Week 48!

Hey mom! This week was pretty alright.  We had a lot of fun contacting with the churches "Light the World" thing they are doing again...but how wierd.  That was my farewell talk.  I'm already about to hit a year!! Ah! I don't believe it.  I'm already coming up on the halfway mark.  Holy cow.  

Haha the contacting was pretty good.  We made sure that just about all the members in the ward received a few "Ilumina el Mundo" cards so we'll see if we can get them all to hand them out :) we also did a ton of street contacting, and found a few new people to teach, so you can't go wrong there.

This week we also had exchanges with the zone leaders this week. It was fun, the only problem in that whenever we do exchanges...every appointment falls through.  Hahaha, that's just how they always go though.  It was even weirder because we didn't have water for a big chunk of the day...so we didn't get to shower until after lunch, hahaha.  All is well, all is well. 

Today was transfers!  Elder Hancock and I are both staying, but sadly 2 sisters from my district (Hermana Dorado, and Hermana Miranda) got transferred.  I know Dad said that some sisters could be a pain in the butt, but here they seem to be the best workers, haha.  They both left this morning, and I'll get to meet the new sisters this Friday when we have district meeting.  It's also weird...we had a district of 4 elders and 4 hermanas, but they moved the elders to another district...so now it's just me, Elder Hancock and 4 hermanas in the whole district.  All is well, I can tell it is going to be a successful district.

Saddish news.  We didn't even have LUNCH on thanksgiving...the members don't love us enough I guess, hahaha :), I kid.  So we ended up calling the sisters from our ward and asking if we could tag along with them for lunch...in the end, not so bad.  When we got home at night we tried to celebrate, but all we could really do was eat ramen noodles and watch the cool Bible videos the church makes.  WOOO.  WHAT A PARTY.  

Thanks for everything mom :) you're number 1!  Thanks for everything.  I'm sure everything will work out with your job :) 

Also...I've tried the google drive thing 100 times and I can't get it to work.  It keeps telling me to set the correct time and date...but no matter what I do it doesn't work.  I'm sorry :( ill keep trying :)

Week 47!

Hey mom! Congrats on the JetBlue grad! Sounds like a tough experience but I'm glad its over.  Good thing it all ended up well.

This week was pretty alright for us. Not a lot happened.  We weren't able to find that many new investigators, but that's okay, we were able to work quite a bit with the people we were teaching last week.  Lot of work to do :)

Also, this week was kind of weird because we had some other random things we had to go do.  The stake held a blood drive this week, and they asked all the missionaries from the stake to come help.  We all went and had to contact outside of the church and try and get people to donate blood.  It was kind of interesting...a lot of people know we are missionaries so it was a quick "No" and walk away. So some people you had to tell them after they already denied "It's just a blood donation" and they sometimes turn around and go "Ah, cool" and take a flyer and go in, haha.  I think the best part of the blood drive was when we ran in and grabbed a hymnbook and sang as loud as we could to contact.  We would have 3 people sing and the other would hand out flyers.  Haha, I don't know if it really worked but we had a lot of fun doing it.  

Also...today we literally took a portal back to freaking Costco.  It's a store here called Pricemart, and its just Costco's divorced wife or something.  We have a member who let us borrow their card and so you KNOW we hit that up.  We found all kinds of good stuff.  It's kind of hard though because they are basically American prices, and they sell everything in bulk to it's a bit much for a missionary budget.  We did what we could though :)  It was super weird...we are just walking down the aisle dying at everything we see, and all the sudden we hear a bunch of people speaking English.  What the heck??  So we look at them and go "hey, uh, are you gringos?" and they go, "Oh hey!! What ward are you guys from?" and we were like, "huh? Gringos...and members??" haha, it kind of freaked us out.  That doesn't happen too much down here.  They were super nice, and gave us some shopping tips.   They (or their husbands) work in the US embassy so they all live down here.  Super crazy run-in.  They were super nice too, they invited us over for Thanksgiving dinner even.  Sadly, it's outside of our mission, but they were super nice to invite us.  They even bought us lunch after.  Super cool experience, haha!

After our cool Costco experience we headed over to a mall called Hayuelos (where JUMBO is) and went bowling as a zone. It was cool and really a lot of fun.  I'm still pretty awful at bowling but that's okay I still love it.  And heck, Elder Hancock freaking killed it.  Who woulda thought, haha.

And that's kind of the week! Not a ton happened, but  just enough to keep it interesting :)  Love you guys, keep on living large.

From Jessica Wilcox (pictured): Saw your cute son at PriceSmart today and want to share! We invited him to thanksgiving, but we live in the Bogotà north mission so they didn’t think they could come! He seems to be doing well. They were so cute, we gave them some cash to buy lunch and they tried to give us the change back.  It was fun to run into them.  Keep my name somewhere in case you or he needs some help (we forgot to tell them our names).  We American members down here get it and are happy to lend a hand! 

