Monday, August 29, 2011

August 29, 2011

¿Hola, que tal?

This week was pretty ballin....it started out crappy but has ended good. On Tuesday we went out to look for all of the less active members again, and yep, all 10-15 don’t exist anymore. So that day we were pretty mad but just kept looking and looking. The next day on Wednesday, we went to visit Lily. She is the one who just opened the business of delivery with her boyfriend and he bailed because it was going under. Anyways, the business is doing good, really good. We made a lesson for her on the Holy Ghost, and how he can help us make choices. We made this lesson that morning, then later that day when we went, we talked to her about stuff and she didn’t really know what choices or decisions to make. Our lesson just happened to work out pretty well for her. Her date to be baptized it Saturday. We are going to go to her see her every day this week; Satan really works against the ones who are ready. Pedro and Sonia are not doing too well though, it seems like they are going backwards. We have been promised that if we bring members and have prayers on our knees that they will be baptized. The members that we take bear testimony of their same problems, about getting married. Hermana Delgado, our mom who cooks for us 3 days and does our laundry, ripped them a new one. In the most loving way she told them what’s up. You know it’s a good lesson when they cry and they know what they need to do but it so sad when they don’t do it. They got some folletos from the J.W.s We were pretty shocked when they didn’t come to church on Sunday, I told Elder Moore that they probably went to that church on Sunday.....he agreed!

So that night, the assistants got to our apartment at like 12:00, so we didn’t get to bed until 12:30 and I fell asleep around 1:30. At 4:45 we all got up and showered, shined our shoes, got looking all churro and we left, got to our church at 5:30 to set up for the zone conference. Took a while but it was good. President Arnold came, he is the President of South America South or Argentina, Paraguay, and Uraguay. He is so cool, he came around right before we started, gave us all hugs asked us where we are from. His wife was real nice too. We had a ballin zone conference with him his wife and President and Sis. Callan. Pres Arnold would tell jokes and make comments all throughout the conference that were just funny. He´ll make fun of you a little in a loving way. At the end, he said now all of you are not going to stay around and take pictures and whatnots, leave and go work. But Elder Moore & I are in charge of the chapel so we had to stay for a bit to make sure a person would be there to lock up. So during that time we just talked to President Arnold for like 10 min. Asked us how you guys were, how I like the mission they are just really nice. The churches here don’t have a gym, they have a soccer field, basketball court mix type thing, and after the conference, he went out and played soccer with some kids and he is just a baller!!!!

Ok now for the questions.....

1. I am in the city, but we do have places out in the campo. Once a week we go out to San Miguel. The furthest place out there is about an hour and half. There are no street names out there, no house numbers, and so good luck finding any references out there.

2. So the animals are not in big supply here in the city. I killed two cockroaches last night. When it is hot there are tons of lizards, but they are colorful, unlike the ugly ones in the Idaho desert!! There is an ugly dog in the city, well there are a ton of them, but this one has a broken leg, so it hops around all lame. There is a lady in our ward who has a monkey, we have only gotten into her house once....she keeps her monkey in there and it smells so bad, probably because they never clean out the mountain of poop in the cage.

3. How to have fun, idk. The importance of knowing a ton of scriptures.....a quote from Elder Alexander, ´´remember elders, we don’t bible bash, but when we do, we win! Just remember that boys!

4. All you can do as a family is pray for all the investigators that we have which isn’t many. Pray so that we can get more, and that they will keep their compromisos.

Mom, ok my package was great, we don’t have a muffin pan to make the muffins, so we are going to buy flour and make pancakes out of them. The peanut butter was good on our chocolate cookies. You don’t have to send candy, there is tons of it here that is so good, you can’t even imagine how good the chocolate alfajors are mom....I will bring those home. Pictures are always good too. I’ll start to make a list of stuff we think off that you could send.

The scripture that I want on my plaque is Mosiah 3:41, the one that says remember remember because the lord god has spoken it, but I want it in Spanish, so if you could look it up and have them type it out in Spanish :)

So this is the last week with Elder Moore. He goes to the mission office on next Tuesday, and on Wednesday his dad will pick him up and they are gonna hang around Paraguay for a week. We have a mission calendar with all of the missionary’s pictures on it and we started to have a draft of who’s coming here with me to be the new district leader. Hopefully a Latin companion.

Well thanks for everything until next week, oh and you´ll get another email with some pictures of my scripture cases that finally came today!

Love you mom

Taylor













Monday, August 22, 2011

August 22, 2001

A few more pictures from the MTC

MTC District

Once a wrestler, ALWAYS a wrestler!


Enjoying a little snack!!!

More wrestling . . .

PARAGUAY PICTURES

1st package from home


He looks so happy!  That makes me happy!






Look at the dirt they come home with everyday!





Dear mom,

So now that all the kids are gone back to school, you can just enjoy it....since there is nobody to bug you.

