#37

Hello family! This week was swell.

No, I haven`t had transfers yet. Today two elders got transferred from my zone, but I`m still here.... I don`t want to have transfers until after my birthday though. There`s been too many whispered conversations just out of my ear-grasp so I know something´s going down. The next normal day for transfers in in 2 weeks, I`m sure I`ll be out of Valencia by then. 

This week... Monday, shortly after writing you all, we went to Quevedo and got into a taxi, and the taxi was playing Brick in the Wall. I couldn`t believe it. And then I realized that it`s actually kind of creepy that I liked that song so much when I was little.

 

This week has been challenging, but good.  We were blessed to find people that were legally married, which is nothing short of a miracle, but despite our best efforts we couldn`t get them to continue listening to us. It was especially disappointing with a family that has marriage problems, and we know that exactly what they need to fix their home is the gospel of Jesus Christ, but they turn away. We still have hope for them though, and we are working to help them feel the Spirit, because we already love them a ton.

 

In the mission, Sundays are the most important. Everything you teach and do is to help people attend church so that they can receive a testimony, feel the Spirit, and prepare to make covenants. You can teach a hundred lecciones in a week and you can have felt the Spirit and what not, but the truth is that if people don`t come to church, you feel like all that you did was in vain. Yesterday we passed by the houses of each of our investigators to wake them up, to tell them that we`ll be waiting for them in the church, and no one was in their houses. We were not too thrilled. But we decided to stop by and reinvite some old folks that we had contacted to come to church, but we firmly believed that they would not come, because they were old, they were pretty faithful to their church, they were poor and couldn`t afford a mototaxi and would have to walk a decent distance to come to church, and because they couldn`t read and they had trouble paying attention when we were teaching them. 

BUT THEY CAME. And we were thrilled!

It`s kinda funny that you had the snake issue Momma, because Hermana Flores was recently tramautized by a snake. We were visiting Yenny, our recent convert (she got baptized and confirmed this week), and to get to her house you have to cross a creek with a bamboo bridge and the path winds through cacao trees and banana and plaintain trees, and it`s a grand adventure. I really like walking to her house. But we saw a HUGE snake. Bright lime green and I would say it was about 7 feet long from what I saw and it moved SUPER FAST.

 

I really love this ward. As much as I want to leave and start a new adventure, this transfer is going to be cruel and brutal. I`ve included a photo of us, Francisco, Romina, and Luis, some of my favorite chamacos.

This is Yenny.

But I have to explain a few things about this foto.
1) It was the hottest day of my life. I was pretty sure I was going to die and I don`t think I have ever sweated so much in my life.

2) It was the sunniest day of my life. I`m not kidding, you could feel your skin burning. Also, i couldn`t open my eyes, which is why, mixed with the fact that I sweated off my makeup, I look like a blonde fat chinese baby. 

3) Yenny looks like she`s not happy, but she was super happy. I don`t know if you`ve noticed, but the adults generally don`t smile in fotos. This is a custom that I`m working to change. 

Me, Romina, and Francisco rockin´ Crocs. 

#36

Oooh yeah I have to tell you that my Crocs came and they are the envy of all the sister missionaries. I`m not even kidding. Everyone dreams of having waterproof shoes like these. So even though by the world´s standards, they are absolutely hideous, by Ecuadorian sister missionary standards they are Coco Chanel. 

I met the mission president and his wife and they are amazing. Full doctrine, full amor, full obedience. It was so fun. We had a training meeting with them on the 4th of July. Seriously, they are the greatest. We left from that meeting so excited to work and find people and get them sealed in the temple.

