Week 1: Transfer 2

Hola Familia,

Ok so I have uploaded a few pictures and I there are a few stories behind them. I'm not sure if you know this, but here in California, they grow oranges. You know, the nice big ones with the really thick skins but have a lot of juice. Entonces, las naranjas que tengo es las primeras imagenes fueron...pues... robado.

(Espanish) Este es la historia. Ok. Un dia, el companero y yo estabamos manejando en nuestro carro y vimos un arbol que tuvo frutas bonitas. El companero salio el carro y tomo dos frutas (como los dos que estan en el imagen). Pero, cuando rompimos las frutas para comerlos, ellos fueron frutas de mentiras (is that how you spell lies?). Ellos fueron limas! >={

Thus, we reaped the fruits of our labors.

For those of you who don't speak Espanish... phone a friend or babelfish.

So the next story was interesting. So do you remember how I told you how my last companion, Elder Smith, would get upset if I wasn't careful with the dogs? Well two days ago, we went to the Fuentes family's house (around 7:30 or so) and upon arriving and knocking on the door, we heard barking emanating from the backyard, followed by the scream of yelping dogs. I looked at the fence and it was one of those 6 ft wooden fences. We then heard loud banging against the fence, after which a large dog (aka - midsized pitbull) jumped over the fence. Oh, then Elder Sanchez (who is from El Salvador...I won't tell him that you thought he was Mexican...he might flip) said, "Oh, by the way, their pitbull can jump over the fence. =)" Well, I was rather astonished as free jumping over a six foot anything is a difficult feat for most creatures. Well, I thought that this was rather cool and started petting this really nice dog. I decided that I will show this picture to Elder Smith at district meeting. I might be a rather funny experience.

 

About the Mp3 player.... sigh... they strictly prohibited by the Missionary Handbook. =\  I truly feel that I could ask but the thing is, I would have to go through the District Leader, he would say 'No', the Zone Leaders would agree, and the Mission President would say that too because if he justified it for me, he would have to justify it for everyone else. Then, there would be missionaries (are there are sadly a lot of them) who would go out and buy an Ipod Touch, and download blah blah blah... so... I feel that I have lost the battle on that front, even though I would be completely true with it, many would not. It turns out that there are many missionaries who just haven't come out here prepared for the work. They haven't locked their hearts and in turn, it gets them as well as the mission, into trouble.

As far as biking goes, yes, it is very wet, but we bike around in the cold anyway because Elder Sanchez and want to get into our James Bond weight. But as far as driving goes, because we cover such a large area (which includes Crow's Landing, Newman, and Gustine... some of our members are even in Patterson, but we don't cover them), we are allowed to have unlimited miles. Well, it is due to that, and also Elder Sanchez has had some medical problems which give him that privilege (biker's crotch) <=/.

I am still awaiting the awesome package that should arrive tomorrow at District Meeting from the Zone Leaders. I am really quite excited. I feel that Christmas hasn't really ended yet.

Thank you Steve for the "Chronicles of Narnia" vignette. That is really cool. I will try to watch that if possible... next year. =]

I truly felt that the phone call was way too short and I didn't even have time to say Happy Birthday to Rachel, Cristina, or Mom!

Well, Happy Birthday!

I love you very much!

I shall write you letters.

Gotta go now.

I love you all.

Elder Ostler