i cant believe another week is gone (week 10)

wow, so i absolutely loved getting your letters today as always. i love hearing about the family. mom, please send me some pics of the family because i really want to see them. it seems like ella is turning out to be a really good tennis player. i just hope she doesn’t turn out like andre agassi…too much tennis made that guy a nut. that’s so great ella found a sport that she is great at and i am assuming she really loves it. ben…i freaking get the chills when i think about that kid driving. how the freak is that kid almost 16? mom, remember my drivers license experience in oakland? ha, ha, what a memory, we were the only white people in there with all of the gangsters throwing up gang signs ha, ha, so sketchy what the heck was i thinking going to oakland dmv ha, ha. i worry about ben in rugby too. i worry about all of you all of the time…it is really funny. like i never did worry in the past but right now i just like get scared thinking about ben in rugby and driving…i admit i’m a wuss. speaking of me being a wuss, you know how i am one of those people that whenever they hear about a sickness or disease they think they have it. well, i have that and it has gotten worse in guat. i’m perfectly heathly but i always think i am going to get a brain worm or some freaking flesh eating disease here…i’m ridiculous. its great to hear that the family is doing so well. no baptisms this week but i probably had my best work day of my mission thus far on saturday. i don’t know what got into my comp but he actually wanted to work really hard so that’s what we did. we didn’t rest. we taught 8 lessons and all of them were pilas. the spirit was really strong in all of them and my spanish…what the freak…i don’t know what i did but my spanish was flowing. i taught the majority of probably 5 of the 8 lessons we taught. i was just spitting spanish, asking inspired questions, and sharing scriptures that came to my head. it was just a really good day for working. i just want every day to be like saturday was. it was one of those days i can say i did everything i could and that i did my best…so that was great. another good story is we were eating at wilmer and catorinas house for dinner and when they gave us our food my soup had an iguana in it. i was like, “what the heck is going on here?” wilmer was cooking that night so he just went off into the forest behind his house and killed like 5 iguanas for dinner. ha, ha, what the heck! it was ok, i guess it tasted like chicken ha, ha. this week though, holy cow, it has been hot. they say the heat is just starting and i thought it was hot like 2 weeks ago but that was nothing compared to yesterday and the previous days this week. it is smoking right now. i just sweat sitting down, i sweat with a fan, i sweat when i sleep, and its just weird its so hot. its not bothering me that much though surprisingly, the lord must be helping me with that. but the people say that in 1 month its going to be even more hot. i’m going to be honest, i don’t know if that is possible. really, i dont know, i thought that this earth is supposed to have goldilocks conditions where the temperature of the earth can support life. if it gets any hotter then it was yesterday i might die…really, i might die. we go through a 5 gallon water jug like every 2 days and its costing me a fortune in pure water ha, ha. today for p day we went to these caves in the mountains. it was pretty sketchy and i couldn’t help but think that the cave was going to cave in on us…ha, ha, i’m such a wuss. but it was really fun and the cave was super cool. it reminded me of the time we went up to the caves by the cabin. i think we did that…i don’t know maybe that was a dream. oh, speaking of dreams, i had a dream last night that i was in san fran with you guys and we wanted to go to cheeseboard but ben was like noonoo i don’t want to. ha, ha, then mom you were saying, “i have been to the best restaurants in the world and cheeseboard is better” ha, ha, so funny and so random. but i was a little sad because the dream ended before i could go to cheeseboard. that’s about all i can think of right now that happened this week. i love you all and miss you all. mom, mothers day is only 2 months away…can you believe that? i will be talking to you in no time. love you all and miss you and remember to pray always…the lord hears and will answer all of your prayers.

love, elder call

got this jersey at a paca for 2 dollars perfect condition frank gore jersey…ha, ha.

