Christmas letter home 2013

Merry Christmas Everyone!!

So Christmas season is finally upon us. It seams like it was just yesterday that we were all sitting together in the family room, reading and watching “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” “A Christmas Story” and “White Christmas.” It finally hit me the other dray that for the first time in my life I am not going to be home for Christmas. It feels extremely weird.

I hope you are making the most of this Christmas season. I know I am. It is super weird to be in Mexico during Christmas time. They don’t really celebrate Christmas here to the same degree we do in the states. In the states you can’t walk down a single street without seeing at least one or two houses that have gone all out with Christmas decorations. Here in Mexico I have walked down about 20 or 30 different streets without seeing even one house decorated. What makes it even weirder is that here there are about 20 or 30 houses to a block, so not seeing even one house with decorations. I also hope that dad wasn’t a grinch this year (again) and put up lights on the outside of the house. I have never really made a big deal about it but I have always missed seeing our house lit up during Christmas.

I absolutely love this time of year. I love how everyone is nicer to everyone else. People in the street telling each other “Merry Christmas" and smiling. It really is a shame that people can’t be like this all year round. It really is the most wonderful time of the year.  Everyone cheerful and bright. Even the houses seem happier during Christmas.

The only time on my mission when I might get a little bit of “trunky fever” would be right now as we get closer and closer to Christmas. The hardest part is that everyone always says that Christmas is to be spent with family and here I am about 5-6 hours way with no prospect of being able to get home fro Christmas. I really hope you all remember that the reason we celebrate Christmas is to remember the birth of our Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ. It is a time to spend with friends and family. I wish I could be there with you all this Christmas but I know I am where God needs me to be right now. Just remember that even though I can’t be there in person, I will be there in heart. I love you all.

Elder Jason Blanding

A mother's treasure. 

December 23, 2013

I wish you a Merry Christmas, I wish you a Merry Christmas, I wish you a Merry Christmas and a happy new year.

well I didn't think Christmas would come so fast but here it is. I don't know if it is just being in the mission or it has something to do with the lack of Christmas celebration that they have here in Mexico but it doesn't really feel like Christmas. I'm definitely missing the atmosphere that we have at home of Christmas.

So training isn't quite as hard as I thought it would be. It is a little lonely during the teaching because the new Elder still isn't confident enough to talk a large part in the teaching. It is something I am trying to help him with.

Friday we had the Christmas zone conference. it was awesome. we sang, played a bunch of games (minute to win it style), ate a tropical [I think he means TYPICAL] American Christmas dinner, the president talked for a bit and we had an ugly tie contest (one of the ones you sent me was in the top five , or bottom five depending on how you look at it). it was super fun.

we also had one of the families of investigators that we are teaching come to church on sunday!! it was awesome now they just need to come 3 more times and get married. then they can be baptized on the 18th of January!!!

well I'm making this a little short because we are going to talk on Wednesday and I don't want to tell you all everything before then.

Elder Blanding is not in this photo

President Christensen

December 16, 2013

[He put in the subject line: E-mail of pure awesomeness!!!]

so this week I decided to do it a little different and just send a free E-mail instead of a reply.

Changes!!!

so tomorrow are the changes (transfers) and guess what. I AM TRAINING!!! yes you read that right I'm training. I am going to receive an Elder fresh out of the MTC. This means that I am staying here for the next 2 transfers (not a sure thing but very very likely). I am kind of nervous about training but I know I'll be fine.

this week the Branch had its Christmas party, it turned out pretty good and everyone that came had a really good time. It is interesting how differently they celebrate Christmas here. In the states it would be a live nativity or something like that. Here they broke 2piñatas and had a dance party after. either way it was a lot of fun. (the picture is of the party)

Feliz Navidad! From San Pablo del Monte
Elder Blanding is the blond in the very back without a jacket on. 

