Bautismo!

Hey Mom and Dad,

Haha I´m glad it sounds like you´ve had another great week. And yeah that´s interesting there´s a volcano exploding because I haven´t heard anything about it, lol. And yeah sounds like you´ve been having great weather, lol. I´ll never forget the days of football when we´d get terrible rainy weather but Nyquist would always tell us that it´s “bulldog weather.” But that´s sweet that Queen street was flooded. Must´ve been like here when the streets flood. I bet the kids must´ve had a fun time.

But anyways, I got a package from the youth of Oak Creek ward today that was fun to see. Letters from everyone. It´s sad I think I know less and less of the Youth now. It was fun Tad wrote me asking if I remembered the days when I gave him rides to school from Seminary, he said those were the “good ól days” lol. Also looks like Sister Dunmire Beer put in a disk with “mensajes mormones” that looks way good. One of them I´m way excited about entitled “completely alone” taken from the talk of Elder Holland about Christ. It should be way good to use in lessons. Just little spiritual thoughts to help us remember what´s important.

Oh and I got a letter from Amanda Ostler today telling me that she got her mission call! Though wait, I think she mentioned she called you to tell you, which would mean you already knew, and didn´t tell me! Lol j-k I´m not sure if she said she did or didn´t. But that´s way cool that she´s going to Chicago. Crazy how life goes. She´ll be a great missionary.
But anyways, well this week has definitely been a crazy one. The first good thing was that we had a baptism for two youth on Saturday that was way good. The mom is a member but has been less active but recently is coming back. It´s an awesome family of just the mom with her 4 boys. The youngest is about 6 and way hyperactive, lol. The oldest is 15. The two who were baptized were the two middle children of 11 and 13 years. So yeah hopefully soon the oldest, Byron will be able to feel the need to be baptized. We´re going to head over tonight with some Dinosaur cookies and we´ll watch a movie for a Family Home Evening to celebrate the baptism :). Here are some pictures of the family. They´re all fun kids.

But anyways, oh and just so you know this was the last week of the change, thus the entire week we were having Changes in the Zone. After my experiences of my last 3 changes starting on Monday night I started to feel nervous, lol. Anytime the phone rang my heart jumped thinking it might be the assistants to tell me I´m going to be changed, lol. And the worst part is most of the time it was the assistants with changes for different elders in the zone so I would talk to them. I couldn´t sleep easy until finally last night the last of the changes were made and I now have the security of knowing that I will be staying in Quevedo for at least 6 more weeks and I´ll still be with Elder Barrientos, “phew!” But there were quite a few changes made in our zone. Over 10 Elders were moved, including all three of the district leaders. But ah well it was probably for the best. We already got a new Elder in our house, Elder Palmer from Utah. He´s stilly pretty fresh with just 6 months but last night we found out that he´s going to be District leader so that´s awesome. The only fault is that he´s a bigger soccer fan than football, lol. Oh boy and now that the World Cup in Soccer is going on it´s going to be crazy, lol. Have you heard about that, btw?
So yeah all is good I´m excited to have another 6 weeks here in Quevedo. There are so many people that we found last change that should be ready for baptism this change. Hopefully all goes well!!

Oh and before I forget, I think that´ll be fine to send a pair of my old shoes. In fact I remember Elder Sanchez received a package of new shoes and I don’t think it cost much at all. Though I was thinking maybe you could look to see if there´s another pair of good shoes, I remember the black ones were good but just a half size too small. If there aren´t any other good ones the black pair is fine but maybe you could check the size and see if there is any other pair just a little bigger. But yeah that´d be great if you could send and it doesn’t cost too much.

Ok well thanks for everything! I love you and hope you have another great week!

Love,
Elder David Frome

!!!FELIZ DIA DE ANIVERSARIO!!!

Hey Mom and Dad

¡¡¡¡FELÍZ DÍA DE ANIVERSARIO!!!!! (I´m actually not sure if that´s how you say Happy anniversary, but I´d imagine it´s something like that :). Wow 29 years that´s so awesome. One of my favorite visuals to use during lessons is our family photo that we took in front of the Provo temple. It´s great to testify of the principle that the gospel blesses families as well as families can be eternal. Now, I´ll get to tell everyone how many years the Frome family has existed.
That´s fun that the ward got to hear about the missionaries too. And wow yeah that´s way awesome the lines you shared from the hymn. Hymns can be so powerful I thought too often when we are singing we miss the message that they have. So that´s neat you shared that. And that sounds like it was a fun activity that some of the families did to live off of food storage for a week. That would be pretty intense. It´s kool in every house the missionaries stay in there is one big 72 hour kit for each companionship. They always look old and worn out, it´d be interesting to see what they have in them. But on top there is the strict statement saying that we can´t open them without the president´s permission, lol.

