Will The Real Investigators Please Stand Up, Please Stand Up‏

Well hello!  Where's Channing at?  It's almost 5 and nothin!  Chuta.  But oh well.  I guess we'll just keep on goin!

Aight, aight, this weeeek..... what the heck happened this week?  Oh we had a baptism.  Jorge Caisedo.  The baptism was good and we had investigators attending.  His family are members and now he is too.  He was excited and almost crying when we had the baptism.  So rock on!!

We've found a few people who are really awesome.  I can't remember if I told you about Familia Almeida or not, but his two sons are return missionaries, but he's living with some other lady and has a 20 year old daughter with her.  When we found him he pulled out his Book of Mormon, Bible, Liahona, and Gospel Principles book.  Eeeeheeee.   So that was cool.  He attends church but we still have a hard time with the wife and daughter.  The wife still doesn't want to get married and has her firm belief in the Diviño Niño.  Hey do they have that in the states??  Do they worship the... Divine Child?  And are they big on the saints still?  Do they still pray to statues?  It's so weird because the Catholic beliefs change from place to place.  Like this week, we found someone who we thought was gold (and he's still awesome).  Named Ricardo Lopez and he is super excited for his baptism.  But he couldn't attend work because of his work schedule, so we started praying and thinking of a way we could help him come to church, then he just tells that they changed his work schedule (that he's had for 4 months) so that he could attend church every Sunday now.  YEAH YA!  But now we have this thing about reincarnation vs. resurrection.  Cruud.  He's not letting it go either.  But we have an idea that I think will get him goin on the right path.  We'll see.

Well sounds all fine and dandy in the Valley.  40 degrees sounds miserable to me.  I'll keep it in the 60s thank you very much.   I hope Blake does good too in San Francisco.   That's cool.  Eesh I dunno, I just can't remember anything to say about this week.

We did a service to help some investigators of San Juan, and that turned out to be gluing (how do you spell that?)  medicion boxes.  But I couldn't fold the boxes right so I got demoted to counting and putting rubber bands on all of the boxes.  Needless to say, I learned how to count to 25 in Spanish relatively fast.  Every one thousand boxes they do, they get 5 bucks.  It's a good life.

You know you have transportation problems when you have some old lady holding on to your butt like it was the bar handle.  That stinkin Ecovia.  There was some woman just floppin all over my companion the other day.  It looked like some kinda Deacon Beehive dance gone wrong.

When we were doing divisions me and Elder Uribe, from Mexico, went to visit a recent convert.  What we found wasn't what we were expecting.  The questions were raised about the law of chastity and the word of wisdom.  This recent convert acted really weird and just kept telling us that he couldn't talk right now couldn't talk right now.  And we didn't know what the heck to do with a women in his room.  Okay.... well..... see ya later!  HEEEEHHH???

We were going to our house last week at the end of the day when somethin nothin important happened.  Turned the corner to our house and I had the keys out lookin for the right key.  Then there are these 3 guys from the hood walking up to us and I think ¨oh ssssshhhhhhhhhh someone's coming¨  Elder Redd is behind me almost yelling in English,¨Elder, Elder, open the door.  OPEN the door.  Elder, get in the door¨.  Well that just puts on the pressure and I start fumbling with the keys trying to find the stinkin key but it just ain't happenin!  They get closer and then adrenaline kicks in.  I was ready to run like a gazelle or attack these guys like a badger with a bee up it's butt.  So I just get ready to beat these guys with the keys, when they finally are coming right at us.  I say, Buenas noches,  they say buenas noches, then walk right  on by.  I open the door and we walk in.  Huh hu hu hu huh.  Pretty crazy huh? Yeah..... I want a sandwich.

And that's about it.  Nothin much to say here today either.  Hope all is going well and that you guys rock the Valley.  Hope you're enjoying life!  Adios!

Halo abery budy!

Let me start my letter in a nice, loving, dignified manner.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHGGGGGGGGGGGGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEJJJJJJJJJEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!
LONNIE IS GETTING MARRIED?!?! What the french poodle's fleas is goin on there? Elder Baker? HEH? I've seen jacked up stuff here in Ecuador but that, my friends, is strange. But, send my congrats.

Ah man, the Galactic Battlegrounds. I'd be trying to kill you both right now. But that's great. (AH Man I can't focus with this guy talking in my ear. He likes asking us questions. But he's cool. Wants to know more. Daft..... writing family or missionary opportunities??? I hate moral dilemmas.) But just keep working and having fun and do what ya want. Cambria I remember going to Adams for my History Fair. We got to go to Boulder just cuz we made it to Adams. Boulder was one.... crazy time. People runnin around all over and pizza. BEWARE!! Those women were of the devil I tell ya.

But it's awesome that you guys are growing and doing cool things. Violin and work. Young Women's. FIND SOME SKILLS!!!! Then give them to me so I don't look like a bald wambat.

