week 6 i believe...last week of the transfer anyway.

Hola todos!

Notes from scripture study this week...Luke 17, verses 7 through 10 paired with DC 123 11 through 17 have been both my greatest consuelo in this past month and my greatest chagrin. Also, the epistle to Corianton is WONDERFUL for explaining doctrinal topics. Alma talks a lot like Elder Bednar. Really direct but still warm and comforting and really, really logical, as though speaking to an educated person or an atheist, not that those two things are mutually exclusive. I feel like Nephi speaks less with logic and more with power. It´s good to have both.

Pres. Sanchez in the CCM counseled us to search for Lost Sheep, or members that are living in ward boundaries that the ward doesn´t know about. We found four this week. One, a vecino of a less active from Veracruz, Alejandra who´s a young mother we just started teaching and took to the second time we met for her to tell us she used to go when she was younger but was never baptized, a nicaraguan man (actually, i´m not sure he counts because I didn´t understand the conversation) and Esperanza and her daughter. It was pretty funny with Esperanza, because we were just teaching her Lesson 0 and she was like Oh, my daughter´s a member and lives in Colorado. Few minutes later, Oh, my other daughter´s a member too and lives up north. But my other daughter´s a Jehovah´s Witness. Few minutes later, Oh, I´m a member. and so is my daughter who lives with me. So she was in church on Sunday, her and her nieta. No baptisms yet, but that´s fine as long as I´m helping build Zion in other ways.

Just kidding, apparently we´re not required to make plans before setting goals. I asked Elder Alcalá why we did it that way and he said, oh we don´t have to. De hecho, it´s better the other way around. So we´ve been doing it the right way for a few days now. Numbers have gone up, go figure.

I believe in revelations. Specifically, I revealed to Elder Alcalá lo que es Stuffed French Toast. Yep. It´s easier to not get frustrated when I cook for him, so I made a Desayuno Americano for him on Domingo. He liked it. So he polished my shoes. So then I thanked him, took them upstairs and buffed and shined them. Next step of service, teach him how to buff and shine a shoe. He uses plenty of polish, but he doesn´t buff or shine.

One more thing we eat a lot of is spaghetti in a sort of cream sauce with maybe tomato or chile sauce mixed in. It´s really, really good. We had it for lunch one day earlier this week with Hna Obelia and her familia, her two soltero children and her married daughter and her husband. The two-year-old granddaughter had been kidnapped the night before and the abuela and the madre were on the phone the whole time being frustrated by police and other bureaucracies. I noticed the Mexican version of PBS was on. Then Hna Obelia asked me to say the blessing on the food.

What on earth can possibly be said for a blessing on the food in a situation like that? I don´t remember what I said, But i do remember the Priesthood power that filled that room as I prayed. I didn´t bless the food, God blessed the family through that prayer and we all felt it. Hna Obelia asked me to pray again. That, I believe, is the most sacred ordinance of the gospel, prayer with a real intent. I hardly made it through the prayer and had to have my companion read the scripture I pulled out for comfort for them. I was looking for something else but ran across this one and decided it would work. DC 50, 41 through 42. Please, tonight instead of whatever prayers you would say for me, please pray for Hermanita Carla that she can be found and returned to her family and pray for the family that they can be comforted and not lose hope, that they can keep in mind and look forward to the time when they see her again, which God willing will be sooner than later.

Thanks for everything!

Cuidaos,

Elder Taylor

week five ish

esta carta va a ser bien breve para que les pueda escribir más individualmente. necesitaré chequear si esté bien con el presidente rodriguez, pero les voy a tutear porque nunca tengo otra chanza usar esta forma menos cuando me dirija a dios o a perros y muchas veces no tengo idea de lo que digan las personas cuando se use.

first, i found in the scriptures what i consider to be a perfect manner of living. funny how that works, search in the scriptures and voila, there it is, how we should live our life. it´s d y c 88 verses 123 through 126 paired with section 89.

we talked with a less active lady this week who said she´d never received a respuesta from dios if the ldm is true or not. this is something i´ve been thinking about. i think some of us are called to walk by faith our entire life, without knowing that we know that it´s true. i don´t know. i´m going to have to think about how to phrase this later.

i had mole this week. bien rico.