I also got to feel loved this week because I got about 7 letters when I went to the Trainers meeting and I have been told that I have about 5 more in the house of the zone leaders (will get them tomorrow). oh and while I am on the subject. two of the letters were from Mike and in one of them he asked for advice in preparing for a mission. well right now the advice I have for him is to IMPROVE YOUR HANDWRITING!!!! It took me about twice as long to read his letters than all of the others because I had to spend so much time trying to interpret his handwriting. we do a lot of writing here and if his handwriting isn't legible it will be a big problem.

I hope everyone is having a great time watching the Seahawks rip apart every other team in the country. I hope you all get to see them go win a Superbowl (and that they keep up this kind of playing until I get hope so I can see them win one).

December 9, 2013

you are all in luck because this week I have all the time I want to write :)  The last two weeks we have had zone activities and so we have been rushing to even get an hour to write and last week I only had 30 minutes. 

This week was really cool. we had a zone conference in which the area president , Elder Johnson, spoke to us. He spent a good 2 hours talking about just the first principle of lesson 1 in chapter 3 of Preach My Gospel, I am a child of God. It was amazing what he showed us about this theme. Sadly I don't have my notes with me, if I did I would say a lot more. It was AMAZING!! After he finished talking about that he moved on to us (the missionaries) working with the members. He taught us exactly what we need to do to be able to work together. He gave us what he called "La regla Elder Johnson" or in English "The Elder Johnson rule". this rule is that whenever we enter a house we must teach at least one principle of chapter 3 of PMG (Preach My Gospel) and the second part is that we must receive one more person to teach before we leave that house. it has been really interesting putting this rule into practice. the day after the zone conference we were talking with the old branch president and just buy asking him for names he started listing off people who were either less active, old investigators or people that he knew. in the end we had about 11 names of people that lived near him. the only problem is that they all live in San Isidro which is in the other half of the branch and therefore not our area (there are 4 elders here, us and another companionship). either way it was really cool to see it put in action. 

Later in the night of when we had the zone conference we had another meeting with Elder Johnson. this time it was with all of the ward councils in three stakes (Amalucan, Fuertes and La Paz). there he had us split of into ward councils and each of us then listed names of people that the ward council members knew who were not members or less active. it was amazing how many names were pulled out of that meeting. in just our little branch we had about 35 names and in all the three stakes we had about 1500 names (no I am not exaggerating). 

One of the things he said a few times in both meetings is that we are now in a new era of missionary work. we no longer go door to door trying to find people, we work with the members. The world has really changed a lot. the members have now been turned into the finders in the work and the missionaries are just here to teach (we will still contact and find by our own means just that it shouldn't be our main resource to find people).  

As for writing you all a letter. I have :) I wrote it a few days ago but haven't been able to send it yet. It will hopefully not take to long or else it won't get to you around Christmas (it is Christmas themed).

Speaking of Christmas... We were allowed to watch the Christmas Devotional last night. it was really cool. it was a nice thing to be able to do on my birthday. It also made me miss home a little. particularly the winter/Christmas atmosphere that is there right now. I really do miss being there with all of you. Of all the things that I miss about home, the people is what I miss the most. Well at least it will only be another 14 and a half months until I get to see you all again in person. 

While I am on the subject of seeing you all again we should probably discuss when you want me to skype you. I would think that it would be easiest in the late afternoon or evening when you are at Grandma's and have had time to get hooked up and all. Just tell me when you want me to call and I will do my best to call at that time, but remember that I am 2 hours ahead of you all and I have to be back in the house by 9pm (7pm your time). I hope I get to talk to you all for awhile not just a few minuets. It will also be nice to be able to see all of the family together.

make sure to give a thanks to all the people who wished me a happy birthday. I don't want to miss someone.

as for the area. I told you just about everything when I first got here. It is a pueblo but a relatively big one. the area itself is bigger than my last one. Even with such a big area there still aren't very many members. We seriously have less than 10 families of members in our half of the branch. the good thing about that is that there are plenty of non-members here. as for what makes up the area it is mostly houses (the other half is the "downtown" part of the pueblo). the streets are mostly stone (not really cobble stone but more of a interlocking patio stile, it will be better to show with a picture when I have one).

well I don't really have much more to write so I hope this satisfies your want of a letter from me. 

