Dear Family,
Wow...this has been a pretty unpredictable week. Last P-day everything went pretty much as planned. We ate breakfast with the ward, had a BBQ, then we went and played some football. Apparently some youth in Sugar Land challenged the missionaries to a game of football and they were talking a lot of smack, so the missionaries there called up a couple companionships to put a team together and we killed them.
We had 2 BYU football players, the starting running back for the Dixie State football team, a player from another college team, and 3 huge Tongans. It was hilarious to see my companion play. He would run directly at the guy with the ball, through whoever was in front of him, and get the guy with the ball out (we were playing 2 hand touch). It was as if he didn't see the people between the guy with the ball and him. After a few plays nobody would block him. Then on offense he would always catch the ball with one hand and half the time he would forget it was 2 hand touch and just lower his head and run straight at someone if they were in front of him. He had never seen football played until he got here.
Unfortunately the story doesn't have a happy ending. After we clobbered the youth, we (the missionaries) made 2 teams and were playing against each other. Near the end, my companion jumped up to get the ball and when he came down, he landed in a hole. It turns out he tore his ACL and his meniscus (however you spell it). So last week we had to go to doctors appointments, MRI's, and he had to ice it and keep it elevated. Tomorrow were going back to the doctor to get the MRI read and they'll talk about what to do about the surgery...whether they'll do it here or in back in New Zealand where his family is. Luckily, it doesn't hurt bad enough to the point where he can't move. Obviously we cant go knock doors or just make random visits, but if we had a set appointment then we'll go. So I've been calling all our investigators and setting up lots of appointments.
We get to go to the temple this Thursday! The youth are going on a temple trip, so the Dor's kids are all going to go for the first time. And we get to go with them. That will definitely be a highlight of the week.
Yesterday was a really good day at church. A lot of good things happened. Michelle Dor (the mom), brought her sister-in-law and her nephew to church. She is already doing missionary work! Hopefully we can start teaching her and her kids. 2 of her kids already come to mutual with the Dors kids. Jonathan Dor, who is 12, got the priesthood yesterday and passed the sacrament for the first time. That put a smile on my face. He is a really good kid...he's one of those people you know will be a good member the rest of his life. Then like 15 people got callings. A few less actives we've been working with got callings which made me really happy. It shows how much they've progressed and this will help them stay strong and active. One of the people who got callings was our investigator David Majewski. He's on the activities committee with his wife. That made me happy too. We're going to have a lesson on Wednesday with him..he should have a baptismal date soon. We haven't been able to meet with them for like 3 weeks because they've been out of town. We had 6 non members at church this week, which was really good.
I actually do have a couple stories even though we didn't go out that much this week. We had a very strange dinner appointment last Saturday. Mom would have loved to have been a fly on the wall in that house. We got to their house and they invited us in and we sat on their couch and talked with them for like 15 minutes. I was wondering if they had forgotten about our dinner appointment. I don't remember what we talked about but it was definitely a strange conversation. Then in mid sentence, all the sudden the husband was like, LETS EAT! (I use an exclamation point because he literally yelled it). So we go to the dining room and its all perfectly clean and very elegant. There were china plates and full silverware (including the different sized forks). I was pretty surprised and wondered what we were going to eat. So we went into the kitchen and saw 6 boxes of pizza. That were more boxes than there were people. Well, lets just say we both ate until we couldn't eat anymore. Oh yeah, there were a couple of boxes of breadsticks too. That was delicious. They talked to us about computer games and that vampire romance book and all sorts of other things. I had a great time there..it was all really entertaining. They were both very nice people, but they were just a little different.
Next story is also about a dinner appointment. We ate at a Chinese restaurant called Bamboo Hut. I wasn't too happy when I heard we were going to go eat Chinese food, because we eat it all the time and I never really liked it to begin with, but this was gooood. It was a buffet and it wasn't just Chinese food. They had steak and ribs and all sorts of meat. They had a sushi bar and a huge selection. There were some interesting foods too. I had a crab claw. I was thinking it was the fat part of the crab arm full of meat. It literally was just the crab claw. They put the claw part of the arm (basically like a finger nail) and wrapped it in potato or something. I also had cheesy crab. I think it was imitation crab meat, but it was still alright. I also ate a frog leg. I don't know how many chances I'll have to do that, especially for free, so I did it. It tasted just like fish to me. It didn't taste that bad, it was just weird knowing it was a frog. Plus you could see veins and ligaments and stuff in there.
What a coincidence...I saw a professional football player too. I actually got to eat dinner at his house. I think he just barely got released from the Texans, but the Broncos are going to pick him up. He's and offensive lineman, so he is huge. His name is Scott Jackson I think. He lives in Sugar Land. I was on exchanges in Sugar Land so I lucked out that we were having dinner with him that night. They were a really nice family.
Alright well I think that's about all for this week. Hurricane season officially starts today for this area. That always makes things more exciting.
Oh yeah, did you guys see the videos that were on my memory card? I thought the video of me playing the phantom of the opera was pretty funny, just because that's what Christopher would always play when he got home.
Ok, well have a good week! Don't tear any ligaments...its not fun! I love you!!
Love,
Chase
NOTE FROM CHASE'S MOM: I didn't even know there were videos on Chase's memory card! Glad he said something. Here is the Phantom video:
Monday, June 1, 2009
Monday, May 25, 2009
Received Mon, May 25, 2009
Dear Family,
Well, first off, Happy Birthday last week Kylie!!! I remembered all day that it was Kylie's birthday and I remembered while I was reading the e-mail Mom sent me, but I forgot to write it down! So Kylie has 2 new pet rats. Maybe we should buy a snake and feed them to it. I think that would be more excited. You had better watch out for the Black Plague!!
It's a good thing we live with a member, because all the libraries are closed! I am using the Randall's laptop to e-mail today. This week my companion got sick for the first time in his life. He was sick from Sunday to Thursday. He didn't really know what he had, all he knew was that his head really hurt and he was really really weak. He didn't know what was going on with his body, because he's never been sick with anything before. He kept having really quick body temperature changes. One time in the middle of the night he woke up and showered twice, then he put on his white shirt and tie and tried to go back to sleep. It made me laugh, but I could tell his mind was definitely not working right. The rest wasn't so fun for me though. Lets just say its pretty easy to get bored when you are stuck indoors and the only thing you can do is read. I did enjoy all the reading time though. I read the entire book of Acts. Now I'm in Romans...Paul uses some complicated language sometimes but I still love it.
Unfortunately reading so much really messes up your eyes. I've noticed that my eyes have gotten a lot worse and I'm sure I need a new prescription. I talked to Sister Allred about it a week or 2 ago and she said that the mission insurance doesn't cover it. At a walmart around here I saw a sign that said a basic eye checkup was $50. That seemed like a lot and my eyes aren't too bad, so I'll probably just wait and if my eyes really effect me with driving or anything.
