April 27, 2015
un chingo de fotos

(This week Curtis got to email him back and forth so we didn't get much of a letter but received amazing pictures!)
 

We went to the beach today for pday and just got back so we're real short on time. But I'll give yall the importants!

 

first, I found a sand dollar today. Remember when we were in sanibel (I think?) and just found buckets and buckets of those things? They were different I think but still. 

 



this one is a district photo on the beach. the girl on the left has a funny tshirt because it's pronounced "yamaha" spelled that way in spanish. from left to right we have bolivia, california, paraguay, el salvador, FLORIDA, and another boliviano. 



 

This has been quite a week! Sure has been eventful. But I really only have time to upload the pics, we have an appointment in 30 minutes or so. Also, you guys are killing it! Loved all the stories and pictures. Good looking bunch of people, everybody. And I'm real glad the boys got to go fishing, thats exciting stuff. Awesome pictures and stories. Wish I had more time to respond to all of it, but...just know I'm proud of yall! I'm gonna send my friends some pictures and then see If I don't have any more time to write to you all. But the other thing, are we good for may 15th to skype?

 

 

 

now, the first baptism. Here we are, gathered at the waters of mormon. What a beautiful for a place for a baptism. 



here's Luis. Super solid. He's attending seminary, going to all his meetings, hanging out with the youth, and even singing in the choir. I'm only singing in the choir cause we're expected to. 

Luis with his family. Really the whole family's been converted but we just gotta get them married. The mom is named Rosibell and the dad is named Rigoberto. And his little sister is Karen. Super solid all of them. 

Yudi  (judy) and cynthia. Niece and Aunt but she's practically her mother. Also solid. Everyone thought they were members. Different river. 

 

April 22, 2015

howdy! Not a ton of time to write, I'm kind of on a modified pday, but here I am! The seminary class is taught by the relief society pres. Usually 4 or 5 students. And yeah, we live together, but we're getting split up next week! We have to leave our awesome house. However, we found another house, just for my comp and I, and its...amazing. It'll be like living in America. The bedroom has AC, and we have hot water...it was actually kind of a cool story because the couple had to leave town and had been praying to find someone to rent their house to that wouldn't have parties and didn't have kids and would take care of it, and then the next day we showed up and wanted to rent their house. They're relieved and we get an awesome house for cheap. And it has a yard full of fruit trees and a patio and they might even leave the washing machine.

waiting for the members to show up in the bus to stake conference-5:30 AM and Africa hot. It's a selfie but heres our group. The non missionary got baptized that day along with his friend, and we have a baptism...tomorrow! Of Luis. He moved it up so he could get baptized on his birthday and so his dad could attend. 

 

And no, ramble away. That's all I ever do, my updates sure aren't organized. 

And as far as my package...I'm in need haha. HOnduras suddenly hit a drought of contact solution, so If you could include some in the package (if possible) it would be great. I hate using glasses. Also, I could really use some shorts. Plain khaki shorts, not cargo shorts, like the ones I used before the mission. same size and everything. Length is fine, the ones I had that got torn up in the shop were enough to cover the garments. I really shouldn't walk around on pday's in gym shorts, and my jeans are even worse after all the working we do in them. And....new shoes! I actually think it would be better to send boat shoes-what I'm really in need of is pday clothes. All my other clothes-jeans and tshirts-are just fine for service, already ratty-but I want to be able to walk around on pday in decent clothes and maintain a semi-profesional appearance, it's really not ideal to walk around in gym shorts and a tshirt. 

But yes, I'm exercising, and eating relatively healthy! I don't buy soda anymore, its just when people give it to us, which is a couple times a day. Also, side note, I've drunk unpurified water a few times in the last week and haven't gotten sick...I'm Honduran! 

And thanks for the talks! 

And tell Nikki I'm sorry about the ACL, that stinks. Is he done done? If I remember he had lots of potencial. 

I was just rambling too, but thanks for the pictures, and have fun tonight, and If I think of anything else to tell while I'm writing friends I'll be sure to throw it in. 

Love you all!