Love
Elder Jason Blanding

EXTRA, EXTRA

Elder Blanding's mission has a Facebook page as well as a blog and every now and then they post pictures. This last transfer/conference they posted a few with Elder Blanding in them.  

Elder Blanding on the right (the blond)

Elder Blanding is the blond in the back. 

Elder Blanding is just peeking in on the left side behind the beautiful sister missionaries. (A mom will take any picture of her missionary son.)

Elder Blanding peeking around on the right of the sister missionary. He's the blond.

December 2, 2013

[Editor's note: I'm not going to edit Elder Blanding's emails because I love seeing the Spanish seep into his English.]

So this is going to be a short letter (I have about 10-15 min. to write) I really hope you are all good. I have officially started with Christmas. It is weird how differently it is celebrated here. They barely put up any lights, to the point where you can walk down about 10 or 15 streets without seeing a single house with lights on it. I just hope you are celebrating to the full extent back there (this is a hint to have Dad or Kray put lights up on the house).

On the work side: This week we had a surprise baptism. The 9 year old girl of a less-active family wanted to get baptized. We started teaching Monday night, had the interview Saturday and Sunday before the services she was baptized (on her 9th birthday too). 

Other then that not much is happening here. Things are going along normally. We just need to be able to get people to actually come to church. Things are going just fine all things considered.

Elder Blanding.

Elder Blanding far left.

"How they make tortillas here in Mexico (the good way)."

"Us on our way back from eating, (Yes we have to go up the mountain to eat)."

"The other elders here in the branch walking down the same path as the [last photo]."

"My nativity set that I bought for 180 pesos (it is about 14 dollars). Oh, and I will be sending you the nativity set to add to your collection for next year. I really don't want to have to pack it up and carry it with me for the next 15 months."
 

November 25, 2013

Well Thanksgiving has officially come and gone. it is sad that they don't celebrate it here. really, if I hadn't had it marked on the calendar I wouldn't have even noticed that it was Thanksgiving. It really is a very sad thing they don't celebrate one of the greatest holidays in the world here.

As for things here they are doing pretty good. we have 5 people with a baptismal date. the only problem is that they aren't attending church. two are a couple who aren't married yet but are in the proses of getting married. they are super close to getting everything ready but they still are missing one document. The other dates we have are with two 18 year old girls (really good friends) and with a women that is about 45 and separated from her husband. I really hope that they all start coming to church next week.

it is very weird to be in an area where there aren't very many members. It is a constant battle with church attendance. the good news is that it is going up. yesterday we had 40 people in church which is up from 14 about 3 months ago. the goal right now is to get up to 100 so that we can start working towards getting a chapel here in San Pablo. After the attendance starts getting close we need to start worrying about the number of Priesthood and Tithing. it won't be easy but we can do it.

well the only thing I can think of adding is that I want to send a letter to the Hilltons but when I sent it it got sent back so if you could send me their mailing address that would be great. oh and also this transfer is going to be 5 weeks instead of 6 so the changes will be on the 17th of December instead of the 24th (yes the reason is Christmas).

Elder Blanding.

November 18, 2013

Changes!!! So I am now in the pueblo (town) of San Pablo del Monte (in the state of Tlaxcala). My new companion is Elder Espinoza. I am senior companion. We are only a small branch here and by small I mean that we had about 30 people in the house of worship (I think that is the English version of Casa de Oracion) and we only have 9 families in our half of the branch (we have 4 elders here), 4 of which are active. We have 4 people here that have baptism dates. Two of them are not married but living together (they are in the process of getting married but it takes time), and the other two are relatively new investigators with whom we put a date last week. The area is actually kind of big, we have half of the pueblo of San Pablo del Monte and it isn't that small of a pueblo.  I still haven't really learned the area yet but I have the next month to do it before the next changes (this change will be a little weird because of Christmas, 5 weeks instead of 6). Oh and talking about cold... here in San Pablo it can get pretty cold. My second night it was super cold, the worst part about it was that we had to teach a lesson in the street because there wasn't a man in the house. At the end of the lesson I was soooooo cold. The package with the sweats and hoodie got here just in time :). 