I got my package full of socks and 2 shirts and a fortune teller. It made me laugh. It's supposed to start getting hot next week, so they will come in handy when I have to start showering 2 times a day again.
Yesterday we had a big thunderstorm randomly come by. The thunderstorms still amaze me every time. It takes about 5 seconds to go from sunny and not raining, to pouring rain. The rain drops are huge too. When they hit our car windshield they drops are bigger than a quarter. I love it when it rains though...it makes things more fun.
Oh yeah...last week we ended up going for a little tour in Reliant Stadium where the Houston Texans play. Unfortunately that day they weren't giving out full length tours, but the guy there felt bad for us and gave us a half length tour for free. We walked around on the field, which is actually just a cement floor right now, and we went into the visiting team locker room and their coaching areas and all that stuff. It was a really fun P-day activity. Now I want to go to Minute Maid Park and to the place where the Rockets play...I forget the name. I'm going to make sure I go to those places before I leave Texas.
That's funny that you guys are singing random hymns for sacrament meeting. They did that in our ward for a week or 2 and it didn't go so well either. I think its fascinating to be in a different ward. Every ward does things so differently. Nearly every single week here they have 2 youth speakers then 2 more older people speak. I also found out that every month they have a topic for sacrament meeting. Now that I look back I think that might be how most wards do it, but I never realized it. I thought it was so weird when I first got here that all they ever talked about was temple marriage. I wondered what was wrong with this ward and why that's all they ever talked about. They also have a transition hymn after the closing prayer where everyone sings a hymn, except for the teachers get up and leave and go prepare their classroom for their lesson. The good part is that a member of the bishopric stands at each door and shakes everyone's hand as they walk out.
We had 3 investigators at church on Sunday and 3-4 less active people were working with. That made me really happy. I'm pretty sure I talked about Maria (the lady with bad depression). She came to church. That was really good to hear. We had a member stop by to give her a ride. A lot of people talked to her at church to.
This morning we had a memorial breakfast and a 2 mile walk. Maria went to both those too. We skipped the walk and just went to the breakfast. It was delicious. There were unlimited donuts and cinnamon rolls and fruit and drinks. Then at 1 today were going to go to a Tongan member in a nearby ward for a BBQ. Elder Taufa served in that ward when he first got here and this Tongan member wants to do a big BBQ for him for he leaves. Then tonight we are having dinner at a members home who always feeds us steak or something really good. So were getting fed 3 huge meals today. That's what I call a good P-day. We're probably going to go play football or softball in between the BBQ and dinner.
Well...enjoy your 3 day weekend! I was going to send pictures of the Dor's baptism through my e-mail this week, but this laptop doesn't have a USB port, so I can't. I'll do it next week though. Have a good week!! I love you all and pray for you every night!!
Love,
Chase
Well, first off, Happy Birthday last week Kylie!!! I remembered all day that it was Kylie's birthday and I remembered while I was reading the e-mail Mom sent me, but I forgot to write it down! So Kylie has 2 new pet rats. Maybe we should buy a snake and feed them to it. I think that would be more excited. You had better watch out for the Black Plague!!
It's a good thing we live with a member, because all the libraries are closed! I am using the Randall's laptop to e-mail today. This week my companion got sick for the first time in his life. He was sick from Sunday to Thursday. He didn't really know what he had, all he knew was that his head really hurt and he was really really weak. He didn't know what was going on with his body, because he's never been sick with anything before. He kept having really quick body temperature changes. One time in the middle of the night he woke up and showered twice, then he put on his white shirt and tie and tried to go back to sleep. It made me laugh, but I could tell his mind was definitely not working right. The rest wasn't so fun for me though. Lets just say its pretty easy to get bored when you are stuck indoors and the only thing you can do is read. I did enjoy all the reading time though. I read the entire book of Acts. Now I'm in Romans...Paul uses some complicated language sometimes but I still love it.
Unfortunately reading so much really messes up your eyes. I've noticed that my eyes have gotten a lot worse and I'm sure I need a new prescription. I talked to Sister Allred about it a week or 2 ago and she said that the mission insurance doesn't cover it. At a walmart around here I saw a sign that said a basic eye checkup was $50. That seemed like a lot and my eyes aren't too bad, so I'll probably just wait and if my eyes really effect me with driving or anything.
I got my package full of socks and 2 shirts and a fortune teller. It made me laugh. It's supposed to start getting hot next week, so they will come in handy when I have to start showering 2 times a day again.
Yesterday we had a big thunderstorm randomly come by. The thunderstorms still amaze me every time. It takes about 5 seconds to go from sunny and not raining, to pouring rain. The rain drops are huge too. When they hit our car windshield they drops are bigger than a quarter. I love it when it rains though...it makes things more fun.
Oh yeah...last week we ended up going for a little tour in Reliant Stadium where the Houston Texans play. Unfortunately that day they weren't giving out full length tours, but the guy there felt bad for us and gave us a half length tour for free. We walked around on the field, which is actually just a cement floor right now, and we went into the visiting team locker room and their coaching areas and all that stuff. It was a really fun P-day activity. Now I want to go to Minute Maid Park and to the place where the Rockets play...I forget the name. I'm going to make sure I go to those places before I leave Texas.
That's funny that you guys are singing random hymns for sacrament meeting. They did that in our ward for a week or 2 and it didn't go so well either. I think its fascinating to be in a different ward. Every ward does things so differently. Nearly every single week here they have 2 youth speakers then 2 more older people speak. I also found out that every month they have a topic for sacrament meeting. Now that I look back I think that might be how most wards do it, but I never realized it. I thought it was so weird when I first got here that all they ever talked about was temple marriage. I wondered what was wrong with this ward and why that's all they ever talked about. They also have a transition hymn after the closing prayer where everyone sings a hymn, except for the teachers get up and leave and go prepare their classroom for their lesson. The good part is that a member of the bishopric stands at each door and shakes everyone's hand as they walk out.
We had 3 investigators at church on Sunday and 3-4 less active people were working with. That made me really happy. I'm pretty sure I talked about Maria (the lady with bad depression). She came to church. That was really good to hear. We had a member stop by to give her a ride. A lot of people talked to her at church to.
This morning we had a memorial breakfast and a 2 mile walk. Maria went to both those too. We skipped the walk and just went to the breakfast. It was delicious. There were unlimited donuts and cinnamon rolls and fruit and drinks. Then at 1 today were going to go to a Tongan member in a nearby ward for a BBQ. Elder Taufa served in that ward when he first got here and this Tongan member wants to do a big BBQ for him for he leaves. Then tonight we are having dinner at a members home who always feeds us steak or something really good. So were getting fed 3 huge meals today. That's what I call a good P-day. We're probably going to go play football or softball in between the BBQ and dinner.
