August 21, 2017

hey momma, i have like 18 journals, i am probably not going to use them all. The fence lady was indeed a member, an active member too, which is hard to find. I mostly just knew, pretty much all my spanish is the gift of tongues, but i remember the stuff i learn really good, this week i said soldering gun in spanish and afterwards i was like "how the heck do i know the word for soldering gun". Gustavo goes to church with his wife and his family. the branches are still just dying slowly. this week we talked to our ward mission leader, and he said the work isnt progressing so he feels...lazy? (desesperado) and so he doesnt do anything. and hes right, we have 0 investigators that are progressing, and it sucks, but we still work freaking hard every day, without the help of the ward mission leader. My singing partner? whats that? I do pushups and abs and i starting doing jumping jacks, maybe if i do more cardio ill stop getting fat. budgeting is good, i am saving money good, i have like 1000 pesos saved. Elder pacheco leaves Friday. Its still hot around here, not much has been going on, walking a lot, working hard, not that much noteworthy stuff happened. We did a district activity and me and elder pacheco made a big book of mormon which was rad. We are teaching a family of 7 which is rad, but the freaking parents arent married. they dont get married because of the commitment. you have 5 children from the age of 16 to 8. thats not a commitment or anything. freaking dangit. But other than that they have a lot of potential, they used to be TJs but then they realized those dudes are crazy and right now they arent going to a church. There dog got hit by a car so we were praying for it, and told them if they had faith God could save it if it was his will,k but then their dog died. She told us the same thing happened with her baby, she didnt have enough faith and thats why it died. next visit we are going to teach the plan of salvation and it will be awesome. The rama manzanillo has been helping us out a bit by having FHEs with less actives that we are trying to activate. It is wild here to see people so strong in the church with families and everything that fall into drugs and it just ruins their lives. We have this one guy who wants us to help all his addict friends, but he is an addict and doesnt want our help, and doesnt really want to return to church, which is sad. We also had an FHE for rama brisas but we were at a baptism so we showed up late and ate the food, and after the food they were going to clean the church, but we had to leave to get home on time because the church is like an hour away. I felt like a bum but it was whatever. you should ask Cary why im getting fat, i walk a ton so i get hungry, but im not burning that many calories, im going to start eating less tortillas,and i got steel cut oats and tuna to eat for breakfast and dinner, so hopefully i can get swole.

