November 29, 2010

Happy Turkey Day!

Ok, so I've got to say that Thanksgiving was weird in a foreign country. It was a pretty fun day though and we worked hard. Only one member lady knew that it was Thanksgiving. They just call it the day of thanks here because there isn't really a translation for Thanksgiving. It was cool though. Sadly though, I did not have anything that even resembled Turkey. Instead, I had more cow udders. I've gotta say, guys. I'm going to eat everything when I get home no matter what it is. Ha! I'm even eating fruits and things regularly. As for the weather here, it's nice. It gets up to about 75 or 80 still in the day, but it gets way cold at night! It's been fun though. I am definitely eating good food and I'm enjoying that a lot!

Other than Thanksgiving, let's go through the week. So first off, Elder Lambert is here and happy! He has a really tough companion, but his Spanish is way good and I know he's going to be a good leader in the mission. It was funny. We have District Meetings every week with the zone and afterward we were talking (in Spanish because we are in the company of people who don't understand English) and he just stopped and said he had to talk in English with me because he had a bunch of questions for me about everything he's supposed to be doing. It was kind of weird because I realized I didn't know what I was doing either. haha. Anyway, we talked for a little bit and he seems to be doing really well and enjoying Mexico and everything. Speaking of district meetings, it was weird. My zone has a bunch of goofs in it and it's tough to get stuff done, so we had to talk to the districts about the importance of our calling and important stuff like that. It was strange to tell people what they need to be doing because really, I need to work just as hard as anyone else and more to be worthy of my calling and the priesthood. I do love how much I've learned these few weeks about myself, about who I want to become these two years, and who the Lord needs me to be. I have so much room for improvement, but I promise I'm trying to do my best. I have definitely felt the Lord lift me up in my times of need and my support always comes from your letters, talks, or scriptures. Thanks so much for all your support!

Alright, so moving on with the week: Oh, mom, you're gonna love this! There is a guy in my ward who looks like.... Johnny Depp! And when I say looks like, I mean he acts like him too! At least in the interviews I've seen! Fun, eh?

So, last night we went to a member's house and guess what we did! We wrote letters to Santa! So you all don't even need to worry about me because Santa will find me and it'll be alright! Sweet, eh?

Anyway, lots of love,

Elder Alexander



November 22, 2010

Familia!
Hey guys! How are you all? I hope amazing because I'm feeling pretty good! It is a little weird right now to not be home for Thanksgiving because people here don't really know about it. haha. It is fun though. Christmas is beginning here and it's like 70 degrees or something. Crazy, eh? Anyway, it is pretty fun here. Elder Lopez is pretty cool and we're working pretty well together. We really don't have any problems because we just keep going and WE work. He's really funny and a little crazy which
really is ok because hey, I'm a little bit nuts too.

So this week on the 20th was the centenial of the revolution of Mexico which was cool. There were fireworks going on, special speeches, stuff like that. It was cool. (Oh and by the way, people really don't celebrate cinco de mayo. Half of them don't even know what happened then. I guess it was a battle of some sort. Who knows?) So that was cool and also, I went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders this week to learn a little bit more of how to teach better, contact better, and really just do everything better. It was actually pretty cool. I went with Elder Watson for 24 ours in his area
to work with him and Elder Quintana went to my area to work with Elder Lopez. It was fun and I did learn a lot. I learned that I need to work hard because I don't know very much! haha It was good though and we taught some amazing lessons with the Spirit and I can't even tell you how cool it is to just bare testimony of the Gospel and help people to resolve doubts or problems they have.

Ok, so I have to tell you the crazy thing I ate and there really isn't a nice way of going around it so..... I ate bull testicles.... Gross, eh? I don't really want to go into detail, but yeah, they didn't taste too bad and really it was just meat, but still.... yeah.....nuts, eh? We were with a family and yeah, they served it to us in a stew type thing. Can you believe it, we're outside burning with heat and they have stew and soup at every meal. haha.

Anyway, that's about it other than the fact that Nate has a beard!!!!! I definitely need to see some pics of that because I'm just not picturing it or believing it right now!!!! Crazy!!! I would love to be doing that charity thing too, but guess what.... I shave every day! haha It's actually getting to the point where I really need to because my neck and chin look bad in the mornings. Oh, and some other news, Elder Lambert's coming to my zone!!!!!!!! I'm stoked to see him and even though he only got here like 3 weeks ago, he's senior companion! How sweet is that? He's gonna dominate and it's gonna be fun to have him here!

Ok so really, this is the last thing... maybe. I feel old because this week I bought an Iron. Crazy! My comp's Iron wasn't working so I bought a nice $20 Iron to smoothe out those wrinkles. I feel like an old man. Oh and hey, just have a few requests of you.... I need the picture of me, mom, and Nate the day I reported to the MTC because I printed out the one mom sent and the resolution is really bad so if you could e-mail another one, that would be sweet. Also, there's a picture of Joseph Smith that I love and I found out who painted it and what it's called. It's "American Prophet" by Del Parson.... If you could encounter that somewhere and send it to me that would be awesome. Also, there's this picture of Jesus where he's smiling with his teeth and everything and I don't know what it's called. It looks like the normal one the church uses, but hes smiling and I would relly love to have that too. Also, I want to send a package of stuff home for you all, but I lack the funds here to do so, so if you could put some money in my account just so I can do that, that would rock!

Love you all sooooooo much and here's a little Spanish:

Mi familia: les amo bastante porque soy un miembro de la Iglesia verdadera por ustedes. Muchas gracias por sus ejemplos y la vida que yo tengo. les amo.