elder robinson and elder vestel the zl with me in the caves this morning

elder robinson and elder vestel the zl with me in the caves this morning

my second baptism here in guat (Week 9)

wow, i loved getting your emails today they were so good. life seems good back home in alamo california...i’m not going to lie...75 degrees, hikes, bike rides, man i dream of doing stuff like that here. i really loved yours emails today. they really were incredible and keep me so motivated to do the work here knowing i have all that support back home. the weather here is starting to get a little brutal. everyday this week it has been about 100 degrees and in a couple weeks its going to be 110 and above everyday. no wonder the lamanites were dark skinned…ha, ha, that makes no sense because the nephites were white. ..ha, ha. i can’t believe brady is gone on his mission that is crazy. i thought he just got his call and was having to wait forever to leave. i have no idea how i have been out here for 4 months already. i feel like i have been here for a couple of weeks at the most. the days just fly by like none other. i swear i get up, study, go to lunch, teach and then the day is over. it feels like the days have 12 hours not 24. this week the district leader came to our area to do interviews for the baptism we had saturday so i went to san bonito, another area, with elder laourtizen who has the same amount of time here in guat as me. that was an absolute blast. our spanish was great though. i felt like that day i was fluent. i taught perfectly in spanish and contacted 3 people in like 45 minutes and gave out 3 BOMs. super fun day because elder laourtizen is super motivated and just wants to work like me. so it was super fun just being able to retire for the night knowing i did everything i could do to change peoples lives that day. i don’t know how i am going to do it with my comp but i want to get him motivated so we can work all day everyday. the highlight of this passed week was definitely the baptisms we had saturday. wilmer and catolina are awesome and just the best. i baptized catolina. so it was the first time i had actualy baptized someone ever. super cool and i couldn’t have imagined it to be better. i was a little nervous but the spirit was just so strong and the smile she had on her face when she came up out of the water is something i will cherish for all of eternity…that was just incredible. the next day i confirmed her a member of the church and conferred the holy ghost to her. i really didn’t know what i was doing. i mean i kind of prepared something to say in the blessing but the spirit took over and i really can’t even remember what i said but elder ortega said i had perfect spanish. wow, the gift of tongues, how crazy is that? i don’t even know what i said but it was good and it was good spanish…so sweet, ha, ha. that was such a good experience. i hope so bad and i pray that they will remain strong in the church and that they will go and be sealed in the temple for all eternity in 1 year. if i am in the capitol i will be able to go be with them when they do it. oh, and sorry if my english is bad, i think in spanish 24/7 so i don’t really know english or spanish right now ha, ha. my comp says i talk in my sleep in spanish so that makes me happy to know that i am practicing spanish even in my sleep…ha, ha. there is a fair in my area, san jose, right now so there are like a million people in this small little town. i want to go and do some contacting but ill have to see what my comp says…i can’t wait until i am senior comp. all is well out here in peten guat i’m loving every minute of it. pray that i will find more people to teach and please pray for my spanish ha, ha, ha. love you guys and miss you!

elder call

with one of the new assistants to the pres. he’s a super cool guy and we did divisions with him last week. we got along really well and taught some really good lessons

wilmer and catorina right before they got baptized. i don’t really realize how much bigger i am until i look at the picture ha, ha…i look huge…love these guys and hopefully their son is going to get baptized next week.

another funny thing i meant to mention is when you ask people "como esta" they tell you exactly what they are doing…it is so funny. like, "como esta" and they’ll reply, oh just washing the dishes. oh really, i didn’t know that ha, ha or they well say pues aqui which means “well here” and i just think, oh really, well next time i wont ask you because i already know what you are going to say ha, ha, ha. this is just something i think is super funny.

First week of my second change (week 8)