my relationship with my companion is improving. no we´re not like elder petersen and i were and i don´t know if we´ll ever get there. but i have a lot more patience now. i am learning from him as well as learning from being with him. everyone keeps telling me he´s one of the best in the mission. i had this thought a couple nights ago. maybe god is preparing me for tougher companions in the future. oh joy.

i really shouldn´t compare my relationship with elder alcalá with my relationship with elder petersen because i´ve never had a better friend besides katherine and jared and maybe a few others and definitely not ever formed such a relationship so quickly. it´s good that i miss him and that we are friends. but as soon as i start wishing i still were with him en vez de quien sea mi compa actual, i start finding fault and there´s no way whoever can measure up to elder petersen unless he does. i don´t know if that´s clear.

we do a lot of things differently here than how i was taught. i went on divisiones with an ap on thursday. apparently we´re supposed to memorize every lesson and teach every point of doctrine in every lesson and plan before setting goals, three things we were specifically programmed not to do in the ccm. but i have to trust my trainer and president.

in a moment of wistful rebellion, i calculated if i´m going to have a different president. the answer is no. actually, it´s quite likely los rodriguez and i will go home the same day. the mission opened in may or june of 2013. my license expires and hence i will return in may of 2016.

this week i remembered something sister osborne promised us in primary. if we would read 8 verses a day of the bom, we would learn how to read. so that has now become my goal. 8 verses por lo menos so i can learn how to read...and speak.

last thought, there´s nothing quite as unnerving as having a cockroach attack your shoes as you´re having a pleasant little poop. i was going to name her something, but then elder alcalá killed her the next morning. she lived in our shower. she was a big stinker too.

les quiero mucho

elder taylor

week 3 i think

hola todos and gracias por sus correos!

lo siento, I´m not even going to bother correcting what I write because it takes too much time to try and fix it.

we started teaching a couple this week. they say they´re religious but don´t attend church. i think she´s catholic and his mom´s TJ (jehovah´s witness). they´ve been to a bunch of churches but not to ours yet. Anyway, we started with lesson 0 which is basically God loves you, we´re here to serve you, this is what faith is, will you be baptized? It was kind of weird, because usually when we do this people nod and say Okay, thanks. Bu these two kept adding stuff to the lesson. And when we got to the definition of faith (how can you move the glass with your faith?) they knew the answer (stand up, grab it and move it). Most members don´t know that one. It was also weird because the autistic neighbor kept pooping in and adding to the lesson. This is Jesus. He saved my son. I passed your church. The gate was locked and churches ought to be open always. My father was a priest and spoke Latin.

I gave a blessing to the uncle of one of our less active members. I didn´t know the guy or reallly any of his difficulties, but I knew God did. So i trusted that God would guide me and said what came to mind. It´s amazing how clear it comes and in Spanish too.

It´s weird to me that God would trust someone like me with the authority to act in His name. That just boggles my mind. What kind of God would do that? obviously one that trusts humans more than I do. So maybe I should trust humans more. I should place more trust in my trainer. Even though his music is totes efy tastic.

I went on divisiones with the zone leader, Elder Hutchins. OH was it nice to speak English. and to have warm water in the shower! I thought I´d never leave. We were working in the city, whcih was nice because everything was close together and so we didn´t waste time crossing the desert. I don´t know exactly what happened, but after it, I had a lot more confidence in talking to people. So this week went a lot better.

I´ve been reading my patriarchal blessing much more frequently now, and it´s amazing how some things take on different meanings. Some things I can look back and say That´s a fulfillment there, or I´m glad I did that right. Some things I can look and say WOw, I should have done that better. But a lot of things pop out at me that I´d never noticed before. SUch as I will have the gift of teaching on my missions, plural.

One thing I´ve found that helps me a ton when I know I need to fix something about me is make a list. I take one night and write all the things I don´t like about me. Then the next night I write all the things I do like. THen the next night I write specific goals based on the two previous nights´ lists to improve myself. it works awesome.

We had chili rellenos yesterday. Quite possibly the most glorious thing I´ve ever eaten. Coahuilense chili rellenos. You guys ought to try it. And coahuilense salsa is super easy. A tomato or avocado, some chili pepper or something, some milk or water and bland it up. Es bien rico.