GO GO GO SEAHAWKS!!! I love that we are kicking butts left and right. I just hope we can keep it up for the playoffs and the next two years (so I can be there when we win a super bowl). 

Elder Blanding

oh the pictures are from the roof of our house here in San Pablo. I am not sure but I think that the first one is of El Popo, I don't know what the others are they were just cool and I could see them from the house. I took them early in the morning (about 6:45 ish).

From the roof of Elder Blanding's new home in San Pablo del Monte. The mountain the distance is El Popo (he believes). 

Another set of mountains from Elder Blanding's roof. 

Elder Blanding looking at some mountains. 

 

November 11, 2013

Well to answer your question about transfers, they are tomorrow and I have transfers (figured that after half a year here in Alamos they would move me). Next week I will let you all know what happens. 

I did get the packages just fine. I don't think anything was missing. The one with the sweatshirt/sweatpants was a little squished but nothing was broken (other than the chocolates were a little squished). 

GO SEAHAWKS GO!!! 

I do hope to receive that talk at some point. 

So this week we made some pretty good progress. Turns out that contacting works (who knew). We have 11 new investigators just this week and all of them were from contacts of last week or this week. I really wish I could have more time here in Alamos but oh well God wants me to be somewhere else. I really want to know where I am going and who will be my new companion. Changes (Transfers are called Changes here) are always full of unknowns, I hate unknowns. 

On saturday we got to go to a fireside that our mission president gave. It was given for less-actives, actives and investigators alike. It was focused on the apostasy and the restoration. It was really cool. He used scriptures from the bible to show why there was an apostasy and why we needed a restoration. He also kind of bashed the creeds of the other Christian religions (with bible scriptures). It was really cool. even better was that he made it fun and he showed that he wasn't trying to say that the other religions are wrong and ours is right just to help inform people. It was awesome. 

Well that is about all this week. I'll let y'all know where I end up after the Changes and who my new companion is next week.

Elder Blanding

November 4, 2013

Well at least the Seahawks are still doing well. Who did we play on Monday Night Football last week you forgot to give me an update on that.

Today I don't have a lot of time to write because we had a zone activity and also we have to end our P-day at 5 (it is 4:30 right now) because we have to fill out some forms by Wednesday and we are completely full on appointments tomorrow. It is a little annoying but it oh well things are how they are.

The zone activity was really cool. Basically we played tourists today. We went to La Catedral, the most famous cathedral in Puebla, I also happens to be in the south mission... by one street (don't worry we got permission). We also took a tour bus that takes you around to see most of the famous sites in Puebla. It was really cool.

Also my packages have arrived and are in the zone leaders' house. I would have gotten them but we were short on time and it was starting to rain so I decided to wait until Wednesday when we will be having a zone meeting to get them.bThey didn't say anything about them having been opened so I assume they are just fine. 

So this week we have had a little more success with investigators. We still didn't have many lessons but we have at least had more appointments. I also don't get why the Missionary Handbook says that holidays are some of the best days to find people in their houses because we had the 1st and 2nd of November full of appointments and only one person was there. Maybe it was referring more to Christmas and the like than to the day of the dead/Halloween, but still, either way we tried and we have a lot of appointments with contacts in the next few days so I have some hope that we will get a few new investigators.

Elder Blanding.

The picture is from when we went to visit someone and they had this so we decided to take some pictures. I'm teaching her about the Book of Mormon.

 "Don't think she is feeling it, Elder."

La Catedral Elder Blanding visited today in Puebla. 
This is from the internet--Elder Blanding didn't take this photo.

October 28, 2013

Nice news from home.

As for the Facebook thing, don't worry about it for a while. It will for sure not happen until January or maybe even later. We were just told it would happen in a few months. I do however believe that I will be using my personal Facebook and not create a new one. 

