(remaining days: 43) ¡Me quedo!

We got the changes and I'm staying! It'll be fun finishing my companion's training for my last change. He's learned a ton and we get along well. By the way I'm a potential prophet because I predicted the transfers in the district with exactness (Just kidding, but really I did). The new DL that'll be coming is Elder Bell. He was "born" when I was his ZL in Quito West (San Carlos) and I haveb't seen his since then (like 9 months) so it'll be good to see him. Right now I'm in a trio with his Colombian companion waiting for his becuase he gets here around 8:00pm from Coca (Whoo hoo! Jungle!)

This week we traveled to Quito for Elder Arrieta's verification with the rest of the missionaries from his group. I got to sleep in San Carlos again so that was cool being there for the first time since October. I saw Elder Guild too. He was asking me what we could do during to layover between Miami and Dallas hahaha. I'm not trunky, he is. We found some really solid new investigators this week. All of them have their fellowshippers and should be progressing soon. I feel really comfortable with the sector and I hope to baptize with Elder Arrieta this change. We definatly have the potential.

The weather has drastically changed from last week to this week. The sun is pounding us and the winds are insane. I've seen so many dust devils and been attacked by a couple. The members are saying that it¡ll be windy like that until August. By the way! Check out the July Liahona. The talk about the pioneers talks about Otavalo. Kind of cool. At least for me since I'm here.

¡Les quiero mucho! Oh and Elder Wright says hi

"Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners" - (Ephesians 2:19)

I've been thinking for like 10 minutes where I should start... On Wednesday we had a 7 hour zone conference with the other zone in Otavalo too. It was my son's first big zone conference so he loved seeing over 30 missionaries at a time haha. It was great though. We learned a lot of good things. President talked a lot about using family history to find new investigators and the assistants taught us an effective way to recieve referals from members.

The week was really weird as far as lessons go. On Tuesday we had an awesome day filled with great lessons every hour.Thursday and Friday we just had a ton of fallen appointments but a lot of street contacts. Saturday a ton of forigners contacted us. Like 8 in total. I've never spoke so much English in my mission to someone that's not a member or missionary. One was from Austria and I got to re-practice my German... I've forgotten a ton hahaha. It's crazy how many different cultures you can find in this small indigenous city though.

Hmm. What else... I got sunburnt from the zone activity we had last Monday. After the activity I got a haircut and by my ears I'm super white so I looked like a fool haha. The wind has been randomly crazy here too. Especially on Friday. I was seriouly waiting for a tornado.

No sé que mas a pasado esta semana jaja... Pero amo la misión. Sé que el señor sabe hacer las cosas y sigo aprendiendo cosas nuevas diariamente. Aveces veo mucha oposición aquí en la misión pero sólo me da un testimonio mas completo de esta gran obra. Nunca caeré. ¡Gracias a todos, les quiero mucho!

(remaining days: 57) Craziest week with my son so far

I'll start with the work and then I'll get to the crazy things so if you're not interested, skip to the 3rd paragraph haha. But right now Silvio and Jessica Torres still have a date but now for the 4th of July (´Merica!) because this weekend they went to Intag (A town that's super far away) to see his mom of the first time in months. Other than that, we're working with a ton of new investigators and other investigators that have had baptism dates before. Like the Moreno-Blanco family. They were the new family of 8 that we found this week. I seriously haven't found so many new investigators in one week for a long time. Other than them we found many more.  So this next week we'll try to keep up the pase.

On Tuesday we had divisions with our district leader. Elder Arrieta (My only begotten) was with the DL Elder Quiroz, and I was with his companion, Elder Andonaire, In my sector. They we fun divisions but the only terrible thing is that they were 24 hour divisions and Elder Andonaire snores like none other... I was about to shove one of my dirty socks down his throat but his snoring sounded like a bear so I decided not to. But that was the day when we found the new family so it was worth it.

On sunday night we witnessed an assult. We were contacting a guy that works at a small store with a return missionary in the ward around 8:45pm. In the street corner about 30ft away we see this girl screeming and a guy near her behind a parked car. We though they were just playing for a second but then we saw him beating her in the head with something. We almost ran over to help but then we saw that she was being beat with a pistol so we didn't. The car drove away and we ran over to the girl that was bleeding and crying. Felipe (the return missionary) calls the police and we're trying to calm down the girl. Then other neighbors come out. Another member that was just a block away saw the license plate so we got them... Crazy though.

To change the mood (haha), Friday night we had the most successful activity that I've ever seen in all my mission. We had a "talent show". In between every talent, us 4 missionaries had a mini 1 minute skit. I've never made so many people laugh before. I can talk more about it later but I have a ton of pictures thanks to a member and I'm going to try to get the videos from Elder Herrera. Around 250 people showed up! We have a ton of new people to contact.