August 14, 2017

Pday was good, we cleaned our house really good and rearranged our kitchen, we stole a table from the church, which i kind of bad about, but i feel less bad because now i dont have to prepare my food on an ironing board anymore. but now our kitchen is way nice because we have a table and rearranged everything. Did i already tell you we hang a lot of our food from a clothes line we strung in our kitchen, that way the ants dont eat all our food. its manzanillo, not manzanilla, manzanilla is spanish for chamomile, silly head. Teaching is good, we are still working like slaves. We taught this guy named Gustavo, he has been going to church for 3 years with his wife but hes atheist, he tried to out science me, but i spent a lot of time arguing with ****** about religion, so i smoked that dude in all the science points he tried to bring up, i think he was really impressed that we arent just dumb kids who are only out here because of family pressure, but he realized we actually know stuff. That was probaly my favorite lesson of my mission so far honestly. But hopefully we can teach him some more about faith and get him baptized, he says the church is perfect, the only flaw he has been able to find is that everything is based on faith, and there is no way you can no for certain, we taught him that thats kinda the point, but he is still skeptical, which is whatever. I sewed my pants to make them bigger this week because im getting fat, i was pretty impressed with myself that i figured out how to sew my pants, but pretty not impressed with myself that im getting fat. Ha, funny story, so sunday, we left our house and were walking down the street to catch the bus to church, and the guy walking in front of us was smoking weed, which isnt anything out of the ordinary, and then i look up the street and see two army trucks full of dudes with rifles, also not anything out of the ordinary, but then the trucks stop and they all jump out super fast mode and take down the dude who was smoking weed, and we are all of a sudden surrounded by like 10 people with assault rifles. And they start patting this guy down, and IDing us, but i left my ID in the house, which is the first time ive left my id in the house my whole mission, so the dude is yelling at me, and im apologizing for not having my id. but they didnt kill us and everything was fine, definitely woke me up though. On monday we climbed cerro del toro, a really big mountain here in manzanillo, we went with some members and they said it takes 2 hours, it took us like 6 hours. It was super fun though, we didnt take water and i was super thirsty, so we drank out of this little muddy stream, they told me it was safe because its running water, which i am 100% true thats not scientifically proven, but i drank it and didnt die yet. I also caught a snake which was cool, everyone was impressed with my manliness, im pretty much bear grizz out here (thats the guy from survivorman right?) I also climbed a vine, they tried to teach me how to tell the difference between a vine that is solid and you can climb, and vines that will fall when you pull them, i couldnt really tell the difference, but the people here know how, which is cool. On tuesday we went on divisions to Barra de Navidad, there arent members there so we had to make our own food, and they had fish that some guy gave them, but they didnt know how to clean them, so i taught them how to clean fish and i cleaned like 20 little fishes and then we ate them and they were delicious, i still dont really love to eat the eyeballs, but i do it because mexico. Also, we were teaching a lesson in a little pueblito in our area and we saw a chicken freaking out, and we didnt know why, so we look and theres a scorpion, and then the scorpion stung the chicken and the chicken died,i didnt know scorpions were that dangerous, and then we went to build a fence for this lady, which was really fun, but we had to clear out the brush with machetes because it was really thick, and they told us to watch out for scorpions and i was careful because i didnt want to die like that chicken. And the ground was straight rock so to make holes for the fenceposts we had to pound through with a bar just chipping away little by little, and it was a lot of work but it was fun, i love doing service, especially manual labor stuff, i which we had more opportunities. We also did some painting this week which was fun. Hey, so this week i have been working out really hard so that i stop getting fat, but it is hard to motivate myself, so i was thinking for christmas you could send me an ipod stocked up with music, we can listen to disney music and instrumental, so just get instrumental remixes of pump up songs, like piano guys and pentatonix and stuff, the rules are pretty loose on music, but i want it for the purpose of working out, so think pump up,if you could put skye and baylee and andrew in charge of that that would be great, and an aux cord so i can plug it in to my speaker. I know its only august, but you have time to stock music, and send it so it gets here before christmas, and if you could also send me a nice mission belt that would be nice, one that the wet and sweat wont make the paint stain my shirt, but one thats not crappy synthetic because those get destroyed out here in like 5 minutes. Also, i already said i have been stupid tired all the time, but i think i am going to buy some vitamins, if you could study what vitamins are good and then i will buy them here that would be great, but not iron, that helped you but it wont help me. Ask cary maybe or something, idk, but i would love to here about the vitamins next week. thanks a ton, i love you.

August 7, 2017

hey i dont really have any time to write this week because dumb, but ill write double good next week, i pinky promise. this week was good. everything is fine here. i love you guys

July 31, 2017

We ate some shrimp fettucini this week which was pretty delicious. We also ate crab and shrimp soup, but like the little crabs that run around on the rocks, and they just throw them in the soup whole, and they dont take the skin off the shrimp so you just eat it whole and it scratches your throat, but it tastes good. Not much happened this week, speaking spanish is like taking a dump right about now, i dont even have to think about it, it just flows. which is neat as far as the language goes, less neat for my digestive system we found a girl this week, shes like 25 and has 3 kids, and before she got all the lessons and she loves the church, but she couldnt get baptized because she was living in union libre and her boyfriend didnt want to get married. but now her boyfriend left so she can super get baptized, and so can her son, so we are teaching them and its really neat. And her son that is 9 prayed that the light bill and the water bill dont come in too expensive, and that he could be smarter and finish his homework fast so that he could help his mom, and he prayed that his mom could sleep good and that shes not too tired, and it pretty much just melted my corazoncito. We also saw fireflies and it was way super cool. Oh ya, also, we made friends with the kids on the street this week so that was fun, we were going to go visit a lady but we were walking and saw her and walked her home and talked and she was coming from the beach and was in her swimsuit and was all wet, so we left so she could shower and stuff, so then it was like 8:45 and we didnt have any plans, and the kids on the street started talking to us asking us if we have trash because they are poor and gather trash to sell the cans and bottles and whatever we have. So they asked us for our trash and then we were chillin and they were telling us all their nicknames, and my nickname is juevos, because i have an accent and they think its funny when i say juevos, not sure why, and they had trompos so we played trompos for a minute, but then it was almost 9:00 so we had to go inside and so we go in and we always leave the door open, and we are taking our clothes off and were standing there in our underwear and we hear a scream and the next thing we know there are like 11 kids in our house, and mission rules say not even the bishop is allowed in our house, so we started beating them up and they left, and they grabbed our trompos off the table and start playing with out trompos. that was noteworthy. But now were homies with all the kids on the block.