Hey Dad how's it goin, how's the work, how's the cold? Yeah it's true that the mission starts preparing you for different things. Based on my mission so far I think my life should be pretty interesting if that's the case. Or I'm doomed to being (how do you spell it?) mediocre. Shame. But time will tell.

Stinkin Patriots.

Well Quito is different. So my companion, Elder Redd, was a zone leader but now is district leader. But he teaches like an animal and is a good leader. He's really been helping me out in my teaching and how to be a missionary in general. So how I see it is, my two Latino compañeros helped me learn the Spanish and he's teaching me how to be the missionary. So I got no complaints. (The little questioning man is now reading my letter trying to figure out what the heck it says. READ IT MAN REEAAADD!!!) But here is a little like Guaranda in the terms of the lack of help of the members and the ambition of the leaders. Santa Ana isn't know for being super successful either. But that's not an excuse either. We gotta work.

And the physical therapy has been interesting to go to every morning. Elder Redd gets it on his hips and he says it feels like little knifes stabbing and ripping into different parts. The little lady who does it likes to ask Aguantas? Aguantas? Then I get to push down on the electrodes for 2 minutes. He says, wait wait not too hard, hold on; I say where they at? Where they at? Then I push, he screams, his leg twitches, then we're all chill again. It's interesting at least. And we go on the Echo Via everymorning. Which is like the Japenese subway I imagine. Tons of people jammed in there like little tuna fish. And the rule is that there is always room. Even when the people in the bus thing try to make it look like there isn't.

But we shove into them, and if you can grab a bar you're in. I've been squished a few times by the doors. But we find away. Usually at the expense of some little Ecuadorian woman smashed between a hefty man and a gringo. I get to have this little woman's shoulder in my ribs and a 30 minute trip to physical therapy.

The problem is though, is that we don't get to study much in the mornings. We're gonna work on that. I need to work on my Spanish too, because Elder Redd likes to study and speak in English. But I need to improve my English too. Like Channing said, the three languages. All three baby!!

I had to give a talk in Sacrament meeting again. Talked about missionary work. Again. But this one was different. The members at least thanked us for our talks and some said thanks for talking with the Spirit. So that was good. Then we had a training for the leaders of the stake, every missionary gave a training. But sadly not a whole lot came. I had the idea of making the leaders be the missionaries and us being the members that didn't want to give any refrences. HOW'S IT FEEL PUNK?!

This week was hard in that I've never had to teach so much law of chastity and marriage things. Good grief. But hey, I now know the great way to teach commandments that Elder Redd showed me. So I don't feel so scared teaching commandments at least. ROCK ON!

Um so I'm in the heart of the Quito so I have a lot of cool places to go to in my zone. So I'm sending some pics. Disfrutenlas.

And that's about it. I love you all. Go help the missionaries why don't ya? You all have tons of people that can accept the gospel. Instead of just praying for the missionaries, let's actually help them out. Faith+Works :) Till we meet again!!!

Well howdy doo from Quito.

Well howdy doo from Quito. Habia cambios. So I left my dear home of
Guaranda do be here in the heart of Quito. I´ve hit the big time.
I´m in the zone of Santa Ana with the sector of Villaflora. My new
compañero is Elder Redd, the district leader. He´s a happy guy who
gets electric shock therapy to his hips. Sounds painful. But rock
on!!

So I found out last night at 11 that there were cambios, so I was
packing and writing until 1 in the morning. Got up at 4:30. Had very
strange thoughts in my sleepy mindless state. Something about I´m
getting moved because I couldn´t pick up the stinkin cotton balls up
fast enough. I swear I´ll practice more.

But I feel good. I left the sector better than when I found it.
There weren´t any baptisms but we have 6 with a baptismal date. So
they´ll get baptized eventually!! But the week was interesting as we
were searching for people. We found a man named Angel who looked like
Fidel Castro and had tooons of questions. Asked about how the aliens
built the pyramids and how they were the star at Christ´s birth. He
thinks I´m here in Ecuador to avoid going to Libya. He also asked us
if Jesus was a great magician in his time. My question is if Angel was
a great stoner in his time.

Then we were contacting up in the mountains, and we found like a
stinkin Disneyland. All these huge gates, huge houses, and huge
dogs. The more money you have, the bigger the dog. Nobody was home.
One great 3 story house had a flag of Germany. And these dogs were
jumping at the fence flashing their teeth. It was like a zoo of
horrors for missionaries. Then we come to the end of the road. It
doesn´t go any further and there´s a chain link fence. So we turn
around to see one of the big dogs got on top of the wall. Then it
jumps down and starts running towards us. I say, VAMINOS! And I jump
on the fence, my compañero tells me to have faith. So I get down and
say, alright. So I start walking towards the dog too, and it stops,
turns around, and jumps back over it´s wall. I was thinking of
Daniel and the lions den. I thought, wow! Faith really works! So
turn around to see my compañero a few feet behind me drop the brick he
was getting ready to throw. Faith...