I just want sarah to realize how much fun we're gonna have together in BYU. Also, how's my truck? What's the plan with the horse when sarah's runnoft? Glad Prom was fun, I actually ended up liking mine. Will there be a time when us three will be at the Y together? Possibly? 

 

April 20th, 2015

(Scott has an extra partial Pday this week so we heard from him twice.  I was able to email back and forth with him and that was so fun!)

Playing soccer. Not fat, it's the wind. I'm actually getting skinny again, my little balleada belly went away. Hondurans are so direct, I've had lots of people come up and pat me on the belly and say " you're getting a little fat now ain't ya??" I love it, it cracks me up



Javier Ramos with his son and daughter. They all got up early, at 5<30 AM, to go to stake conference with us, and Javier was sustained to become an Elder. His wife's not in the picture. 

Just so you all know, this is the hottest place on earth. Between now and June is basically hell. It's unbearable hot, there's no rain, and it's still humid, and all the haze has lifted up and covers the valley. It's stifling. But, no worries. 

Other interesting things from this week! We had stake conference this week. And it was really nice. As cool as it is having church outside on someone's porch, it is truly refreshing to be with a large group of saints, in a chapel, with air conditioning. It's powerful. And the priesthood sessions too, singing "praise to the man"with 600 priesthood holders is pretty cool and made me homesick. Strength in numbers!

Had kind of a rough experience this week though. Not rough per say, but here goes. One of those times that reminds me that, as tranquil as morazan is, we're still in Honduras. So we've been working with a man named Carlos for a long time. 20 years old. His family are more or less active members. He finally gained some trust in us and this week he confided in us what's up. Basically, he left home when he was 15 because of family problems and long story short ended up getting forced into a gang. This actually happens alot, what happens is you offend the gang or someone related to the gang, and then they're like..."well, we've got two options...we'll kill you and your whole family, or...you sell this truckload of cocaine in two weeks"and then they end up selling drugs to preserve their lives. Can't go to the police because the police will just tell the gangs that somebody snitched, and they'll end up getting killed just as quick. Long story short, Carlos and his cousin sold the drugs but then burned through all the money. So the gang chief in charge of carlos kept threatening to kill him and made attempts, so carlos, as a 15 year old, went to his house and killed this man with a belt and shoving a bottle of pure alcohol down his throat. Turns out this man has higher up connections, like Narco/cartel connections, so now the cartel wants revenge. He told us that they drive by the house every 15 minutes and are always watching him just waiting for their chance. So, we called president and he told us that we really don't have a choice, we have to leave him. For our own safety and for the safety of the church (the inactive son of the woman that hosts the church in her house has cartel connections and a fear is that if Carlos ever came to church he'd tell his associates and they'd come by and kill him in church) we have to leave him. Honestly broke my heart. He'd come so far. He has a testimony of the Book of Mormon. He reads. We had just gained his trust to where he told us of his past. We told him he could be forgiven. I feel for his poor mother, who sticks by his side 24/7 to feel like she's protecting him and had such high hopes for our visits and clasped our hands and kept saying "bless you, bless you" when we first started to visit carlos...And now we have to leave him. Learned alot from this experience. Lots of gratitude for where I'm from and the kind of family I have. And Its a perfect example of how easy it is to get caught up in things like that. Little steps lead to big steaps and pretty soon you're bound in chains like Carlos is. Satan binds us by flaxen threads. Carlos just started off smoking weed on the street corner with his cousin and kept getting brought down that road. Hate weed and I hate the gangs and I hate the cartel and most of all I hate the honduran government. 

Anyways. Now I'm not really in the mood to share anything else haha but that's our week. Definitely some high points though. We have a super solid investigator named Luis that's gonna be baptized next weekend. He goes to seminary, went to all three sessions of stake conference, made friends in the church, reads the scriptures regularly, and in our last lesson he bore his testimony to his parents about how he's repented and ready to be baptized. In the bus ride someone hopped on the bus to sell snacks and stuff, like normal, and he announces to us "well, I gotta make good use of my time before I'm baptized and have to keep the sabbath"and then he bought what the man was selling, super funny. Pray for him! And if everything goes well we'll baptize Yudit next weekend too. She's so solid, goes to church and reads, its just a marriage issue. Her husband has been working in the states for two years so we'll just have to see what they decide. 