Well...enjoy your 3 day weekend! I was going to send pictures of the Dor's baptism through my e-mail this week, but this laptop doesn't have a USB port, so I can't. I'll do it next week though. Have a good week!! I love you all and pray for you every night!!
Love,
Chase
Monday, May 18, 2009
Received Mon, May 18, 2009
Dear Family,
I’m at a library in pretty ghetto part of Houston, so I’m making sure to type my e-mail in Microsoft word in case the internet messes up on me again. We’re planning on going to Minute Maid Park, where the Astro’s play and take a tour of the place. I think it will be a pretty fun activity.
I’ll start out with the highlight of the week: the Dor’s baptism yesterday! It was a really good baptismal service. The room was packed and the members gave some great talks. I’m not sure if I’ve explained this, but the father works in Miami and he flew in so he could see the baptism. He was really touched at the baptism and had a really good experience. It was a pretty long baptismal service because there were 4 people who got baptized, all 4 of them had to get confirmed because the father had to go back to Miami early Sunday morning, and they had to be welcomed into Young Mens, Young Womens, and Relief Society. The two daughters, Mendy and Pascale, gave their testimonies at the end of the meeting. It was a memorable experience.
The Dors live next to 2 families they are related to. Some of the cousins have been there when we have taught some of the lessons and they love it. One of them gave the closing prayer and he prayed that he could come to church to see the Dors confirmation and baptism. Both of the cousins that were there last week asked if they could get baptized too. Unfortunately the father in one of the families there is trying to become a pastor of his own church, so they got into a big fight because everyone except for him wants to come to our church. Finally the husband told his wife that if they went back to the church again he would divorce her. So we are staying clear of that situation. It is really sad to see that like 10 people are behind held back by 1 man. That’s ok…I know in the future they will have a chance to join the church.
We got our transfer call this morning: no changes. For me and my companion at least. One Elder is getting transferred and one elder is training. This is my companion’s last transfer and he’s always made it a goal to leave an area better than he found it, so were going to be working hard to find more good people to teach. This transfer should be a good one. My mission president will be leaving at the same one. They’re going to leave on June 26.
I got Mom’s “Guiltless Spaghetti” package. I thought it was pretty funny. Pictures are always fun to get too. Whats even funnier is that it seems like everyone here loves to make us spaghetti. For a whole week we ate only spaghetti and pizza. I’ve had some delicious meals recently though. We had porterhouse steaks & shrimp one night. There's a really good steak restaurant around here called Saltgrass and they used the Saltgrass steak spice to season the steaks. That’s probably the best steak I’ve ever had.
I know I’ve asked this question before, but if I was told the answer, I forgot. I’m starting to get bored of my food and I remembered (again) how Dad taught me to make omelets. I was wondering if Dad could remind me of how you do it. All I remember is that you put some eggs in a frying pan, let it sit, put some cheese and ham and whatever stuff you want on one half, then flip the one side on top of the other side. I’m pretty sure that’s how you do it, but I’m not sure if you have to put water in there or something.
Here’s a last couple of random thoughts. Since coming on my mission and especially being in this area with this companion, I’ve started to love the bible a lot more. My companion would read the Bible all the time back at home (ironically he would really read the Book Mormon very much) and he knows so many scriptures from the Bible and all the stories. The people here love the Bible and when they see that you know the Bible, they respect you a lot more. So almost every day in my personal study I’ve been reading the Bible. I found my new favorite scripture in the Bible too. Its Ephesians 6:10-18.
I’ve also learned to appreciate good weather. The weather here is awful. The difference between humid heat and dry heat is that in the humidity the air all around you is whats hot, so even in the shade its burning up. You instantly start sweating. In dry heat it’s the sun that’s hot. In the shade it’s a little cooler and when there's a breeze it feels good. When there's a breeze in humidity it just blows the warm air around. These last 2 days have been really nice weather. My companion got sick for the first time in his life, so yesterday I sat in a chair in the back yard and read general conference talks. The wind was blowing and it was cool…that was good weather. Whenever Nana and Bumpa would come to visit us they use to always say how nice the weather was. I didn’t really understand it because that’s how it was every day…now I definitely know what they're talking about.
Last thing: the name of the guy that got drafted into the NFL is Michael Bennet. He’s actually on the Seattle Seahawks. That’s what I’m told at least.
Ok…that’s all for this week. Sister Randall is going to send off a package with my memory card, and shirt for me today, so that should be coming this week sometime. Have a good week…I love you!!!
Love,
Chase
I’m at a library in pretty ghetto part of Houston, so I’m making sure to type my e-mail in Microsoft word in case the internet messes up on me again. We’re planning on going to Minute Maid Park, where the Astro’s play and take a tour of the place. I think it will be a pretty fun activity.
I’ll start out with the highlight of the week: the Dor’s baptism yesterday! It was a really good baptismal service. The room was packed and the members gave some great talks. I’m not sure if I’ve explained this, but the father works in Miami and he flew in so he could see the baptism. He was really touched at the baptism and had a really good experience. It was a pretty long baptismal service because there were 4 people who got baptized, all 4 of them had to get confirmed because the father had to go back to Miami early Sunday morning, and they had to be welcomed into Young Mens, Young Womens, and Relief Society. The two daughters, Mendy and Pascale, gave their testimonies at the end of the meeting. It was a memorable experience.
The Dors live next to 2 families they are related to. Some of the cousins have been there when we have taught some of the lessons and they love it. One of them gave the closing prayer and he prayed that he could come to church to see the Dors confirmation and baptism. Both of the cousins that were there last week asked if they could get baptized too. Unfortunately the father in one of the families there is trying to become a pastor of his own church, so they got into a big fight because everyone except for him wants to come to our church. Finally the husband told his wife that if they went back to the church again he would divorce her. So we are staying clear of that situation. It is really sad to see that like 10 people are behind held back by 1 man. That’s ok…I know in the future they will have a chance to join the church.
We got our transfer call this morning: no changes. For me and my companion at least. One Elder is getting transferred and one elder is training. This is my companion’s last transfer and he’s always made it a goal to leave an area better than he found it, so were going to be working hard to find more good people to teach. This transfer should be a good one. My mission president will be leaving at the same one. They’re going to leave on June 26.
