January 27, 2014 - Letter to Dad - Week 21

Hey Dad!! 

Things have been really good here!  Minus the terrible weather, but I feel like I always say that!  Wow thats pretty fuerte that the prophet called for a big fast!  Somethings going down then huh?  Is it really hot?  You can have some of this rain here I don´t want any more!  

I kind of expected the celtics to be bad we traded away everyone good, but hahahha about the Lakers.   

We have walked A TON this week trying to find people to teach.  I´m getting pretty good at making people stop even if they don´t want to.  It´s weird we are like salesmen, but like people don´t want nada and sometimes you just feel like telling them well ok if you don´t want salvation too bad, but that´s life.  Agency blahh haha  

Other than that not too much to share I don´t think!  My spansih is getting way better I´m excited to skype again!  That is like really close!  Time is starting to move bye pretty fast it´s crazy!  

Well hope you have a great week!  How is training going?  Love you!!

Nathan

p.s. How is work going??

Crazy ham!! And churros! Food here is way good :)

January 27, 2014 - Letter to Mom

Hola!!

 

Pues este semana era genial supongo!!  No tuvimos un montón de trabajo pero me encantan todos los misioneros de mi barrio ahorra y sí!  Jugamas fútbol hoy y no tengo much tiempo para escribir pero voy a tratar a compartir todos las cosas que sucedieron este semana.  Ok so my spanish is way better speaking than it is typing.  I probably made like a million garmmar mistakes in those two sentences but it´s ok!  

How has your week been?  We were finding a lot this week and having a good time some days and a really tired time other days.  But I love this ward.  We have such cool people and there is so much potential here.  It is kind of weird that like after this transfer I have the most potential out of all the Elders to leave this area.  But we shall see!  

Mario and Eddi are doing really good!  So is Carmen!  Don´t forget our preggo lady!  She gives birth in February so that will be cool!  Mario is having some rough times at work and he might move to the states for a few months so that he can learn English and get a better job.  Eddy is good old eddy and we have been trying to work with his family.  I got his brother to give us his info so we are going to pass bye his house this week sometime!  

Ok questions...

1.  No our area is just a free for all.  All 8 of us just serve wherever we want and really don´t see ecah other much because there is so much to do here and so many people.  The bigger areas like pueblo nuevo and quintana occasionally you´ll run into each other on the big street, but it´s rare.  Nothing like poway i could imagine.  We also don´t really like ever meet together to teach, unless for some reason a member invits over more than one companionship, which happens!

2.  In the piso!!  We have a washing machine which is nice, and we jsut all take turns doing all our clothes and stuff!  The one lame thing that spain doesn´t have is dryers, but it´s ok i´m used to it by now.  Everything gets hang dryed every day, but it´s all good, i´m going to get back and that will be such a luxury!  Ohh and dishwashers too!!  Can´t wait to get one of those!!!

3.  I love my ward mission leader now that he is here! His name is Luis and he is the man!  He just got married in December so he was off on his honeymoon for like a month(because south americans LOVE their vacations!) but now that he is back he is always helping us!  He went on a  mission himself so he knows how it works pretty much!  He works a lot so he can never be in lessons, but he will always help us in any way we can.  We don´t have many ward activities because our bishop is sort of, well, he doesn´t like stuff like that too much but the ones we have had we have sang and done stuff like that. 

 

That´s good that young women´s is going well.  There are like 3 young women in our ward so the program isn´t too big, it´s funny because since we always bring Martha and Dary there are almot as many non mormon young women as there are members, and they know like just as much as the others hahah.  

I´m so tired right now!  But that isn´something new.  I was talking with Luis the leader and he asked how long I´ve been out and I said like almost 5 months and he was like ohh you don´t know tired yet! Just wait-.  Because it pretty much gets worse and worse as the mission goes on!  But oh well it´s fun!  

Spansih has been going well, things are all good with the companion and everybody.  Hm not sure what else to say!  Sorry it has been a somewhat boring week!  I love you guys!  Read 1 nephi 17 verses 3 and 13.  And we can see the blessings we recieve from keeping the commandments of God.  I especially like the promises in verse 13 about how God will light our way through the wilderness and drive us in the path we need to be.  I don´t know if it as cool in english but I like it in spanish!  It´s so weird how some scriptures are just so much more powerful in one language or the other!  Like I´ll find something super cool and I go to read it in spanish and it´s not the same!  Or vice versa.  Well i gotta go!  have a great week! Love You mom!!!