Week 46!

Hey mom! I asked about Skype, and they say it's like a three day thing, where we can choose which day, so we should be alright.  Sounds like things are super busy for you guys! I'm glad you are ending your training, it sounds tough.  Yeah Christmas is gonna be weird, but hey I only have to deal with one out here, then I'll be home and the next Christmas will be rad.

Things here are good!  The good news is, Andrea and her son Sajam came to church! They got a lot of friends and they really seemed to like it! They even brought 2 friends along with them so it was a really solid experience.  Things are starting to look up really well this week.  We are super excited.  

We set a goal this week to find 6 new investigators, 3 from members, 3 from contacting.  We totally got just that! Last night, we were short the 3 investigators from contacting, and we didn't really have enough time to find them, so we were slightly bummed about that, but we got to an appointment early, so we decided to contact some doors.  We contacted a bunch with no luck, but then we hit one last door, and the lady let us in.  We got to share with her, her husband and another guy who lived there as well.  It was basically a miracle.  They talked about how there are a ton of churches, and so many of them just open up for money.  So we explained that an honest prayer can help up find the truth.  When we got to the part of the lesson where we talk about the Book of Mormon, they both (the couple) went, "Of course! We always knew that there were more books!" They were super excited about the BOM.  Everything cool.  

Today I might have taken a little early Christmas present...sorry.  The sweaters I have were starting to look pretty rough, haha, so I went and bought myself some.  I tried to find a good deal so it wouldn't be too expensive.  Thanks ;)   ALSO.  We went shopping at that place called Jumbo (the one where I found A1 with Elder Nielsen) and we found...wait for it...DR PEPPER!!!  It was pretty pricey because it was imported, but dang it was good.  Good times. 

That's kind of the run down of this week! Thanks for the write, and everything.  Love you guys! Talk to you soon.

Elder Hancock and I having a grand ol' time

Week 45!

Hey mom! Thanks for the write! I'll look into getting permission to Skype Christmas Eve, that would def be better.  Also, on the scriptures, I don't need the smallest ones, just smaller than the ones we bought.  And, if you could somehow get your hands on the quad that has like a little buckle or cover kind of thing that would be ideal as well.  Just for convenience :) 

This  week the mission work has been pretty alright.  We had  a lot of time out of our area which was kind of hard.  We almost missed like 3 whole days (Well, we missed three days, but not the whole day) due to interviews, meetings and baptismal interviews.  It's all good, that's just the mission. 

This week we were able to find two new investigators that were a reference from a member (which is almost ALWAYS better than knocking doors).  She is the aunt of a real recently returned missionary.  She took the lessons from the missionaries a while back, maybe a little less than a year ago? But never really got to the point of baptism.  BUT the good news is that now she lives with two recently returned missionaries so they are probably going to help her out a lot.  She also had a son who we are teaching.  They both are really cool, and I hope they can gain a testimony.

Today is a holiday here in good ol' Colombia (who knows what...probably some random catholic holiday) which means we got to go to the temple! The coolest part was getting to see my "dad" Elder Sotoski!  Haha, I haven't seen him even once since my training ended, so it was really cool to see him.  Plus he got to meet his "grandson" Elder Hancock.  So we took a cute family pic.  Good times.

After going to the temple, we went to a place called Mundo Aventura, which is like a mini lagoon. It was a lot of fun.  We got to go with some of the people from the zone.  We had a lot of fun there.  

That's pretty much whats cookin' down here in Colombia Bogotá South. Things are good.  Love you guys, talk to you soon :)

Week 44!

Hey mom! This week was pretty good! I'm glad to hear Collin is home and had a good time.  I hope to hear some good experiences from him. 

Things here in the good ol' Colombio are good.  We have just been working hard and having a good time.  We had one pretty funny experience yesterday while contacting, haha.  We knocked on a guy's door and started introducing ourselves and trying to share a little with him.  We talked about the importance of family and how key it is, and he goes, "Can you wait five minutes and come back?" So we said yeah, sure, but then he goes, "Hold on," and he opened the door, and invited us in.  Turned out to be his 6 year old daughter's birthday party, haha!  So he told us to sit, and we figured since it was like 8pm it must have been ending and he wanted to listen after, but one after another the girl kept opening presents...with two gringo missionaries chillin' in the middle of the party.  Super weird.  They even brought us over some soda and food.  We kind of talked to some other parents who were there about the mission and our church and stuff, but it was still super weird.  We could tell the party wasn't ending soon, so we said bye and left.  If nothing else, we got his number and we will be calling to set up an appointment :)

We did quite a bit of contacting this week.  It's kind of hard because our area is like more than half apartment buildings so we have already contacted nearly everything.  It's all good...we might just need to do it all again.

