running away or that she didn't want the lessons. She is still 100% sure about getting baptized.

We also passed by all this week to visit other investigators that we are working with. We always teach them and the girls. After the lessons all of the kids always ask us to play marbles. It's been a loooonnngg time since I have played marbles, ever since I was little. It was a lot of fun, they taught me how they play and I was getting into it. Just in case you were wondering, yes I did beat a bunch of little kids....but barely. Sadly on Saturday, the mom told us that they were going to be baptized that that she didn't want it because she knows a bunch of inactive members that were only baptized and then stopped going. She told us that she didn't want to be one of them. We tried to tell her that its nothing to do with the church but it was the fault of them that fell. Once again, we looked to the Gospel of Jesus Christ which one of his teaching was Endure to the End. We always will be falling a little off the path put that's why it is so important to endure and go to church and to be able to be digno to partake of the sacrament every Sunday. But she didn't change her mind. Its so sad, they are such a great family. We will always pass by to help them.

We also stopped going to our cook lady about 3 weeks ago. The food was getting too bad and it was still making us all sick (us and the Hermanas here). So the package helped me out a ton! Thank you so much Mom!

Oh just so you all know.... I completed 6 months of being in this area. I have never been in an area for so much time!