April 27, 2009

Hey everybody! I thought I would just get on and tell ya that shawn is doing well. He is working hard and is doing a great job. He didn't even know about the earthquake till he was asked if he felt it and he didn't know about the flu till a member told him. The Mission president has given the elders some guidelines while the flu is out and about. All we can do is pray that everything will go alright. Thanks for keeping up with what has been happening. And sorry I have been horrible at posting this for him. Will try to keep it updated more in the following weeks! :)

~Shay

March 2, 2009

This past week was good, although it did kind of stink too, because well I got sick pretty much the whole week and now I will tell you the story of how it all started. First about sunday of last week I started to sneeze a bunch and my nose was starting to be stuffy, so it was a start of a cold, so I was like great but continued to work and stuff. On wedneday we had divisions with the district leader and the zone leaders, and I went with the zone leader and well things were fine until the night when I felt tired and a headache, but the following day after the divisions we started working but then I got sick to my stomach, I felt like throwing up but didn´t, so we went back to the house and found out that I had a fever as well so I slept pretty much the whole day until the night time then we did some visits. Friday I felt a little better so we worked and stuff and Saturday I felt worse so the morning I slept to feel better for the appointments that we had for the day. Yesterday I felt tired all day because I didn´t sleep well saturday night i don´t know why but oh well. So that is my exciting week although we did have a baptism yesterday of a girl who is 17 years old and has a son that is 1 years old or maybe 2 don´t remember. But the baptism went we had some members come to support and stuff so that was nice. Oh on friday something funny did happen, Okay is that we are knocking on a door of one of the investigator that we found, and well there is this guy that comes up to us out of no where and is like `do you want an orange?` I was like no so he asks my comp the same thing and well my comp didn´t want it either so the guy is like `why don´t you want my orange, what do you have against me` and throws the orange on the ground, and looked like he wanted to fight but lucky for us is that there was a cop car that was coming so my comp signals the cop and the cop is like what is going on here and so the guy who was offered us the orange well picks up the orange and offers it is the cop and the like says okay you know how things work, and the guy opens the car door and gets in by himself and the cop take him away it was so funny but the bad part was that the investigator wasn´t home. Anyways that is my excitement for the week. What do you mean how do we get around? The whole mission walks. This area has a bit more money then the other area, but almost everyone struggles with money but they enjoy the company of their families. Well I think that does it for me this week. Well Love YA!

Elder Larsen

February 23, 2009

bueno, voy a escribir un poco en español pues porque Yo puedo y ustedes no pueden entenderme. ¡Que Chistoso! Pues a menos que Tyler me entienda, pero vamos a ver. (Ha ha, again i will not translate, hopefully you know your spanish or know someone who will tell you what it says...) Well sounds like everyone had a fun time this past week. although I do have one question, Sean went to Argentina or Australia? Because I thought you told me Australia but I could be wrong. If he did go to Argentina then he is learning a different spanish then I am. Well same words they just say the words differently but that is cool. What I like about my new area is that it is more of a city life then the small town life that my other area was like, and less streets, and smaller area. The thing that I don´t like is that not a lot of people will listen and the people that will listen are Christian´s that don´t want to be baptized "again" so we don´t have a lot in the teaching pool right now. Oh I do have an experience that was pretty fun. so on friday I do believe, a TJ (Jehova´s witness) came and knocked on the door and one of the sons of the sister where we live goes to the door to see who it is, and there he was a TJ and my comp is like go and teach him so I went and asked where they took out some scriptures from the bible and he responded saying that their bible is the most correct book on the planet because they took the original text from the bible. Well in revelations it says that anyone that takes a word out from this book, then their name shall be taken out from the book of life. But he is like no because this is the from the original deal and things like that. Then I asked him if jehova and jesus is the same person and he said no that jehova is god and that many people are confused by that. Well I showed him some things but he didn´t understand not because of my spanish but he would just change it to something else. But he knows a little about our church so yeah that is just a little bit of my fun this week it was pretty exciting. We are hoping for a couple of baptism this week but one of them has beening going on before I got here, her name is Cenorina and all she needs is money for a divorcement and to get married. And the other we found about two weeks ago and is about ready. Oh and yesterday we went to the visitor center here with some investigators and it went well watch a movie and walked around and answered some questions it was pretty sweet. then that night we played Jenga with the family that we rent from that was fun too, I lost once. well that is pretty much it for this week. Anyways Love Ya!!

