Newz

Grant, and family,
Please know I love these emails I get from you. Never stop. Please send this around, I think it will be the big email for the week, or tell dad to send his around, b-c it's pretty big also. But I didn't have a p-day last week, so that's why I haven't written for a while. They have p-day on Mondays here in my mission instead of Wednesdays like at the MTC, so I sadly missed it. Boo. My favorite day of the week.

The first night I saw 5 roaches and they were huge. My comp, Hna Varela kind of rolled her eyes and said "you're not in the MTC anymore". That was a mind blower. Anyway, it took me like 2 hours to fall asleep after that b-c I kept thinking they were on me. Ugh, I hate roaches. And there's a new one every night. But we have a nice clean apartment. It's on the ground floor like everything here. We have a floor. We are blessed. Most of the people here don't have real floors, unless you count dirt as real.

Also, it's been pretty rainy here.
I don't know if you heard, but a volcano erupted close by here and we had epic rain Saturday. Which means we didn't have church Sunday and we got our 72 hour kits put together. We could have done everything normally, but you know how it goes.We had about 5 people who were going to attend church with us Sunday but it was canceled, that's hard. We didn't have church, so we just studied all morning and at 2 began the day as normal. We went tracting and had some lessons with members, investigators. But Sunday it was hot and there was no water anywhere. Weird, so we just studied until 2 and ate lunch with the ward mission leader. It had 1/4 head of cabbage, a chunk of beef, and a platano chunk, peel included. Platanos are like bananas, but I guess they're a vegetable, very good fried. Bananas, not so good fried. Blech, I tried to this week b-c it was brown and I don't like brown bananas much. Better raw.

I also found out my mail won't come except transfers, so every 6 weeks. So please still write me, even though I won't respond to those letters until 6 weeks after you send them. At least. This is going to be a mail adventure I can already tell. I also miss brownies. Tell mom the next package she decides to send should have brownie mix in it. I miss my sugar. We have lots of roaches here. One a night in the bathroom. I cleaned the bathroom this morning. I'm pretty sure it hadn't been cleaned in a month.

Grant, A second job will be amazing. Find a close one and you won't need a car. Walking is good exercise, even in the rain. If you need more incentive, go back and clean some more buses. Oh how I hated that. Please let mom know I got her May 16 dear elder on May 25. So it takes about 10 days to get to me I think. I don't know. But yeah, mail takes a while b-c they send it when we have transfers.

I have lukewarm showers, we don't have hot and cold here, only on and off. Which means I don't like showering. And I zapped myself this morning b-c I was brushing off a spider web from the pipe and I accidentally touched it. Which means my showers are luke b-c they are heated by electricity. If I don't die here, I will be stronger when I get home. I am so ready to serve people here, but a year and a half seems like eternity right now. I've only been here a freaking week.

Also, I love my companion, but it's hard to work when you don't understand 70 percent of what's going on.I love serving the Lord, but sometimes it's hard. It's hard for different reasons than I thought. It's hard b-c half the people we talk to don't speak Spanish, they speak Ketchi. It's totally different and I don't know Ketchi, and I hardly know Spanish. That makes it hard. My comp's name is Hna Varela. She has much patience with me. B-c of this patience, when I cry, she is very nice and tells me how smart I am and that I need patience. I need way more patience with myself than with other people. So far. I'm sure it'll change. My comp is a little jaded, though...I try talking to everyone and she kind of rolls her eyes and gives the minimum. She loves the members and investigators though. We'll be comps for 2 transfers at least the pres told her, so I should serve her more. She's very loving, but at times a little bossy..prob. b-c she's a trainer. It's hard when people don't have addresses.
They just have hovels of different types and colors. So you can't get addresses to contact them later, you have to follow people to their houses, or just teach them in the streets. And when it rains nobody will come outside. They don't have bells, you just yell, "Buenas". and they come or don't come to the fence to let you in.


But I'm glad to be here. Even if I cry a lot..and I've only been here a week. I have it pretty cush compared to most of the people who live here. Their entire lives they live like this. I only have a lukewarm shower for a year and a half.

In the mornings I always want to cry b-c I don't memorize well and we're supposed to have D&C 4 memorized, our purpose, and JS History.It's slow. I have most of the parts memorized of our purpose and JS first vision, but I miss parts or forget connector words. I'm the worst. I don't want to be home, but sometimes I don't want to be in the middle of Spanish speaking land either. But the people here are very loving and it's wonderful to be here. Time is slow and passes. I like the burritos and eggs we eat every day. We don't have cooks...our mission was having morality problems with the cooks and their assistants, so our Pres. canceled the food program. We still have a lady who does our laundry though.
I think the food we cook ourselves is better...another reason they don't have cooks is b-c people were complaining about hair in their food and not knowing what was in it. I like knowing what I'm eating. I try and keep my hair to myself. Mostly I braid my hair every day. I think I have bed bugs, I get at least two new bites a night, even though I'm eating B6 regularly. I don't know about mosquitoes. I don't see many, but I'm sure they're around.

I'll be here a while. It's nice here. The people are angels.
They're so humble and nice. It's nice to be here. I hope some time soon I will understand the other 70 percent of what is going on around me..I speak Spanish, but mostly gospel terms. I'm working through it.

The church is true. Love you! Thanks for writing. Love, Hna Peterson