This week we haven't been able to get appointments with any of our investigators. It is a little frustrating that we just can't get the appointments to teach them. Of all the Investigators we have they are all busy with changing schedules or tragedies in the family that make us unable to put appointments with them. But we are however having a little more success with the less-actives in our area. This Sunday we had a family that had only come a few times to church come. In the 5.5 months I have been here they have come about 3 times and now they have come 2 weeks in a row!! We also had a less-active who hadn't been to church in years come for the first time!! Even though we aren't having much success with the investigators here we are having a little with a few of the less-actives and that is nice. It is nice to be able to see some of the fruit of our labors.

Other than that there isn't much to say about what is going on here. We are working to get more people to teach and get appointments with the ones we are currently teaching. It isn't easy but it is worth it.

So here are your answers for the week:

My health is fine, I haven't had any problems whats0ever. I am also eating just fine and the food isn't a problem anymore (unless they make it really spicy). 

As for money, I am fine. I took some money out of my account last week and will take a little out today too but I am only doing it because we aren't supposed to use the mission money for souvenirs or personal items (there are some military stores right next door and we went to them last week and are going again today). 

As for language, it feels weird but it is almost more natural to speak in Spanish than it is to speak in English now. I still have a lot to learn (mostly vocab and proper grammar) but I don't have any problems anymore expressing myself. 

They still haven't gotten here yet but we have to go to the offices tomorrow morning and they may already be there (they don't tell us we have mail we just get it when either our leaders or ourselves go to the offices).

Elder Blanding.

[He sent another email] 

So here in Mexico they have their day of the dead and as part of it they put offerings to their ancestors on their tables for about a week. One of the things they put there are called Hojaldras. It is a type of bread that they only make in October and just for the offerings (I wish they made it other times of the year because it is good bread). In the ward there are two bakers and one of them has the oven in a building just to the side of his house. We went to visit them and they were in the middle of making some. After every batch they have to heat up the oven and I decided to take a picture of it. They basically use a flame-thrower to heat up the bricks at the bottom of the oven and then put about 9 trays of Hojaldras in to cook. When they first start they need to take about a half-hour to heat up the oven this way but once it is hot they only need about 8 minuets between batches to reheat the oven. It was really cool to see. To cook a batch is also really fast, about 4 minuets in the oven and they are ready to be pulled out. Here is a photo of some Hojaldras so you can know what I am talking about.

Hojoldras

Warming up the oven. 

October 21, 2013

GO SEAHAWKS!!!!! 

The other news isn't so good especially the part about the Pettys moving ;(

I am certainly jealous of the stake choir starting up... without me ;(

So this week we had a little more success in the less-active area. We had some less-actives who had not been to church in a long long time come yesterday. the best part is that they came as a direct result of our work. I think it was the Monday after the conference we visited them and I shared (from memory) as best I could the talk about when the 70's father went inactive because they chose not to go to church and tied it in with Lehi's dream (just like the talk) and they said they would do everything they could to get to church on Sunday. It took them two weeks but they got everything out of the way to get to church and came!! We also managed to get one other family who had basically gone very very cold (in the brother's words "frozen") to the Church to come on Sunday. Again it took us two weeks to do it but they came. It was amazing.

I also had the privilege of baptizing one of the investigators of the sisters (they don't have the priesthood so they needed to get someone to do it). It was weird to go down into the font and preform the ordinance. 

Elder Blanding on the left.

I have been debating weather I should tell you all about something that is going to happen in the mission in a few months and I have just decided that I will. The news is that the technology upgrade (Internet, Facebook and whatnot) is coming here to the mission in a few months. This is a big change we don't know exactly when or what it will entail but we do know that is is coming. I also know from talking to other Elders who have friends serving in missions where they have already made the upgrade that it will probably mean that we will have Internet in our houses and that we will be using skype and Facebook (our own personally ones from our houses) to find people and teach the gospel. The reason that President Christensen has told us so far in advance is because he wants us to all be as converted as possible when it gets here (there will be a huge temptation to abuse it or use it in ways that we aren't supposed to). This means that probably about the beginning of next year you will be seeing Facebook massages from me about missionary work. It will be so weird especially after about 10 months (that is what I will have in January) of working the old fashioned way. It will defiantly be a big adjustment.