I got Mom’s “Guiltless Spaghetti” package. I thought it was pretty funny. Pictures are always fun to get too. Whats even funnier is that it seems like everyone here loves to make us spaghetti. For a whole week we ate only spaghetti and pizza. I’ve had some delicious meals recently though. We had porterhouse steaks & shrimp one night. There's a really good steak restaurant around here called Saltgrass and they used the Saltgrass steak spice to season the steaks. That’s probably the best steak I’ve ever had.
I know I’ve asked this question before, but if I was told the answer, I forgot. I’m starting to get bored of my food and I remembered (again) how Dad taught me to make omelets. I was wondering if Dad could remind me of how you do it. All I remember is that you put some eggs in a frying pan, let it sit, put some cheese and ham and whatever stuff you want on one half, then flip the one side on top of the other side. I’m pretty sure that’s how you do it, but I’m not sure if you have to put water in there or something.
Here’s a last couple of random thoughts. Since coming on my mission and especially being in this area with this companion, I’ve started to love the bible a lot more. My companion would read the Bible all the time back at home (ironically he would really read the Book Mormon very much) and he knows so many scriptures from the Bible and all the stories. The people here love the Bible and when they see that you know the Bible, they respect you a lot more. So almost every day in my personal study I’ve been reading the Bible. I found my new favorite scripture in the Bible too. Its Ephesians 6:10-18.
I’ve also learned to appreciate good weather. The weather here is awful. The difference between humid heat and dry heat is that in the humidity the air all around you is whats hot, so even in the shade its burning up. You instantly start sweating. In dry heat it’s the sun that’s hot. In the shade it’s a little cooler and when there's a breeze it feels good. When there's a breeze in humidity it just blows the warm air around. These last 2 days have been really nice weather. My companion got sick for the first time in his life, so yesterday I sat in a chair in the back yard and read general conference talks. The wind was blowing and it was cool…that was good weather. Whenever Nana and Bumpa would come to visit us they use to always say how nice the weather was. I didn’t really understand it because that’s how it was every day…now I definitely know what they're talking about.
Last thing: the name of the guy that got drafted into the NFL is Michael Bennet. He’s actually on the Seattle Seahawks. That’s what I’m told at least.
Ok…that’s all for this week. Sister Randall is going to send off a package with my memory card, and shirt for me today, so that should be coming this week sometime. Have a good week…I love you!!!
Love,
Chase
Friday, May 15, 2009
Received Monday, May 11, 2009
Wow Mom, that was a pretty good e-mail considering we just barely talked on the phone yesterday.
The heat here is getting pretty bad. Every day is supposed to be 88-90ish degrees throughout this next week. I’m going to leave my watch on every day and see how bad of a watch tan I can get. I can never manage to get one, I think it slides around too much. I can see the faint outline of my watch on my wrist already, so maybe I’ll be successful this summer.
Here’s the story about a lady named Maria Solorzano. You might remember that about a month or 2 ago me and my companion went biking in the pouring rain. My companion’s pedal was about to fall off and we needed an allen wrench to fix it, so we were trying to think of a member nearby. My companion remembered an address of a convert that lived just around the corner. Neither of us knew anything about her, and Elder Taufa had just happened to see her address earlier that day. Well when we knock on the door a lady answers and she told us that her daughter joined the church a few years ago and now she’s at BYU-Idaho. She was really nice to us, so we went back a week later and we found out that she is going through some really difficult times (I might have told you some of this already in past e-mails). We shared scriptures, and gave her a blessing and gave her a lot of advice. Well, for the past 10 days she’s been in the hospital because her depression got so bad that it could have become fatal. While in the hospital she thought a lot about everything we talked to her about, and about how she felt. Last evening we visited her (she’s back home now) and she said her daughter just got engaged to a member, and they plan on getting married in the temple. She wants to be a part of it and she knows that she this church is the right place for her. Shes seen miracles happen in her daughters lives and she always gets a good comforting feeling when missionaries or members of the church come by. So she committed herself to come to church next week and she wants to start taking the lessons and hopefully get baptized. That was really exciting because we have been praying a lot for her. I can't say I expected this to happen though.
In other news, I heard a week or 2 ago that the gay guy named Ryan that we were teaching in Galveston now has a baptismal date. That is pretty amazing and a huge change to make.
Nope, I haven’t gotten the spaghetti letter yet, but I’m sure its sitting in the mission office, so I’ll get it on Friday.
Ok, well that's about all for this week. It was fun talking on the phone yesterday. Have a good week, I love you!!!
Love,
Chase
The heat here is getting pretty bad. Every day is supposed to be 88-90ish degrees throughout this next week. I’m going to leave my watch on every day and see how bad of a watch tan I can get. I can never manage to get one, I think it slides around too much. I can see the faint outline of my watch on my wrist already, so maybe I’ll be successful this summer.
Here’s the story about a lady named Maria Solorzano. You might remember that about a month or 2 ago me and my companion went biking in the pouring rain. My companion’s pedal was about to fall off and we needed an allen wrench to fix it, so we were trying to think of a member nearby. My companion remembered an address of a convert that lived just around the corner. Neither of us knew anything about her, and Elder Taufa had just happened to see her address earlier that day. Well when we knock on the door a lady answers and she told us that her daughter joined the church a few years ago and now she’s at BYU-Idaho. She was really nice to us, so we went back a week later and we found out that she is going through some really difficult times (I might have told you some of this already in past e-mails). We shared scriptures, and gave her a blessing and gave her a lot of advice. Well, for the past 10 days she’s been in the hospital because her depression got so bad that it could have become fatal. While in the hospital she thought a lot about everything we talked to her about, and about how she felt. Last evening we visited her (she’s back home now) and she said her daughter just got engaged to a member, and they plan on getting married in the temple. She wants to be a part of it and she knows that she this church is the right place for her. Shes seen miracles happen in her daughters lives and she always gets a good comforting feeling when missionaries or members of the church come by. So she committed herself to come to church next week and she wants to start taking the lessons and hopefully get baptized. That was really exciting because we have been praying a lot for her. I can't say I expected this to happen though.
In other news, I heard a week or 2 ago that the gay guy named Ryan that we were teaching in Galveston now has a baptismal date. That is pretty amazing and a huge change to make.
Nope, I haven’t gotten the spaghetti letter yet, but I’m sure its sitting in the mission office, so I’ll get it on Friday.
Ok, well that's about all for this week. It was fun talking on the phone yesterday. Have a good week, I love you!!!
Love,
Chase
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Received Mon, May 5, 2009
That was a good letter this week. The griffin stories always make me laugh. Zak sent me a good update as well.
I figured the “”I got it” email was just saying that you had gotten my e-mail. I think you sent me an e-mail about the swine flu while I was checking my e-mail so I knew that you were online. I think there's a delay though because I didn’t get the “I got it” til the next week.