But anyways, I´m glad you got my cards. Hmm that stinks about the one card not working very well. Yeah I´m not sure if it´s the one that didn´t work before. I suppose it could be. It might be a good idea to just throw it away after. It´s not worth the frustration dealing with it. I do have a copy of all the pictures here on a disk so if it is broken I have the pictures here. That would be sad though. Oh and so here are some pictures that we´ve taken. Both me and Elder Barrientos have realized that we´ve really kind of been slacking in taking pictures up to this point in our mission so we´re trying to take more. Here are some that we´ve taken. Saturday night we had a surprise visit by a giant leafy looking grasshopper type insect, lol. It was funny apparently it came flying in and looked like a small green bat. So we had fun taking pictures of that. Also there´s a picture with the mamita Valencia and her family that gives us lunch every Sunday. She is an awesome sister, lol. She has been a mamita for the missionaries for like 15 or 20 years so she has so many stories and has known so many missionaries it´s amazing. Plus, she´s just hilarious, lol. I´m gonna try to send 7 photos all together so hopefully they go through. There´s one of me and Elder Barrientos in the Zone Conference when we´re both dressed in suits so you can see a photo of Elder Barrientos.

But anyways, oh and that´s fine no worries about being busy with the election. That´s neat that you´re doing so much for it. Here I think it´s about election time because every now and then we´ll see a parade of cars go by honking horns with signs of some candidate, lol. Oh and before I forget yeah I´m doing good on sleep. It´s funny almost each time the alarm goes off at 5:30 I´ll hear it, but then feel so tired that I say to myself “man it´s so early! I´m only getting up if Elder Barrientos gets up. . . “ then I glance at Elder Barrientos bed and he´ll still be fast asleep, lol. I guess he doesn´t even hear the alarm most of the time.

But alright, well as for news here all is doing good. Nothing too exciting has happen this week. Just working and finding as usual. We´re finding a lot of good people and yesterday we had some in church that we hadn´t had yet which was awesome. We´re teaching one young man named Stalin and his dad is completely against the church so I guess he kinda snuck out to go to church, lol. But he´s 19 so it´s ok. Also Azalia we are also teaching and her parents are Jehovas Witnesses so that´s even harder. But somehow both came to church so it was great.

I think the experience that really caught my attention happened last night. We were looking for a family that a member gave us as a reference and we found a beautiful family of 4. The father is a member but hasn´t gone in 8 years. He had an 11 year old son and 8 year old daughter that are both very smart. I realized how clever they were when we were teaching and the kind of answers they gave us. We were teaching the first principles of how God is our lovenly father and the blessings that we´ve received in our lives. I asked the common question of “what are some of the ways we can show our love for our Heavenly Father?” I use that question often and almost always hear similar answers like we can pray, read the scriptures, go to church, keep the commandments, etc. But this time the answer that the 11 year old gave caught my attention. It was amazing he heard the question, thought for a second, then told us “by just being a good person.” A simple answer yet to me profound. He went on by saying for example we can help other people. I think it was something that too often we forget. One of the best ways we can ashow Heavenly father we love him is in the class of person we are. How we live and act. It was a good reminder for me, especially strong because it was given by a 11 year old.

All right well I´d better get going. Thanks for the email! I hope you have another great week! Love you!

