So yeah, here I am. Good to hear from you all, as usual. Nothing super exciting has happened thats out of the ordinary for honduras. Stuff from the week:

had two good service opportunites-took up this ladie´s floor in her house and it felt good to work with my hands again. took up all her wood floor which was interesting because her house is built on a steep hill and we were walking on this framework of 2x4´s over a 20 foot drop while taking up the floor. Also went and cleared some land with machetes. They use machetes for everything here. Everyone has at least a few machetes.

Had a great sunday yesterday-church was great, and, always an adventure. Was thinking the whole time of the blessings of the temple and the family unit and how I can´t wait to go to the temple with all the family one day. And we played a game in our gospel principles class where we divided the room into teams and it became an all out war. full on shouting. always an adventure. Then after church this sister in the ward who floods us with referrals invited us over to lunch along with other people and it was fun getting to her house-we crammed 4 elders and 2 hermanas and 5 other people into a ford ranger and cruised up to her house flying over hills with a view of the ocean. And then lunch was good-I´m understanding everybody and participating in the conversation and jokes and it was just one of those moments where the mission is getting pretty good.

And this place would be the easiest place to live off the land. We were waitin for someone the other day and I realized that I am sitting in a grove of mango trees, with a beehive above my head, surrounded by fields of banana and coconut trees, with chickens pecking the ground around me while surrounded by an ocean full of fish. No one ever goes hungry here-even the poorest people can always go catch a fish or pick bananas.

I´ll tell ya about one family-I still don´t know their last name but they are misquito, which is an indigenous group of people mixed with indians and slaves. Their oldest boy is alonzo, whos 23 and we are struggling to retain. He is the embodiment of people that have recieved witnesses to the truth of the message but will not lift a finger to do anything about it. But their younger kids are awesome. We challened them to read the BoM every day this week and then we happened to pass by their house later in the week and the two younger ones were sitting at the table reading the BoM by candlelight. We´ve really been preparing David, the younger boy, to recieve the priesthood-and the other day when we were leaving he just comes up and gives me a big hug. All their kids love us. I gave them scripture marking pencils and they just about died.

The weather is getting really nice here-its still Africa hot during the day but in the mornings and evenings its really pleasant. fairly dry, and our area is all coastal so we get a nice breeze all the time. The best times are when we´re teaching people on the hills and we teach them outside of their house with a view of the ocean and a nice breeze.

Spanish is coming along great. I´m up to understanding about 60 percent of what people say but i can always get the jist of it.

Hardest thing for me this week has been patience. We spend an unreal amount of time waiting for people. Waiting for the Hermanas. Waiting for investigators. ya voy a venir, which means, basically, I´m already coming! has become profanity to my ears, because its always a lie and usually means I´m gonna have to wait another half hour. So that´s a struggle.

Had an interesting experience with an evangelical pastor this week-which I actually always enjoy because everytime I talk with an evangelical my testimony of our faith grows because of the apostasy and ignorance that dribbles from their mouths. It was cool at first because he seemed sincere and wanting to kinow but as time went on he just kept trying to preach. We managed to maintain control of the situation but still...it just made me realize how much of a waste of time stuff like that is. We have better things to do. We ended things when he told us how sinful it was to play sports or to wear shorts or for women to cut their hair.

That´s about all I got, time´s ticking. I´m gonna send more pictures and reply to everything.

lunch one day. typical meal. usuallly rotate between fried chicken and fish with a litle stack of corn tortillas.

 

one of my favorite little areas to work in-its clean and the houses aren´t jammed together

 

this pic is the house of our cook, one of the nicest houses i´ve been in. her name is Hermana Garay and is a great and upstanding member of the church.