Then today, did my 6 hour drive to Quito. Elder Andrade went to
Esmereldas. So that´s good. But I had to find my sector by myself on
this trolley train thing in the middle of Quito. The big gringo head
taller than everybody, standing in the middle with his big luggage.
But hey, they all don´t just point and stare like they did in
Guaranda. And I started a conversation with a lady about the world
ending in 2012. It´s great to tell them that they can start preparing
now by living the Gospel of Christ. Nothing like the end of the
world to help people remember God.

Sounds like everybody is doing good! When I heard Channing's story of
the iguana I heard my lizard music in my head, "dooooo dodadadadoo
doooooo" from the times of my stories with Cambria. And hoorah for
peeing babies and speaking Spanish! I have a feeling that it´ll be
harder for me to talk Spanish all the time. But I can learn quicker
now too I think. I can just ask in English. Elder Redd has 20 months
in the mission.

Get some work Blake! Or just get something! Whatever work for you. And
work is what makes some people pee blood I´m sure. So just keep on
truckin mis padres!!

Ah, it´s okay that the Broncos lost. This was the learning season
anyway. Next year even better. HEAP YEAH! That means I´ll be able
to see them go to the Super Bowl in a year and a half from now.

And well, that´s whats crackin in Quito. It´ll be interesting to see
what I can learn and what the people are like here. And the house is
WAAAY bigger here. I have a room just for my clothes!! YEAH BOY! So
it´ll be great to see what happens. Cheers!!

Oh and I´ll be sending letters next week. I have some from Christmas
I just haven´t had to time to send. So when I find the mail place,
I´ll be sending some. YEah!

Aight love ya all, clean your bed sheets, hope you keep the hygiene
strong. Adios!!

Somebody´s Always Puttin the Turd In The Punch Bowl‏

Well howdy doo everybody in the Northern Hemisphere. We got Elder Jackson here with the latest rooockin hits on the Zeeeeebrrraaaa.

Ah that radio station. Good times.

I hate that I have stories to tell then my mind goes blank. Daft. Well let´s start at the beginning shall we?

YEAHYA MI HERMANA!! Crap it out, throw it in the air, and sing hallelujah! Bishops aren´t perfect but hey, he can see if you´re doin your part por lo menos. So just do what ya read. Rock on. Your President sounds like a cool guy though. And I bet you are learning stuff to help you with your life. Chuso, and you ARE just as good as your siblings. Not the rotten apple. Some of us are rotten and we just hide it in our peel. But what it´s all about is the desire really. But glad the mission is helping with that. Hope it it´s changing me too.

BRONCOSS!!!! I just knew they´d start being good when I left. I knew it. I can´t do anything about it. And now all those people will be jumping on the wagon. But it´s so much sweeter when you´ve had to taste the bitter years. Hooorah. Rock on my friends.

Well sounds like everybody had fun swimming and having the time of their life. The only time I get to swim is through my tears. And the flash floods we have sometimes. And when the toilet is clogged.

But the huge amounts of rain means that behind my ears is cleaner than ever!

MAMA TEACH ME HOW TO COOK OR I WON´T EAT FOR MONTHS AND THEN SHAVE MY HEAD (except for a few hairs of course) AND MAKE GOLLUM NOISES BY YOUR BED!!!

Well this week was too terrible. Taught some lessons. Just realized that cambios are next week. NOO!!! We haven´t had a baptism this cambio but now we got some seeds planted and I believe the next cambio we´ll see the fruits of our labors. But I´ll probably leave. I hope not. Even if the people here are harder here than the rest of Ecuador, they're still cool. They might be fake Catholics, but they still matter. I was feeling kinda bummed that we haven´t had a baptism these 6 weeks but then I had to think, oh wait, some people only have a baptism their whole mission. So I'm blessed. And it´s not the numbers I´m worried about, no, it´s just that it´s hard when you don´t have anyone progressing. But this week we had 3 investigators attend church. That´s 3 more than we´ve had the whole 6 weeks!! PROGRESS BABY!! So they´ll be our priorities again. Heap yeah.

Um, again, nothing as spiritual as Channing. But I think I feel the Spirit guiding me more though. PROGRESS PAPI!! We taught The Family The Proclamation to some contacts. Turned out that they weren´t married. But it was my turn to read a paragraph and I read how they must be married....."So.... how do you feel about this commandment?" She said she´s Catholic so it doesn´t matter what our religion says about marriage. But that opened up how we can pray to know if it´s from God or no. Then we had another lesson, and now they´re praying to set a date to get married. Hope for the best no?

