CREATED AND UPDATED BY: M♡M

In Moravia

January 26, 2009

Hello, I am doing fine here. Moravia it’s just a little NE of San Jose. I can see San José when we get up in the hills of our area. Our area is huge. My companion is Elder Bonn from Las Vegas who has only been in Costa Rica for 4 months. We are probably the youngest companionship in the mission. He is a nice guy. We rent out a tiny house that is in the backyard of the owner. I can’t really explain it. We also live with two other elders. Costa Ricans aren’t as humble as I thought. They seem more European than Latin. There are no addresses here so its hard finding peoples houses in this big area if you don’t know the area very well. Luckily my companion knows it pretty well. We walk everywhere we go and take buses every once and awhile. We haven’t had much success lately. We knock and contact all the time. We’ve been trying to work more through the members lately. The weather is nice. My comp thinks its cold but it’s perfect. There has been a light mist and wind all week except for today was hot. Today was p-day and we played soccer. It was an elders birthday so we egged and threw flour on him.
Not much to tell really so see you later. Pura Vida!

Arriving in San Jose, COSTA RICA

January 19, 2009

Hello everyone. I've arrived in San Jose safely. I met Elder Christensen in Atlanta. My first area is Moravia which is a little outside of San Jose. The weather right now is perfect (in the 70's). It's very beautiful here and it reminds me a lot of some parts of Colombia. The mission president is really nice and so are the elders I’ve met. Anyway so far it’s great here and I won't go to my area till at least tomorrow so I still don't know much more.

Leaving Maryland

January 17, 2009

Hello Everybody.
I just found out yesterday that I am going to Costa Rica. I leave really early Monday morning. I am taking a plane to Atlanta and then a plane to San Jose, Costa Rica. I'm kind of sad I’m leaving so soon because I wanted to stay here for at least one more week. We have an appointment to take an investigator to the Washington D.C. temple visitors center tonight so I’m excited because it’s my favorite Temple. It's just been to busy around here. On Wednesday I couldn't finish writing because my library card time expired, but when you read the journal you'll know the rest of the story.

Mission in Maryland

January 14, 2009

Hello. Life’s good here. It's cold, but not too cold. My companion Elder Moreno lets me borrow one of his jackets. I've been sick ever since I left the MTC and everyone here is sick too because we always have to go out and knock in the cold so we never get better. I just cough a lot and have a cold so it’s no big deal. I’m still in a companionship of 3 but this week Elder Dickens is going to be at doctors offices during the day because he’s been having knee problems for a couple years and he might need surgery. His parents came out yesterday and we met them. We still don't know what is going to happen to him. I sleep on an air mattress on the floor, but it’s pretty comfortable. We have the car every other day, so we use it to go to referrals that are in other cities like Damascus. I am Spanish speaking but we still talk to English people too. We had a baptism on Saturday. She is a 23 year old woman named Cindy. She is going through rough times right now. Her husband was deported and she doesn't have a job. She also has a baby girl, probably about a year old. But Elder Moreno has been teaching her for awhile and she had enough faith to be baptized. The baptism was really nice and a lot of new members and investigators we are teaching were able to attend. One of them Ana Sedillo. Ana was set to be baptized on Saturday too, but she canceled on us. At the baptism it looked like she was touched by the spirit, so we're hopeful for her. We have visited her a couple times since then and we showed her the Testaments movie. There is a woman named Maria who was baptized a couple weeks ago who we have been working with lately as well. Her four kids want to be baptized as well, but her husband is against it. Also this week we found a family that looks solid. They were a referral in Damascus, a woman and her mother named Xenia and Blanca. We taught them the first lesson about the apostasy and the Restoration and they agreed to read and pray about the Book of Mormon.

Other than that we knock doors a lot. We've only been invited in once and a lot of times people tell us to come back later (make appointments) but don't answer the door when we show up. A couple times the people just slam the door in our face but it's kind of funny so I always laugh. My companions don't always think it's funny but I do for some reason. We always get dirty looks at the store too and it baffles me as to why people dislike us so much. Yesterday was an interesting day so ill tell you about that. We started out with a great day planned, but many people canceled on us. We wake up at 6:30 every day and we're supposed to exercise but everyone just usually sits on the couch. Elder Moreno usually exercises but since he’s sick he doesn't. We get ready (shower, eat, get dressed) at 7:00 and at 8:00 we have personal study and at 9:00 we have companion study. At 10:00 we have language study and the rest of the day we work. Yesterday Elder Moreno and I had an appointment with a preacher at 10:00. Elder Dickens wasn't with us the whole day (he was a the doctor) so I drove to Damascus where we had the appointment. But I’m running out of time so ill finish next week.

Leaving the MTC

January 7, 2009

Hi, I'm here in the Baltimore Mission. Yesterday I left the MTC at 6:30 AM. Everything in the airport went smoothly and I didn't have any problems. I traveled alone because no other Elders were going to Baltimore. I talked to this guy from Seattle. When he was about to board the plane I mentioned the church but he rejected me and ran on the plane. On the plane I sat next to a man that has a son serving in Mesa Arizona mission. Two Elders and a guy that works at the Mission Office met me at the airport. Then they took me to meet my companions. I am companion with two Elders. Elder Moreno and Elder Dickens. After eating dinner at Taco Bell we went knocking doors and got rejected a bunch of times. I knocked at one door and we got a return appointment. Afterwards we went to an appointment with a family where the mother just got baptized and her kids want to be baptized but the dad doesn't want them to yet. I am doing Spanish speaking right now by the way. I'm actually not in Baltimore; I’m in a town called Fredericks which is East of Baltimore.

Today is P-day this morning we played indoor soccer with all the Elders in the area. They do it every other P-day. It was really fun and I scored a few goals. One of the members rents the indoor arena every other week and then takes all the missionaries to Pizza Hut afterwards. Next we are going shopping and we have appointments tonight. I am staying in an apartment with four other Elders. They've been very welcoming. Right now I'm here at the library in downtown Frederick. I still don't know exactly how long I’ll be in Maryland. What's everyone up to? What’s everyone doing? Did U of U win something because I saw a congrats sign on the way to the airport. I’m fine here, there are a lot of trees and it’s been raining a lot. Talk to you later.