ZONE CONFERENCE

I had my first Zone Conference today (which was kind of weird that it was today on a Pday. Usually they´re on Wednesday or Thursday, but this change was different). But yeah also it was just our zone. But it was really neat. President and Sister Gamboa came and they really are fantastic. Of what I understood was great. It was kind of crazy leading up to today because the other elders would talk about how these kind of meetings can be intense because President will always come down and walk around and will ask individual missionaries about a certain topic like "why do I need to keep the sabbath day holy?" or "why do i need to be baptised." and ask for scriptures. Not only that but once you say a scripture he´ll ask "ok, what does it say?" Expecting you to have it memorized. yeah, pretty intense, lol. So once the meeting got started and he came down and did that it was pretty intense, but not really as bad as I thought. And more than being scared, I just really got the impression that he just expects excellence out of us. We are the Lord´s missionaries. We really should have scriptural backing for every principle we teach. I can´t imagine how you could be a more powerful teacher than being able to quote scripture smoothly as your teaching. It kind of reminded me of high school football, lol, just in that we need to master the basics to perfection. For the whole mission they have what´s called the "Maestro." and it´s just a list of scriptures that they´d like us to know by heart. It´s pretty kool it´s organized by Miles. The first mile has a list, then the second mile has some more scriptures, then more and more. there are 9 miles and each one is a little harder. the 9th has like to memorize the "living Christ" and things like that, lol. so yeah that´s something I really need to work on more. So yeah overall the Zone conference was pretty neat. They had me share my testimony because I´m new and they had Elder Martineau speak because he´s going home this change. As well as another Elder Tudela I believe. Oh and yeah Dad you were right, we wore our suit coats, lol. So it looks like I´ll be wearing my suit once every six weeks, for zone Conference.

....So anyways, I´ve realized that I don´t think I´ve really given you a good description of the fun perks of every day life here in Ecuador, lol. (ok some things are more the opposite of perks, depending on your attitude, lol). For example, one of the first things I learned is about the plumbing. The sewers aren´t very good here so we cant flush the toilet paper. Every bathroom has a little basket where you put it. Yeah. . . it can´t be very sanitary. As soon as I heard that I thought it was going to be terrible and every bathroom will smell terribly, but really it´s not as bad as i thought. Also, it seems that there´s gotta be 100 times as many ants as people here, at least. Ants are everywhere. in our house we can´t leave food out over night because the ants will get to it. We have a can of Raid but it doesn´t seem to do the job very well, lol. It´s kind of fun some days we´ll get up and find a string of ants crawling along the wall and we´ll just follow it to a plate or cup that was left out the night before- it´s quite amazing how long the line of ants can get. Every time we´re just like "how do they know??" Elder Sanchez says it´s better than cockroaches, which is what most other areas have, so I guess I should be thankful, lol. Though we do have a few cockroaches here and there, really small though. The things that we really don´t want the bugs to get to we put in the fridge and feezer (like we always keep our toothbrushes in the freezer). Obviously we can´t drink the tap water, so once every two weeks or so these guys in a big truck come buy with these huge 5 or 8 gallon bottles of water and we get some to last us. we use that to brush our teeth as well as drink. ´Oh, I almost forgot, I learned the first morning that there isn´t any hot water, like, anywhere, lol. There´s just one knob to turn for every sink and every shower to turn the water on and off. So yeah, cold showers every morning, lol. Which again isn´t that bad- I just try to imagine I´m in some tropical forest under some nice waterfall. It helps a bit, lol. I learned quick the technique of just kinda plunging myself in to get used to it, kind of like jumping straight into a pool of water when you go swimming. Hmm those are really the main differences that i can think of. We love fans in the house, lol. Every night we sleep with a fan pointed at us- each elder has his own. it has 2 purposes- to cool us, and to keep bugs off us, lol. oh wait thats another thing, we don´t use blankets here, lol. there just like aren´t any in the missionary houses. We just sleep with a sheet on us. That´s probably why i had to bring 3 flat sheets. Which was different but I can see why, it´d be hot with a blanket.

