John In El Salvador

Alright, Who Prayed for Humility?                                                                       January 28, 2019 All the letters on the Spanish keyboard are in weird places, so bear with me. I also made a new revised list of contacts before I left the MTC and saved it as a draft, so if anyone didn't receive a letter that was expecting one, just let me know and I'll add them. Lastly, if I don't respond to a personal email you sent me, I didn't forget you, I'm just preparing to respond to you next week.  Mas o Menos Sencillo: Well, who woulda thought that the El Salvador is nothing like the MTC? It was almost snowing when I left Provo. It's not ...

I’m Not Dead Yet January 21,2019 I'm here in the mission home with my new Mission President! I just wanted to let you know I made it safe and sound, and my P-days are Mondays now. El Salvador is beautiful and pretty crazy. I hear it's like camping, and everyone really likes riding in the back of trucks with pigs and mangos. The mission is great, and my address is Apartado Postal 142 CP Santa Ana, Santa Ana El Salvador. It's just a little bit warmer here than is was in Utah, and we already got some cultural eating in at McDonalds. It turns out there was another missionary in the MTC headed to my same mission, and we met at 2:30 this morning. His name is Elder Hernandez, and he was only at the MTC for 3 weeks, since he's fluent in Spanish. 10 more missionaries from the Guatemala MTC come tomorrow, so we got some extra visiting time with our Mission President and his wife. They're really cool. I...

Put Me In, Coach                                                                                             January 19, 2019 Note to everyone: I'll be in El Salvador for my next P-Day, and I hear I might only have 30 minutes to e-mail, so my letters will probably be a lot shorter, and if I don't respond to your personal emails, I did not forget you! I'm probably just typing up a response on my alpha smart to reply to you next week. I love hearing from you all. Simple:      This is my last week at the MTC. I leave...

Que Mas Puedo Hacer?                                                                                       January 12, 2019 Simple:      This wasn’t a very crazy week. Hermano Guillmen got reassigned to another district, which was sad, cause he was a good teacher, but it’s okay, cause we still have Hermano Chamberlain and Hermana McDougle, who are 2 great teachers. My companion and I have been doing better at planning each morning or night, studying together, and speaking almost only Spanish. I bought a new journal for the purpose of writing about the p...

May your Rock Bottoms be Mountaintops                                                     January 12, 2019 Fun Fact: I looked in my drafts box on Tuesday, and somehow this email from last week (the second attempt that got deleted) was no longer deleted. So here's what I wrote last week, completely untouched. Simple:        Lots of crazy things happened this week. First, I just spent over 30 minutes, almost an hour, writing my letter, then it all deleted, so I'll summarize quite a bit more, lucky for those of you with short attention spans. On Wednesday the last of everyone in the two older districts left, but we weren't lonely for too long, because we got to host incoming missionaries. I hosted 3 elders, ...

The time’s the third time.                                                                                 January 5, 2019 Simple/Divertido/Importante: I learned a lot this week. We got 2 new districts, they’re awesome, and Elder Silva and I are the new Zone leaders. Today, I learned patience. While doing my laundry, I spent about 45 minutes writing out an amazing letter, and then I pressed send, the page said it couldn’t save changes, then reloaded, leaving me with nothing, but it was a great letter, so just be inspired. Practicing my patience, I didn’t even punch anything, I just started t...

MTC stands for Awesome                                                                               December 29, 2018 S imple:      Alrighty. This week was Christmas. On Christmas eve, we had choir practice again with Brother Eckett. He's awesome. He's got the greatest stories, so it's more of a Choir Talk than anything. That night we watched  A Christmas Carol  with George C. Scott. The next day, we watched  My Broken Horse Christmas  in the morning. It's a little cheesy, but it's got a great message. After that, David A. Bednar spoke to us all with a great message...

I Can’t Do This                                                                                                  December 22,2018 Simple:      On Sunday, we had church as a zone, which was great. Every week we prepare a talk in Spanish and they don't tell you til the moment of if you're speaking or not. We watched a really awesome video that night of a David A. Bednar Talk called The Character of Christ. On Monday we did service by cleaning up our residence hall. For Gym time Elder Silva and I alwa...