July 24, 2017

My interview was good, we just talked, He says hi. he asked me what i would change about the mission and i told him i want to play soccer. they just came out with another slew of rules, I feel like im being suffocated by rules. I feel like a good missionary will be a good missionary regardless of all the rules, and if you put more rules on disobedient missionaries they will just be more disobedient because there are just more rules to break. Its kinda frustrating. We cant play sports, we cant play card games, we cant do pretty much anything. Its fine, Im still being obedient, but every month when the leaders meat with president he sends out 20 more rules, if we keep it up im going to have to ask permission to breath. If you send pants send 32 and i cant tighten them with a belt id say. maybe 31 or something. Most fun was idk, just working is fun. Best experience? we got a less active to come to church. she wants to go on a mission but her mom wont let her, so she got discouraged and stopped coming to church, but we got her coming back to church andf hopefully we can get her on a mission. My week was pretty good, not very much happened this week so my email is going to be pretty lame. Transfers were yesterday and Elder Pacheco and I stay the same so thats neat. Elder Rodriguez our zone leader finished his mission friday so his companion was with us for the weekend so that was fun. There is a dude next to me in the ciber right now who is crazy drugged out and he is singing really loud and crying and speaking gibberish and dancing in his seat. He isnt really saying real words but the noises hes making rhyme so i guess he is alright as a rapper. Its kinda freaking me out though. We had a FHE with a family this week and played perudo and i won so its whatever. We walk a lot and meet with tons of less actives. We are updating all the binders so that pretty much just means we walk around looking for addresses that half the time dont exist. The numbers on the houses here have no logic to them, its like 208, 210, 212, 1400, 7, 8, 214,1401. It is really frustrating sometimes. We watched a dog get hit by a car from like 3 feet away, that was pretty not cool. President didnt ask about my neck so we didnt get in trouble, so that was neat. I had a big rugburn from wrestling with the zone leaders. Hermana Clayton asked what happened and i said "funny story actually" and she asked what happened and i froze and in english (elder pacheco doesnt speak english) elder pacheco says "its fine" and for some weird reason Hermana Clayton took that at face value and moved on, so that was neat. Ummm, President thinks I am really quiet, which is weird because I´m never quiet. 