I'm kinda struggling with my personality too. Like, I feel so blad as a missionary. And a lot of it is that it's hard to have a personality in a different language but still. But really, I get to thinking, who am I? Why do people like me? Ya know? 

Also, today I turn 8 months old, fun fact. 

That's all I got for now. Can't wait to hear from you all! Love and miss you all, every day.

Elder Hansen

Playing soccer. Not fat, it's the wind. I'm actually getting skinny again, my little balleada belly went away. Hondurans are so direct, I've had lots of people come up and pat me on the belly and say " you're getting a little fat now ain't ya??" I love it, it cracks me up. 

April 13, 2015
It's a long one!

Para la familia Heintzleman-

Gracias por todo su apoyo. Solo para que sepan, las lecciones que me dio antes de la misión me ayudo bastante. Y, aunque no puedo poner acentos (este computadora es para ingles y no se como cambiarla) estoy bien cómodo con el idioma. A veces hablo como si yo fuera puro catracho. Tendré mi acento para siempre, pero no me importa. Si la gente puede entenderme, cheque. El único problema es que no hablo español, sino catracho, o sea, hondureño. Pero si, este es la obra del Señor. Tenemos mucho exito y la iglesia esta creciendo. Crecimiento real. Me imagina que mis padres ya les dijeron lo que esta pasando en mi misión, pero hay milagros cada semana. Estoy-estamos-bendecidos, de seguro. ¡Les extraño!

Good old heintzlemans. Hope I didn't make any mistakes, that would be embarassing. 

By the way, I'm finding it difficult to express myself without missionary/spanish words/sayings, so...you all may just have to learn them. Just so you know, 

geeper-flirty girl that likes the missionaries. The verb form is guipeyar. 

que honda-what's up. That ones actually spanish

cheque-ok. All is well, we'll roll with that.honduran. 

machete-when someone gets chastized. 

You'll just have to learn the rest, I can't spend two years translating things into normal enlgish. 

Good to hear that Kent's still alive, also really glad to hear about Rhys and Dallas. He was airlifted to phoenix or what happened? I'm a little confused on that part. 

oh, and Dad looks good in that yellow fishing shirt. 

And yeah man, animals mating...maybe I'm still immature but it cracks me up. The worst is when they get stuck together and there's just two sad looking dogs moping around town together. They say that if you look too long at two dogs stuck together it'll make you go gay. My last comp from Guatemala was legitimately afraid to look, good old latin superstitions. 

And I would definitely agree with President Carter's assessment. I've got the honesty and selflessness down, still working on the humility part. But it really does impede the work when missionaries are selfish. We spend a huge amount of time working with less actives that were converts of a companionship here that just went around baptizing people willy nilly without regard to their preparation because they just wanted baptisms. There's lots of ways missionaries can be selfish and it makes things hard. 

But yeah, what you said about inadequacies is spot on. I read Ether 12"27 alot. 

And yeah, I think Helaman would be good for her. Way more opportunities to make friends. More of a social scene. Heritage halls is really quiet and if I wasn't with the roommates I was with I would not have liked it. Didn't take first year writing. What's she gonna major in? But yeah, she sent me her own message. 

And yeah, grandparents-stories. Little things. Like where they worked, what they like, interesting little tidbits from their life. I actually have the stokes already filled in with stuff I remember but I can always add more. 

looking forward to the pictures, send me the old hunting and fishing ones too! 

Curtis-Look at you, ain't you a real florida boy, living it up! That's terrifying about the gators. I've had that happen too, (but at least I was in a bigger boat). they're so camoflauged it looks like a log, and then the light hits the water just right and you realize there's a giant alligator sitting motionless underneath you. Cool pictures too, you like the kayak huh? How's fishing out of the kayak? Do you just put your tackle bag on your lap in the kayak or what? putting my fishing stuff to good use? pre ap us history? didn't know that was a thing. 8th grade next year right? Keep on having fun and send me pictures!

