Week 9 Report - 2 Months In!

Elder Wride's Mom here. I was gone this morning - I forgot that he said p-day would be Monday this week, so I wasn't online and I hadn't written him, but I guess he still had one of my late unopened emails from last week, so maybe he didn't notice. He sent a journal entry and lots of great pictures! They had a baptism over the weekend of a sweet little girl, I'll let Joseph tell about it -

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Subject:  2 MONTHS IN                        

What's up Fam! Well this week was overall super great and I'm officially 2 months in as of TODAY since I got to the Guatemala MTC on June 27th.

Meggan's baptism was Saturday and that was awesome. I don't think I've ever seen balloons and streamers at a Baptism before but Elder Aquino was super excited about them and I do know that Latios like to party.

It was really an awesome baptismal service though.

Jason, a priest in the ward, baptized her. He's a good kid and is getting ready for a mission. He's still 17 but I think turns 18 in December.

Elder Aquino has some more pictures that are better quality too. Lemme know if you want those as well (Editor Mom here - these pics are the ones from Elder Aquino's camera, cause they were pics of the same thing just that Joseph's were blurry)

We're going to keep working with their family to help them be able to enter the temple to be sealed and I hope it happens during my mission and then I'd be able to go!

That would be amazing. They're family is so precious and their kids really remind me of my siblings especially Giselle who is 5 and is literally the Guatemalan version of Natalie. They act EXACTLY the same it's a little freaky. Megan reminds me of Sophie a lot too and their little boy Steven is about Daniel's age so if they ever come to Utah we need to have a barbeque or something so my siblings can meet their guatemalan twins. So that was definitely the highlight of the week. Here's a picture of the program from the Baptismal Service.

Let's see here are those pics that I didn't leave enough time to include in my email last week sorry about that.

My Zone here in Monserrat. These guys are awesome.

Top left is Elder Strong. He was in the MTC at the same time as me and like his last name is very strong. He's super cool and is from Centerville. In front of him is Elder Faroñan who is from Peru and is in his last change. He's training Elder Strong. They're reopening an area like we are and since Elder Faroñan leaves in 3 weeks Elder Strong will get a new trainer so he has to really learn the area like the back of his hand. Elder Bywater is the tall one in the back with his tongue out. He is from Olympus!! He has a year in the mission and we've talked a lot about people I know from Oly and people he knows from Skyline. He was an SBO there and played football and after his mission he's going to play football for the greatest school on God's green earth - Brigham Young University. Haha I'm glad he was here in Guatemala and didn't see this past season. Next to him is Elder Zwahlen who was also in the MTC with me. He's an super cool guy and is from California. I'm betting we'll be companions at some point but ya never know. Then there's some guy named Elder Wride. Next to him is Elder Dustin who went to Davis High School and has about a year in the mission as well. He's super cool and has been helping me on the piano. He's the other district leader.

Middle row is Hermana Osorio. She's from here in Guatemala and is kinda quiet but I like her a lot. Her companion Hermana Christiansen. She's in her second to last change and has been directing the choir since our zone is singing at multizone conference this week. She was in BYU women's chorus before her mission. Then Hermana Camargo from Panama and she's pretty funny. She is training Hermana Martin who was also in the MTC with me. Our Zone has the most greenies in it. Hermana Martin went to Box Elder High School and did a year at the U before her mission. She doesn't like Skyline because we always beat them at swimming. Go Eags.

Bottom Row. Elder AQUINO ma COMP!! Then Elder Millich who is the other Zone Leader with Elder Bywater. He used to be an Assistant and this is also his last change. He's the one who I thought was Guatemalan but he's actually from Draper. He's super great. Next to him is Elder Benson who is my District Leader. He's from California as well but did a year at BYU before the mission. He's awesome. He's training Elder Cornejo next to him who is from CHILE! Elder Cornejo got here one change before I did though so he's got 9 weeks in the field whereas I now have 3. So yeah that's my Zone.

Here is where we study every morning. My desk is on the left.

This is our bedroom. My bed is on the right. We got Mosquito nets installed this week and I also have a picture of that I'll put in.

Beans and tortillas.

Like I said I've eaten more beans in my time on the mission so far than I had my whole life but every meal I've always eaten all my food.

Mmm

Behold the glorious bean tortilla platters.

Our whiteboards we use to keep track of investigators and a desk with our stash of folletos

The cool pictures of all the past prophets.

The water filter!! This thing is really cool

So those are the pictures that I meant to include last week, plus my zone. Here are other pics from this week. We played this fun game that was like revenge but with soccer last week on  p-day. 

If your chair got hit with the ball you were out and if the person who got you out gets out you're back in. Elder Cornejo won most of the time. Latinos are good at soccer.

So we are teaching a family that speaks Kekchi (They came to church with us this week!!). I also don't know how to spell Kekchi but its whack. Some Elders going to the Coban mission had to learn it and they were in the MTC for NINE weeks. Not everyone in the family speaks kekchi but some do so we got some kekchi folletos and Books of Mormon for them. LIX HU LAJ MORMON hahah I think it'd be super cool to learn kekchi

My Mission Scripture Words of Mormon 1:7-8 in kekchi

The SemCo themed Scripture last year Ether 12:4 in Kekchi

And Moroni 10:4-5 of course

We bought some eggs this weeks and I got a dozen eggs... in a bag. So I was very careful on the walk home that night.

Here's the mosquito net. It's pink because they delivered the nets like 4 weeks ago when there were still Hermana's here but now its us and they finally got them installed. We don't really need them in the capital but I've been using it because there are still some mosquitos I've seen in the apartment.

A couple nights ago I must have been moving around too much and accidentally pulled the mosquito net down on me in the middle of the night and slept the whole night like that. It was weird because you feel like you have blanket over you and are going to suffocate but it's a mosquito net so you can breath just fine.

Here is the view outside our window.

We live on the second floor of this building. It's not much but it's home.

Also that is not our car. We do a LOT of walking around here.

And here is a street here in Berlin that we walk up probably every day. Elder Aquino looking fly as usual.

So yeah great

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Joe's mom here. I was able to get into his email and get the pictures that Elder Aquino sent Joseph that he forwarded but didn't upload, meaning we couldn't see them. Yay for online life. So some of the pics above were from Elder Aquino, and there were also these two short video clips, so I am glad I was able to log on and get those. That makes for a good email day, should be able to get us by until next week! So great to see them, as Corey told Joseph in an email yesterday, "It makes me smile every time I think of you out in the streets meeting with people. Keep it up! We're very proud of all that you're doing."