Re: hola!

Hola everyone!

 

So just to address the not much time to email thing, Jalen and his district let me in on a little secret. If we hold down the mouse button while clicking on the minimize button for the window, it pauses the time! So right now after reading both emails I have 29:45 left :) It's awesome! I've learned so many little secrets since being here. I can't wait till the newbies get here this Wednesday and we can act all knowledgable and helpful haha :) We are supposed to get 8 new elders and 4 new hermanas. So that should be way cool! I am hoping since a whole district is leaving from our zone this week that Chris will be in my zone and have class two doors down from me! That would be great. But we will see! So I was super excited to get mail today and we were all sad and down in the dumps after Friday when only the same elders got mail (every single day almost, I SWEAR it gets really annoying haha, and some guy sent my roommate 100 bucks and he doesn't know the guy that well. He's lucky. But I prefer the heartfelt letters of love and wishes from home;) ) So yeah, when we remembered it was Memorial Day, it really bummed us out! But then I remembered I got email so I'm super glad to be doing this right now haha, it is definitely a spirit-lifter.

 

Well I'll be honest, the food has started affecting me. Nothing so terrible or anything. Just annoying stomach grumbles in the middle of an "investigator" lesson. Oh well. Everything is okay, the Spirit can still be there whether your stomach hurts or not. Oh and yes, they gave us the little newbie envelope with all our stuff in it like the keys and everything. And it had our mail address, and on it it says ARG-MEN 0716 so I guess I will be leaving the 16th! Jalen is supposedly leaving the 17th so I'll be out a day longer. WHOO HOO!!! I really am super excited. Even with my white-boy Spanish accent (which has improved I must admit, if I do say so myself) I still want to just get down there and get going. But I think I'll survive learning more Spanish for another 6 weeks haha. And I kinda would like to stay here since I get mail so quickly instead of the supposed 2 week wait. That will be one of the hardest things. But I know I will be busy doing what the Lord wants since it is His time I'm on after all. So I will adjust I'm sure! (albeit grudgingly.... haha just kidding)

 

I'm glad you had the missionaries over! After being out in the field and cooking for themselves I know how much they appreciate it!!! The food here is good I guess but.... yeah. You know what I'm talking about. I have days where I can hardly eat anything and then days I eat two or three entrees. The latter never ends up feeling very good but I'm just so hungry I do it anyway. I'm so desperate in here! *hint cough* a package with outside treats and knick-knacks would be cool.... *cough* just kidding--that can definitely be expensive. But the drop off thing if anyone is in Provo would be great! I could use some caffeinated drinks like REAL Dr. Pepper not caffeine free. Grandma Gibbons I know you can feel my pain. You can't do that to a perfectly fine drink. Just ask her everyone. haha  I will be honest, I laughed when you told me about dad's maiden voyage with his new cooking displays. I can imagine him wearing an apron, talking to a camera, explaining his meal, and being a tv chef. Tell him to try it out for a home video. That would be a good family home eveing I think! But that's cool, that made me really jealous of the good food out in the world. There may be bad people and bad things, but food, nah it's just delicious!!! Take advantage of it while you can.

 

So today we sent off our two Zone Leaders that were so cool and friendly and pretty much the main reason our first week here wasn't crappy. It was sad to see them go, but our new Zone Leaders are just as awesome, and probably the most odd-looking companionship here, since one is 6' 8" and the other is probably... 5' 7"? Not sure exactly, but they are just so funny and really nice guys. So I'll miss Elder Rose and Elder Surmik but they were so excited to get out of here and get down to Santiago Chile! So we sent them with the best of wishes. They'll be great missionaries, I know it. And my district is all hoping that we get to ride the same bus or van to the airport before we go separate ways. That would be nice. I'm gonna miss these guys when we leave. But that's still a long 7 weeks away! Oh man. I have got so much more to learn. But I'm doing my best to be humble.

 

Tonight we have our next investigator Fernando, from Mexico (really it's just our teacher Hermano Snyder, but we teach him and our other teacher Hermana Christensen, who will be acting as people they taught on their missions, which will be awkward but kinda nice since we'll know him. Oh, and the Isabel woman I told you about is actually our other teacher, Hermana Christensen. We were all mind-blown when we found out. Apparently Hermano Snyder will be acting as the investigator for the next group, that will be fun to hear about) But yeah I'm excited for that! I feel like I can actually talk and have a conversation somewhat now, and Elder Johnson has improved SO much since we got here, we are speaking about half and half now which is great for me and for him. So I'm glad he's learning so well. I've been giving him little private lessons when the teacher is gone with simple basics of Spanish since they don't really teach us that, everyrthing we learn is Gospel things, so I'm teaching him grammar and conjugations and things like that. Thank goodness for Mr. Rekow and all the drilling he did. If you see him tell him thanks a million for all the great Spanish teaching! It's really paying off now.

 

It has only been about 2 weeks but everyone in our district is hitting it off well so I'm so thankful for my district. We all get along great which really makes me glad because we hear stories of other districts who have people go home because they don't feel welcome. Yeah we're doing our best not to do that! We do everything together so I hope it stays that way from now on! I am doing laundry now though so I should probably get going. I'll write all you guys back after this since I got your letters Thursday (you were right!) and you'll get those hopefully this week! I miss you all but don't worry about me, I know I'm in the Lord's hands. I'll be fine as long as I get to do what I'm supposed to and teach those people I meet. I'm way excited for this next week. Talk to you in a week! Don't have too much fun without me :) Just kidding. Live your lives! But in accordance to all that is right and good. :D it's da BEEEEEST!! (our district has a major fascination for Nacho Libre, so watch it in memory of us. Elder Allen can quote every great line from that movie, and he sounds exactly like Nacho and Steven hahahaha. Just think of us when he says " I ehate you're eSTUPID orphans!" ) Anyway, Adios! Hasta luego! Mucho amor!

Elder Tyson David Gibbons