The 4th of July was like the greatest day ever because we got back to Valencia to bring about our mega activity, CHOCOTALENTAZO. Basically a talent show with a chocolate fountain but the members really brought it. We had lights, smoke machines, bubble machines, a huge sound system, and everyone had practiced to make it awesome. It was so fun! The young men and young women danced to a Grease medley, and I never noticed just how dirty those songs are, but I was the only person who understood what the songs were saying. The primary performed a traditional dance in traditional clothing, and lots of people sang, the Bishop did a skit where he was a doctor and he had some magic juice that cured everybody and then we, the nurses, passed the juice out to members in the audience, and then the first counselor walked in dressed like a little kid and revealed that he had dropped his sock in the juice, after everyone had already drank... drunken... drunked... dranked...  their juice. I honestly have no idea how to say drink in past tense. I took little video clips of everything, but the activity started late and ended at 11 pm, so I didn`t get to see all the talents. But it was super fun. Me and Hermana Flores and Lina were screaming and clapping and trying to get the rest of the audience to liven up a bit, but apparently in Ecuador it`s normal for the audience to be a little dead, but the gringa, the Mexicana, and the Colombiana were not going to have any of that. So we returned home with sore throats from screaming and cheering but it was definitely worth it.

 I`m afraid I don`t have too much to tell you this week either, because my poor companion was super sick and sunday, monday, and tuesday we were in the hospital. I slept on the floor. But she`s fine now and we`re a-okay. The new president is so sweet because he was calling us to make sure that she was okay.

We found a lovely family. They attended church, but their baby was SUPER ticked off and no one knows why, and he refused to enter nursery, he refused to go with his parents, he didn`t do anything. No one could make him happy, we had candy, bread, toys, and this kid didn`t do anything until the bishop showed up. And then he reminded me of Dad and how good dad is with babies.

Which reminds me...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PA! FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS PAPÍ! Te amo mucho y espero que tengas un feliz día. Estoy muy agradecida por tu dignidad como poseedor del sacerdocio y por todo lo que me has enseñado. Eres un buen papa y tengo mucha suerte por ser tu hija. ¡Te amo!

I don`t have pictures except for from the CHOCOTALENTAZO. 

First is a photo of the young men and young women´s number. In the role of Danny is Luis. He`s our little brother. When I met him, the first thing I thought was "this is the type of guy that Holly should marry." He`s a recent covert (6 months ago) and he`s super faithful and excited to serve a mission. 

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Me and Hermana Flores. Hey guess what I`m skinny now! In the training meeting I saw people that I haven`t seen since I was in Milagro and they asked me what my secret was (hint: my secret ain´t pretty).

Also, one thing I´m going to miss about Ecuador is being able to tell people that they`ve gotten fat or skinny and them not being offended. This is something we should adopt in our country. 

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More of me and Hermana Flores. We were in the bus and it broke down and they wouldn`t let us out. So that`s what´s happening here.

Did I already send this? We wanted one of those catalogish missionary pictures but it didn`t work out too well. We will keep trying, but so far this was our best take.

That`s all I got, love you all!

#35 (A week late.......sorry! The administration.)

WOOO Does the Lord know what`s up or what? That mission call is perfect for cute Erin! She is going to learn a ton and meet so many people! That`s the mission call I wanted (or Pennsylvania... I`m not really sure how I ended up with Ecuador).

Ecuador got booted out of the world cup, and Mexico lost yesterday so right now I`m rooting for the USA and I`ve got the Bishop on my side (we`re best friends. They asked me how you were mom, apparently you`re not too active on facebook these days). There`s tons of Colombians in Ecuador though and they`re all rooting for Colombia. 

This week has been rough. My companion has been super sick, so we haven`t been able to work too much. I`m not going to lie, at first the idea of sleeping in the afternoon was very inviting, but that`s only fun for half an hour and then you just wanna go crazy.   We watched every single video in the Doctrina y Convenios dvds (we watched the clip Una Dama Elegida [I think that translates to A Chosen Lady or something] about Emma Smith about 20 times and cried like babies each time), and all of the District 1 and 2 as well as 4 versions of the Restoration (I`m scared of some of the old Jose Smiths.). 

So transfers came and went again, and I`m still here. I think that´s just because the new President´s been in Ecuador 3 days and isn`t too keen on making changes right now. We already talked to him to ask for permission to go to the hospital. Chances are my companion has dengue and has to be admitted and stay over night (I`m going to go crazy). But the good thing is that we went yesterday and our doctor friend from the last time was there. He`s super cool and we really want to convert him haha. 

