Take Care of Your Body-Your Virtue-Your Mind

9/26/11


Hola!

First of all -- !HORMICAS! You CANNOT ESCAPE them! And the ones in this new house BITE. And it itches forever. And it was just that kind that invaded my package. So I was obligated to open it. Cursed insects. You know what they were after? That orange coconut peanut butter stick - that’s it! They CHEWED through the plastic to get to it and only that! The rest was fine! But they forced me to open it early dang it! Thank you for all the good stuff. I share almost all of it cuz these Elders never have tried such goodness in all their life and the jockstrap is sweet. WAY better than the boxers I bought here and I’m flattered you bought me a large. The shirt is sweet and the shorts are perfect - and all the yummy goodness sustains me - there are Elders here who are lucky if they even get letter from their family or even an email. You guys are the best.

This week was sweet - I did inter cambio with an AP from Idaho. We ended up with 7 lecciones con miembro. It was cool to see his example y to see him fulfill his calling or assignment cuz I felt totally hopeful after he left. Last Friday we did a camida gringa with some of our investigatores. I made ham cheese and tomato sandwiches and accidentally bought jalepeno flavored cheese so it was PICANTE. But good - and apples and pringles which they don’t like - Wierdos. I put lime juice on the apples just for the heck of it and it was so good. And during the dinner they brought us this crab, alive but without pinchers and I was holding it and it started to freak out - all of its legs were flinging every which way and I just held it yelling “Oh My GOSH! OH MY GOSH!” cuz I had no idea what was happening and everybody laughed.

The houses are tiny and built super poorly - It’s never cold here so they hardly worry about windows - just bars so no one gets in and they are built from bricks - bien fubros asi. with cement in between - we could make them as a service project in one day --or faster but that’s all they need here a roof from the rain and a fan from the heat -- a toilet, water, gas and a mattress.

Being the district leader in this district is weird cuz everyone is the same or older than I am - I’m trying to set 3 goals for the district each week but I still got a lot to learn. Pedro y Ana Iris are getting along - he understands not a lot and she is sort of dragged into by her dad, but hey, she’ll feel it I hope. I’ve almost let myself get mad at the costerios? They mess up there lives so bad and just don’t get it. No one here gets married. A lot of the men are planting way too many seeds. And the trash. It is everywhere. Sometimes I just want to scream “Take Care of Your Home!” I didn’t realize a difference it makes to simply appreciate what you have by taking care of it. Like your body -- your virtue - your mind. God gave us these things we’ve got to take care -- never had it hit me like that before - a little thing like litter - makes a HUGE Difference.

I am definitely starting to take more of a lead in the missionary work and it is good - I am definitely learning what it is to be humble - we’ve been doing a lot of splits lately with the members which I love. I told you we moved - our new house is way far away from our area. Then we have to cram into this little car that takes us to our house - terrible -- but adventurous.

I’m doing great, trying to focus more and work according to Preach My Gospel. !Love you tons! You are simply the best,

Love,

Elder Taylor

Mission Life

9/19/11


Hola Familia!

And here we go -- this last Sunday I gave a talk on the 11th and I talked about the Atonement - I talked about how we are bought with a price, how everyone is but don’t know it. How we have to share it, that is the price we have to pay. It was really cool because when I started talking, en espanol, there was noise and stuff and shuffling there arrived a point in my talk that was just intense. The atmosphere was just thick as heck and nobody - not even the little kids were making noise. I had successfully captured everyone’s devout attention. And I told of when I watched the Elder do pushups for me - it was intense - and whether they were so attentive for their desperate lack of understanding or overwhelming inspiration from the Spirit I have no idea, but it was awesome.

We had cambios this week...I’m staying here with Elder Jorge but did move from the cool house to a more ugly house farther away from our area - not awesome and somehow they made me Lider de Distrito which is surprising on several counts. But hey! Obviously God expects more of me and knows I can do more so he called. But I’m looking at this like a “Step it up Elder,” and not a Congratulations.

Let me explain my companion to you. He is from Argentina, can speak english (almost really perfectly) is super funny - he’s only got til January - he’s exactly one year ahead of me and he’s made an awesome and useful friend named Richard. They are like best friends 4EVER. Richard says I’m the only Gringo que le cae bien - which means I fall well with him.

We are working more and more with the members, which is awesome. This mission as a whole has struggled with that. It was the foundation of our Zone Conference. There are some really powerful members here and the bishop is awesome, though a little strange. Also we’ve had a failed English class every Saturday for the last 4 - number of students I have -- 0 - that, my family is a big Goose Egg. Mi Distrito es pequero - Elder Taylor, Elder Jorge, Elder Frenchy y Elder Ellis - Solo 4 and they are cool - but I try not to get Frenchy speaking english because he only knows bad things. And yes, I’m the only gringo pero no impenta porque soy costeno mas nada.

The people here are great, they really are. My comp and I went to dinner with an investigadora - her two member friends and Richard were so awesome! It was like dang! Wish I had a testimony like that!