The brick idea is working well. It was actually our Ward Mission Leader who did it all. People are already building the house. Just about every day we go to one or two active members and remind them about bishops challenge to invite members into their homes, so we’re really trying to keep everyone’s desire to do missionary work up, and its been going well. No teaching opportunities have come out of it yet, but people are asking questions and slowly opening the door to the gospel. This has also helped us to gain the trust and respect of our bishop. A few months ago he was saying how this area needs more than one set of missionaries because it is so big and a lot to handle. This last week he changed that thought and he wants us to get more miles in our car so we can work our whole area. He really trusts us and he knows we can do everything he wants.
Our area is huge, I don’t know if I’ve ever said that. From one side of our area to the other its around 50 miles 1 way, so we don’t get to go out there very often. By the way, yes that was a typo, we don’t eat at our bishops house for breakfast every day, I meant every Saturday. Every Saturday morning before we go and play soccer we eat breakfast at the bishops house. Sometimes he buys donuts…those are the best breakfasts. I actually just went to buy some donuts. I spent like 3 bucks at McDonald's, then used a bag of change I have to get some donuts across the street. The lady there was a very talkative Vietnamese lady. We must have done a good job entertaining her because she gave us each an extra donut.
While were still on the subject of food, I have to tell you about the huge breakfast I had. Last week I ate all of my cereal so I couldn’t have cereal for breakfast for like 2-3 days. It was weird not to have breakfast for cereal. I obviously missed it because on Tuesday morning after I bought more I ate over half a big box of Apple Jacks and nearly drank a half gallon of milk. That was delicious. I calculated that to be about 1400 calories.
I had some more bike troubles this week. Its not really surprising to me anymore to go to get my bike and see that the tire is flat. The only problem was that I had a really difficult time trying to patch this hole. 2 patches popped off and I only had 1 left, so I put that last patch on, then got some electric tape and wound it around there several times. When I pumped it up, I saw that there was another little hole, so I wound some electric tape around that hole too. I’ve ridden on my bike 3-4 days now and my makeshift patches are still working. I’m pretty proud of myself for that. I do have to give credit to that Guatemalan guy named Angel in Galveston that fixed my inner tube using masking tape. He gave me the idea.
This week we had Zone Conference. It was really good. This is our mission presidents 2nd to last Zone Conference. But like all our other Zone Conferences it got reeeally long. We were at the building by 8:30am and didn’t leave til 5:00pm. They did feed us lunch, so that was good. It gets kind of hard to pay attention for that whole time, but I learned a lot of good things.
I have a kind of funny story. Somehow in our conversation a month or two ago I told Elder Taufa about how I got diarrhea really bad in Galveston. I came to find out that he had never had diarrhea in his life. So he asked me exactly what it was and I told him. (I’ll leave out my explanation of diarrhea). He said that he wished he could have it to experience it. Bad idea. Yep he got bad diarrhea this week. He thinks he got it from some old Mexican food that was in our fridge for a few days. He pooped constantly for almost 2 days. We could barely get out to work when he had to come back and use the bathroom. He couldn’t really use a members bathroom because it would stink up the whole house, so we always had to come back home. He thought it was pretty cool at first. Then he got tired of it. I couldn’t help but to laugh at the whole thing. I still remember when he had it the first time he walked out of the bathroom and was like “Woow…that was so cool. I think I got diarrhea!” He has a little accent that makes everything funnier too.
The Dors baptism is still scheduled for May 16th and they are doing awesome. We taught them the Law of Chastity last week and talked to them about watching good movies and having good language and everything like that. Michelle (the mom) was like, this is what I’ve been trying to teach my kids!! She’s never let her kids watch rated R movies or anything. The kids asked us if there are any movies made by the church that they could watch, so were bringing them The Other Side of Heaven.
Tien, the Vietnamese lady, is still going to get baptized, but shes had to go into Houston for the past few weeks so we were going to choose a baptismal date again for her this week.
That is funny that the JW's are stopping by. Its always funny when they knock on missionaries doors. If they are in their proselyting clothes, the JW's freak out and just walk away usually. Sometimes they'll give us one of their Watchtower pamphlets. They are afraid of missionaries though...every time they see us they turn around and walk the opposite direction. If you try to talk to them they will ignore you. I think just bearing your testimony to them was a good idea.
A preacher from the Pentecostal church came to our church yesterday. I sat by him during sacrament meeting and told him a few things, and showed him a picture of the prophet. I also gave him a Book of Mormon and told him all about it. After Sacrament meeting he took me into the foyer to ask me questions about our church. I think he was trying to scare me and he quoted a bunch of scriptures and things. I finished quoting a lot of the scriptures he was saying and answered all of his questions. He told me he was very impressed with our church services and he was very interested to see what was in the Book of Mormon. He told me he was very impressed with what us young missionaries do. It was a really neat experience.
Everything else is still going really well. We are in week 5 of the transfer now. That means in 2 weeks we’ll get our transfer call. I’m pretty sure I’ll stay here, but you never know.
I also just realized I’m going to hit my 10 month mark in 5 days. It does not feel like its been 10 months to me.
Alright, well I love you all!! Have a great week!
Love,
Chase
PS. I forgot the name of the guy in who was in the NFL draft. I only remember his first name was Jacob. I think he's on the Steelers now.
PPS. I carry a pocket sized hand sanitizer thing with me pretty much every day and I use it pretty often. I did hear there was a confirmed case of the swine flu in a nearby high school though.
I figured the “”I got it” email was just saying that you had gotten my e-mail. I think you sent me an e-mail about the swine flu while I was checking my e-mail so I knew that you were online. I think there's a delay though because I didn’t get the “I got it” til the next week.
The brick idea is working well. It was actually our Ward Mission Leader who did it all. People are already building the house. Just about every day we go to one or two active members and remind them about bishops challenge to invite members into their homes, so we’re really trying to keep everyone’s desire to do missionary work up, and its been going well. No teaching opportunities have come out of it yet, but people are asking questions and slowly opening the door to the gospel. This has also helped us to gain the trust and respect of our bishop. A few months ago he was saying how this area needs more than one set of missionaries because it is so big and a lot to handle. This last week he changed that thought and he wants us to get more miles in our car so we can work our whole area. He really trusts us and he knows we can do everything he wants.
Our area is huge, I don’t know if I’ve ever said that. From one side of our area to the other its around 50 miles 1 way, so we don’t get to go out there very often. By the way, yes that was a typo, we don’t eat at our bishops house for breakfast every day, I meant every Saturday. Every Saturday morning before we go and play soccer we eat breakfast at the bishops house. Sometimes he buys donuts…those are the best breakfasts. I actually just went to buy some donuts. I spent like 3 bucks at McDonald's, then used a bag of change I have to get some donuts across the street. The lady there was a very talkative Vietnamese lady. We must have done a good job entertaining her because she gave us each an extra donut.