Sterling-another wild man, we're gonna have a blast when I get back with you and Curtis. You and Wyatt are best buds or what? And you got to ride in the Camero...lucky dog. playing in the river, spears, that's the life. Glad you're having fun, and Academy sounds pretty cool. How are the parkers? Excited for middle school?? And just so you know, that breakfast sounds awesome, but balleadas are probably the best breakfast food in the world. Nice greasy flour tortilla filled with eggs and beans and cheese and sausage...mhmm. 

Kate-What's Gucci? Is that what kids are saying these days? Sounds really dumb. Y ¿que honda con diamond dolls? What do you do? I love baseball games though, hope you enjoy them. By the way, you're awesome. Good example. Proud of ya. Your friends are still guiping on me? Keep on keeping on, and send me some pictures every now and then! Who are your top 5 friends? Also I'm thrilled you loved conference. When I was your age I hated it. 

Ok, here's my little brief update. 

First off, just about everybody in Yoro is sick-the disease called chicomguya or something or other is passing around and hitting everybody and it's actually pretty bad. But we had a cool experience this week-one of our inactive families has a boy of 14 years that we're reactivating (came to church this sunday, with his inactive friend!) and he was bad. Couldn't move for pain, had a super high fever, couldn't hold down food, he was outtttt of it. We gave him a blessing, and I don't think he even realized we were touching him or giving him a blessing. Then we left. Next day we came back to check up on him and he's out playing in the yard. The family flags us down and is like "it was the priesthood! it was the priesthood!" Turns out he started to improve almost immediately and was completely whole by the morning. This disease usually lasts a full week. My comp had it for 5 days, and this kid had it for about 6 hours. Cool experience with the priesthood and the power of blessings. I can't remember if I ever told you about it but we healed a little boy on the island too-when the people have lots of faith there's lots of blessings! 

And yes, as you might have guessed, we have done lots of hard labor this week. It was actually only one day but we made it count alright. Javier Ramos (you'll see his picture-he's the one that quit marijuana and cocaine hard turkey to get married and baptized, and fun fact, recieved the priesthood this week) has property up in the mountains. Here, flat ground is for rich people so everyone else buys land up in the mountains, and they plant it-all of it. I could barely walk this hill was so steep, and he's got it planted with corn. Cornfields are called milpas here. So anyway we went to harvest his corn, so his family could make their own cornmeal for corn tortillas for the year. What we did was fill giant sacks, called metates, with the corn, and then hike them up the hill to a certain ridge and then roll them down the mountain to his little camp below. These bags are huge and when full with dry corn weigh about 150 lbs. I can barely walk this hill without a load, and with a load on my back I was stumbling around like a drunk guy. I fell down a few times, and Javier is dancing around me like a mountain goat. So we get everything up on the ride, then roll down the bags about 300 feet-and he has it down to a science. Every bag landed touching one another. Completo, este tipo. But it was beautiful with a view of Morazan (from the other side-we were in the southern mountains this time) and a super honduran experience all around. His wife packed us a breakfast and we sat up on the mountain as the sun was coming up eating beans and tortillas. Then when we sat down to rest at the end he cut us some sugar cane so we sat up there and chawed the sugar cane (sorry Bishop/Dentist Spencer) for awhile and talked about the price of corn.  The worst part though, is that we came on bikes. So we had to return dead tired, cross a river-picture pending-and then ride our bikes through town. It was a blast, totally crazy. Morazan is a small town but the main street is just as crazy as any big city. We're flying down main street, dodging buses and motor taxis and street vendors and horses, and I'm a pretty tall guy riding on a honduran size bike. Must of looked ridiculous. I don't think it was too stupid but at the same time I remember thinking "I kinda hope president doesn't find out about this". Good times all around and we found some new people to teach that work with Javier. Javier is a better missionary than we are, he talks to everybody about the church. 

javier eating breakfast on the mountain

Me and Javier standing on our metates. Javier's been an illegal a couple times and told us a story about how he got caught in Arizona. He went wetback and a rancher found him and gave them food and water and then called the border patrol. He still holds a grudge. Some times as a gringo its just best to keep quiet. 

 

crossing the river. I was expecting cold water with the current and the rocks and coming out of the mountains and all but it was warm! Like the pool in august. I was a little disappointed. 

