14 de noviembre

Dear Family,

 

This week I traveled with Elder Mapa to Panama again to go to consejos. We have consejos every month, so I will be making the trip several more times. It is always fun to see everyone, and we get fed amazing food. This last time was boiled potatoes with all of the toppings we wanted and chicken. Sister Ward always makes sure we get our vegetables too. I am starting to crave raw broccoli and carrots now. The two times I have been to consejos, I have been reminded of the great responsibility the zone leaders have.

 

Thanksgiving is not celebrated here. I am still going to go buy some special food for that day. I was wondering if maybe you could send me some recipes to make a tasty thanksgiving dish like pumpkin pie or stuffing keeping in mind my abilities in the kitchen.

 

Elder Mapa and I found a ton of new investigators this week. We went through our area book and pulled out some old investigators that looked positive. The problem is that the directions are terrible (usually a crudely drawn map), so we found lots of people just asking for directions and help. It was a surprisingly effective tactic to break the ice with people. Two people we contacted like that came to church on Sunday. I was laughing so hard one day because Elder Mapa convinced one of the kids of an old investigator that he knows everything. There was a little bit of information on our records, so he was telling the kid his dads name and how old he was. The kid then asked my companion to guess what year he was born. My comp asked the kid how old he was and then told him the year he was born. The kid was amazed haha. Quizás ésta historia no tiene sentido. Ya me di cuenta que no puedo explicarme en ingles. Elder Mapa and I have been using some hardcore Spanglish in the house. There are some things that do not have translations into Spanish/English, so we just use the two languages.

 

The stake president came to our ward on Sunday to set apart a new elders quorum president. He talked to us a little more afterwards about the details of our move. We will begin doing divisions with the missionaries currently there and will change areas completely at the end of this change. I imagine we will do more divisions afterwards as well. I am still kind of bummed that I will not spend Christmas with the members I already know here, but it will be a good move for the missionary work.

 

Hope everyone has a good week. I love you.

 

 

In last weeks email Elder Whiting mentioned that they had built a block wall around an investigator's home. These are pictures from that p-day activity. I noticed the absence of gloves which are useful for working with cement block, etc.