While were still on the subject of food, I have to tell you about the huge breakfast I had. Last week I ate all of my cereal so I couldn’t have cereal for breakfast for like 2-3 days. It was weird not to have breakfast for cereal. I obviously missed it because on Tuesday morning after I bought more I ate over half a big box of Apple Jacks and nearly drank a half gallon of milk. That was delicious. I calculated that to be about 1400 calories.
I had some more bike troubles this week. Its not really surprising to me anymore to go to get my bike and see that the tire is flat. The only problem was that I had a really difficult time trying to patch this hole. 2 patches popped off and I only had 1 left, so I put that last patch on, then got some electric tape and wound it around there several times. When I pumped it up, I saw that there was another little hole, so I wound some electric tape around that hole too. I’ve ridden on my bike 3-4 days now and my makeshift patches are still working. I’m pretty proud of myself for that. I do have to give credit to that Guatemalan guy named Angel in Galveston that fixed my inner tube using masking tape. He gave me the idea.
This week we had Zone Conference. It was really good. This is our mission presidents 2nd to last Zone Conference. But like all our other Zone Conferences it got reeeally long. We were at the building by 8:30am and didn’t leave til 5:00pm. They did feed us lunch, so that was good. It gets kind of hard to pay attention for that whole time, but I learned a lot of good things.
I have a kind of funny story. Somehow in our conversation a month or two ago I told Elder Taufa about how I got diarrhea really bad in Galveston. I came to find out that he had never had diarrhea in his life. So he asked me exactly what it was and I told him. (I’ll leave out my explanation of diarrhea). He said that he wished he could have it to experience it. Bad idea. Yep he got bad diarrhea this week. He thinks he got it from some old Mexican food that was in our fridge for a few days. He pooped constantly for almost 2 days. We could barely get out to work when he had to come back and use the bathroom. He couldn’t really use a members bathroom because it would stink up the whole house, so we always had to come back home. He thought it was pretty cool at first. Then he got tired of it. I couldn’t help but to laugh at the whole thing. I still remember when he had it the first time he walked out of the bathroom and was like “Woow…that was so cool. I think I got diarrhea!” He has a little accent that makes everything funnier too.
The Dors baptism is still scheduled for May 16th and they are doing awesome. We taught them the Law of Chastity last week and talked to them about watching good movies and having good language and everything like that. Michelle (the mom) was like, this is what I’ve been trying to teach my kids!! She’s never let her kids watch rated R movies or anything. The kids asked us if there are any movies made by the church that they could watch, so were bringing them The Other Side of Heaven.
Tien, the Vietnamese lady, is still going to get baptized, but shes had to go into Houston for the past few weeks so we were going to choose a baptismal date again for her this week.
That is funny that the JW's are stopping by. Its always funny when they knock on missionaries doors. If they are in their proselyting clothes, the JW's freak out and just walk away usually. Sometimes they'll give us one of their Watchtower pamphlets. They are afraid of missionaries though...every time they see us they turn around and walk the opposite direction. If you try to talk to them they will ignore you. I think just bearing your testimony to them was a good idea.
A preacher from the Pentecostal church came to our church yesterday. I sat by him during sacrament meeting and told him a few things, and showed him a picture of the prophet. I also gave him a Book of Mormon and told him all about it. After Sacrament meeting he took me into the foyer to ask me questions about our church. I think he was trying to scare me and he quoted a bunch of scriptures and things. I finished quoting a lot of the scriptures he was saying and answered all of his questions. He told me he was very impressed with our church services and he was very interested to see what was in the Book of Mormon. He told me he was very impressed with what us young missionaries do. It was a really neat experience.
Everything else is still going really well. We are in week 5 of the transfer now. That means in 2 weeks we’ll get our transfer call. I’m pretty sure I’ll stay here, but you never know.
I also just realized I’m going to hit my 10 month mark in 5 days. It does not feel like its been 10 months to me.
Alright, well I love you all!! Have a great week!
Love,
Chase
PS. I forgot the name of the guy in who was in the NFL draft. I only remember his first name was Jacob. I think he's on the Steelers now.
PPS. I carry a pocket sized hand sanitizer thing with me pretty much every day and I use it pretty often. I did hear there was a confirmed case of the swine flu in a nearby high school though.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Received Mon, April 27, 2009
This week I am writing my e-mail in Microsoft Word, then I will copy/paste it over. I always try to remember to copy my e-mails before I send them, but I’m usually just so relieved that I got through my whole e-mail without having any problems, so I click send quickly before anything happens. Unfortunately most things go wrong while you're sending. This is kind of interesting writing in Microsoft word…I get to see all my spelling and grammar errors. Myldsmail.net does not have any sort of spell check.
There are only a few interesting things that I left out of my recap letter last week. One of them being that I got to play racquetball again and it was a lot of fun. They also made a new rule that missionaries are no longer allowed to go to public gyms anymore, because it separates you from your companion and because missionaries are spending too much money on memberships. Me and Elder Taufa lucked out though. We have permission to keep using our gym because it’s a little private gym for the residence in our area only. It is kind of strange to hear the radio every morning and see TV’s, but I’m so tired in the mornings I don’t really pay attention to anything. So I’ll get to keep going to the gym as long as I’m in this area. I’m thinking I’ll be here for a while. I’ll be here for the rest of this one, and I’m pretty sure I’ll stay in this area and finish off Elder Taufa’s mission, then I’ll be here one more transfer at least to teach Elder Taufa’s replacement the area. So that’s like 3 more months or something. I’m very happy though.
Dad might be the only one to appreciate this, but Frank Beard from ZZ Top lives in our area. We just found that out…we have been driving past his house at least once a week. He has a huuuge property with big fields with lots of cattle. He has a big gate in front of his drive way and it says “Top 40” on it. The next time we see that gate open were going to drive down his driveway and go knock his door. I’ll let you know how it goes.
We just introduced our ward mission plan yesterday. Its really simple, but effective. Basically, our bishop challenged everyone in tithing settlement to invite 4-5 nonmembers into their homes every year. The goal is to have our ward have 1000 visits from nonmembers into their homes this year. I think it’s a genius plan. If members do this, everything else will fall into place. People will ask questions about pictures or whatever random things members have in their homes and it will spark an interest. More importantly than that, they will feel something in their homes that they don’t feel anywhere else. We’ve heard a lot of neat experiences already. To track the visits, our ward mission leader drew a house with 1000 bricks. Each time someone has a non-member visit, they get to fill in a brick with a marker, so by the end of the year hopefully all the bricks will be filled in and our house will be built. It’s a fun little idea. Our bishop loves the idea and he has full support for the plan. We have a really good relationship with the bishop, which is vital to be successful in an area. Part of that is due to us having breakfast with him every morning. I love that because we get to eat delicious food and we are helping progress the work.