ONe meal we´ve had a lot and is really delicious is hamburger meat cooked with zucchini and carrot and potato, next to orange rice, refried beans (never black), always served with small flour tortillas, sometimes with a fork. And some sort of agua. Usually it´s jamaica or coco or limón, but my favorite is blended up cantaloupe with water and sugar and maybe ice. All this just in case someone wanted to experiment.

ANd now a little about the people in the church. First of all, the church is beautiful. It rivals the one nicole and I found in Ivins. The ward is made up of almost exclusively converts and they love feeding us and talking to us which sometimes creates a problem when we´re at someone´s house for two hours. There´s one family, the Guerreros. Apparently they met on their mission in Guatamala and now have a son on a mission in Torreón, which I guess is a bit like being called to BOise from Rexburg like that one Elder we once met. Actually, more like being called from Boise to twin falls. Speaking of which, there´s a guy here who just returned from serving in the Boise and Twin Falls mission. I haven´t met him yet, though. ANyway, Hna Guerrero my first sunday came up to me and specifically welcomed me. She seems to be the Sister Swenson of the ward.

Yesterday we taught the jovenes. It´s not surprising but still amazing how the same it is. Not as big, but the YM/YW have basically the same personalities as they do in the EEUU. Still always on their phones.

ALso, nobody here can sing. the hymns are always an adventure, especially since usually the piano is automated and doesn´t stop for anything and is often programmed wrong and misses or adds beats or notes.

One hymn that´s in Spanish but not in English is AWESOME is number 88 and called Placentero nos es Trabajar. I´ve been meaning to tell about it since the 2a semana of the CCM but kept forgetting. The lyrics were written by a Mexican missionary in jail about to be executed.

Yesterday we had my first bien horrible rainstorm. By the way, bien means muy here. I took a foto from our doorway, but it´s not going to work to send the foto this time. It looks like fog, the rain is so thick.

Quote from the week. Elder, there´s a scorpion by your butt! luckily he understood scorpion and stood up in time. We were sitting outside on our stoop planning because we were locked out because i forgot the keys inside because i was a little tonto in that moment.

One interesting bit from scripture study. Nefi and his disciples were baptized twice, once before and once after Christ´s coming. I don´t know if a reason is given.

Last thing, DEJAR is pronounced here dtheKHAHRSHTH. something like that. bien raro el idioma acá.

les quiero mucho! cuidense!

Elder Taylor

Week 2 i think...

Hola todos!

The problem with the keyboard is it’s an English keyboard with Spanish conversion, so nothing is what it says it is in the punctuation.

This week was difficult for me because the work was too easy. I became really frustrated with my companion which was totally unfair and I knew that then too. I wanted to work with efficiency and I knew he did too, but it just seemed like we had very different definitions of efficient. Our lessons were averaging about fifty minutes or for forty minutes with active members, but I felt powerless to do anything because I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t necessarily know if we’re teaching or just chatting. One day, we spent 5 hours at a member’s house.

Basically, we weren't working hard enough. Missionaries that don’t work hard enough aren't worthy to see miracles and those who aren't worthy of miracles aren't worthy to represent a God of miracles. This was my frustration. I was praying for patience and diligence, but I couldn't shake the feeling of anger and every time my companion did something like sit and wait for someone instead of contacting with me or whatever it was, I thought I would explode.

But then I had a thought. I can’t expect him to be perfect any more than he can expect me to be perfect. But then I had another thought. We weren’t doing our best and maybe I can’t expect perfection but I can push us to do better.

So the next day during personal study, I read DC 123 11 through 17 and then came up with a list of specific things we could do to be more efficient, such a s set time limits in people’s houses or never sit and wait if we can be doing something else. I shared them with Elder Alcalá and he thought they were great ideas and so we've been working on implementing them.

What a difference! Our numbers didn’t change at all, but our effort increased so much and I’m no longer constantly frustrated. No we’re not perfect. But we’re on the right track.

