#8 Letter From Ecuador

I forget it's Christmas because Holy Hannah it's a scorcher out there. Yesterday, it was very likely that I would die. But all is well!

I absolutely adore my companion! This week we went to the temple! We traveled to Guayaquil Wednesday night (and ate Pizza Hut what what) and then went to the temple early Thursday morning. (It was cool because they've finally translated the new presentation into Spanish and so most of the missionaries were seeing the new presentation for the first time. My companion included. We had a lovely whispered chat in the celestial room about how great it was).

 

After the temple, we had a capacitation with Presidente and Hermana Amaya, and then after that each zone (ours included) performed a short christmas themed skit that has to do with the obra de salvacion. I played a curtain.... yeah... 

Anyway while we were there it was pretty apparent to me that our zone lacks the same amount of unity that the other zones had, and this could be why we are one of the zones that has the most trouble meeting it's goals. Me and Hermana Chil got to thinking about this and decided that if we weren''t unified as a zone, who better to start fixing things than us?! So that's exactly what we're doing haha. We have prepared little things to give each companionship to brighten things up at our lately dismal district meetings, and this morning, we requested a meeting with the zone leaders to discuss our other ideas on how to unify the zone more. Let it be known that no, we have no leadership callings in this zone whatsoever, but we decided to not let that stop us. So we met with the ZLs this morning and told them what's up and they were really thankful and I believe we're going to implement some things in the meeting tomorrow, so I'll let you know how that goes. I love that she's a go-getter. If something isn't working, we as a companionship aren't going to sit idly by and hope it gets fixed, we're going to request a meeting with the ZLs! I love that I'm starting to feel more like myself in Spanish haha. 

What else what else.....

I got packages and letters! From Padre Rust, Dan and Em, Aunt Silvia, Uncle Spencer and a letter from CTR 7! I don't know if I should wait until Christmas or what but I'm excited! I smell essential oils in Aunt Silvia's package.... :)

I don't really know what else to say. We're working hard, but waiting to see the fruits of our labors haha. We're trying to figure out ways to get the members more involved.

OH YEAH HOW COULD I FORGET!
I spoke in Church yesterday. In Spanish.
Like, a real talk. In Spanish. About the obra de salvacion. In Spanish.

I made it through pretty well I think until the end when I could for the life of me remember how to say "I say these things" to say amen and then I got really flushed and David Torres started laughing at me so up until that point I think it went pretty well.

Yeah. I don't really know what else to say so I'll start sending the pictures and add bits and pieces if I remember something to say

Love you all!

This is from three weeks ago, me and the only Ecuatorian taller than me, Irwin Ordoñez

THe noche de hogar from a few weeks ago. I love all of them!

One of my favorite pictures. There are I believe 5 very funny things happening here. See if you can spot them all.
Friendly reminder that no one reads English too well here.... :)

The conferencia por la Navidad. This is all the hermanas in five zones with Hermana Amaya. Hermana Chil (Mi querida compañera!) suggested this pose and surprisingly (to me at least) Hermana Amaya was all for it haha.

My zone with Presidente y Hermana Amaya.
Hermana Chil asked if we could do a funny picture, and the asistentes told her that they´ve never seen Presidente agree to a funny picture. He didn´t do anything funny, but still it was surprising. Milagro is famous for it´s pineapples, which is why me and Elder Maddock are making pineapple signs with our hands. It´s a little something I invented that has spread like wildfire with the youth in my ward. They all know how to say pineapple jaja.

Elder Lizana just says I am pineapple whenever we´re speaking in English and he doesn´t understand anything. It´s swell.
The time is far spent. Love you all!