In my time in the house I`ve been practicing talking in vosotros (which is the way they speak in the Bible in spanish and in parts of Spain) and working on my Enrique Iglesias accent. I think he`s from Spain, but anywho with this accent the cion and z you say with a th sound. And the ll that they usually say with a y sound or a yj sound you say with a sh sound. Like, shegar in place of saying llegar and in place of saying corazón to say heart, they say corathón.  

So yeah practicing other accents and reading Doctrine and Covenants is basically what I`ve done this week. We`ve only been able to teach like 10 lessons this week. 

We are teaching a fiery little 70 year old. She wears bright red and fuchsia lipstick and we get along well. She really likes church and she`s ticked that her grandchildren didn`t ever invite her and that she had to tell them to take her to church. 

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I love you all family, thanks for writing and thanks for the prayers!
Love, Hermana Roosht, Rowst, Rawst, Roost, Roast, or Roosh.

We have a difficult last name for these folks. 

#34

What can I say...

Everyone said that now that it`s June, it`s going to start cooling off and the sun isn`t going to be as strong. I`m here to tell you that they all lied.

The old man husband of a member gave me a funky fruit. I thought he was carrying some sort of dead animal, so I asked him what it was, and he told me it was a fruit that made delicious juice and then he gave it to me. I peeled it, and the pulp inside had the exact same consistency and coloring of phlegm. But I went ahead and ate it anyway and stuck parts of it in the blender with sugar and somehow the juice ended up being brown. So yeah Ecuador`s got some freaky fruit going on. I´ll include a photo. The skin looked like dragon skin. I pretended I was a student in Hogwarts in potions class. It was fun. My companion was a little weirded out I think but I enjoyed myself. 

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 So there`s a sweet little hermana in our ward that is a convert of 20 years or so. She wants so badly for her family to all be members, and she`s invited us to teach family nights in her home with her grandchildren that aren`t members, and yesterday she invited us to another family night (we actually didn`t know that we were going to be teaching, her granddaughter told us that she invited us to eat hotdogs [which were delicious]), and the hermana invited her daughter and two of her sons in laws and a few other youths that were already members. We had no idea what to teach to such a wide audience of members, non members, less actives, adults, and children. Luckily we are always prepared and she started to teach from the Proclamation to the World. When was the last time we all read the Proclamation? The Proclamation is awesome. Super direct. I like that. We taught parts of Law of Chastity, temple marriage, parts of the Restoration, and parts of the Plan of Salvation, just with the Proclamation. And the adults that weren`t members really liked it. They really liked that we talked about families and that it was bonito I´ve never been too good at telling stories but what you should know is that the Spirit was really strong and I really love that families can be together forever.

We`ve had some people wanting to Bible bash this week. Sometimes it`s really good that I was called to serve speaking Spanish, because I can`t always translate what I`m thinking, and when dealing with people that have whacky ideas, it`s a good thing I can`t say what`s on my mind. But I really like disproving the doctrine of other churches with the Bible, but I do it in my personal study, because I don`t let myself Bible bash, no matter how much I like being right. 

We made t-shirts as a zone. I don´t know why but everyone wanted the t-shirts to be in English on the front. I was against the idea but oh well. The back is cool though. Our name is across the back with Ecuador Guayaquil Norte.

​Hmmmmmm........
What else.....

Things are great. Everyone is all giddy about the world cup, and they tell me how things are going with the us, even though futbol is the last thing on my mind haha. My companion is just about dying though that we can`t watch the world cup. She`s really big on futbol and she prayed this morning that Mexico would win their game today. I love her. This morning when we heard the alarm the first thing she said was WE DIDN´T HAVE TRANSFERS! (Because if we have transfers, they call us around midnight on Sunday). So were still together! We`re surprised that they`ve kept us together so long, but hey, we`re not complaining! 

#33

HAPPY FATHER´S DAY PA! They celebrate father`s day here, but it`s not as big as a deal as mother`s day. Almost no early morning serenades. The truth is that I forgot until the bishop asked us to take some funny pictures for him as his gift for father`s day.

 

Yeah we had a baptism on Saturday (miracles all three of them). One of them was the son of an active member who got baptized hace two years. He never wanted to get baptized because his parents are separated and his father is super catholic. Missionary after missionary have visited him for the last two years and finally he decided to get baptized. His mom was so happy, it was presh.