July 17, 2017

Hey momma, things are pretty wild around here, I am still in mexico selling dictionaries, sales were up this week. One day we got to the house of the person that was supposed to feed us, but she forgot and was in colima, so we were walking and all of a sudden a member is shouting elders! and so we go talk to her and she invites us in to eat because mexicans are super cool like that. It was way awesome because the only thing more enjoyable than walking up hills in this heat is walking up hills in this heat on an empty stomach, but luckily we didnt have to do that because the Lord has our back. it was reall neat. Ya, so thursday we were walking around doing missionary stuff and we get a call that they needed me to go to the mission offices in guadalajara which is (on a good day) 5 hours away. But we had to go to Autlan which is 4 hours away first because we had to do a baptismal interview, so we went to autlan and left autlan for guadalajara at a little before 5, which is supposed to be a 4 hour trip, but there was an accident and we didnt get to guadalajara until like 1 in the morning. So that was pretty much way to long on a bus. After that, we went to the offices and i got to see some people i know, and sined a paper so i dont get deported, and i saw elder Koyle, my companion from the CCM, so that was neat. then we went home friday afternoon. Then saturday we helped an inactive member wash windows in her fonda and it was fun because she was listening to english music and i was singing it and they thought it was really funny. Then saturday we had to go to Barra de navidad to sleep so that we could get to autlan for chruch on sunday, because the elder that does the interview has to be at the baptism, so we got up super early to get to autlan. Autlan is in the middle of everything and close to nothing (thats a saying in spanish) its basically a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere, but we get there and theres a member and she asks where im from, so i tell her the united states, she says where, i say nevada, she says what part, i say north, she says reno, i say around there, she says what town, i say fallon, so her husband opens his phone and he was texting chip rutledge, like what the heck. This dude apparently was 3rd counselor to hoyt skabelund and is good friends with mister rutledge, and they live in tijuanita the trailer park on the reno highway. How crazy is that? Then on the we home from autlan to Barra it was cool because autlan is super high altitude, and we were up above the clouds and you could see the clouds down in all the valleys which was way cool, but then we entered the clouds and couldnt see anything, and quite conveniently, our bus broke down on the side of the mountain. So today we spent half of our pday on a bus coming home because last night we stayed in Barra de Navidad because we didnt have time to get home on time, so this week was mostly traveling and madness, but it was fun. My clothes are getting pretty thrashed, i sweat so much my pants are always soaked, and the sweat gathers at my knees, not sure why, but the it dries and the salt on my knees gets crunchy, its great, and i sweat through my belt so my belt is soaked and then the dye from my belt stains my shirts. Our branches are...ya, in the last year assistence has dropped more than 60 percent, so we spend a lot of time visiting non members, which is frustrating. Everyone has so many problems and i just want to help them all but i just cant, and somehow they think stopping to go to church is going to help, and they all want to go to church but the just cant for some reason or another and its so frustrating. The members are semi helpful, but the references they give us are all less actives. My favorite family is probably the family of the girl we baptized, Clavel. We have interviews with president tomorrow so ill let you know how that goes. Have a good week. I love you.

July 10, 2017

I can get just about any food you can get in teh states, but not sour cream, that doesnt exist here, i am a little weary of cooking meat, but ive done it, i just waqnt recipes that dont require lots of seasonings and spices becasue i dont have much of that and its expensive. Meat and fresh produce is really cheap here. I killed my pet parasites and am feeling better now. Just be patient, or something, tell fabiola and rhett that would be awesome. Fish eyes arent that great, the brains taste fine though. My allergies are fine, but i fell down a hill one day and my allergies were acting up. my feet havent stopped hurting for 6 months, but thats life. Tell dad he needs to move more. does he still play basketball? Miracle this week was getting a ton of new people to teach, i am excited. Our area is ginormous so that makes it hard to go see everyone, from one side to the other is about an hour or more direct. It is so hard to cover it all. I am doing good, probly safety is definitely the best prayer topic haha. Your week sounds way rad? On sunday we fasted and then this week we had more new investigators at put more baptismal dates then we did in the whole month of may and june combined (may doesnt really count because we didnt do anything last transfer) I think i am going to stqart fasting every day because it works like magic.  I bought a hammock and made arroz con leche and sit in my hammock and i feel super mexican, i Kinda love mexico. I am not sure if im getting more mature or less patient, but when people email me and tell me about their first world problems they just sound like children and i am half amused half irritated. People have no idea what its like to have problems in their lives, america is like a freaking bubble. Also, in spanish they say "vete a la goma" which means go to hell, but more mild, people say it all the time, but elder pacheco alays tells me "go to hell man" in english when i mess with him, and it sounds a lot harsher in english so i think its so funny. Another saying here is amor apache, which means apache love, which means the more he hits me the more he loves me. So this week we had probably the worst lesson of my whole mission, talking to a less active, her husband is active. us "why did you get baptized" 

her"i have no idea honestly"

us"did you read the book of mormon"

her "nope"

us "why did you let the missionaries in"

Her "my husband brought them"

us "why do you love your husband"

her "i dont"

us "why did you get married"

her "insurance"

us "do you want to be with your daughters forever"

her "these arent my daughters, theyre his from another woman" 

us "do you think the gospel changed your husband"

her "he doesnt hit me as much as he used to"

There was more flow to the lesson, those were just a summary of all the dead ends we hit with her, it was so funny.  I am taking video journals with elder pacheco, you wont understand them, but you will still like them i think.