 

Nathan

 

Oh and p.s. the package from nana came!! I loved it!!!! THe sweats are So comfy and holy cow I have so much peanut butter!!! haha

January 20, 2014 - Letter to Dad - Week 20

Hey Dad!! 

How´s it going!!  Sounds like the training thing is doing good!  I tried like a mini sort of diet this week since it´s too cold to do any serious exercise outside and it worked out good!  I almost starved to death because I had nearly no food, but I lived this past week eating only fruits, veggies, and a little bit of fish at the beginning of the week!  But it´s so expensive!  I swear eating healthy is pricey here!  I went back to buying normal not as healthy food this week and it was like nearly half the price!!  So that´s a bummer, but I´ll figure it out!  

The bags are going great!  I don´t use the brown bag as much anymore but I still love it!  I have a black bag that is about  a third of the size of my brown one, maybe less!  It´s really small and really European ( which means like kinda feminine) but it works perfectly so I use it!  It was Elder Sargents, but he couldn't fit everything inside so it´s mine now!  And he´s up north so he can´t take it back haha.  I trade off just with how much I have to carry and stuff.  

Sounds like everyone is training for this triathlon thing!  Is Kara doing it too?  Man that sounds fun!  I wish I could join! hahah  

It´s been such a cold rainy week!  And when we need to be out on the streets contacting people it gets roughhh!  Thank goodness we had a decent amount of lessons.  Also one of my good friends came here for an exchange with me, so that was a fun day!  We are both fairly new so it was an adventure with spanish!  I really find it fun when me and my companion don´t know spanish!  It´s just kind of like well here goes nothing and we just sort of laugh our way through the day!  But like us two this week even with our spanish got a TON of references this past Thursday!  Well not like a TON but I think it was 8, which is really good for one afternoon working and lessons included!  

Dang 80 degress sounds amazing!  I feel like my weather is just way off and I´m going to get back and be dying of heat in like 70!  And I laugh because Kendal is in 70 and she is freezing to death!!  It´s all funny!  

So I´m excited to hear about this superbowl!  Could you send me the celtics record?  I´m curious if they are sucking it up or actually playing decent!  Oh and my companion is a celtics fan too!!  That was a cool thing we found out this week!  We are doing good!  Sometimes it´s frustrating not being able to talk freely because I don´t know a ton of words, but we make it work.  And there are plenty of culture differences, but it´s all fun!  

Minus the cold I´m having a good time here!  Well gotta go!  Have a good week! Love You!

Nathan

January 20, 2014 - Letter to Mom

Hola!! 

Ok what should I talk about first!  You asked for a quick little spiritual message!  I can do my best!  So one that I shared this week that I sort of thought up and like was with Mario.  He has been having a crazy week with work and all sorts of stuff, and we were talking about like computers (inspanish, so I was mostly listening about computers) and just the stuff he works on and how things keep changing with technology and the world getting faster and faster and crazier so I shared a scripture I like in the book of Mormon.  Like the book of Mormon inisde the BoM (make sense?? haha). It´s in chapter 9 you can read verse 9 and then verses 15 and 19.  

9 For do we not read that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and in him there is no variableness neither shadow of changing?

15 And now, O all ye that have imagined up unto yourselves a god who can do no miracles, I would ask of you, have all these things passed, of which I have spoken? Has the end come yet? Behold I say unto you, Nay; and God has not ceased to be a God of miracles.

19 And if there were miracles wrought then, why has God ceased to be a God of miracles and yet be an unchangeable Being? And behold, I say unto you he changeth not; if so he would cease to be God; and he ceaseth not to be God, and is a God of miracles.

Even with everything changing and life going on we know that our Heavenly Father is the same, yesterday, today and forever.  That he loves us just the same as in the times of old and is still a God of miracles.  The reason people don´t see them is because they aren´t looking and because they don´t have the faith to bring them to pass,  However if we have faith, are obedient, and ask Heavenly Father with real intent he will guide us through anything.  So ya!!  Just a little something I was sharing this week!  

I kind of sort of started the bible from the beginning and some parts are so awesome and interesting and other parts I want to die reading it haha I just don´t have too much of an interest in the biblically correct way to sell property.  But ya you can find good stuff in between all the boring!  