Well I got my package this morning.  The thing that they sent out about packages isn't really that important....it just means that I have to pay for them to send it out to me, not that big of a deal so whenever you want to send one you are more than welcome to!!!  One thing, we don’t have a muffin pan so I think those will just get made into the pancakes. My breakfast of starbursts was very yummy too.  I just loved all of it.  I haven't tried out my water enhancer yet it smells good!!!  Mom remember what you said about the summer is going to go by slow for you while I am out here, well it’s over already and  it went by fast.  This week we had some interesting stuff, on Saturday night we ate cow heart which wasn't that bad, it was actually good.  

On Monday I expect a bunch of pictures from Spencer and Grants games. Idk if M’Kay is playing football or not, for east or for little kids again but pics of his games too.

With my handy dandy Skippy peanut butter I'm gonna want to eat 3 of them sandwiches a day too, but the only thing here that is close to jam is Dulce de guayaba, it’s like guava jam, its def not my favorite but i can deal with it.  

I'm surprised that Spencer got to take the boat out by himself with Grant and M’Kay but with friends wow wow wee wow....and yep sounds like Spencer to forget the boat keys, surprised he didn't do that with his dirt bike too.

And M’Kay has his b day in 5 days.  Did Spencer and M’Kay get their letter yet???

I’ll have to tell you my fave scripture next week, I don’t really know one right now....

Elder Moore & I  try to work out in our appt, we have boxes of Books of Mormon that we can use as a weight I guess, we can do pushups, jumping jacks and stuff that will help in the long run.  We do however get a ton of walking in during the day, I had an idea that I should have brought a mile counter with me so I could write down how far I walked everyday in my journal and by the end of 2 years have it be hundreds or thousands of miles!!!

I'm not sure if I have really gained weight or lost weight, when it’s hot you sweat like a dog and it’s not even summer yet, forget about going to the bathroom, it’s always water whatever end it comes out off!!! But the food I eat, oh so yummy and greasy. Yesterday we went to the Delgado's for lunch(pretty much every day it seems like) and she made a huge thing of empanadas, so I had like 10, I don’t want to get fat but it’s so hard to not get fat here in Paraguay. 

This week we got a referral from Hna Delgado and we went to his house, he was a less active member and apparently he moved or something, but his dad came to the door and he said we could come back on Thursday, so we went back and it was a good lesson, his wife and son are members. He has a good chance of getting baptized  next change.  We taught him lesson 1 and it was pretty good.  When people don't talk a billion miles an hour I can understand them, pretty much all of it, there are just some words that I don't know yet.  And I can talk back to them about most stuff now. 

I learn lots from Elder Moore, he knows about every scripture or a scripture for about every situation and me ha I know like none.  But one day I hope!   He never has problems with saying OK mi compañero va a compartir una escritura con nosotros. I’ll pick one out, have them  read it and then I’ll explain it and ask them about what they understand, how it applies to them and bla bla bla. I like doing that, it’s fun, being here is great. Yeah i miss all of you but I have another family down here.  

This Thursday Pres. Arnold of the 70 is coming for zone conference.  Probably going to be ballin. And they said he probably has time for interviews, like talk to you and see how you’re doing how your family is, stuff about you. Elder  Moore & I are going to try and get one.

Oh and Elder Moore and I get along all the time just fine, we never fight and always have a good time. There are tons of missionaries who just hate their trainers, but I was lucky!

One of the better experiences this week was I took a picture of YODA....this old lady out in the campo came to the door with her star wars beanie, return of the Jedi, I’ll send  it home today.

Thanks for the package of goodies, I have to write some letters and stuff and then I will send all them home and my camera card home so yall can see some more pictures.

Love ya mom


TAYLOR

August 15, 2011


Well another week gone, and been out here for 4 months.  It’s really hot. Like 100 degrees right now.  I don’t know how I’m gonna survive when the summer gets here in like a month.  The Spanish is so so.  We still don’t really have that many people to teach so that makes it hard.  This week we took the member list of all the members in our rama/ward. It’s not big enough to be a ward.  But we only have like 20 people show up for church every week, so we started to look for a bunch of these people.  One day, I think it was Thursday, the hottest day last week; we went to look for members.  We had about 10 had 2 street names and a house number, well all of those houses don’t exist anymore, they have all been destroyed.  So that helps that they are no longer in our rama so it’s getting closer to being a ward. Now we just need people that we teach to have so faith and do something. 

We have about 10 people that we are teaching.  And that’s not very good; you can’t go to them every other day, so we just look for other members and part member families.  This week we taught 5 lessons with a member, 10 other lessons, 3 baptism invitations, and 3 investigators came to church.

I don’t know if I had any best experiences, we had some funny good ones.  Yesterday we saw this guy from across the street, and he made a B-LINE right to us.  He said what’s up. What did Joseph Smith say? We said oh he already died a long time ago.  The other guy said oh he isn’t resurrected, and we said no not yet.  Then he said oh so he didn’t say anything about me?  Nope he sure didn’t, and he was like oh well I was already resurrected; I’m angel Gabriel, son of the son of God.  We said wow good for you and just joked with him for a minute.