Our investigators are all doing really well. We taught Tien the Word of Wisdom and she said she’s been living that for her whole life. We also taught the Word of Wisdom to the Dors and there were not really any problems, but Michelle (the mom) drinks decaf coffee. We were sure if that is included in the Word of Wisdom or not, so we talked to our mission president who told us we should just be safe and tell her we need to follow the word of wisdom completely and not drink any kind of coffee. I was a little bit worried, but when we told her, she was like, “Ok, I will stop drinking it.” It was no problem at all. A lot of our other good investigators have been sick with something that’s been going around here, so we haven’t been able to see them, but they are all doing well. David Majewski (the one that is going to be baptized after finishing the Gospel Principles book) is doing well too and hes getting pretty close to the end of the book.
This last week me and my companion have been on an ice cream crave for some reason. Ever since Mom sent me those peanut butter blossom cookies I’ve been on a cookie crave too. Last week Erika sent me a cookie pie (basically just a sheet of cookies on a circular pan) and I’ve been eating that on top of a bowl of ice cream almost every day. Together, me and Elder Taufa ate a gallon of ice cream last week. It was delicious. We bought another gallon today.
I tried some African food the other day. Maybe Steven has tried some also, but we had this stuff called Fufu with a big fat cow tongue and goat meat. Fufu is…well I think the best way to describe it is that it looks like Play-Do, tastes like it, and feels like it. I’m not sure what its made out of and I don’t think anyone really knows. My companion went on exchanges to another area and brought that back for me. I tried a tiny bite of each and it was gross. I don’t recommend it.
The doors fed us Haitian food again. They made fried plantains. They were pretty good, considering I don’t even really like bananas. I didn’t even know what plantains were until I came on my mission. I actually learned the word in Spanish, platano. So when I saw the plantain in the Dors I was like… Ohhh that’s a platano! They looked at me weird and I realized that was only a Spanish word. They also made a Papaya smoothie which was soooo good.
I think one of the coolest parts about serving a mission is that you get to talk to so many people from all around the world. They all have different backgrounds and their own unique stories. I counted it up the other day and I’ve talked to people from 28 different countries that I can remember. I’ve learned how to say hello in 15 different languages: English (obviously), Spanish, Vietnamese, Hindi, German, Korean, Russian, Tongan, Samoan, Fijian, Tahitian, French, Hawaiian, Japanese, and Tagalog. Those are all the ones that I’ve written down.
I think one of the neatest guys that we visit is a guy named Brother Noah. He has really bad cancer all over so he never really leaves his home but he has some crazy stories. He started out by working for the CIA (he cant really talk about anything he did there), then he was in the first group of people to be a Navy SEAL. This was during the time of the Vietnam war so he had a lot of special ops missions over there. He has some crazy stories. He got wounded and had to quit that, so then he went on to develop and build nuclear weapons. So we always have a good time talking to him. He let us hold a real grenade.
Last week I also talked to a guy who was in the NFL draft. I’m not sure if he got drafted or what team he went to, but I’ll find out today.
Well that’s about all. Mother’s Day is coming up, which means I get to call home. We have church from 11-2, which I think means we end church at 12 California time (you might want to double check). So if you give me a time frame that I should call in, next week I’ll try to give you a more precise time I’ll be calling.
Ok, well it sounds like everything is going well at home. I think that was a genius idea to hide the beetle so you could play with it later. Oh yeah, I’m not sure if I wrote back to Nana and Bumpa when they sent me a birthday card, so could you ask and see? If not I will write them next week. Ok, I love you all!! Have a good time at testing! I always loved that week because we had no homework and they were always easy tests.
Love,
Chase
There are only a few interesting things that I left out of my recap letter last week. One of them being that I got to play racquetball again and it was a lot of fun. They also made a new rule that missionaries are no longer allowed to go to public gyms anymore, because it separates you from your companion and because missionaries are spending too much money on memberships. Me and Elder Taufa lucked out though. We have permission to keep using our gym because it’s a little private gym for the residence in our area only. It is kind of strange to hear the radio every morning and see TV’s, but I’m so tired in the mornings I don’t really pay attention to anything. So I’ll get to keep going to the gym as long as I’m in this area. I’m thinking I’ll be here for a while. I’ll be here for the rest of this one, and I’m pretty sure I’ll stay in this area and finish off Elder Taufa’s mission, then I’ll be here one more transfer at least to teach Elder Taufa’s replacement the area. So that’s like 3 more months or something. I’m very happy though.
Dad might be the only one to appreciate this, but Frank Beard from ZZ Top lives in our area. We just found that out…we have been driving past his house at least once a week. He has a huuuge property with big fields with lots of cattle. He has a big gate in front of his drive way and it says “Top 40” on it. The next time we see that gate open were going to drive down his driveway and go knock his door. I’ll let you know how it goes.
We just introduced our ward mission plan yesterday. Its really simple, but effective. Basically, our bishop challenged everyone in tithing settlement to invite 4-5 nonmembers into their homes every year. The goal is to have our ward have 1000 visits from nonmembers into their homes this year. I think it’s a genius plan. If members do this, everything else will fall into place. People will ask questions about pictures or whatever random things members have in their homes and it will spark an interest. More importantly than that, they will feel something in their homes that they don’t feel anywhere else. We’ve heard a lot of neat experiences already. To track the visits, our ward mission leader drew a house with 1000 bricks. Each time someone has a non-member visit, they get to fill in a brick with a marker, so by the end of the year hopefully all the bricks will be filled in and our house will be built. It’s a fun little idea. Our bishop loves the idea and he has full support for the plan. We have a really good relationship with the bishop, which is vital to be successful in an area. Part of that is due to us having breakfast with him every morning. I love that because we get to eat delicious food and we are helping progress the work.
Our investigators are all doing really well. We taught Tien the Word of Wisdom and she said she’s been living that for her whole life. We also taught the Word of Wisdom to the Dors and there were not really any problems, but Michelle (the mom) drinks decaf coffee. We were sure if that is included in the Word of Wisdom or not, so we talked to our mission president who told us we should just be safe and tell her we need to follow the word of wisdom completely and not drink any kind of coffee. I was a little bit worried, but when we told her, she was like, “Ok, I will stop drinking it.” It was no problem at all. A lot of our other good investigators have been sick with something that’s been going around here, so we haven’t been able to see them, but they are all doing well. David Majewski (the one that is going to be baptized after finishing the Gospel Principles book) is doing well too and hes getting pretty close to the end of the book.