It has been a good week!  Lots of finding and a decent amount of teaching!  Our ward came out with their missionary plan to help us out for this year, and our ward plan is 30 convert baptisms for the year!  I can´t decide if that is a lot of a little!  We already have 3 or 4 in January so I think it is possible!!  

Ok the questions you have!!

hah service... Ya i wish we could do service!!!  There is NOTHING to do around here as service.  Like since nobody in Spain has yards, you can´t do yard work, and just like the whole city is all buildings and the parks have people hired to clean them and there isn´t much!  The funnest things I recall doing are painting the Hurtados house and building a bunk bed, that was an adventure!!

But ya my spanish is getting better!  Not like a ton better, but my conversational spanish I guess you could say!  But I still have so many words to learn!  Gah like a whole language worth of words!  But I have most of the important ones.  Like I think if I had to I could live alone in a spanish country and get by not too bad for a little while. But still like it´s not too great.  Oh well I have a while till I skype you again to get better!!  

My companion is good! We have lots of fun moments and lots of moments where we just 

can´t get the message across to each other haha  But we have some crazy powerful nerf guns in our piso so the 4 of us have been having fun!!

Hey I like Kara´s pictures!! I´m so excited to hear about the college stuff!!  I can't wait to hear!  I´ve decided it would be super fun if we were both going to BYU together!  And if Justin went to a year before college and got in we could all be at BYU at the same time.  That is kind of weird huh??  But cool!!  

Ahh i have like no time... Sorry!!  So i made abondigas this week!!  But like it doesn´t count because they sell it in a can here :) haha  It was still good!!! I´m learning this week how to make good platanos! Elder Galeano is going to teach me!  We are good buddies since we are the two new ones haha But I´m excited.  Fried sweet bananas! If I can perfect that you guys are going to love it!!  

Well I hope you have a good week!  Have fun at Seaport Village tomorrow!  

Oh cool news Brooke is back in Madrid and we meet in the same building for district meetings!  So I think I´ll get to see a friend this week!  I´m excited!  Oh and other randomness.  I have no clue about American holidays nowadays!  Had no clue it was Martin Rey day, but that´s cool!!  Well I love you!!  Have a good week! 

Nathan :)

P.S. How is Young Women´s going??

January 13, 2014 - Letter to Dad - Week 19

Hey Dad!

Woah crazy weather everywhere it feels like!!  I couldn´t even imagine negative 60 that just sounds terrible!  I don´t even like the weather here so I would die in that!  But ya I guess in the summer here it gets like unbearably hot too!!  Soo lets pray I´m in the islands or in the north when that happens!  Yep it´s kind of weird I´m the elder with the most time here in my area.  People keep caling me like hey where is this and that and half the time I just fake my way through it haha  But I am really surprised with how much of my area I have memorized!  Every big street and in certain metro stops like the majority of the streets in general.  

It has been a pretty rough week teaching wise.  Lots of cold weather made it so people didn´t want to talk to us outside, and now that our best people were baptized we are trying to find a lot!  But it´s all good.  My spanish is like being forced to skyrocket up because I like talking to people but I have to talk to Elder Alvarez in spanish.  But it´s fun.  And every night we do planning for the next day in english, which makes it soo much harder but it´s fun.  

I taught my first english class this week!  Since we have two natives now in the ward and the other elders were busy me and the Hermanas taught, which was interesting haha I realized that english really makes no sense whatsoever and anyone learning it as a second langauage is really impressive!  Even though spanish is hard, english would be like a billion times harder to just learn... But it was fun still!  

Where is that river you are going rafting on?  That is one thing I´ve realized lately how grateful I am for how awesome of a young men´s program we have in our ward.  Like everyone else did some decently cool stuff, but our high adventures and stuff are just sososo much cooler than everyone elses!  Not to put them down but I´m way happy with all the cool adventures we had.  

Well not too much else to share I don´t think, the family who sent the pictures I´m guessing was the Bonifaz family, they are so awesome!  They feed us like every week and they have two sons sort of my age. One is 21 and the other is 19 i think, but they are two of my best buds here in barrio dos.  

Well have a great week!  Love you!!

Nathan

January 13, 2014 - Letter to Mom

Hey Mom, 

Ok so it has been a pretty good week!  Hard at times especially with the rain but fun and my spansih is gettinglike a million billion times better.  Especially just like saying random everyday stuff because we can´t talk in englsih too much!  I still have Elder Galeano in my piso, who was there last transfer too!!  We´re buddies!  And he is bilangual fluent in both so he helps me a lot with stuff I don´t get.  And ready for the other one!  This might make you laugh!´ Elder Cousins is now in my piso!  Like that guy who we used to follow his blog to learn more Spain stuff...  What are the odds haha  he is a cool guy and it is nice not having four super young people like last transfer.  Well just nice having people who can helps us new people more.

