Dec 7, 2009

Hey there again,

How are preparations for the Christmas season coming? It does not feel like Christmas here in Paraguay, but people are putting up lights and all the stores have Santa Clauses and posters of snow and stuff... it´s kind of weird, not gonna lie. But yeah, Elder Adamson is a good kid, his spanish is way awesome, and he really wants to work hard. Who would've thunk that the two New Yorkers would be together. It makes it easy though, because everyone asks us where we´re from, and we just have to say New York.

Pedro Juan is a pretty cool place, but there´s a lot of Portuguese, as you can imagine, since like you said, there is absolutely no border control whatsoever. The city is literally divided in half, the Brazilian side is called Ponta Porã. As far as describing where my area is though, it´s right up on the border of Brazil, the church building is literally 2 blocks from the border. The only difference is the visible difference, because Brazil is so much nicer than Paraguay. On one side there is the cobble stone streets of Paraguay, and on the other it´s nice pavement, and its just a whole lot more organized. Anyway, my area, I have no clue how to describe where to find it. Does it have names of building on google earth? Or you could just hop on the church website and look for Pedro Juan Caballero 2, that´s the branch I'm in. I think it should have maps.

Our area is a good 40 minute walk everyday, there and back, from Branch 1, where the ZLs are, and so we're looking hard for a place, but it is so expensive out here that nothing we can find is in our price range, which is up to about 800 mil guaranies, or like $150 a month. I mean, it´s so cheap, but out here that price, if you're in a normal area, can get you premium living. Most places in Asuncion are only 400-500 mil a month, and they're nice big houses. But no luck so far out here.

But we're working hard, we're getting soaked quite a bit in the rain too, because it likes to rain out here, and its a long 40 minute walk home and we usually aren't prepared because in the morning its all nice a clear, and then we get to walk home in the rain. Last week we were fording the flash flooding rivers of streets that were caused by all the rain, and that was awesome. Don´t worry, the lighting hasn't hit us yet :)

We had a baptism and wedding on Saturday, so that was awesome. We´re working hard, and having a good time. I'm doing my best to stay focused, but it's super hard on P-Day hahaha. I love this work though, it really is the most important work on the face of the earth. I love you all,

Elder Dennis