 

Funny story for this week-remember the family of Jenny and Marta? We had a little short lesson with their whole family this week, and they have a little girl that's about 4 years old. Sweet as could be. She looks like a little white girl and always hops up onto my lap and asks me to say words in English and pesters my companion and I the whole evening and always hugs our legs as we're leaving. But then we were saying the closing prayer, and I started to look around a little bit, right? Bad habit, I don't know. She catches me looking, and all of a sudden, uncrosses her arms, and...flips me the bird! She flicked me off in the middle of the prayer! And then she saw me trying not to laugh, so she stands up and gets in on it with both hands and is flicking me off and dancing, and nobody has a clue except me. Then the prayer starts to finish and she sits back down and folds her little arms, sweet as could be. I died laughing. 

But yeah, we had a really succesful week this week. We have 3 solid baptisms coming up at the end of the month-they'd be next weekend but we have stake conference. Our attendence exploded to 76 this week, which is unheard of. We're growing! And 9 of those were our investigators, from our companionship alone. And two of our less actives that we're reactivating, two boys of 14 and 15 years old, came with white shirts and ties and all. So yeah, we're doing well. Just goes to show that when the Lord wants something to happen it'll happen. We're working hard but I feel like I worked harder in Roatan but with less success-the Lord does the work! 

Also had divisions this week-so I got to go up to Santa Rita with one of the zone leaders from the Dominican Republic and we had a good time all the round. He was about to get signed on by the MLB, I forgot which team, and then hurt is elbow. Pitches 87 mph in his prime. Cool guy, and I didn't struggle in the least to understand his spanish, which means I'm doing ok, because dominicans are probably the most difficult to understand. 

 So yeah, there's my week. I'm dead tired. My pday's gonna be sleeping. By last night we were walking like zombies...walking back to the house was the longest walk of my life. Took me a good minute to climb the stairs. Pday was much needed. 

Time to send some pictures now! 

Also, I'd love it if you could send me some BYU devotionals too, don't have to be from GA's or general conference addresses. 

Always love hearing from ya'll and seeing pictures of what's going on. Still waiting of a picture of mom fishing on the river. Everyone is looking good and healthy. 

Love everybody, pictures are coming!

first pic is javier eating breakfast on the mountain

April 7, 2015

Ahhh, I miss Easter dinners! And watching conference at home! That's fun having the house full.

Right on on the GPA! When do you sign up for classes at BYU? And about the ancestry stuff, I only want stuff about my grandparents. There's not space for the others, only info.

And we had to break the sabbath too, we ran out of water and had to buy some. And that special olympics picture is awesome, I'm glad she's still doing that.  

And yeah, talks via email works just fine. As always I love hearing about the family and pictures and all that good stuff. How's the trees doing? Any sign of a garden? Sunburst? how's the crew doing? 

Here comes the updates, in which I imagine I'll answer your questions. 

First off, the week started really good. It later got pretty slow because my comp got dengue, which is pretty much west nile virus, and was bedridden for three days so we just did divisions the whole time and got about half the work one. But the start of the week had really spiritual lessons-teaching powerfully with people that were progressing, and people that recieved answers to their prayers. So all that was really great to see and feel. Moments like we had early in the week really keep you going. This sure was an interesting week though, and Í've got some stories. 

This week is semana santa, or holy week-in latin america they celebrate the whole week of easter. They have processions in the street and all kinds of events put on by the catholic church, I'll send pictures. The most interesting thing though is that they send out "jews" into the streets too (can you imagine anything so offensive happening in the states?" with horrible looking masks and hunchbacks and canes and they walk around the town making little shrilling noises and asking for money (cause they're jews...get it?) and if they don't give you any money they hit you with their sticks. We ran into a bunch but they didn't hit us, thank goodness. it's actually really creepy. I'll send pics of the parades with Jesus walking the via de la cruz.

 

Also something I want to tell you (props to sister bush) is how many times I've remembered seminary scriptures this week-and I remembered them using the same stupid little clues she taught us to remember them with. Guess it worked! 