This last week me and my companion have been on an ice cream crave for some reason. Ever since Mom sent me those peanut butter blossom cookies I’ve been on a cookie crave too. Last week Erika sent me a cookie pie (basically just a sheet of cookies on a circular pan) and I’ve been eating that on top of a bowl of ice cream almost every day. Together, me and Elder Taufa ate a gallon of ice cream last week. It was delicious. We bought another gallon today.
I tried some African food the other day. Maybe Steven has tried some also, but we had this stuff called Fufu with a big fat cow tongue and goat meat. Fufu is…well I think the best way to describe it is that it looks like Play-Do, tastes like it, and feels like it. I’m not sure what its made out of and I don’t think anyone really knows. My companion went on exchanges to another area and brought that back for me. I tried a tiny bite of each and it was gross. I don’t recommend it.
The doors fed us Haitian food again. They made fried plantains. They were pretty good, considering I don’t even really like bananas. I didn’t even know what plantains were until I came on my mission. I actually learned the word in Spanish, platano. So when I saw the plantain in the Dors I was like… Ohhh that’s a platano! They looked at me weird and I realized that was only a Spanish word. They also made a Papaya smoothie which was soooo good.
I think one of the coolest parts about serving a mission is that you get to talk to so many people from all around the world. They all have different backgrounds and their own unique stories. I counted it up the other day and I’ve talked to people from 28 different countries that I can remember. I’ve learned how to say hello in 15 different languages: English (obviously), Spanish, Vietnamese, Hindi, German, Korean, Russian, Tongan, Samoan, Fijian, Tahitian, French, Hawaiian, Japanese, and Tagalog. Those are all the ones that I’ve written down.
I think one of the neatest guys that we visit is a guy named Brother Noah. He has really bad cancer all over so he never really leaves his home but he has some crazy stories. He started out by working for the CIA (he cant really talk about anything he did there), then he was in the first group of people to be a Navy SEAL. This was during the time of the Vietnam war so he had a lot of special ops missions over there. He has some crazy stories. He got wounded and had to quit that, so then he went on to develop and build nuclear weapons. So we always have a good time talking to him. He let us hold a real grenade.
Last week I also talked to a guy who was in the NFL draft. I’m not sure if he got drafted or what team he went to, but I’ll find out today.
Well that’s about all. Mother’s Day is coming up, which means I get to call home. We have church from 11-2, which I think means we end church at 12 California time (you might want to double check). So if you give me a time frame that I should call in, next week I’ll try to give you a more precise time I’ll be calling.
Ok, well it sounds like everything is going well at home. I think that was a genius idea to hide the beetle so you could play with it later. Oh yeah, I’m not sure if I wrote back to Nana and Bumpa when they sent me a birthday card, so could you ask and see? If not I will write them next week. Ok, I love you all!! Have a good time at testing! I always loved that week because we had no homework and they were always easy tests.
Love,
Chase
Monday, April 20, 2009
Received Mon, April 20, 2009
Ugh...I just wrote a big long e-mail and it didn't send. This website definitely is not the greatest for sending e-mails. I might just start writing my e-mails in Microsoft word then copy and paste it over to send it to make sure I don't lose any more e-mails. I only have 10 minutes left so I'll just try to recap everything quickly.
We are doing really well...we've found some really good new people to teach that we are excited about. We've been working really well with the members. We never go to a set appointment without a member. The only time we teach lessons without members is when we are knocking on doors or talking to people in the streets. In those cases most people don't listen long enough to let us teach them a lesson. Its pretty interesting. This week we had 8 member present lessons and only 6 lessons w/o members. Usually people get tons of lessons w/o members and have a hard time teaching lessons with members. Its been really fun to work in this area.
I discovered a new drink called Apple Manzana. Its in a red soda can with a green apple on it or something. They have it all over the place here. They always have it at church events and any time someone is going to feed a lot of people. Its just like sparkling cider but not nearly as carbonated and its a lot sweeter and much more delicious.
I discovered a new snack as well. One day Sister Randall made some cookies and I decided instead of just eating a cookie I would get 2 cookies and put a big huge scoop of ice cream in the middle and have an ice cream sandwich. It was soooo good. Its just like those tollhouse cookie sandwiches, except they don't cost 2 dollars.
Everything is going really well. I cant believe I'm starting the 3rd week of my 6th transfer. Time flies out here. But like President Uchtdorf says, "Time flies, but you are the pilot."
Elder Taufa and I go to the gym every morning, which is pretty fun. We go to soccer every Saturday morning, where members bring their nonmember friends.
Ok, I have have to go.
I got that package of mail mom sent. The cookies were a little stale, but that's because I didn't open them right away. They were still delicious. No, its not a big deal to send that shirt home. I will try to do it next week. I'll send along my memory card full of pictures too.
Ok, I love you all!! I have to remember to start copying my e-mails before I send them!!
Grr...thats ok. I loved hearing how everyone was doing.
Love,
Chase
We are doing really well...we've found some really good new people to teach that we are excited about. We've been working really well with the members. We never go to a set appointment without a member. The only time we teach lessons without members is when we are knocking on doors or talking to people in the streets. In those cases most people don't listen long enough to let us teach them a lesson. Its pretty interesting. This week we had 8 member present lessons and only 6 lessons w/o members. Usually people get tons of lessons w/o members and have a hard time teaching lessons with members. Its been really fun to work in this area.
I discovered a new drink called Apple Manzana. Its in a red soda can with a green apple on it or something. They have it all over the place here. They always have it at church events and any time someone is going to feed a lot of people. Its just like sparkling cider but not nearly as carbonated and its a lot sweeter and much more delicious.
I discovered a new snack as well. One day Sister Randall made some cookies and I decided instead of just eating a cookie I would get 2 cookies and put a big huge scoop of ice cream in the middle and have an ice cream sandwich. It was soooo good. Its just like those tollhouse cookie sandwiches, except they don't cost 2 dollars.
Everything is going really well. I cant believe I'm starting the 3rd week of my 6th transfer. Time flies out here. But like President Uchtdorf says, "Time flies, but you are the pilot."
Elder Taufa and I go to the gym every morning, which is pretty fun. We go to soccer every Saturday morning, where members bring their nonmember friends.
Ok, I have have to go.
I got that package of mail mom sent. The cookies were a little stale, but that's because I didn't open them right away. They were still delicious. No, its not a big deal to send that shirt home. I will try to do it next week. I'll send along my memory card full of pictures too.
Ok, I love you all!! I have to remember to start copying my e-mails before I send them!!
Grr...thats ok. I loved hearing how everyone was doing.
Love,
Chase
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