Love,
Elder David Frome

Hola de Ecuador

Hey Mom and Dad,
Thanks for your email! I´m glad it sounds like you´ve had a great week! That´s awesome to hear about the baptism for Elder Fuller and Lopez. And thanks I like to think that missionaries live and act in such a way to help lift the life of everyone that surrounds them on a daily basis.
But anyways, as for your questions Elder Sanchez goes home no less than 2 weeks (crazy!) and funny thing I´m not actually sure what the church did to extend his visa or how it worked exactly. Often the visas that we get last a month or so longer than the exact year or two year mark, like the censo I have now will keep me legal here until halfway through march of 2011, then I´m pretty sure your passport will keep you good till a month after the censo expires. So yeah maybe he just did that. It is funny, though, because his certificate from the church authorizing him as an official minister of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints expired so officially he´s no longer a minister, (oop Elder Barrientos just came over to show me something with the email page and got confused with one thing and then accidentally closed the whole internet and was like “oh fetch” in his calm low voice. I laughed and pushed him back to his computer, good thing I´m typing this letter on Microsoft Word first :)
And that´s great I´m glad you got the memory cards. Funny thing I sent it certified but then I forgot to give you the code to be able to track it on the internet. But ah well I figured just having it stamped certified would be the important part putting pressure that it would get delivered. I didn´t actually tell them they were memory cards in the package, also I´m glad it was delivered well enough. I guess the mission went over the top with sending heavy letters and spent way too much so now they´ve made a new rule that if you want to send mail, you have to find the post office in your area and send it through there so I think we´ll be using the correos of Ecuador more often now.
But anyways, well this week has been awesome. Firstly we had interviews with the President on Monday then on Tuesday we had Zone conference in Babahoyo! That was way awesome. It was fun because we had it in the same chapel that I assisted when I served there. It was kind of crazy too because before it started when we were all sitting down Elder Sanchez waved me over and asked me if I had ever conducted a zone conference before (which is funny to think now, because being it my first change as zone leader, of course I´d never conducted one before, though now that I think about it, I guess I had conducted one in the MTC before I left, lol). But yeah I told him no and he said well this´ll be my first time, lol. Then he gave me a paper with the program and told me what I needed to do to conduct the zone conference. Yeah kinda made my heart jump for a bit but it´s really pretty easy to conduct. I was a little nervous standing up to start and announce everything but after that it was fine. It was fun but at the same time I tried to be a bit more formal. In District meetings I´m usually way laid back conducting but I always noticed when the Zone leaders conduct zone conference it´s all very professional so that´s what I tried to do. So yeah that was fun to be able to welcome everyone to the zone conference and conduct. Then zone conference itself was way good, as always. One part that was neat was the presentation the Assistants gave, was in large part, in English. Elder Sanchez obviously knows English and Elder Aguirre (from Mexico) knows english fairly well and they must´ve prepared well. They spoke of the importance of the companionship and two being stronger than one. Elder Barrientos afterwards said he was lost. But it was good because the mission has been putting so much stress on the importance of studying english and they said that in the changes the mission will slowly progress until entire zone conferences will be given in English. They said that other missions with American mission presidents are already doing that. It´s pretty neat how much emphasis they´re putting on it. I think I already told you how the mission received a set of manuals for studying Spanish for all the latin missionaries. Elder Barrientos has been studying very well but not progressing as fast as he wanted so I guess he asked the President for permission to get up at 5:30 each morning to be able to study more. It was funny he didn´t tell me till we got back to the house and he told me that he asked permission and that president said yes, but asked if I knew what else President said. Realizing quickly what else he must´ve said I joked “and he said that your comp can sleep in as normal???” Elder Barrientos laughed and said “ah no Elder Frome, he said I can get up together with my companion.” Yeah I half joked asking why would President give such permission. But it´s all right. The first time we set the alarm for 5:30 I heard go it off but Elder Barrientos slept straight through it, so I decided just to sleep in, lol. But yeah now we´re getting up early to study. Yeah less sleep but eh, now I´m sure we´ll have more companionship unity at least.
But alright well I´d better get going. Thanks for the email! Love you!
Love,
Elder David Frome

FELIZ DIA DE LA MADRE!

Hey Mom and Dad,

Haha yeah it was great talking to you on the phone last night. Yeah when the phone rang Elder Barrientos answered and I looked and saw that it was the house phone I hoped it was Dad calling so you could at least understand a little of what he said, lol. And yeah when I got on the first few things I said were in Spanish like “hola! Cómo estás? Cómo le va?” so that´s probably why I sounded different at first. I think when one speaks a different language his entire voice sounds different. I remember with Elder Sanchez thinking what a contrast it was to be in a lesson speaking to each other in Spanish, then outside talking in English, it´s like two different voices. So yeah that could be why I didn´t sound the same (that and yeah changing from speaking Spanish full time to English is a little hard in the first few moments, so I suppose maybe I did have a little accent:).

But wow sorry that must´ve been way frustrating trying to get through. I was honestly a little worried about the area numbers I gave. Those are numbers we never use but just asked to people from here. Maybe next time it´ll just be better to give you the basic phone number of our cellular in the house and you can look up on the internet the area codes to get through. Gotta love the internet and everything you can find on there, lol.

But yeah that was fun talking to everyone. And fun to talk to Walker in Spanish. That´s neat how he served years ago but his Spanish still sounded way sharp.