Another thing I'm really realizing is that the best way to make worry and anxiety and any kind of stress to go away is to immerse myself in the work and in the scriptures. With a sick comp immersing myself in the work was a little tricky, but I was able to force myself to study hard and utilize my time instead of loitering around and I came away with new insights and more knowledge.
 But yes, Marta and Jenny got baptized!

 

We ended up baptizing them in between sessions of conference, so no river baptism pics :( hopefully in two weeks. They are super solid, especially Jenny. Future missionary. Reading everyday and those two are the first two in church. They get there before we do. Their case is really typical of the church here-we teach the whole family, whole family loves it, but the parents aren't married and won't or can't get married so we baptize the kids, the kids are super active and end up going on missions, and the parents, without the blessings of baptism and the holy ghost, eventually fade away. Really we're building the church here for the next generation. The church is very young here. In our little extension of a ward with an attendance of 60 we have around 5 future missionaries that are preparing now-as in saving and starting their papers. And then all of their little siblings. So while growth is slow for right now, the future is pretty bright. There is Kevin, the  "bishop" who is second counselor of the ward in Santa Rita, and we're under santa rita's jurisdiction. Aside from that its pretty much the missionaries. We meet lots of people who know some of the pillars of the church, and then they give us the chance to talk to them because they know good members of the church. so...be examples!

Also in my next package, could you send me a little slingshot? not even joking.There's been so many times this week where I could have used one...dogs, cats, pigeons...I love animals but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. The cats are the worst. There are a few that perch outside our window every night just doing that super loud meow all night. And, funny story, speaking of cats and slingshots-we were all watching conference in the church (which is outside remember) and we have a tv set up in front of all the chairs. It's already kind of irreverent, ton of kids, the duena is cooking, signals pretty bad. And then, on the roof of a shed right behind the tv, two cats hop up and start getting it on, and loud too. The place just lost it. All the kids are just dying of laughter and I was too. That was the moment that I decided I needed a slingshot.

Another funny story from the same day-a big easter tradition here is eating fish soup. But the fish is dried-they make a fish jerky basically-it smells horrible and straight up rotten (the fish is usually snook, fun fact) so they take the fish jerky, mix it with eggs and corn flour, and fry it and make little cakes. It's horrible. It smells like the bottom of the live wells in a bait and tackle shop and tastes about the same. So this sister happily dishes us up heaping plates of this garbage, and I'm just stressing. I'm really good about choking food down but this is too much. So I pull up my backpack and start slipping pieces into a little plastic bag inside of my backpack. We're all laughing, and then Elder Tarqui, a brand new little fat missionary from Bolivia, starts to do the same, but then the sister walks out-so he panics and for whatever reason shoves this bag of piping hot fish right off the fryer in his pants. And then the sister just stands there...watching us eat...making small talk...And I'm just watching tarqui and he's got tears coming out of his eyes, poor thing and we're all trying so hard not to laugh. Finally she leaves and he jumps up and screams like a girl and loosely translated screams "my God, my nuts are cooking!" I just about died, funniest thing ever.

But yeah, we got to watch conference! I even got to watch one session in english. Unfortunately though, I forgot my notes, so you'll have to wait another week to hear about what I liked and my thoughts and all that good stuff. It was really good though, spotty signal and irreverance and all. Some of them were very powerful and we had investigators there to watch it.

But yeah, this week was really good and kind of hard at the same time. I mean, it's always hard, but recently its been extra tough. I don't know how to explain it but back in Roatan I was top dog. Everyone came to me, I had all the responsibility, I knew the island, I knew the people and how to work with them, had really close friends in the branch and I just felt more respected. Thrived on the responsibility and on having to do it all myself. And now, I went from being a big fish in a small pond to being a small fish in a big pond. I'm definitely not top dog anymore. My comp is a really good missionary, has things under control, I don't know the area as well as I should, my spanish sill feels iffy some days, and it's real easy to either feel inadequate or unneeded. I should be greatful I have a good comp but I almost like it the other way around better! Anyways, there's my vent for the week. it'll get better with time, no doubt, just gotta keep on truckin'.

There's my update, I'll send some more pictures. And I'll be here for awhile in case I remember anything else!

Love you all, keep me posted!

Elder Hansen