February 16, 2009

I am in the same state as before just a different area, Olivos. (He got transfered!!!) It is a little bit different place then my area in tecamac because here it is a bit more city life, and it is a smaller area. We have like 3 or 4 main streets then we have like 12 smaller streets, we can walk from the bottom of our area to the top in like 20 mins so yeah kinda small. We live with members, which they are really nice also they have two sons, one is 19 in which he sometimes comes with us to work and stuff and the other one is older I am not sure how much older but yes older. Another cool thing is that the older son is the Ward mission leader, but the bad thing is that he is hardly home so that is cool. The ward is kind of small, this past week there were 90ish in sacrament meeting. The members are pretty nice too. But not of people want to listen to us though, because we did a lot knocking on doors and stuff but not a lot of people want to listen so this will be interesting. Okay so my new comp is Elder Rodriguez, he is from San luiz mexico, 21 years old, has 7 brothers and sisters, and has 9 months in the mission. He is a good guy, likes to play fúlbal. Our apartment is a lot better then the one before, because we can basically live there, there is a kitchen and desks. Although it is smaller but that is okay, I like it better. Oh another thing about the apartment is that it is also stuffy because there isn`t a lot of air going in and out. Sounds like home is home, but I don´t like the Idea that you bought a new bottling machine without me, or my advise, but more then anything is that you bought it when I am not working there, about 2 years ago would have been nice. nah just kidding, you should name it stainless bob. Oh just some info on veracurz mexico because I have met some people from veracruz here, and they are interesting people, they can be kind of rude and I am sure that cameron will hear and the swear words a lot more. But they are interesting people. (My friend Cameron is going to Veracruz Mexico, and so i told shawn about it.. So yeah) Oh about the church building is that it is very very very small, all it is, is just one hallway at one end is the sacrament room and the other end is the offices and in between are the classrooms, and only two wards go there so that is good, our church starts at 10 in the morning. Oh and yesterday we had to fill the baptism font with buckets, Okay about half of it maybe a little less then half, because there was already some water but not enough. Bueno so this past week we did a lot of knocking on doors and stuff and while we were walking there was this group of people started to talk to us in english saying to come here because they wanted to talk and stuff, to we go and start talking, and come to find out that 3 out of the 10 that were there were mormons and yeah that was cool because one of the question is that if we change our shoes, and I was like no and I show them my shoes and in fact one of them has a small hole so we laughed and stuff. Yeah it was cool, will not sure what else to say so yeah Love YA!!

Love
Elder Larsen

February 9, 2009

Sounds like everyone had a fun week! I had a pretty good/amazing week, we baptized the dad of a family and his son, in which it completes the whole family so that is cool and really sweet because how this dad got his answer was freaking sweet. it was wednesday night and we go to the house to share a some scriptures, which I shared 2 nephi 4 28 and 30 and also my comp shares a scripture in the bible after that my comp says that we are going to kneel down and pray, and he will pray for his answer. After some time of praying he gets up, and he is crying, and says okay I will get baptized, it was freaking sweet because everyone was crying because of this response as well as that we could feel the influence of the spirit. the baptism went very very well. The wife has been a member for a year, and a number of missionaries have tried to baptize him but didn´t so that was the highlight of my week. Another thing that was cool was that the son is 8 years old, and when he turned 8 he asked his dad that for a birthday gift would be that the dad gets baptized along with the son, so on saturday we did just that. Well that is about it for this past week because we spent quite of bit of time getting him ready for his baptism. Last night I found out that I have transfers, I don´t know where I am going but I will let you know next week, because we find out if we have transfers sunday night, then the transfers happen tuesdays at the church next to the temple. So yeah I think that is about it I thought of something for my next package but I forgot so I guess don´t worry about it. Hey has kevin entered in the MTC? Okay I don´t remember any thing else to write, I have a letter started but I don´t think I will have time today to finish it, because we still have to wash and I need to pack my stuff up for tomorrow. Well LOVE YA!!!