Just to be clear, I don’t think Elder ALcalá is lazy. I think he works hard and teaches really well. He just doesn’t do things the way I was trained. In the MTC, we were taught to give 5 to 30 minutes lessons. 1 hour in most cases is too long. Also in the MTC, they pounded into us to set goals for the key indicators BEFORE planning for each day. Well, we’ve been doing it the other way around, which really doesn’t make sense. Why would you decide what you want to accomplish after you’ve set how you want to accomplish it? i found the ?

But i´m the junior companion and don’t feel like coming in and turning this guy’s rhythm upside down and inside out. And it’s not like we’ve not been productive. So you have to pick your battles.

A few days ago, we were walking through loma Blanca which is a really poor section of town and we passed a lady standing on the only piece of sidewalk for two blocks in any direction, just kind of gazing into the sunset. I turned to say hola when I saw her face, I suddenly got this really strong thought. Ï want to baptize her¨ I was about to say something when my companion spoke up and we started talking. Turns out she believes in Christ but doesn’t attend a church and her granddaughter has either met with or talked with the missionaries, I wasn’t really clear on which. One of the missionaries was tall and skinny and the other was short and gordito. I think she might be the grandmother of a girl we met about a week ago in the same area, but probably not. Still, I really hope something comes of this.

We also started teaching a young mother of two kids and the two hooligans that hang out at her house. It’s fun even thought it’s difficult to keep their attention.

My first baptism is scheduled! Actually, we had one scheduled for my first Saturday but it fell through for family complications that I didn’t understand. But this one is a for sure and we know this because she’s already a member but her baptismal record went missing. But it’s turned into a good opportunity to reactivate the family.

Two nights ago I had my first contact without being prompted by my companion, an abuelita we saw walking about half a block from our house. Turned out to be deaf. So we gave her a card. We later saw the Jehova´s Witnesses (TJs for short) talking to her and her family out in front of their house. Looked like fun.

We went into the city center for lunch with a member this week. Lots of people and scary driving. And a real pig’s head hanging from a hook as I ate my carne asada. It had blue eyes.

Call me racist, but I was expecting just about everyone to be mestizo, dark skin, eyes and hair. But I see a lot of freckles, light skin, blue or light brown eyes and quite a bit of red or auburn hair. One man we talked to in the street I would have sworn was Irish, but nope. Still, the majority are mestizo. And I swear, they all have been speeding up the talking since I’ve been here.

Also, I’ve been much better since my stint at the hospital. So no se preocupen. I’m pretty sure it was just food poisoning and not Montezuma´s Revenge.

I’m sending pictures too, if i can figure out how.

'Elder Taylor

Saltillo

His apartment?

Week 1 in the field

Could you please send this to everyone else_ Also, i can´t find the question mark...

Today was the hardest day so far. Woke up puking and crapped my pants and had to go to the hospital. So yeah...but the man gave me some magic pills and I´m feeling a bit better.

First, I am actually in Saltillo (Linda Loma Colonia),  which is fortunate because the weather here during the summer is actually nice and everywhere else in Coahuila is supposedly hellish. The mornings are cool, the day is hot but not unbearable, then we have thunderstorms about every other day in the afternoon, followed by street floods. Then the evenings are sweaty but otherwise nice.

I was expecting the food to be super spicy, but it´s not. AT ALL. It´s delicious, but little to no spice. I haven´t experienced all of it, but I have noticed a few trends. Lots of soup, carrots, zucchini, potatoes, corn (sometimes on the cob), and maybe some sort of meat in some sort of brothy roux. Once we had meatballs in some sort of tomatoey orange soup. It was delicious! All the rice is orangeish pink. Then there´s this thing called ¨gorditas¨that are basically fat tortillas stuffed like pitas with stuff like eggs, ham andor cheese. Also, everything is served with tortillas de harina. They also drink a lot of ¨agua de sabor¨here. I haven´t yet heard anybody call juice ¨jugo.¨ It´s agua de splat. And it´s not just kool-aid stuff either all the time. Yesterday, we had ägua de jamaica and guayaba¨ with floating bits of guava pulp. To be fair, it´s quite possible they´re saying ¨jugo¨and I´m just missing it.

The first day I actually understood quite a bit and felt good and it was fun even when I didn´t understand. Then the next day we taught some lessons and I still felt pretty good even when I swear, I just didn´t understand when people talked directly to me. Then the third day was like ökay, party´s over¨ and I became really frustrated. And I swear they´ve all been speaking faster every day. But I understand the majority of everything that´s said during lessons and contacting. Next step, participation.