Let me tell you about the mission life here.

• I have a fan blowing on me from 9 PM until 11 AM the next morning almost all the days. Air conditioning does not, or at least efficient house cooling air conditioning, does not exist.
• (I recently received a new Black fan that is mega awesome.)
• Letters come like every 3 to 6 weeks. (I did receive your two giant packages - Gracias - I’m trying to decide whether I want to wait until my birthday to open them or not)
• It costs $10 dollars or almost $10 - Quince mil pesos to send a letter to the states and even then it has got to go through the office so it takes even longer.
• There are ants everywhere - in everything - they are like boogers for me now - I just pick em, roll em, and flick em when they are crawling on me. Or just chew em if they are on my food.
• The rule changed and now we can eat fish and seeing as we live in the coast - they give us a lot of fish - but it is not normal fish - its the body entire - O joy -
• We have contracts with the members to wash our clothes - but we can’t include our garments - so sometimes in the night or like once a week or when I feel like it I wash my garments by hand! so fun
• We lack a lot of things that just make life nicer - like a microwave - a warm shower (not necessary now that I think about it) carpet and stuff but we are never in the house so it doesn’t matter.
• All missionaries did receive a DVD player to improve teaching so that’s cool.
• The members feed us every day - rice - rice - rice - rice - so much rice - and gaseosa - or juice from the fruits here that are so amazingly delicious - You’d be surprised at what I eat now.

Investigators -

• Pedro Ruiz y Ana Iris - they are the next for baptism - He struggles to understand pretty much everything and can’t read well - But his daughter Ana Iris is So dang cute. She has 12 years and reads with her dad and they read though they may not understand.
• Francisco y Jusney are cool - he is a less active member and they need to get married - she’s not a member - He’s building desire and we went on splits yesterday and El. Jorge and I and with Joned who is awesome and another member whose awesomeness we discovered so Joned were with Francisco and it was one of those sweet moments and Francisco said - I feel more of the desire to progress - or a literal translater - There’s a little seed I feel. It was cool.
• Luz Belky, Carina y Haner are cool but I have no idea what their desired are - they have 18 years.
• I’m bowling with they assistentes as I write this - cool. And I’m doing really well - wonderfully even.

Love you all tons y espero que esta carta salga bien!

Love Elder Taylor

I Am Here To work

I Am Here To work

9/5/11


Hola familia!

i don`t have a lot of time, surprise right but i wrote an outline so this should contain some good stuff. first off it rained A LOT one day and was awesome we got got compltetly soaked and our lunch failed us so we were going to mcdonalds in the mall. but we had to cross the road with some construction and the entire thing was flooded and all we could see were some piles of dirt so we headed towards those. Raining ferociously and all of the sudden my comp drops, and is up to his chest in muddy water holding his bag above his head. So funny. i had no idea what to do so i stood there dumbly laughing as he crawled out. later we cleaned ourselves in rain from the rooftops and he was not that much wetter than i was even though he fell in a hole.

Good news, Moisès got baptized the week after I left so we are good on him. Everything went well. This last week we had a zone conference and it was sweet. Elder Holland gave a talk in the MTC the week before I started the mission and we watched this talk. his main point was about being active after your mission and how we`ve left our nets like the apostles forever I was totally pumping up.

I am a better missionary because of my companio. I look at the mission more practically now and how to work màs eficaz. Really what I learned the most from him is my own drive to work. I`m not perfect, but i know why I am here. I am here to work.

More than anything i need to learn to take initiative in every moment. Like cleaning the bathroom and creating a rag out of nothing was how I applied this today.

I am doing well. learning lots and trying to forget myself for these people, even though that is not easy. Anyway i love you all tons thanks for all you do for me. I really feel great here and I love the challenges. If it was easy, everyone would do it. Jacob 1 8 ish i think

love you tons,

Elder Taylor

Rain Rain Go Away

8/29/11


Hola Familia,

i am good. i am eating well and doing more exercises in the morning. i have been way lazy since i arrived in colombia, like 100 jumps of the rope. can you believe it?

This week i went on two cambios in a row and they were sweet. i love going to other people`s areas and working. it is fun one was with an elder named Frenchy and the other with my zone leader who is sweet but kinda hogged the lessons. i still love him. we had to run in the rain to our house to make it on time and the streets were literally rivers. it was nuts. when we got home i literally poured out my shoes.

We have two investigadores quienes son bien bacanos. but they have to married and their esposos no son bien bacanos. so we are working with that. and we are finding some good people- what i want to see is someone just in the depths, and they pull themselves, o sea, Christ pùlls them out and they just CHANGE,

what i don`t want to do is baptize a bunch of people who are going to go inactive because if you look at it, 1 of 10 baptisms has remained active in this ward. and it was like that in my last ward too. The work really is laid out for us.

i feel great. I am learning tons. like a real whole lot. màs que nada how important is the family.

Love you all!

Elder Taylor