Elder Larsen

February 2, 2009

bueno ¿pueden entenderme? Si no pues ¡Que triste!(do not ask me for translations, i just put the emails on the blog. I have no clue what he is saying. For all i know, he could be making up his own language...) Charle, the super bowl has already happen?! oh well, how were the commercials? I don´t have anything interesting this week. We did help the sister missionaries with their baptism this past week so that was fun. we did the baptism late at night like at 8 en la noche. voy a poner a few palabras of spanish por ustedes so that ustedes aprenda the language tal como me. Okay that was fun, it is pretty cool learning a different language because sometimes like I think in spanish like some words then other times in english but oh well I am sure that is what happened with tyler. So he understands me. (and yet we don't!) Today we had the zone activity in a church building where we played basket ball and fútbal, fetch, the mexicans are way good at fútbal! Es como Charle. Also we ate pizza and watch "Other side of Heaven" so that was fun. So Derek is going to Argentina huh. Thats cool. I guess a lot of people are going to different countries now because before there was a lot of people going to states missions, but who knows everything is inspiration so just depends. This past week we did have contacting, because we got some references like 50, because about a month ago we had in activity at the church. The activity was like the visiter center but smaller, so that is where we got them. So we checked some of those and contacted and stuff. okay so now to answer some questions.
Things are going well with my comp, we think that I will get transfered, and transfers are next week so I will inform you then. Our room is cleaner now then when the district leader came to the apartment. my area is kind of boring actually like there isn´t much to do on P days because it is just like a small town, but about half an hour there is a mall and that is about it. The Ward is alright just not of excitement for missionary work. I don´t have any amazing experiences this past week, but next week I probably will. my clothes are going good for the most part, but my shoes the souls are about worn out, and quite a bit of my socks have holes in them, so things are still good. Well my favorite scripture is a whole chapter, in Alma 26 it is a good one for missionaries. Well the one that I thought of for a song was a child´s prayer, but there are more then that. Oh hey not sure if I told you but sister Bulloch got the christmas card that you sent mom, and says thanks! I think she got it about a month ago. Well I think that is about it for this week. Have fun, and don´t die!!

Les Quiero, or if you like Les Amo

Elder Larsen

January 26, 2009

Sounds like everyone is having a good time with everything. For me one of the most exciting thing that happened to me was last night, because it was funny. So we were walking to the bishop´s house and then we hear a bang! Then the next thing I see was that someone was running away, because he hit his car with someone else´s car, fortunately there was a cop right behind when the accident happened so the cop started to run after the guy and the cop freakin throw him to the ground. I was like wow I am in mexico, it was freakin sweet! So that was pretty exciting. So where is Derek going? So Ted is going on a mission for sure? That´s pretty sweet. Russia huh, that is weird because while I was in the MTC, the people that were going to Russia had to change where they were going because Russia wasn´t accepting anymore for a while, but maybe they changed their minds I don´t know, I hope so! This week has been good, we had a baptism yesterday, it was a kid that his sisters are members but the parents are not because they are not married for civil because the husband thinks that it just a piece of paper and nothing more. so Anyway, on Friday night we had some meat from Oacxca it was freaking good!! so for your question mom, I was not embarrassed when he came.
On Thursday, we helped a sister in the ward, who is in-active, paint her house, while just the frames around the windows outside. So my comp cleaned first then I painted, and we had to use a ladder so that was pretty fun. And today we are going to have a family home evening with a family that are newly members, so that will be fun. Oh so I have started a letter and I am hoping to get it sent here soon, because I finally had a little time to do it. Well that is about it for this week Lucky Kyle eating cookies, and shay Cheesecake. Unlucky for Tyler, I´m sorry Cuate. When does Kevin go into the MTC? What is his e mail? Bueno I am done. Love Ya!!!!!!

Elder Larsen