I was 100% sure I was going to have transfers this week, but the night passed and we never got the call. It`s kind of awkward though, because last night we were walking to a lesson and all the youth that I love were together and I bid them all farewell (complete with tears. I`m not the only one that cried. I really love everyone here - they love me too). And so yeah I`m probably going to see them all again today or tomorrow so this is going to be awkward. But I love my companion and I wanna kill her off (missionly speaking) because she only has 2 months left.   We went to the doctor yesterday (we`re so united we got sick with the same symptoms and everything at the same exact time) and the doctor told us "it is easily noted that you two get along very well" and that we were twins with our matching symptoms so he gave us matching medications and what not. We`re not like gravely ill, we just can`t shake the colds that we`ve had for the last week and a half, so the President told us to go to the doctor. He gave us some nyquil-like pills that have us falling asleep every few minutes so this week is going to be interesting. We`re a little loopy. I hope this letter makes sense. 

President Amaya already gave his last farewell to us. I would send photos but Hermana Scott assured me that I would look great in her red lipstick and she was gravely mistaken. So yeah we`re going to keep those pictures in a nice dark place. But he said lots of things in his final training that reminded me a lot of the things you guys told me growing up. Like, he told us that the names of our companions have to be safe with us (their name is safe in our home!) and obedience with exactness and there was something else too but I can`t remember. 

What else can I tell you? Me and my companion have been lending service. My only pair of jeans is now covered with four colors of paint. I like how here, if you want to paint the outside of your house (where lives 5 men and one women) bright pink, that is a-okay and not tacky at all. I can`t figure out how to word that sentence right, but you get me right? I am having severe issues remembering English.... 

THE GOVERNMENT WANTS TO KIDNAP US. A lady came up to us and asked for all of our information, she told us that she worked for the Valencia government offices and that the president wanted all of the information about teh foreigners currently living in Valencia. She didn`t have identification and it was super sketchy, but she made us come with her to her office and give her our names. We may or may not have lied to a government official because we told her that we were new here and we didn`t know our address (Hermana Flores didn`t know, but I did, but there was no way I was telling her) and that as missionaries we don`t have email or telefonos (which we do), so we just gave her the address of the mission home in Guayaquil. And then she started asking us about the other hermanas in Valencia and we told her we didn`t know anything about them because seriously the whole situation was super sketchy, and then we called the other hermanas and told them that if some sketchy lady starts asking them about their names and passports and addresses and all that jazz, tell her that you don`t have phones and all that stuff so then our lies can at least be coherent. Luckily we`ve both seen Taken and we already have planned out what we`re going to do if someone breaks into our house to kidnap us and sell us to drug lords. We also told our lideres de zona. 

I really love everything right now. Our zone is fantastic, my zone leaders are some of my favorite people ever, we made ourselves some t-shirts and everything. Everything is great. Every night when we give our daily report they ask us how our companionship is and they already know that our companionship is perfect, so I told them that we have huge fights and yell at each other in front of investigators and that Hermana Flores hits me so they think I`m funny.

This computer isn`t reading my memory card, so I can`t send pictures. I`ll have to do it next week.

This week was pretty great too because not once for lunch did they serve us pasta with a side of rice. There is seriously nothing worse than pasta with rice so I`m happy. Also, today is going to be a good day because I`m going to buy myself a jalapeño hamburger. Wooo!

#32

*This email is basically a glimpse into the ordinary, run-of-the-mill aspects of a South American missionary, written in true Nataliesque style of course.  - Admin. of the Blog (mom)


What do I have to say this week?

I learned this week that de-parasiting yourself is just one of those things that you gotta do. It´s apparently not weird and it´s a-okay to ask the stake high counsel representative how often he deparasites himself. The whole conversation grossed me out big time but I was also really intrigued and so me and Hermana Flores are in the middle of a deparasiting treatment right now. So wish us luck with that... Also we´re both sick with cold/flu (again) because of the climate changes. Apparently it´s going to start being "cold". I´m thinking their idea of cold is a little bit different because I´m still sweating. Also, I continue talking in Spanish in my sleep! Success!