Weird idiomatic thingsÑ It is very fast here. Not Chalio fast but at least fernando fast. It´s basically Spanish spoken with just barely a hint of a whistle and sounding sarcastic especially when listing stuff. Also, instead of saying üm¨ at a pause in thought, if the ultimate word ends in ¨r¨, it becomes something of a cross between argentine ll and a whistle and they just kind of hold onto that for a while. ¨Tenemos que leeshthshthshth...pero no queremos¨ or whatever it is.

I hear people talk about leaving the MTC and forgetting all the language they´d learned. That wasn´t my experience. I maintained about the same fluency, I just forgot the whole Gospel everything. What is faith! Why are you asking me! What is this Jesus you speak of! Oh, a person! Well, that´s news. But it's slowly all coming back.

A few days ago was embarrassing. We were at a member´s house and I asked the hermana for a taza for my companion. She looked at me kind of funny, then handed him a tea cup. I asked my companion about it later. Turns out taza in Saltillo is teacup, Vaso is glass. Oxford, my dictionary, is not my best friend, as it turns out. 

My companion is Elder Alcala from Tijuana. He´s short white mexican with nerdy glasses. He´s young, Only 18!, and sometimes it shows. But the people think he´s funny, giving high fives when someone on the street says that yes they do believe in Christ. He´s not Elder Petersen, but we get along just fine, even though I hardly speak Spanish and he hardly speaks English.

As far as mexican casas go, ours is pretty big. I have to duck my head when descending the stairs, there´s no hot water and only a sliver of a mirror, the heavy metal doors rattle and slam when it´s windy at night, but other than that, it´s actually pretty darn nice. Two nights ago, the light in the bathroom went out with a huge flash. Oh how I love pooping in the dark. But then Elder Alcalá cannibalized a light bulb from the kitchen, so it´s good.

WE¨RE NOT ALLOWED TO PLAY FÚTBOL! AAAH!

This is my spanish frustration this week. When i first learned reflexives, it was pretty simple. Then someone introduced passive voice and it kind of complicated a bit. Then Hna Cabello in the CCM taught me reciprocal verbs and I knew that was going to be a struggle. I needn´t have worried. I feel like Oprah. ¨You get a se! and YOU get a se! Every verb gets a se!¨

Investigator of the week. Hna Josefina. We met her when her neighbor, not even an investigator, introduced us. We were standing right outside her cardboard gate just really saying hi because it was already 900 at night. She told us she wanted to be baptized. WHAT! I guess she´d already met with some of the sister missionaries before. So we came back to teach her. She sat us down on chairs in her cinderblock hut and gave us lemonade (agua de limon) and we started with a hymn, then taught her that she is a daughter of God and that He has a plan for her. It was quite the experience for all of us.

This is really not a religion of keeping arbitrary commandments. It´s a religion about WHo am i. The gospel is true no matter who you are or what you´ve done or where you live. All that matters is who you are and who you can become, and that is an IMmortal God or Goddess. I´m about to butcher this quote.

You are no less than the trees of the forest or the stars of the sky, yet no greater than the baby born an hour ago, the poorest shepherd or the vilest sinner.

Josefina in her two'room cinderblock hut with a cardboard and chicken wire fence is no less than the old Mormon King of Tonga. The gospel doesn´t make it so, but it helps us realize that.

Scripture for the week and probably for the rest of my forever here in Coahuila. Exodus 4, 11 through 12 (sorry, I haven´t figured out the punctuation thing on these keyboards.) But don´t take my word for it. Cue Reading Rainbow montage. 

Me landing in Saltillo. 

My first night.

Our apartment.

Week 5?

I'm sorry that I didn't respond to everyone's email individually, but I don't have much time this week. We got a new district of 12 elders in our zone and all the computers are taken, so my companion and I are technically breaking rules right now as we are in different rooms using computers. So i'm trying to make this go as fast as possible.

No mucho de significado pasó esta semana pasada. Recibí mis planes de viaje y un email de mi presidente misional, pero no mucho más. Voy a irme para el lunes por la mañana, a las 730. Estoy muy emocionado, pero no demasiado. Yo necisito tiempo para sentirme y pensar para que esté mucho mucho emocionado, y no tenía tiempo, (except for) el día de hoy. 

