Small and simple things

February 14th, 2011

HEY happy valentines day everyone! We
have three baptismal dates for the 26th, we are hoping to get two more
tonight. We need permission from our investigators parents for him to
be baptized, and he is a little scared to talk to his parents, so keep
his parents and him in your prayers. His name is Kevin Molina and he
is 14 years old. He always reads what we assign him and he knows that
the church is true. We have taught him all the lessons, and have been
trying to convince him to ask his parents, but he is scared because
they are catholic. Well this last sunday his grandma died, (his moms
mom) and so we havent had a chance to ask for permission yet. But on Wednesday we did teach the entire family the plan of salvation, so
they felt a little bit of a relief from that. They asked us lots of
questions, and they seemed really intrigued. I dont know what will
happen with that, but small and simple things are great things brought
to pass. I started reading Jesus the Christ this week, and
it is really good. I am learning so much, I feel smarter when I read
it for some reason, its weird but cool. Also we will be baptizing a
guy named Juan Ortiz. All of his kids and his wife are members. He
would be a member already but he needs to get married. So his marriage
is tomorrow, and then we are going to start teaching him the lessons
and getting him prepared for the 26th. He already knows a ton about
the gospel, goes to church every sunday (even when his family doesnt)
and he is super excited to be baptized. I know that he will be a good
leader in our church. Haha my companion says that if we get 5 baptisms
this month I will be training next change. I told him that if I was to
train then our baptisms would go from 5 to 0 lol. Gosh that would be
sooooo overwhelming. Ammy Ramirez is 9 years old.
She is super shy. When we are teaching her she is always afraid to
answer our questions. All of her family is members also, except her
dad because they need to get married. He said they should be getting
married in April so there is another baptism. Anyway, she understands
the lessons really well, and she told us that she wants to go swimming
in the baptismal font. She seemed pretty dissapointed when we told her
that she couldnt haha. Holy
moly there is sooo much mud here in Malvinas. Like it is almost a
guarantee that my shoes are going to be dead after this sector.
everyday I have to scrub off the mud because their is sooo much. I cant tell you how many times I have stepped, thinking it was solid
ground, and just sink shin deep in mud. haha its sooo funny when it
happens. keeps me and my companion laughing. And last night, whooo
there was soooo much rain, like I think it was the hardest rain I have
ever seen. They shouldn´t call it Hollywood rain, they should call it
Ecuador rain. We were having a family home evening with one of the
families in our ward. and it started pouring. So we tried to wait it
out because we didnt have umbrellas. and it got to be about 8:30 at
night so we decided we had to go to make it back to our apartment on
time. At first we were trying our hardest to stay under patios and
stuff but eventually we had to get wet. We are talking flash flood
status here. So long story short, we were walking in knee deep water
back to our apartment. It was a fun experience. I am sure I will be
having a lot more nights like this in the future lol. Oh kinda sad but I will tell it. So we were walking around our sector, and there are
dogs everywhere, and i see this dog, and i see a car coming. This dog
is not moving at all. So this car just full on hits it. The car just
swallows this dog in its tires. All I heard was a bunch of crunching
and I thought for sure the dog was dead. But as soon as the car left
the dog sprang up and was running in circles in immense pain, yelping.
I felt sick. ahh and then we had to go eat lunch. Needless to say I didnt eat much. Oh I ate Cuey for the first time this week. Cuey is
Guinea Pig. Guess what part I got.... The head. It was an interesting
experience having my food stare at me like that. It is super greasy
but it tasted really good actually. Cuey is like a delacasy down here.
Just looking forward to more interesting food later on, chicken feet,
bull testicals. Stuff like that. So when I was in my zone leaders
sector. There is this river called river salada. And it is disgusting,
it is just the melting pot for everyones trash. So we hadnt gotten
rain in a while so it was kinda low. And it smells like sulfer and
throw up all in one. I looked at this river and it was just solid
black. It looked like tar or something. but it was actually boiling.
Like legitly, I wish I could have taken a picture because it was sooo
sick. Our enviromentalists would have a field day down here lol. But
overall everything is good down here. I am learning more and more
each day and I think I am actually sorta getting used to the heat. We
had Zone conference this last week as well and it was super good. President Montalti is such an inspired man, he knows exactly what
everyones problem is and he knows how to fix it. I am so grateful for
him as a President. He is very direct, but I like it. Lots of
missionaries don't like him because he is always very direct.
Apparently the mission president before him was very relaxed on a lot
of the rules so that is probably why they dont like Pres. Montalti.
Anyway thats pretty much all that is new with me, I hope all is well
with you guys, I pray for you every night. Love you lots. and miss you
even more!