Elder Blanding

A Puebla Sunset! Beautiful!

October 14, 2013

Nice news from home. Too bad the Sounders lost... twice. But hey at least the Seahawks are kicking butt. I hope they keep this up to a Super Bowl :)

I wish I could have been there to here those talks they sound like they were really good. I find if funny that all the Utah kids are saying it is too wet there because I was saying exactly the opposite when I was in Utah. But good for the Mission President to just tell them to suck it up and learn to like it. Oh and while I am on the subject of water I think I forgot to answer your question about if it really does rain every day here, the answer is, almost every day.There is the occasional day where it doesn't rain but you can usually count on it to rain at least once every day during the rainy season. we are actually hitting the end of it. I have been told that about October or November is when the rainy season ends. I just hope that it gets colder soon because I am burning up here. When it doesn't rain it is always hot (just from the sun not the temperature) and I am miserable when it is hot. But I guess I should follow the advice of the Seattle Mission President and learn to like it. 

It is nice that you have found some way to get Chris to do his homework.

If you want to say something in the Christmas card just say that I am fine and doing well. 

So this week was more of the same, people not being home, people not keeping their commitments, etc. It is very annoying. We barely had any lessons this week with investigators. We did however have quite a few with less-actives and active members. The only bad part is that we didn't see any results. Not one of the less-actives we meet with came to church even though we had about 8 different people tell us they would come for sure. We tried to visit every person that told us they would come on Sunday after church but only one was home so we have decided that we will try to visit them all today or tomorrow to see what happened and why they didn't come even when they told us they would. It is hard to know what to do when they all say they will come and then don't come. I was thinking about looking for the talk that was given on keeping covenants in the conference and sharing it with them all telling them that when the tell us they will come they are basically making a covenant that they will. I really hope we can figure out what we need to do to be able to help them realize that it is important to do the things they say they will.

Elder Blanding.

Here are some tag pictures. I wish I could get a better one but it is hard to explain this kind of picture in Spanish to someone who has never seen a picture like this before (also my camera won't let me make the back ground blurry).

Elder Blanding's Tag!

Elder Blanding!

October 7, 2013

So conference is officially over ~frown~ . it was really nice to just sit down and listen to the prophet and all the apostles speak to us for 10 hours. I can't wait for the next one. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did (oh and yes I did watch it all in English). If you all want to see how 4 North American Elders watch conference in Mexico I am attaching a picture, fue bien chido. (I hope Kray watched a little of it.)

Other than conference not much happened this week. We barely had any lessons and not one of our investigators went to the conference. This now makes it 8 weeks in a row that we haven't had an investigator in church. If any of you all have suggestions for ways we can get people to come to church I am all ears. Either way I am trying to stay positive and keep working. It can be very frustrating when no one is willing to follow up on their commitments (say they will come to church and then don't). I just wish I knew what we can do to help them come to church. 

Sell not much more to wright about. Keep strong and work hard.

See you in three more conferences (I have two left in the mission).

Elder Blanding

English Missionaries watching conference. 
Elder Blanding is in the back on the right.

September 30, 2013

Well this is just going to be a short letter responding to questions because I have about a million and one emails this week.

I have gotten all of the pacages you have mentioned to me so far don't worry.

I could probably get some sweatpants and a hoodie here but they are not cheap and the sizes here are different so I would be guessing on what I am getting because they don't have dressing rooms. I was thinking Sounders becuase I already have a BYU jacket, and yes the beenie is for the night.

I agree that Mike filling out mission papers is scary. He could be out when I am.

Nice going Seahawks!! Sounders too.

As for what Sister Montiel said it was basicly just saying hi and hope I didn't get hit by all the flooding going on her in Mexico right now (I didn't, the whole mission hasn't had a problem).

I hope y'all enjoyed the open house. Say hi for me.

I'll see what I can do with the picture.

 [oh goody we got a second email later in the day from him!] 