Today we went and had a "Halloween Party" as a zone.  It was kind of just playing volleyball, which is still a good ol' time.  The zone leaders brought me my package so that was super rad :) Thanks guys, 'preciate ya.  So I was thinking, for Christmas you guys don't need to send a package. :) If you wanna, just put some money in my account so I can get some cool stuff here.  I know it's kind of hard and expensive to send packages so that could work just as well.  

Soo...kind of tragic story.  Down there in Leticia, I left my English quad in my bag, that I accidentally left on the floor...and the house flooded.  So my English scriptures are kind of destroyed.  You don't need to rush it, but if you get a chance to send a kind of smallish English quad down here, I'd appreciate it :) 

Tomorrow is gonna be a big huge leadership meeting for the whole mission, so all the district, and zone leaders all get together and have a big training thing or something.  I guess we'll see how it goes.  

Thanks for everything guys! Love you so much.  Talk to you soon :)

Week 43!

Hey mom! I know it hasn't been very long since the last time I wrote you, so sadly I don't have a ton to report.  

So the hard thing is, I am HORRIBLE at directions, but the good news is that Elder Hancock is great at them.  He basically already has the area down, and I'm still lost most of the time, haha.  So it's been really good that he's got it down.  

This week we basically just visited members to try and meet the ward and learn the area.  It's been really cool.  This ward has a lot of really good members.  A lot of returned missionaries too and everyone wants to help in the mission work.  So I'm super excited to start getting referrals. Yesterday my comp Elder Hancock had to give his first talk in the mission field in Sacrament Meeting.  It was awesome.  It was based on President Monson´s talk in April.  He did really well.  Everyone was really excited for him.  Especially since so many of them are returned missionaries and they know how nervous the gringos are when they first get in the field.  But, for being his first Sunday in the field, he killed it! 

Today we got to go check out centro again.  It's been awhile so it was fun.  We just kind of walked around and looked at stuff.  It was a good ol' time.  We also went to McDonald's which is always fun.  Almost the whole zone was there so it was pretty cool.  A bunch of other missionaries were there too so it was really cool to see some old friends from the mish. 

Just so you guys know, we have been hecking using the spices you guys sent, haha.  I love it.  Sometimes here when the members can't give us food, they just give us money, so we buy food and run back to the house and cover it in spices, haha. 

Love you guys! I hope everything is going well for you.  Thanks for the letter.

Week 42!

This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased:

Hey mom!  Wow...what a crazy week!  Now, to start off explaining the title, I'm a trainer!  I got the call Sunday night that I was leaving Leticia to go "open" an area in Kennedy called Marsella 3 with my new son [companion].  So yesterday I came up to the mission home to pick up my new comp!  His name is Elder Hancock and he is from Gilbert, Arizona.  I'm super pumped to be out here working with him.  It's going to be an adventure since we are both in an area we have never seen before.  There were just missionaries here a week ago, but for some reason the president pulled them both out, and sent me and Elder Hancock in.  So far so good! 

Also, another cool thing is now I am a district leader! I have 8 missionaries in my district, 4 sisters, and 4 elders.  I'm super pumped. Its going to be a cool experience.  

So, just a little about my area:   Its called Marsella 3, its in the Kennedy zone.  Its considered the "Poopiest" area in the mission.  Thats Colombian for the richest area in the mission.  Its really cool.  It's covered in really cool malls and restaurantes.  Apparently we have a Fuddruckers here, hahaha.  And Pricemart...which is freaking Costco.  Literally, everything is Kirkland brand, hahaha.  So its a pretty cool place.  I don't know the ward yet, but everyone that's been here says its the coolest ward in the whole mission.  I'm super excited to get everything figured out.  It's gonna be a really cool experience.  

Haha, my Marci senses kicked in Monday when I got to my new house with another elder who was staying with me for the night (Elder Cantos, Quito, Ecuador).  We got there and I have never seen a bigger mess in my life, haha.  You would not believe.  It was covered in boxes and papers and crap.  It was pretty bad.  So Elder Cantos and I speed cleaned everything.  It went pretty well, it doesn't look super bad now.  It was at least clean enough for my new comp to be able to come in comfortably.  

So that's about all that's been going on!  It should be really good!  Also, thanks for the package! I love the ties! I'm rocking the polka dot one right now :) and def if you ever send ties, don't feel obligated to send flower ones, I've got a bunch :) Thanks so much mom! Love you.  Talk to you soon.  

Tanner and his new companion, Elder Parker Hancock

Hugging a sloth - from last week's Amazon River adventures