Other than that everything is going great! I think I´m adapting fairly well. I really wish I didn´t sweat so much, lol. It´s probably in the 80s or 90s most of the time. If it gets down to the 70s the people here are cold, lol. but yeah it reminds me didn´t Robbie say in India he would just sweat all the time, and it was just something you got used to? lol Hopefully I won´t be sweating for the next two years but we´ll see. I actually did feel a little sick this last week from the food I think. But Mom, don´t worry, I think you would love Sister Gamboa. She takes such good care of us. Elder Sanchez said he had to call and tell her I felt a little sick even though it wasn´t that bad and she was just like "ooh por posito. You should do this and this and this and drink lots of water." lol. so yeah, I feel fine now....

The First FULL Week!

Hola Madre y Padre,¿Cómo están? Me alegro que etén bien!

Well it´s crazy to think that I´ve been here for nearly 2 weeks now. Every day seems to take forever but somehow the week still goes by fast. I´m still working on simply understanding people. I really feel like I can talk fairly well so I can teach principles and things but as soon as I ask a question or they ask a question I just don´t understand a word so I´ll just turn to Elder Sanchez, lol. So yeah I´m just really trying to focus (by the way that may be the biggest problem for me, by the end of the day when I´m dead tired as it is of walking all day in the heat and I´m sitting on a couch with a family talking away in some language I don´t understand its easy to just zone out, lol:). But yeah I think I´m getting better. Some people are really understanding and talk slow so then I can understand and it´s nice. But anyways, so it´s awesome we are teaching so many families like every day Elder Sanchez says how our schedule is so full, which is great. We are now working really hard with the family of Julia Magallanes (it´s her daughters family). They have a big family and they are great people I know they would be awesome members and really contribute to the ward. We were also teaching another sister and we were actually about to put a fecha bautismal (baptismal date- AKA commit her to baptism:) when seemingly randomly a guy starts working on a fridge right outside the door with a metal saw. It completely threw out the spirit so we just had to post-pone the lesson for another day. As we were walking away we blamed Satan for it, lol. So yeah that´s just a few of the families we´re teaching. I am still getting accustomed to the area and the names so I don´t remember the names of everyone but it´s amazing how nice everyone is (oh and mom, I hope you´re not worrying about me eating enough because every day for lunch we get a heaping plate of rice and chicken or something that I can barely finish. and on Friday it was funny our second to last appointment made us wait so they could make us dinner. We really had to go so they just put it in a container for us to take then the next family we visited made us wait so they could make us dinner too, lol and this time we stayed and ate with them:). but anyways, that´s awesome that you were able to get in contact with Elder Martineau´s mom. She sounds really nice and he is a really nice guy too. That´s neat you´ve found lots of other mom´s on the list. Yeah I´m not sure exactly how many americans we have here but I thought I heard that we have somewhere around 50 or so.

Oh and before I forget yeah I did get the easter package (they gave it to me the first day I was there in the office in fact, lol. It was kinda funny, actually, me and Hermana Brown were in there and they were giving us the rundown of everything and they were telling us how we should have our families send us packages- he was like they need to be sent with a specific sticker, the green such and such, oh here let me show you- then he went and grabbed a package and showed us the sticker saying that was how it should be. I didn´t even notice it was from you I thought he was just using an example until Hermana Brown was like "hey, isn´t that your mom??" lol.) so yeah it was good...

I'M IN ECUADOR!! :)