So here we are 3 transfers into my stay here in Alamos. So we got transfer news on Saturday and... I am still here!!! By the end of this next transfer I will lack 2-4 days on 6 months here. It is weird to think that I will be in one area for 1/4th of my mission. 

We are still not having very much success with our investigators. They always say they will come to church but then when Sunday rolls around they never show up. It is really discouraging when that happens. Either way we will keep working and try new things to get them to come. The only problem that remains is that we can't really think of anything more or new we can do to get them to come. The nice thing is that this week they have 4 chances to come to a church meeting and 5 for the men. I just hope that someone will show up. 

Speaking of conference we are super exited for it. This one promises to be a great one. Who knows maybe they will change something about missionary work again this year. I have hope that we will be able to watch it in English so that I can hear it all in my native language. I think we will be because our stake president is awesome and also the mission president has asked that they make it available to us in English so that we can receive all the new revelation in our native language. 

Elder Blanding

September 23, 2013

This week wasn't the greatest but be we did get a lot of potential investigators (still potential not real yet) so that was nice. I have officially decided that the people here do not have a sense of being on time or keeping appointments. They don't seam to understand that if you say you will be somewhere at a certain time if you are not there you are being rude. We had about 12 appointments fall through this week. I don’t know why people say to come by at a certain time and then aren’t there.  It can be very frustrating because there isn’t anything we can do about it. If they aren’t there, they aren’t there and we just have to come back another day. Also when we plan activities we basically have to plan them a half hour earlier than we want them to start or they don't start on time. I don't like having to do it (I would prefer if we could just start something when we said it was going to start) but if we want to get what we said done when we want it done we have no choice. 

This week will probably be my last in this area. I have been here for about 4.5 or 5 months and that is a long time to be in one area so I figure that I am probably leaving. I have mixed feelings about the prospect of leaving because I love this area and the people here but at the same time I want to get to know other areas and more people. When I do leave it will be very hard to say good-bye to all the people here. It is actually kind of funny when I tell all the ward members that I am probably leaving and how much time I have here. They almost always say something along the lines of "Really? You have been here that long already?" The members don't seam to keep track like we do (it is really easy for us because we just count transfers). It is weird knowing that I have been here for such a long time.

Elder Blanding.

PS. What is Saydi's E-Mail? I want to find out where she lived while she was here in Puebla (stake and ward) but I don't have her E-Mail.

Picture: Someone so drunk that he passed out on the ground. I wanted to get a better picture but there were a few other people around and didn't want to attract attention. 

Mexican drunk passed out on the street.

September 16, 2013

Awesome news about the Seattle sports scene. 139.6 is really loud, I can only imagine what it would have been like to be there (pour ears). Who had/what was the record before? Where are the Seahawks in the standings right now? 

I got some more of your letters this week and one of them was interesting... it said "missent to Kenya" on the front. I got a big laugh out of it. What they said inside was good too.

This week we had a little more success than last week. We found two new families to teach!! We haven't taught them again yet but we have appointments with them this week. We will see what happens. We also had a stake activity this week because today is a very big day here in Mexico. Today is September 16th, it is like the 4th of July to them. Actually it is exactly that, their day of Independence. As a result we had a "Noche Mexicano" on Friday. We were actually one of the few companionships that was there. It is actually a funny story how we were able to go. The Stake President and the Mission President had a meeting a few days before the activity and they decided that they only wanted about 6-8 missionaries there (good thing because there were enough people there already) and they decided on the zone leaders, a companionship of sisters and the two other closest elders (not us). When we found out that we weren't going to be able to go we had to scramble a little bit because we had planed to bring our new converts to the event because they didn't know how to get there. We probably called every ward member with a car whose numbers we had but none of them could help us. So about 30 min. before we had to bring them to the activity we called the zone leaders telling them that we weren't able to find someone to help us bring them to the activity. The zone leaders told us that we could bring them and stay for a few hours to help them contact people (why there were any missionaries at all). So we went. 

