April 21, 2008

Hola from Paraguay!

So I´ve had one week in a foreign country, and I´m still alive...

Actually its awesome here, I wouldn´t want to be anywhere else. Okay, so about the mission. The first day we just met the President, Pres Wade, and his wife, who are both just awesome, and we got our credit cards for taking out money each month, and filled out other paperwork and stuff, and then we got the chance to visit the temple, which is just gorgeous. Its only a tiny one, but it has to be the second most beautiful temple after San Diego. Then we spent the night in the mission office, where the have a tiny room stuffed with 10 beds... that was interesting. But then the next day we had a big meeting and met all the trainers and then did a little presentation ceremony to our trainers. My companion is Elder Nilsen, from Idaho. He´s awesome, and I´m learning alot. We´re opening up an area, called Salado ("Salted"). Its pretty close to Asunión, and its an awesome area. Its really hard though, because its a new area, so we didn´t have any investigators or know any of the members when we got there on Wednesday. But we´ve been working very hard, in rain and sun and lots of humidity, and we got a couple to church on Sunday, Eusevio and Hemelinda, and Sunday night we got 3 fechas, or baptismal dates; the couple and a brother of a member, Valediano, who is absolutely golden. (Let me just say that the hardest part of all of this is understanding the names... I rely on my companion for that). I´ll give you some of the numbers to show how hard we´re working: 8 Lessons with a member present, 24 other lessons, 23 references received and contacted, 22 new investigators with 10 men and 7 families, 115 lessons taught to recent converts or menos activos (inactive members), and 135 contacts, which is introducing ourselves and inviting people to church (always) or to learn more... in just 4.5 days of working. ¡Que calidad!

There are extremes in our area. Some people live in really nice houses (for Paraguay), and others live in little twig and tarp shacks... its so sad to meet these people who have spent their entire lives of 60 or 70 years in such poverty, and even more heartbreaking is seeing the cutest little kids in the entire world who will be doing that. Even the nicer houses, the majority of them just have dirt floors. The people are awesome though, I love them so much. I can actually follow the conversations now... or at least the gyst of them. Communicating is getting easier, and I´ve made so much progress in just the 5 days I´ve been out among the people. I´m getting used to clapping houses... and everyone is so friendly, they all come out and shake your hand and talk to you. When you pass someone in the street, you say Adios, and the most common greeting is ¿Que tal? I´m also learning a very little of Guaraní right now... in the poor areas they hardly understand spanish, but fortunately my companion has learned enough to communicate effectively with them.

Everything is so cheap here. For about US $2, you can eat a full meal and be stuffed when you´re done. And oh would you be proud of me if you saw what I´m eating. I actually ate a hamburger with everything on it. It wasn´t bad I must say. But so far everything I´ve had to eat is really good... except for yesterday for lunch. We went back to the house and we didn´t have any food, because we just got there, and we live with 2 other Elders, Elder Vasquez, from Chile, and Elder Moreira from Uraguay. They´re both absolutely awesome, Vasquez is trying to learn english, so we help eachother out, I love those guys. But anyways, so we were looking for food, and we ended up with spaghetti, but we didn´t have sauce, so I used peanut butter and Nilsen used hot suace... I don´t know who got the worse end there... I now know why spaghetti and peanut butter hasn´t taken off. But yeah, if somethings put in front of me, I just put it down, and most of it has been really good. And oh my word, the fruit is SPECTACULAR! So ha!

Today was awesome, we went in to Limpio, our Zone headquarters, and had our District/Zone meeting, of which Elder Bullcreek also belongs, so it was awesome to see a familiar face. And then we all played soccer, or futból, and that was just awesome. There was a little less than half of us who were american, and the South Americans are just awesome at it. I did pretty good too, but I have to get used to it again, I haven´t played since I was like 11. But that was fun. And now we´re in Luque, on the other side of our area, to do our shopping and get money for me, and send you peeps an email.

I don´t really know what else to say... oh yeah, Nicole getting married--Crazy! Oh yeah, if you ever need to send a package, put stickers of the Virgin Maria, they don´t pick through it, they´re very supersticious I hear, so yeah. It might be sacreligious, but it works. And sorry, I forgot to bring my camera with me, so I don´t have any pictures to send right now, but perhaps next week. I won´t have any pictures of my area, cause its kind of deangerous to carry around nice things here, they like to take them, but I have a few of the apartment and the temple and stuff. The buses here are awesome, they just cruise along, and you wave them down like a taxi, and then you hop on, and then when you get off, you just have to jump, cause they don´t usually come to a full stop haha. But I love it here, the gospel is true, and I love you all.

Yours,

Elder Dennis