Chiste en español

Cuál es la diferencia entre una pera y una novia? Una es pera, la otra no espera.

Exciting news: my psoriasis is leaving me! On my chest, it's almost completely gone. No tengo ninguna idea porque.

One thing I noticed in the Book of Mormon: La existencia de debates doctrinales al dentro de la iglesia en el LDM. Lean Mosiah 18:9, Alma 39:5 guardando en mente quien están hablando en cada caso y prestiendo atención a la manera de que las palabras se usan. (the phrasing, I just have no idea how to say that in spanish.)

One funny thing that happened this week: I was telling Elder Petersen some story about Daniel that I don't remember what it was, but he stopped me at some point and asked me to repeat Daniel's name. So I said "Daniel." He looked at me funny, then asked me to clarify again. So I did. Then he asked me if all my family said it that way. Apparently, I say "Dane-yell." So then he went through a long list of things, asking me how to I say them. Apparently, "Man" is "Mah-ehn." that's the only other one I remember off the top of my head. I always knew I had a little of an Idahoan twang, but I guess I never really realized what that meant. Anyway, Elder Petersen eventually had to go to the bathroom. I was sitting there alone in the classroom, so I said "Daniel" to myself a few times to hear how it sounded. Then I decided I'd go and ask the hermanas in the next room over how they said it. I pushed open the door and found them just DYING of laughter. I guess it was pretty funny to them to hear me through the door say "Daniel....DANiel."

That night I went around to all the people I know are from Idaho, which is like 3, to ask them. Elder Price from Pocatello didn't support me, and neither did Elder King from Nampa (apparently I say "Nyampah," which made Elder Petersen and the hermanas laugh uncontrollably). Finally, I found one Idahoan to support me in this. Elder Lamm ("Lyamm") from Gooding. I guess I sound like I'm from "30 minutes from the interstate" Idaho. That's almost depressing.

Two spiritual things that really hit me this week: in our devotional, Elder Brown (70s emeritus) spoke to us and he said this: "Are we doing this work in our name or Christ's? Sometimes we focus too much on our own inadequacies and lack faith." However, this is the struggle of my mission so far: I want to push myself to be as perfect as I can be and identify things I need to work on, but at the same time I need to be realistic and can't expect myself to be perfect.

Second: to illustrate a point this week, Hermana Rasmussen (nuestra maestra) taught a lesson in role-play to an "investigator" (Elder Sheffield) como misionera que no hable ingles muy bien. At first it was really funny to hear her mimic the stutterings of someone just learning a language, but then the reality set in: in just a week, I am going to be doing EXACTLY THAT. Even though it wasn't real, it was really touching to see a "green" missionary deliver such a powerful, simple message about the Restoration in atrocious English that was just understandable enough. It was really humbling, too, knowing that I'm going to be in exactly the same spot that she was in, especially in Saltillo where everybody says the food is the best in Mexico, but the Spanish is the fastest and muddiest except that of Mexico City.

Then she made the point: "The gift of tongues does not mean that we will speak perfectly; it means that we will be able to teach and be understood despite our mistakes. If learning the language is your focus, you can't teach with the Spirit and you never will. If teaching with the Spirit is your focus, the language will not matter."

That landed on my head like a ton of bricks. Learning the language had been my focus this whole time. I wish she had given that lesson at the beginning. Actually, she had, just not using those words. She'd been telling us that everyday, I guess I just wasn't ready to listen.

Yo tengo un camino MUY largo enfrente de mi. No estoy listo para Mexico, pero eso no va a importar en cinco dias. Soy muy lejo de perfecto, pero soy mucho mas dispuesto que era cuando llegue aca. (La siento la falta de acentos.) Pues, todo que pueda tener ahora es fe, fe que me guarde seguro Dios y que sea el mejor misionero que puedo ser. (Den cuenta al Subjuntivo :)

Vayan con Dios!

-Elder Taylor

 Elder Petersen trying to be hipster.

Our district minus a companionship plus the other district, all going to Puebla Norte, after the devotional and the Marriott Center.