How weird is is to know that Elder Howlett is comeing home in a week. Yes one week!!! It is super weird for me because it means that I have less time than I thought to be a missionary. Make sure to tell him to write me when he gets back.

Elder Blanding

September 9, 2013

If you think that time has gone by fast you haven't seen anything. For me it has seemed like I went to sleep the day Brandon went to Brazil and woke up with him coming home and me having 6 months in the mission. I can still remember some of the things that were said during his farewell party. It has been weird thinking about how little time I feel like I have and how much I really do have here in the mission. Next thing you know I will be the one who is coming home. 

Well this week we had more of the same... people not being home or not following through on their commitments. We won't be able to have a baptism this transfer because nobody came to church on Sunday. I have learned to dread Sundays here because it is the day when we find out if all the work we did during the week did anything. This Sunday the answer was no. We had quite a few people tell us that they were going to come but they didn't come... that is the worst part, when they say they will come and then don't. And we can't figure out what we can do better. We thought about trying to offer a ride but we don't have a way to do that. Some even live right next door but they still don't come. One of the families we are teaching is catholic and they have mass every Sunday at 12... our services are at 12. We don't even know what to tell them because we can't tell them they need to go to church (they are) and we can't be rude and tell them that their church is wrong. 

This week we had a lot of rain. It rained almost every day this week (I think maybe not on Thursday or Friday) but it wasn't just rain... it was a downpour. It rained so hard that the streets were rivers (see attachment, this was Monday night) and we couldn't get to some of our appointments. We got soaked those days. On Tuesday we almost avoided it. We were coming home from the church at about 9:30 and while we were walking home it started to rain. We only live about 3-4 minutes from the church (walking) but by the time we got home we were drenched. If I didn't have an umbrella and a rain jacket on I would have been drenched from head to foot in a matter of seconds. As it was I could squeeze my pants against my leg and water would come out. 

Elder Blanding

River or road? 

September 2, 2013

Cool news about the sounders. I really hope that they do well this year, and also actually win a game in the tournament. 

Oh and something you should know about Latin American culture is that they all have two last names. The first is the first last name of their dad and the second is the first last name of their mom. So if the last name is "Vazquez Gonzalez" than the dad is named Vazquez (insert some other last name here) and the mom is Gonzalez (insert some other last name here). Also the family goes by the first last name of the dad so it would be the family Vazquez (some times they use both). So the family that wrote you is the Rocha family not the Osorio family.

Great news about your cancer (or lack there of). What does 5 years mean again? I know it is a big deal but I don't remember why.

So this week kind of sucked... we had almost no success what so ever (I will go so far as to say that it was the worst week of my mission so far). We also got some really bad news that I won't say any more about because I really don't want to think about it. (Don't worry it is just about someone in my area, not me). But I won't dwell on the bad anymore. 

I am liking my new companion so far. We have a lot of fun together while we are in the streets. The only hard part is that he doesn't speak a lick of English and so I go almost all week without speaking it. I had always wondered why all the Elders from the states spoke English together all the time but now I know. It is because we almost never have the chance to speak it during the rest of the week. 

Today we had a little bit of an adventure... We went into the south mission! It wasn't on purpose. We were trying to go to Centro (the center of the city) and myself and my companion went to Resurgimiento to meet up with the Elders that are there because we were going to go together. We got there just fine but when we all tried to go to Centro from there we took the wrong bus and ended up in the south mission. We called the Zone Leaders to help us figure out where to go to get back to our mission ( half of Centro is in their area, the other half is in the south mission) and they tried to help us figure it out. It didn't take to long to figure it out and we quickly got back to the mission but it was a weird felling being in the other mission. A little later while we were in Centro we ran into some missionaries from the south mission in our mission. We told them that they were in our mission and that they should probably go back to their own mission but I don't think they cared. I am glad that I am in a mission where the Elders are for the most part obedient (aka not the south mission).

Oh and before I forget... say hi to Alex and Roxy for me... and Happy Birthday Mom!!!! 

Elder Blanding

PS. the picture was lunch... not really, we just saw it in the street yesterday.

Elder Mendoza found "lunch".