Today we had a zone activity. We played vollyball and basketball for like 3 hours in the stake center as a zone. I'm terrible at volleyball but I love it. Over all it's been a really calm P-day... We played a lot of 21 as well. The rim was bent a little bit on the left side so I could dunk it haha.

¡Feliz cumple años papá! te quiero mucho y espero que disfrutas este día. Ya eres viejo jaja. Gracias por las cartas semanales que me han dado. Espero que estén disfrutando el verano. Como lo dirían aquí, ¡Pónganse pilas!

"You promised me your very best!"

This week was the first time in a year that I got to just listen to the mini zone conference training and not give it. Life is too easy haha. It was a really good one though. They transfered Presidnet Richardson's training on Reaching our true potencial. We had a contest where we all had to jump as high as we could without taking a ste First in silence, and then again with people cheering us on. Our results when people cheered for us were like 6 inches higher, it was sweet. We watched a clip of "Facing the Giants" where they do the "death crawl" too and we noticed that when someone is encouraging us, we simpily do better. It was a really spiritual and really irreverent training haha, we all loved it.This week I also got to go to the leadership meeting again because my district leader, Elder Quiroz, decided to do divisions with us that day. The ZLs trained on a special training from the mission council given by one of my old friends from the Orient, Elder Wright! They trained on the importance of teaching like boats (because boats can travel on a more amplifyed plain) and not like trains (That are such bad teachers that they can only follow the same lesson plan every time). And how we can patch up "the boat" of any missionary by verifying their teaching skills.

We're still working with Silvio Torres and some other investigators that are progressing a little slowly. If all goes well though, I could have 2 baptisms with my son in his first change even though we're opening the sector. So we're hoping that we can pull it off. It's hard to find new investigators here in this sector but the members are supporting us a ton. This week will be a good one. The members realy like us too. The 2nd counselor (Gonzalo Riveros) invited us to his house to make empanadas chilenas... ¡Riquísimo! And then he helped us out by visiting some of our investigators. There are a couple other members that are willing to go with us on appointments basically any day.

Other than that, this last week I finished the Book of Mormon in Spanish. I love how that even though it's not my native language, I learn more and more each time I read it. Now I'm reading Doctrine and Covenants. Right now I'm in section 10. Today we also played basketball with the other elders on the ward (Elder Carr and Elder Herrera). Super fun.

4th quarter. Voy a seguir dándole "my very best". Lo cual es lo que prometí al Señor cuando acepté mi llamamiento. Y estoy bien animado porque voy a hacerlo con un misionero nuevo. Solo es mas influencia para hacerlo bien. Les quiero mucho a ustedes y espero que les están llegando todas las bendiciones del Señor... Chaulafan jaja

(Remaining days: 71) First full week with my only begotten

Happy birthday mom!

My son now has more time in the mission field than the MTC so he's happy about that. We celebrated today by buying pizza in this place called Oskar's where the pizza is sold in giant portions for just $1.50. I find excuses to celebrate everything. Even when I was a zone leader we would buy a cake for the zone for any little thing that happened in the zone.

I don't know if it's just Ecuador or all of latin america, but here there are holidays for everything. Today is happy children's day. In the whole month of May is was basically hapy mother's month. Is was harder to proselyte because everyone was having BBQs or something. But we have had some luck with a couple of investigators. One is Silvio Torres. He's going to get baptized this June if all goes well. He already has friends in the church and has attended before. Vanesa Paredes is another personm that we're working with. She was a reference of some active members that are awesome in helping us wth everything. I'll be really happy if we baptize this month since we're opening a sector. My old ward had a baptism this last week too. We attended and took one of our investgators with us to see one. My old companion (Elder Smith) baptized but he forgot to bring his baptismal clothes so he had to borrow his latino companions. They we really short on him haha.

Yesterday I was super sick. I've seriously never had a migrain so bad in the mission. The good things is that the Lord is always encouraging me. I listened to a talk from Pres. Eyring not too long ago that explained that even when our body begs for rest we should always, "remember him". So even though my entire body was aching, we we able to have a day filled with appointments and success. IB-profin helped alot too haha. Now I feel fine again.

Today we went to Mojanda lake again. The other Elders in the district never have been before so I took them us there. Good times. It's super cold up there though. If I ever get the chance to come back to Ecuador I want to go up there again.

Creo que eso sería todo. Otra vez, gracias por todo. Estoy disfrutando mi misión y mi testimonio está creciendo rápidamente. ¡Hasta luego!

(remaining days: 71)