¡Hola!
I´M IN ECUADOR!!!! lol so this week has definitely been crazy. It seems so crazy that I´m actually here, almost like it´s all just a dream. I can´t believe that just a week ago I was still in the States. On one hand it seems like so long ago but at the same time it feels like I just got here. But it has been great! The trip over here went really well. We didn´t have any problems catching any of our flights or anything (though I guess the flight from Texas to Florida was delayed 20 minutes but it didn´t effect anything seeing as we alread had a 3 hour layover in Dallas). Hermana Brown and I were just nervous and excited the whole time, lol- especially on our flight from Florida to Guayaquil! The crazy part was when we finally got to Guayaquil. We landed on time around 9:20 and just followed the crowd to customs. Now that was nerve racking! We waited in line until a desk was open and we went individually. When I walked up to the guy and handed him my passport and visa papers he took a little while to look at them then said something to me in some language that I didn´t understand whatsoever. I tried to ask "¿qué?" but even the second and third time I had no idea what he was trying to say, lol. Luckily there was someone behind me that knew the language and told me that I had the visa and could do it somewhere else. Yeah I didn´t know what they meant but he gave me back my papers and let me walk through. I figured I must be fine if they´ll let me walk into the country through customs (I found out later that I must´ve been supposed to go somewhere else to stamp it because he didn´t stamp my visa so I actually walked in illegally, lol! But it´s weird because the same customs and Hermana Brown got through and her visa was stamped so she was fine. lol who knows). Once we got through baggage claim was in the next room so first we stopped by the rest rooms and then waited for our bags. But oh man it took forever! After us there must´ve been other flights that came in because after 45 minutes the place was filled. It must´ve taken an hour for our bags to come through (the whole time we were wondering what we should do and how we didn´t understand anything and what President Gamboa must be thinking). Oh and by the way in the Florida airport I guess Hermana Brown talked to the daughter and her husband of the Quito mission president and they were flying down to visit. I wish I would´ve gotten the chance to talk to them but I didn´t. But when we were in the baggage claim we realized that somehow they were able to get their bags and were out of there super quick. Yeah we really just felt like nuevos. Well so yeah about like around 10:30 our bags finally came through but then by that time there was a huge line to get through another security x'rays that we had to put our bags through to walk out. yeah that took another 45 minutes. We decided to work on some vocab and memorizing scriptures while we were waiting in this line :) but yeah once it was well after 11 we finally got through all the security and were walking out and I first saw a couple of tall Americans in white shirts and ties then I saw President Gamboa and his wife. We walked around the little fence thing that was there and walked up to them. The elders and president gave me hugs and President Gamboa actually said "welcome!" Elder Sanchez then shook my hand and said he would be my companion- in plain english. Yeah, he´s from California and totally American, lol. That kind of surprised me, I was expecting to have a native companion first and to have a rough first week not understanding anything, which would be good because then I would learn Spanish way faster. but ah wel Elder Sanchez is a reall kool guy. He´s probably about 6´4´´ and 175 pounds and played football (defensive end!) and wrestling. so yeah it was him, the Assistent to the President, and Hermana Browns first Companion (who is actually from Argentina and knows little english, lol so yeah she´s probablyly had a fun first week) who were there to greet us. We all just walked out and the elders took one car to where we would stay and the sisters and President took another to where they would stay. That night we just went straight to bed we were so tired, lol. (by the way, i´ve just spent 30 minutes typing, which in the MTC would mean I´m out of time but here i have another 30 minutes!!! lol:). so yeah the next day we got up, exercised, got ready and had personal study then around 9 went to the office. By the way we stayed with all the office elders- there´s 6 (2 assistants then secretaries and stuff), they´re all pretty fun (4 of them are Americans, lol so yeah when we were in the office we were all speaking spanish so it really didn´t feel like I was in Ecuador yet). In the office they took our picture, gave us a little orientation talk on everything to expect, how to get money, some basic rules, etc, and we had interviews with President Gamboa. Then around 1 Sis. Brown, one of the assistants and I went with President and Sister Gamboa to their place and had lunch. It was really nice, we had fish, potatoes and rice. They were really nice, President Gamboa is pretty funny, lol. They told us that we can expect rice for every meal (which i´ve found to be true, and also every meal I´ve had fried bananas. The rice I like but I´m not gonna lie I´m not a big fan of the fried bananas, lol). after we ate we sat down in their living room and talked and we each shared our testimony in spanish and they last got a picture with us individually. It was really nice. Finally we came back to the office and me and Elder Sanchez took our things and went to catch a bus to our first area (which everyone was telling me was an awesome first area). We got some bus tickets and after a 2 hour ride we are now in Libertad- which is actually a peninsula that juts out into the ocean. I think everyone was right, this is an awesome place to start out. Each day we actually do get to have lunch at a members home (which i was pleasantly surprised to hear) but not dinner. We live with 2 other elders outside of our area (or, as they call it, "sector") so each day we have to walk down the street and catch a bus to our sector. All 4 of us are actually American, lol. Which is another surprise. I think there´s about 50 Americans out of the 175 or so missionaries so it´s funny how 4 of us happen to live together. it´s kool but i´m afraid i´m not going to learn spanish as fast because we all speak to each other in english, but ah well we´ll see. But yeah our area is really rich. Elder Martineau was telling me (this is actually his last "change" or set of 6 weeks, so he´s like going home in a month!) that this area is unlike any other in the mission- it´s really rich. I think it was really good that we went to Peru last summer because it is a lot like that. Only not quite as big city like. But there are paved roads in the main part and there is actually a big mall that we´re in right now (oh and get this, everone here calls it "shopping" lol). of course a lot of the families that we´re teaching live in the poor part of town where you´re lucky to have a floor to your home. They´re really more like shacks that families live in. I remember that first night on Wednesday when we had just arrived walking among the shacks at night- it really just felt like a crazy dream, lol. but the people are so nice here it´s awesome. We were teaching one older lady- Julia Magallanes, and she was actually baptised on Saturday! ( yeah it´s pretty sweet to walk in and have a baptism the first saturday). Now her family we´re working on because they all seem really interested. Elder Sanchez says that we really just get a lot of references and teach a lot- we rarely go door knocking or contacting. Which is really good, but of course not what I expected but it is great. so yeah like I said it´s really a lot like Peru. Though there are dogs everywhere. It reminded me Dad didn´t you say there were dogs everywhere in Argentina? They´re not dangerous or anything. Tell everyone I say hi. Well now I´d better write the president. Thanks for everything and don´t worry I´m doing great! lol the area is amazing!