once again, i love getting your letters, they are the best. both of them were so funny i just laughed the entire time reading them. dad, what you said about kev crushing molly on the court is hilarious because i just picture the same thing…so funny, that kid is hilarious. that sounds like a total blast going to that tennis tourney. about our crazy family day trips those were the best…i love doing those things. to be completely honest, apart from the family of course, i probably miss san fran the most. i don’t get it, like why do i like a city so much…it doesn’t make any sense, but i love that city...that is my hood. seriously, sf is one of the best cities in the world and i miss it so much. so last week i said that this change was probably going to be hard because of my new comp…this change will be hard i think but not as hard as i thought last week. ortega and bonilla didn’t really like each other that much so i think ortega was really lazy to make bonilla mad. i love bonilla and he is my dad but his social skills were a little bit off. he loved giving "sincho" which is like getting after people for doing something wrong like breaking a rule or something. yea, so bonilla loved giving sincho. i realized he was just trying to do what was right so it was never that big of a deal for me. ortega though didn’t like it at all and that’s why i think they didn’t get along that well. so this last week was good but a little slower then the ones in the past because my comp is a bit lazy and it takes a while to get out the door. but it was a good week and a lot better then what i expected. we did work and we did teach but i still would like to do more work. the highlight of the week was confirming the fecha with a family for baptism. they are getting baptized next week and their wedding was last night. it so cool that we invited them to follow the commandments so they got married and next week they will get baptized. i just think it is so cool that they probably would have never heard the gospel if it wasn’t for us missionaries being here at this time. i absolutely love this family and they are the best. i have some pics that i will send you. they are the best and are so happy and they just make do with nothing because they are dirt poor. they are literally dirt poor and their house is the size of mom and dad’s bathroom. they just have a bed, some clothes, and that’s it. they love planting flowers though so they have pretty flowers all over their property. what’s incredible is that they barely have enough money to survive but they love life and are so happy. it just reminds me of that quote in my farewell how money doesn’t correlate to happiness. its so true because most of the people here are so happy and cheerful but live off of nothing. yea, so the fecha and the wedding last night was the highlight of my week for sure. today was really fun though too. we play soccer ever monday in santa elena which is a 45 minute bus ride from our area. we meet up with other missionaries and play soccer. today though was not that competitive because sister missionaries were playing with us too. i didn’t have that much fun so i left early with another missionary on splits. he and i explored santa elena. its not a giant city but its pretty big. we did what i like to do best…just explore and wander just like i like to do in the city. we ended up at some sketchy market with a bunch of counterfeit cool things. then we met up with the rest of the missionaries at pizza hut where we always have lunch. we walked around for like 3 hours exploring and it was the best. my comp doesn’t like to do that so it was cool i could go with another missionary. really fun day but its like a 100 degrees again today. i don’t know if i told you this already or not but the only grocery store is here in santa elena so we have to come here for p days every week pretty much which is cool. it’s a 45 minute bus ride to get here. its actually a van not really a bus and they load like 28 people in it…well 28 is the record…but usually there’s about 24 people in the van so that’s always fun. we also have to come here on wednesdays for district meeting in santa elena so we come here twice a week. in our area we only have tiendas which are like little shacks where they sell drinks, chips, beans, and eggs but thats about it. i’ve started running with my comp in the morning everyday which is a lot of fun. we ran every day this past week starting on tuesday. my goal is to drop another 25 pounds to get down to like 200 and my comp wants to drop 18 this change. we have 6 weeks to do it and it is definitely possible. my goal is just a little bit more than mom's 2 pounds weight loss goal ha, ha. yea, but i am loving it here as always and its the freaking best. this week i’ve really had a better understanding of spanish. i am starting to be able to somewhat understand what the people are saying to me when i talk with them. i can talk fine but its my understanding that is hard for me. i can understand gringos but natives are really hard especially if they talk in vos. i don’t know if they have vos in mexico dad, but its like another form of the tu verb. they take the verb tener for example and they just take off the “r” and add an “s” so it’s tenes. for the command form they take of the “s” so its just tene. it’s different than what i’m used to, and luckily not everybody uses it, but its just something i need to get used to. i’m not supposed to use it though because i am supposed to always use ud but sometimes i use tu when talking to kids to practice. i don’t use vos though because i want to learn ud and tu before i use vos. yea, that’s my spanish and my life out here in san jose peten guat and i’m loving every minute of it. i love you guys and miss you.

elder call

hermano wilmer and i and his youngest son carlitos

this is the whole family 2 kids one 12 the other 6

this is a pic after they had been married wilmer and catorina

another incredbile pic of me jumping over looking the lake. im a huge fan of this pic haha

down at the lake

holy freak i forgot to tell you a story we were eating lunch at wilmer and catolinas house and they had these little chillies. wilmer told me they were not spicy so i ate one. it was spicy really spicy but i could handle it i could handle spice pretty good. bonilla ate one and was crying so ate no more and ortega ate like 3. i was like oh ya thats really good. wilmer kept on telling me to eat more so i did. my moutuh was on fire. i ate 5 with the food and it was hot. after the food wilmer was like have another and i was like freak alright if bonilla and ortega did. so we all at one more. bonilla cired haha and ortega was crying to but i was doing ok. i decided to show the who the alpha male was haha and eat like 6 more. i had 6 in my mouth and were chewing them. terrible decision absolutly terrible. i haven{t been int hat much pain since nam. i was dying crying weezing i was making a fool out of myself haha. it was reallyfunny though and they were all dying. the pain in my mouth lasted another 30 mins but the fire in my stomach lasted teh entire day. learned my lesson haha don{t try to show off by eating a lot of chillies.

