Holy Sabana

Holy Sabana what a week and already at 2 months in the mission . . .

Welp, to start, the weather here has kind of chilled out, I'm not sure if I'm getting used to being hot all the time or if it has actually felt cooler. But the only thing that sucks is that I swear our house keeps getting hotter and hotter. We go out on our little porch and it feels 10 degrees cooler and feels good, then we go into our house and it feels super hot. This week it also rained pretty hard but gratefully we were already in our house. 

This week we also went on companion exchanges, I went with Elder Saldana, he's on his last transfer so he is a really good teacher and very good at contacting and just talking with the people here. I definitely learned a ton from him, I also learned that you leave a blanket for the elder who is with your companion. I took my blanket or bed sheet I slept with and I guess the Elder who was with my companion for the day had to sleep with his towel, whoops.  

We also did some service during the exchange, we just scraped paint off the wall. There were 4 of us so there wasn't much work to do since once we got all the paint off we had to get  another layer off that was super hard and we kind of gave up a little. We also didn't even get to paint the wall but we had already been there for 3 hours. 

We're also close to baptizing one sister.  She said she would never get married to her partner but she said that she might get married, and if she does we can basically do the interview and she can get baptized. There's also a young woman that has been coming to church but we didn't know that she wasn't a member and says she wants to get baptized. So there is a bit of a free one for us. But the one sister, Noemi, didn't come to the Stake Conference this past Sunday and all she had to do to get baptized was to go to church the 3 weeks back to back. So I'm not sure what will happen.  We've also found a few Evangelists, and Jehovah witnesses and they have all been open to talking with us but I'm not sure if we will get further than that. 

One last little part, I finally had Ensebollado, which is a fish onion soup they have for breakfast. Then we went to a Stake Conference, and about halfway through it decided to come back up and I spent about an hour in the bathroom throwing up and dripping sweat. It was funny but I got to ride in the mission president's car.  He took us home so we didn't have to wait for a moto. Gratefully, I'm already feeling better and just think it is just how my body reacts to fish. 

Also was reading in 3rd Nephi - the doctrine and story of Jesus Christ visiting the Americas. I've never realized how deep it was but it is filled with a lot of great stuff. I really like 3rd Nephi 13:34, which tells us to focus on the days right now and not worry about the future since they will take up their own space. That has helped me a ton staying focused in the now instead of the future or the past. 

Miss all you guys and hope you guys had a good week,

Elder Roper

Multi Zone Conference

The zones Juan Montalavo, Puerto Liza, and Puerto Nuevo gathered together to strengthen themselves spiritually.  They received inspired talks by their leaders. 

Suave como Yogur

Second week of the field and it was pretty good. The members like to say "suave como yogur" or smooth like yogurt. It doesn't make any sense and I'm not really sure if that's how you use it but it's pretty funny. 

Other than this week being pretty smooth, it was also pretty good. It's super hot here and whenever we check the temperature it always says about 90 degrees but feels like close to 100 with the humidity. Whenever the sun is out it always feels a lot more hot too. Then if it rains early in the morning and then the sun comes out we are screwed because the sun just bakes you alive mixed with the humidity from the rain. But I think I would rather be dripping sweat while studying Spanish and eating hot soup in the heat, than having to contact while it's snowing or just really, really cold. 

This week we also got to go to the President's house for lunch. It was like a training that they usually do the day we get there but they decided it was better for us to do it a week later so that we can get settled in. But the mission president's house is nicer than most of the houses in the states haha. It's super super new and everything is super nice. I'll have to find some pictures that the APs were taking so all of you guys can see how nice it is. But for lunch we have some chicken parmesan with rice and pineapple juice. It was kind of a weird meal but it was pretty good. This week I've eaten some weird things I would never guess I would be eating in Ecuador, too. For example: KFC, hamburgers, and BBQ wings. They aren't the same like home but they're pretty good. 

Other than the food the work is going pretty well. We have the same two sisters on date to be baptized, but they don't want to seem to commit to being baptized. The one sister, sister Noemi, won't come to church but we visited her last night and was wondering when the next date she could get baptized was. The other sister, sister Denisse, says that she  doesn't even want to get baptized anymore. It also seems there are a few others that are close but just have a couple of things holding them back. It doesn't make any sense to me but it's a complete lifestyle here compared to Utah. 

Also a little funny bit, we were teaching a younger kid and asked him how long he thought I was here for and he guessed a year. I just started laughing. It seems people think I've been here for much longer than I have. 

This Sunday we talked a lot about 2nd Nephi 5, but also Mosiah 2:41 which was pretty cool. Something I was thinking about during the sunday school lesson is that I sometimes think that life was easy for Nephi, but I bet it wasn't. I feel like Nephi is a good example for us because he is always praying and obeying the Lord's commandments and whenever there is something that is really hard he always asks the Lord for guidance. Everyone has stuff that they struggle with, so I invite everyone to ask the Lord for guidance for whichever thing you need help with and he will answer your prayers and help out!

Miss all of you guys

Elder Roper

New Missionary Training

The new missionaries have a training to set goals for their training, receive inspired messages from President Suarez and his assistants and then go to the Presidents house.

First Couple of Days In The Field

First couple of days in the field!!

I'll start first with our 29 hour trip from SLC to Guayaquil and honestly it felt like I was never going to get to the mission field. It was pretty boring since all we had to pass time was the scriptures and sleep. I attempted to read my scriptures but could only read them for so long on a bumpy airplane ride. Our redeye from Phoenix to Miami was pretty bumpy and I only got about 1 or 2 hours of sleep so all day Thursday was really fun. I also for some reason had a pretty bad stomach ache, not sure if it was stress related or not, but when we got to the apartment and was sitting there I wasn't sure if I could do it for much longer. But the next couple days were much much easier. 

I'm in an area called Sedalana, it's just a little suburb from Guayaquil and it's really chill. Just a bunch of cars passing through honking at every chance they can get and letting you know that you're in the way or finding any reason to honk. I think it has rained every single day here, it's not that bad though. I've heard in some areas the road will flood and you're just walking through water up to your ankles. But gratefully that hasn't happened yet. 

Understanding the Natives is pretty hard, they talk really really fast and it just sounds like gibberish, but I'm starting to kind of pick out some of the words that they say and can kind of keep a conversation and know what they are talking about. Most of the members say that my Spanish is pretty good and clear so that is encouraging. 

Other than our little apartment being hotter than outside, it is pretty good here. I'm going to eat very well in Guayaquil, there hasn't been a dish that I haven't liked or after one bite didn't want to eat anymore. The members are all so nice and are always asking us if we want Coke, or something to eat. I think my favorite dish so far has been something called Arroz con menestra y horneado. It was just rice with sliced pork beans and some vegetables. At first I was a little unsure but wow it was awesome. We also had some cookies that were almost macaroons. They were 2 cookies with Dulce de Leche in between the middle and that was pretty good too. 

This weekend there has been something called Carneval which is just a big celebration where everyone throws water on everyone else and the work has been kind of slow because of that reason. The funniest experience this week was having someone call us over and the guy has eyes so read all you could see what the color of his pupils. I still don't have any clue what he was saying.

Miss you all

Elder Roper