We haven´t had transfers yet, next week it is incredibly likely that I will be leaving. I´m going to be really sad, I really love the members and it breaks my heart to think that I won´t see them or Hermana Flores again (Hermana Flores only has 12 weeks left in the mission). We have had lots of laughing moments this week and we are determined to enjoy our final week together the most we can.

 

The carnival came to town again and now they´re leaving. I´m happy, because Ecuadorian carnies are 200% more creepy than American ones. One of them (a young carnie) followed us and sang to me about how I¨m a princess, and now I sing the song he sang to me to my companion and she thinks it´s pretty hilarious.

This week I tried cacao, and not chocolate, like the actual plant pod thingy. You break it open and suck on the seeds. It was pretty tasty, even though it had nothing similar to chocolate as far as taste goes.

 

So we were writing earlier today but the power went out. So we had to look for a new cyber to go to, and we walked all over Valencia. But yeah anyway the semáforos (you´re going to have to look that one up, I can´t think of the word in English) were out too, so the streets were in free-for-all mode. That was kinda scary.

In two days I will be at the halfway point in the mission whaaaaaaaaaaaaat.

Time passes super fast.

 

Sad story, the bishop got robbed. They hit him and stole his phone, and he had lots of pictures of us that he was going to post on facebook later, but yeah they´re all gone.  But we´re excited because their visas got approved!

There´s not really any rhyme or reason to this email. I wish I had more to tell you all, but I´ve settled into a routine and things aren´t new and exciting anymore. I feel like I´m never going back to the US and that this is just my life now, so I don´t really recognize what things are interesting and what things aren´t, not it´s just... life.  I got nothing else to say! Love you all!

 

Here´s a picture of me that Hermana Flores took. We were in an area called la Cadena. It´s super green, it´s in the middle of the bananeras and cacao fields. Breathing the air there is like eating a salad.

We painted a house this week. We sanded down the walls and errythang. The paint here is superwerid though, you mix it with water and they you have to paint 400 coats.  It seemed to me that we could have just painted it once without water but no one was really feeling that idea. 

#31

* Random excerpts of Hermana Rust's letter this week which was more for family than blog.     Sorry for the choppiness. -  The Hermana Natalie Rust Blog Administrator (her mommy)

 I´m tempted to just tell you guys all about my study of the general conference Liahona because the conference Liahonas are the best things ever invented. I`m pretty sure Boyd K. Packer is going to die though because this last talk was so amazing and so BAM powerful testimony of the Salvador that I`m pretty sure he can`t top it again so he´s going to have to leave that as his final testimony. 

 Everything is swell! We´re not going to write much time today because we´re going to go on an adventure with Lina. 

We´ve been travelling a lot this week to a place called El Vergel that´s a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere. It`s beautiful, and I think I`m the first gringa that`s ever been there. It´s surrounded by bananeras and we travel in giant trucks with benches in the back, so everything´s open and you drive with the wind in your hair and it´s swell. I have a curse though, which is that I absolutely cannot be in a truck or bus more than six minutes without falling asleep. I don`t know what it is, I`ll be fine, with lots of energy, and all the sudden my companion is waking me up and telling me that we´ve already arrived.

Speaking of sleeping, I scared my companion because I was singing in my sleep. She asked while I was sleeping if I was okay, and then apparently I started telling her that I couldn`t go with her, because I had to go to church the next day. So it`s kinda fun to know that 1) I observe the Sabbath Day in my dreams and 2) I`m dreaming in Spanish. 

I haven`t taken more photos yet...... I`m really bad and taking out my camera, but I feel like the bishop and Lina take enough that I don`t need to worry about it while I`m here. Bishop told me that he chatted with you momma on facebook. How´s his english? He told me he just uses google and hopes for the best haha. But they are 100% serious about this visiting the US thing. They already have a buddy that promised them tickets to general conference, and it´s cheaper to fly into vegas, so they´re going to visit us and then I`m going to drive them up to conference. And they wanna learn to make Chinese food. 

We might come back and write later, but if not, I love you all!