here is a picture of me right in the middle of all my pain hahaha good times

an incredible sunset with just the top of my head that is visible

My First Change in Guat...Week 7

wow, let me start by saying dad your letter was so funny...i haven’t laughed that hard since vietnam. the thing about kev ha, ha so funny...tennis and then you were like, “yea i’m raw at tennis too if molly is the bar”…ha, ha, ha. i’m still dying laughing ha, ha, ha…i can’t even believe how funny that is. oh, and the part about mom ha, ha, ha that’s so funny 2 pounds…then you were like i lost 2 pounds fasting yesterday…so funny. i have lost 20 pounds since getting to guat. my pants don´t stay on with my belt so i had to make new holes in the belt. i have lost 20 and the heat hasn’t even kicked into full gear here yet. elder sommers, an elder in my zone who was born in my area, lost 50 pounds in 3 months here in san jose. if i lost 50 pounds i would have a 6 pack ha, ha. wow, so news about me, i just finished my first change here in guat. elder bonilla, my trainer, is leaving and elder ortega my other comp is going to finish training me because he just finished his training. wow, so how do i feel about that? mixed feelings…elder ortega is a lot more fun and outgoing but elder bonilla all he does is work. to be honest i wish bonilla was staying but there is nothing i can do. let me say this next change is going to be really, really hard for me. i love elder ortega but he, well, just doesn´t like to work. he likes staying and talking at members houses. oh, and ortega doesn’t know a lick of english so i will have to communicate in espanol which will be really hard but really good for me. i’m just worried about the work. i want to work from sun up until 930 at night. i don’t want to make elder ortega mad when i tell him lets leave the members house and go out and teach. its going to be a really hard balance that i am going to have to find. not to mention, i am going to have to do most of the teaching probably too…ha, ha wow, this next change is going to be really interesting. as long as i can say i did my best i’ll be happy. that is what’s new with the companionship and we might get another companion also. there are a lot of tri comps because there are just an absolute ton of missionarys in the mission right now since we’re preparing for the mission to be split. this week with our investigators was good. we are having a couple get married this sunday so we can baptize them…this family is just the best by the way. i will try to get a picture for you guys. but our fecha for this saturday isn’t going to happen because 2 days in a row we saw our investigator at the bar, right in front of our house, slamming down beers. i mean, have some respect, there are hundreds of bars and you have to go to the one that is right in front of our house…ha, ha…i mean, we can see him from our window…we can hear him laugh too…it’s like torture…ha, ha…so we need to figure out the best way to talk to him about drinking and to see if he actually wants to get baptized. his name is hugo and its the guy that has been taking the lessons for 12 years so obviously he knows drinking is not good. i will let you know what happens with that. but all i can do right now is pray for him. not counting him, we have 4 people scheduled to get baptized this month. i just want to work, work, and work so i really hope ortega wants to do the same. this past week though has been weird weather wise. the beginning of the week was super hot like usual then the last 3 nights i have been cold all night…like in my bed shivering cold. i don’t get it, it was actually really cold at night. during the day it was like 70 then at night who knows what the temp was but it was cold…probably because it was cloudy but who knows for sure. this month is when it is supposed to just get really, really, hot. something else interesting happened on sunday. estabamos caminando a la iglesia domingo cuando yo vi mi primero persona muerto. el hombre estaba tirado in la calle y eschuchamos que lo mataron con un machete...que miedoso. estoy ecribiendo in espanol entonces ella no puede entender. no quero que ella se preocupe para mi…yea but i am loving the mission. it is so fun and i love teaching so much as well. that is pretty much all the news i have for this week. oh, and mom, i just read your whole letter about dave so sad…ha, ha, i love that cat and i want to cry but for some reason i think i'll be fine ha, ha …love you guys and hope all is well in alamo. 

 i just wanted to send it again just because it is so cool and i have nothing else to send this week. i mean look at zarahemla in the background ha, ha, ha.

pic 2. elder sommers and i. he is the one that was born in san jose. born, in case you didn´t know, is the first area of your mission. yea he is the man though and is from kansas. kansas…what the heck, he says his stake is half of all of kansas…ha, ha. he played football too…full back and middle linebacker. he came into the mission like 250 and weighs 205 right now. he is in san andreas which is the area right next to mine and we are in the same branch for church.

me with one of the members parrots ha, ha