Last e-mail from MTC

Hola!
Man today has been crazy. Elders Lockhart and Hale were up late last night packing (yeah they should've been done earlier but they wanted to talk, lol) and this morning I think they got up around 4 so there wasn't too much sleep involved. It was just crazy when I woke up this morning and they weren't there. It just made it sink in even more how close I am to leaving for Ecuador. It was kinda sad saying bye to them last night and this morning. But I'm sure they'll be great missionaries.

The next day on Wednesday we had a really neat analogy from Hmo Falk on the Atonement. You may have heard of it- it's kind of an object lesson. Well it's where the teacher brings a big box of doughnuts and one by one offers each student a doughnut. However, the doughnuts aren't free, after he offers a doughtnut he turns to one student and asks him to do 20 push-ups so that so-and-so can have a doughnut. The teacher asks the same student to do pushups for each doughnut for each person. Even if a student says they don't want one the teacher will ask the student to do 20 pushups so that they can have a doughnut that they don't want. By the end it really makes a big impression when the one doing the pushups is breathing hard and struggling so that they can have a doughnut. That's what Hermano Falk did with us and he asked me to do the push-ups. He had been talking to me like a week before telling me he'd like to do it so i knew it was coming and I was actually pretty excited. I had heard the story of a professor doing it once an it sounded like a great analogy of the sacrifice of the Savior for each of us. It was crazy, because Hmo Falk came in late because he had a 3 hour exam and so he didn't have time to pick up a box of doughnuts, but it just so happen that same day I got a box of 2 dozen krispie kreme doughtnuts from the Wiests (yeah, it was meant to be, right? :) lol so yeah he talked to me privately and we decided to do it. I had told him I thought I would be able to do like 15 pushups per person but after the first three he asked me to do 20 pushups for he saw that I was doing them quite easily so ended up asking me to do 25 for the last 4 people. So yeah, it was hard, lol, but it really felt good. Near the end before I was finished he read some verses in matthew I think about the Savior in the Garden of Gethsemane. I talked to Elder Hale and Lockhart after and they said the symbolism of it all really was powerful. So I'm glad it turned out good (plus it was a good work-out:).
But anyways, yeah this last Conference was awesome!! I've never taken so many notes from conference in my life! yeah I think my favorite was Elder Hollands- He's pretty close to my favorite Aposotle now after being out here and seeing all his talks on missions. He can just talk with so much power and passion he inspires me every time. I wish I could become as powerful a speaker as he is. And yeah yesterday was quite sad being the last day our district would be together. But ah well it's exciting at the same time.

Alright well I'd better go! Thanks for the letters! I'll talk to you tomorrow morning!!!