Another contact accepted a baptism date, but didn´t go to church. But she´s excited and said that she prayed and believes it´s true. Well I believe that you´re gonna be baptized!!

Oh and I got the other package. I was ticked. I thought that they stole the MP3. The package was all ripped and tapped up again. And I didn´t see it. Got that same feeling when our house was robbed. Like ya just wanna beat somebody but you feel helpless at the same time. So I was sitting there thinking, what am I going to do with these Christmas puzzles? Then I saw this little remote lookin thing. Hmmm? WOOOOOHOOOHOHOOOOO!!! Needless to say that the first song I listened to was Oh Happy Day.

Oh and the little ball speaker thing is awesome. Love it.

THANKS!!!!

And yeah that´s about all today. Keep on rolling my family, hope you´re all doin great, say your prayers and look both ways before crossing. Adios!!

We´re Teaching Love In A Holy Place, Teaching love in a Hoooooolyyyy Place‏

Well what´s up one and all and tuna in the can? So I got some terrific news. PACKAGE!! Yippee ki yay. I got it New Years Eve. I was happier than a peanut in butter. I threw on my new sweater, listened to some Fiddler on the Roof, ate some oreos, and wrote some letters. I was pretty dang satisfied. So thanks!! The other package is at the offices so I´ll get that one later. But for now I´m happier than a dimple on a chicken´s butt. Bien hecho con las canciones y comida. Y ropa. Muchas gracias.

Well aight, my New Years was like Channing's. A lot of drunks and we had to stay in our house from 4 to bed time. But New Years day we had to work. And it was terrible. Just hungover, all of our planned appointments fell, people stunk, but we did a bit of service with a member and taught two other lessons. 12 contacts. Whew. One drunk guy let out a drunken Ent cry randomly in the street, NOOOOOOOO!!!

oooh I love Ecuador radio! I BELIEVE IN MIRACLES!!! (terrible, I might be wicked, but I like to put religious twists on them. You and me elder ain`t nothin but members so let´s preach it like they preach on the BYU channel. Gettin holy now!)

But seriously, I hate holidays. Carnaval will be my worst nightmare. But our newly divided rama had 23 people on Sunday. 18 of us bore our testimonies. It was aight. Even though we´re tiny, we have a new mission leader that´s gonna actually help us, and looking so small has reignited the Missionary Fire in the branch. Now we might actually get some help from them too. We have the goal of visiting a member everyday now. So let´s hope for the best.

Um, our investigators don´t come to church so we pretty much have no one progressing. That´s our biggest problem. We try and try but then Domingo is the wrecking ball that brings us back to square one. But I think if we´re working with the members that´ll be the solution.

The other elders had a baptism Friday, and it was good. Bout time this lady got baptised! It´s been 5 months. But they had me direct the music, give the spiritual thought, then direct more music, then give my testimony. I didn´t know if it was my baptism or hers. I wasn´t gonna give the spiritual thought, because president asked my comp to do it, but then he (my comp) dumped it on me. When the president walked out I was a litttle irritated and then accidentally punched my compañero in the forehead. He didn´t talk to me for awhile.... but we´re good now!

Channing, se procupe! Learning the language is all about the patience and diligence. What ya said is the truth. Gotta have that patience. With yourself and other people. This bishop sounds like a crap bag (though I´m sure he´s awesome too). You're right, don´t get discouraged and just keep on goin my sista. I´m not that good either. I realized I have almost 6 months too and it hit me, I´m not anywhere where I want to be. Not speaking that good, not teaching that good, not the person I want to be. So I´ve been making some goals and trying to figure out what I can do. That´s it! Goals! Chip away at the wall instead of trying to break it all down at once. You´re aight!! And from the looks of your lessons, you have the Spirit there anyway. That´s the important part. Rock on!!

BLAKE TEACH ME HOW TO PHOTOSHOP OR I´LL SING SNOW WHITE IN A HIGH VOICE EVERYNIGHT!!!

I want to have a photo of me with that one tribe they found in the rain forest just standing there looking at the camera. It´d be awesome.

Ouch, sorry to here about Grandma and Grandpa sick. No fun at all! And that movie you said you watched reminds me of the time I watched the documentary about North Korea and I dreamed I was running away from their labor camps for a week. Eesh. But stitched hands, large boys, and marriages are always nice to hear about too. Rock on.

Whew I had three glasses of some kinda herbal drink, different kinds, and some bananas and pears and avacado. My bladder is about to burst but I feel goooooood.

Oh Cambria you went to that dance??? Good times. Good times. I remember coming back with my tie wrapped around my head, some sparkling grape cider, and falling asleep in the recliner. Dad put a blanket on me. That was the life.

Well that´s about it! I´m doin aight, feeling good and kinda freaked out that the men dress like women here on New Years and dance in the street, but todo bien. I´ll talk to ya next week. ADIOS! LES QUIERO Y HASTA LUEGO!