Monday, September 26, 2011

Dear family and friends,

        This week has been pretty good. We didn't have that many people at church yesterday. We only had Edgar Cortes and his friend Jose Flores come, but they said that they really liked it. It was Jose's second time coming to church, so I think that he's got the hang of things now. They did say that they might move to another area in our zone, but it would be another missionaries teaching him. It seems that a lot of our investigators are moving to other places.

So we found out on Saturday that we're being double-transferred. So Elder Pirir is going back home to Utah and I'm going to another area, but I don't know where yet. So we're also trying to get our area book ready and everything and it's a little stressful.

 It was kind of funny because when we moved out of our apartment, we thought that we would just stay with the other missionaries in our district for a few days, but we've actually been staying with them this whole time, and I don't think that they've bought a new apartment yet. So I hope that the housing coordinator finds a new apartment for the new elders to come in to.

        So to make a long story short about what happened, there were 3 gun shots and Elder Pirir went outside to see what happened and he saw a guy running away. The next time he saw the guy was when he was hanging out with our neighbors, so we went to an English Elder's apartment to stay for the night. And while we were gone, there was another shooting where they were probably trying to aim for our neighbor's apartment, but they got ours instead. So our mission president told us to move out and so we've been living with Elder Crespo and Elder Lopez (in our district) ever since the 17th or so and they haven't found a new apartment yet.

        We had a really good FHE with one of our investigators, Maria Fuentes. She's the mom of the bishop's secretary, Hno. Herrera. We watched The Testaments with them and I think that they really liked it. We also watched The Testaments with Lurdes, Giovana, and Pamela and I think that they liked it, too. With Edgar and Jose, we taught them the Word of Wisdom and we asked them if they had any problems with it, and they said that they used to, but that they can give up coffee and tea, and they said that they used to do alcohol and drugs, but not anymore. It'll be sad because there's a lot of people we are teaching and now we won't be able to see how they progress.

        It was kind of funny because on Saturday, it was Hno. Herrera's birthday, so our whole district had dinner with him and we had a whole bunch of tacos, so we were pretty full. And then Elder Pirir and I went to Byron's house and he made us some more food. Luckily, it wasn't that much because once E. Pirir saw how big the plate was, he told Byron that we could just share a plate because we were full already. And then when we went to Edgar's house, E. Pirir was whispering to himself "Please don't make food, please don't make food" and sure enough they all had a plate of food ready for us. So not wanting to offend them, we practically force-fed ourselves the food and I could barely talk or walk and I felt like I was going to throw up for the next half hour. Luckily I didn't, but I guess you don't ever have to worry about us getting enough food.

        We also went to a funeral this week because one of the members in our ward had a grandson die unexpectedly this week and she asked one of us to bless the grave. It was interesting to see how differently people view death because now I can say that I've seen both sides of the spectrum. One side where the person has been suffering for a long time and death is like a relief to them and the other side where the family thought that they would see him the next day and it was like a sting to them. Luckily, she knew about the Plan of Salvation because she's the only member in her family, but it was hard for her, too.

       To answer some of your questions, we usually watch General Conference at the stake center of whatever stake you're in and I watch it in English. Some stakes have one room in English and the other room in Spanish or some people do it where they show it in English and they have headphones if you want to listen in Spanish. I've seen both. My Spanish is getting a little bit more comfortable.

Obviously, I'm not perfect at it and I still need to brush up on some vocabulary, but all in all I'm doing fine with it, I think. With my companions, we almost always talk in English because most of the missionaries are pretty fluent in English even if Spanish was their first language. Some missionaries will talk in Spanish though if Spanish is their first language and they're just talking to each other, or they'll throw in some Spanglish.

       Well, I guess that's pretty much it from me this week. I'll be going to a new area and getting a new companion. I'll tell you if I need anything.
I love you!
Elder Meiners