But anyways, oh one thing I didn´t explain on the phone that Dad asked was about the USA currency that is used here. That was the first surprise I think when I got here was to find out the same $5.00 american bill from the states is worth the same here (of course you could say it´s almost worth more because it´ll get you farther here because everything is so cheap:). I guess originally Ecuador had the currency system of using “sucres.” But about 30 years ago or so they had a series of terrible presidents that practically robbed the country. I guess the economy was so terrible that they decided the only way to save it was switch over to the American dollar. I´m not sure what kind of deal they had to have made with the states to do it but about the year 2000 or 2001 the Ecuador government made the change of the national currency from sucres to American dollars and it actually did help. But it´s fun because all the bills are the exact same ones from the states, but along with American coins, Ecuador has made their own style of coins that equal the same amount of our one cent, five cents, ten cents, twenty five and fifty cent coins. But yeah to give you an idea of the cost difference a bottle of water that would cost a dollar in any corner store in the states here costs about 25 cents. You can eat a good conservative meal in a restaurant for about $2.00. so yeah it´s kool. The things that cost more here than they do in the states are all the imports like cameras or other technologies, products like peanut butter, Gatorade, things like that. So yeah, fun facts about Ecuador :)

And yeah it was fun to have Elder Sanchez and Aguirre (the other assistant, who I also know from Libertad because he was in the same zone when I started and is way kool also) over for the night. Yeah president and the assistants often come the night before so they don´t have to travel so far early in the morning the next day. The Assistants stay with us, and President and his wife (when she comes) find a hotel, I think, lol.

Alright well I think i´d better get going. Thanks for everything! It was great talking to you again! I hope you have a great week! Love you!!!

Love,

Elder David Frome

PS- oh and yeah jerky and peanut butter are like gold here in Ecuador, lol (it was funny this morning in the interviews the Assistants had brought pouch and Elder Pugh, an Elder from Utah in our zone, got a huge package with jerky, two huge jars of JIF peanut butter like we always bought and some other goodies. It was crazy to see, lol:).

Hola familia :)

Hey Mom and Dad,

Wow sounds like it´s been another good week. That sounds exciting that it was Women´s conference at BYU. Those sound like awesome talks from Elder Oaks and Sister Beck. That´s true they always seem like strong speakers. That must´ve been great to see family as well.
Things here are going good. But to answer your questions, the Quevedo Sur zone is actually one of the bigger zones in the mission. We have 8 companionships, 16 missionaries. 6 companionships are inside the city limits then there is one companionship 30 minutes away then another companionship that is an hour and a half away that technically isn´t part of this stake, but is part of this zone. So yeah it´s fun coordinating everything. And as for the war against Cockroaches, we are doing much better. It´s nice Elder Barrientos is very much a fan of cleaning and keeping the house clean so that´s helped a lot. There´s still a few cockroaches we´ll see every now and then, mostly in the garbage or things like that, but definitely a much more tolerable level. We are thinking about moving into a better apartment actually because a family in our ward just moved to Guayaquil and the apartment they stayed in is a good price and sounds much better. Hopefully we´re able to talk with them to see.

But anyways, so this week has been great. I think we´re starting to see some fruits of our labors. But first we had an awesome experience on Tuesday. I don´t think I´ve mentioned much before but the first or second week of every change the mission has what´s called “consejo” (council?) of all the zone leaders in the mission. It´s way neat because all the zone leaders come together with the assistants and the president and it´s like a special training session adapted to the needs of the mission. I´ve heard of the things they teach once or twice and always thought it sounded way awesome. We had it on Tuesday. So yeah with Elder Barrientos we got up early and put on our suits to get to Guayaquil by 9:00am and it was neat as soon as we entered we found all the first rows of the chapel arranged in a semi-circle to make it a little more personal. It felt a lot like Zone conference only less people. First Elder Sanchez gave some special announcements for us as zone leaders or rules to be emphasized that the mission has had problems with (for example one announcement was a reminder that confidential information needs to be kept confidential between the leaders of the mission. Apparently the mission had troubles with that). Then President Gamboa did a little activity to see how our memorization was with The Maestro. I got a little nervous but luckily he didn´t call on me. Though it wasn´t as hard as I thought it would be. He just called two companionships and had them do a basic contact and had one be an investigator to ask questions and the other had to answer with scriptures. It actually looked like fun. The themes that were emphasized was a lot about working with the members and bringing investigators to church. One thing that President Gamboa said really caught my attention. We talked about how more than anything the attitude of the missionaries when they come into a sector can make a big impression. There´s nothing worse than to meet a couple of arrogant missionaries that think they know everything, lol. President Gamboa said that when we step into the home of any member we need to remember and keep the attitude that we are “standing on sacred ground,” the home of a family. It reminded me how special a thing it really is, the home. We should show the utmost respect at all times and truly be representatives of the Lord. It was way good training. We learned a ton of good things to put into practice. Then, one of the best parts, when it was over we all went and had KFC chicken lunch that the mission bought for everyone, yeah definitely a good way to end the consejo.

Alright well I´m afraid I´m out of time so I´d better go. Thanks for your email and the package! I got it today! It´s great! I´m excited for the jerky and the cream should help a lot!
Love you! Chao!

Love,
Elder David Frome

PS- I attached a few pictures that we took while doing service in the house of some members. they live by a huge hill and there was a ton of mud and dirt stacked up we had to take out, fun stuff. J