 

We do like nothing in the rain it´s so miserable!!  Well we usually have lessons most days, but if lessons fail on rain days, I like prepare for a day that is going to feel like a year.  Like yesterday!  Whew one the the roughest days I´ve had here just because it was cold and rainy and every single lesson we had failed and on top of that there was a Spain game so everybody was watching that and didn´t want to talk to us!  So it was pretty rough, but we did ended up finding a cool Columbian guy at the end to make it a little bettter.  

I had ribs this week too!!  Like not American ribs but yumm even kind of american food was great!  Mario is such a good cook, and I think I talked him into giving me some of his recipes!  I want like everyones recipes here because I want to learn how to make South American food for all of you when I get back!  It´s delicious!  Well that was pretty much my week!  Lots of fails and the only investigators in church were Martha and Dary, who are amazing and are just waiting for their birthdays to get baptized.  Hope all is well at home!  I love you guys!!

 

Nathan

January 6, 2014 - Letter to Mom

Hollaaaa!!

Hey Mom!  How´s everything going at home??  It´s pretty good here.  I´m probably not as excited as I should be for all the changes that they made in our ward but oh well I´m not in charge of that.  We have three new elders and they all have a lot more time in the mission than Elder Sargent did.  I think I would have preferred one more transfer with Elder Sargent but he got sent up north.  Elder Alvarez seems pretty cool.  He´s from Chile and he has been out on his mission for about a year and a half!  I just met him an hour ago so we haven´t taught anyone yet or anything.  We´ll see more next week!  

Yes Eddi got baptized!!  He is great and just got confirmed yesterday in church as well.  Mario hasn´t done anything quite yet but he gave a talk at Eddi´s baptism that was great!  And he also has a talk in the ward in like a month I believe!  Teaching wasn´t the best and we didn´t have a ton of lessons and I´m even more stressed for teaching this week!!  I hope it works out.  We just don´t have a TON of people to teach. Like ya we have more than the Poway Elders it seems but it´s hard.  And now I´m the only one that knows my way around!  But it´ll work out.  

New Years Eve was good I guess.  We ate with some families and didn´t have anybody to teach and went to bed at 11 like we are supposed to haha but I woke up to fireworks several times during that night if I remember right.  

I miss the beach!  Kara sent me pictures of downtown san diego and they were awesome!  Reminded me of when Zack and I went sailing and barely made it back to shore!! It was funny haha.  I still don´t know what hand and foot is, but I can learn when I get back.  

No I didn´t go to Primarck to buy anything.  I got a sweater as a Christmas gift yesterday from a recent convert couple that loves us, so that works!  

Breakfast...  Well sometimes I just don´t, and nowadays I eat fruity pebbles, but usually i just eat eggs.  They are cheap and good here!  My memory card has so much memory I dont know if I´ll ever run out of pictures!!  However if you want to buy a memory card, maybe like you could send me one and I could send this one home and we could swap them every once in a while?  I don´t take many pictures. I don´t know what to take them of.  

Kendal LOVED the puzzle!!  She said you did an amazing job and she spent a p day putting it together and she loves it!  She said that you put two of the same pictures in so it was extra hard haha was that on purpose??  But ya thanks for being so awesome and picking stuff out and sending packages and stuff like that!  I loved my presents for christmas and Kendal says her companion was so surprised that was like the only present she recieved was from you!  So ya you´re awesome.  

Hmmm favorite scripture this week.  3 Nephi 14:11.  I hope that´s right.  It´s kind of about gifts so I´ve been using it as a spiritual thought this week!!  I´m really nervous for how this week will be.  I hope good.  You know how I kind of like being in charge of stuff and having it be my way, but being a missionary is kind of the opposite sometimes haha so we´ll see!  

Hope you guys have a great week!  I love you!!

Nathan

Oh also, one of my goals for this year was to read the bible, but like not during personal study time just when I have extra time in the morning or at night.  I´m going to finsih the book of Genesis soon.  It´s weird.  Way different from the other books.  I also finished the Book of Mormon again the other day!  It was cool!!  I might start in spanish soon!