Also, when people say George Bush to you they think it’s all funny, and you just say oh perdon, el no esta ahora.  y somos de canada.  Then they just feel dumb and walk away!

Elder Moore and I  are just in one ward, or rama.

This week the favorite most best thing I ate was a lomito.  And bollos.  A lomito is like a burrito but way better, I’ll take some pictures of it and send it some time, and bollos are like doughnuts that you eat with dulce de leche, we bought a nice big tub of that today to eat with our cookies. American cookies, no thanks, the ones here are so much better.  And they have these things here called bon bons, mom you will die when I bring some home for you. Just think of like the best chocolate peanutbuttery crunchy goodness. That’s a bon bon.  For breakfast and lunch today we went to Makos and got ice cream.

The couple that needs to get married is doing good. They came to church this week and last week on their own.  Pedro had his work times changed and so we haven’t been able to teach them because they weren’t home.  That’s happened for the last 2 weeks, but they still came to church. We are probably going to go there tomorrow night.  They have a baptism scheduled for the 27th of this month and hope it happens this time.  You might remember the Hermana I’ve told you about, Lily, she is the girlfriend of a guy in our rama, he always pushes her to do the right thing and come to church and stuff.  Her boyfriend Hermano Nappa, yeah he´s a punk.  We found him in the road one night a little bit drunk, so we were thinking he was a little sketchy.  But he has a business here called nappa express and they do delivery for a bunch of places.  Well he went to Asuncion for something that we didn’t know, and he didn’t come back. And nobody knew where he was. So, Lily called us and she was freaking out.  The reason that he left was because his business is going under.  They opened the business in Lily´s name because he has a ton of debt. So we went over there to talk to here, and nobody knows where he is or why he left, except Lily.  He sent her a text one morning that said hey just letting you know I’m fine physically but I’m not coming back.  Good luck.  What a jerk.  Now she is trying to figure out what to do, and she had a doubt that she wouldn’t tell us.  It was him, she said she couldn’t accept it because  he wasn’t living it, he was smoking and drinking, they were living together.  But now is the best time for her to accept the gospel, so pray for her and pray for pedro y sonia...they need it the most!

Sorry there are no pics this week.  Today is ´´kids day´´ so the normal place we go to do email is closed and the pics wont upload here because these computers don’t have the right program.  I have some other cool pics to send you though.

Love you mom Te Quiero Mucho

Taylor

Monday, August 8, 2011

August 8, 2011

Well this week was the fastest week that I’ve had here in Paraguay. This week was not that great, let’s put it this way, we did a ton of walking. Right now its winter and it’s about 35 degrees C so about 85-88 Fahrenheit plus like 30% humidity, it’s so hot!!!!!! I am trying to upload some pics but no sé; it’s hard on these cruddy computers. It sounds like being up in McCall was great as always, and there was a ton of hellions up there, I can’t wait to go again!!!! I love getting up in the morning and grabbing my tube of cookies and tub of dulce de leche and going to town on those. Today I got all the letters and pictures, they got to Paraguay on the 2nd and you sent them on the 20th of July so not that long, 2 weeks. I also got a dear elder from Andrew, and Richard, and I got Grant’s letter, on the napkin!!! Today we are going to go shopping and get some more treats for the apartment, buy some stuff for Débora for her birthday tomorrow and then idk what else. Today I bought a pan flute; I’m trying to upload a pic of it. Also before I leave Encarnación, I’m going to buy the most ballin sword, the sheath is a bull horn and it’s ballin. Spencer and M´kay, you have something in the mail, not gonna get there by this weekend but it will someday. Hope you like it, nothing too cool or fancy. Right now the pics are loading, so cross your fingers. This month we have zone conference with pres Arnold (70) and stuff, probably gonna be cool. If I don’t get my package before then I will get it then, because people from the office are going to come. I am making a list of things that you could possibly send me some other time that I miss or that won’t be in the package. But mom I have a favor for you to do. This morning we took some pics with Débora and we want you to make a shirt for her. We are the only missionaries who she has ever liked. Always when we get there, she yells ´´mis amigos´´ so I’m going to send you some of the pics with her. We want you to design it do what you want make it cute, it’s for a 3 year old. But we want the pics on it and we want it to say ´´tus amigos te ama¨ so if you could get a white t-shirt to make it, and she is like the size of Lindsay. And if you roll it up small and put it in like a bubble envelope that is small I won’t have to go to Asuncion to get it. They can send it to me from the office. Thanks a ton mom, the pics are going to be in a different email!!!

te quiero mucho

Taylor



Pan Flute

Elder Lamb & Elder Salinas at the airport

City of Encarnación from their window

TEMPLO de Asunción

Elder Salinas

Elder Moore, Débora, Elder Salinas





Débora