Week 14 Layco District, El Salvador--October 26, 2015

compromisos, milagros, empanadas, payasos, bolos, gordo, y más El Salvador!

heyo this week was crazy fast. fast until yesterday because sundays are always the busiest days. but still a great week. we have been having trouble finding new investigators and our investigators havent all been keeping their committments. we have had to drop a few people here and there so its been tough. but! a miracle happened! we had some down time before an appointment in the church so we went tracting in an area we had never been before. right before we left elder palacios said we were gonna go out to find a nuevo. the first door we got to was this lady. we were chatting and she told us how she has some differences with her husband over religion (he goes to this one called the tabernáculo). we shared about the church and stuff (restoration) and i invited her to pray to know that our message is true. while i was talking about prayer and how only our Heavenly Father can give us the knowledge of the true church she began to cry. then she told us how for years she went to the tabernáculo with her husband and went to many other churches and never felt right in any of them and left all churches altogether. she told us, though, that while we were talking to her she felt something, that this could be the true church and that she needed to learn more. elder palacios told her that that was the Spirit and now we are working to get a new appointment with her soon and to get her to church! I am now a living witness of how the Lord will specifically prepare people to hear our message. super incredible

okay so empanadas. every friday we have dinner at this member home and the food there is always good. this time we got empanadas for dessert. these are plantains filled with some cream milk thing that i cant describe at all accurately so just trust that it was good and that you should all eat some and ignore how random this is. one night, we got on a bus to go home and there in the front of the bus was a payaso. straight up full on big shoes, nose, hair, makeup, and all telling jokes or something at the front of the bus. this country is kinda crazy sometimes. then theres the bolos everywhere. also my zone leader and several members this week told me im getting fatter. my zone leader even said i need to exercise better so i am now eating less pupusas late at night and exercising accordingly. the struggle of being in a country where the main food groups are rice, beans, bread, tortillas, and pupusas. okay just some interesting things i wanted to add in there for you guys. be good! look for miracles! love each other! love you all! ¡salud!

pupusa count: 29 womp womp

Week 13 Layco District, El Salvador--October 19, 2015

Gotta catch em all! Spot them all? Gain them all? Eat them all? One of those is right

First things first I saw a torogos this week. its the national bird of el salvador! actually its my second sighting of one but this time was really up close. theyre super rare so i felt like a pokemon master to see it. theyre really cool look em up! so i officially know now that i have gained weight. almost 15 pounds to be exact. but im not bigger. just my belly and face are fat so i dont know if i should actually be excited or not. i dont wanna be fat just bigger ya feel. but thats not whats important around here. so last week was cambios. elder jack is now gone and a lot of our zone (mostly from the other district) have gone away. now its like a whole new group of missionaries here! but i get at least 5 more weeks here in layco (this cambio is shorter and the next will be longer for christmas marsopas (enjoy my newest english from spanish pun)). so yeah things are goin good and stuff. ever since i found out i gained weight i have felt a lot more lethargic (is that how its spelled?) but i think its a mental thing. its been raining for days here so thats fun and stuffs. we are working hard with our investigators that we have right now. the tracting business is running dry so we are coming up with new ways to find investigators. pray for our investigators asusana, victor, alondra, and lina. theyre all good but they are having troubles keeping their commitments. its hard because if they dont have the desire we cant progress them. and we know how important this work is! okay cool beans thanks for your prayers and emails and goodness. love you all so much!

Pupusa count: official from last cambio is 126 (that means i perfectly averaged eating 3 per day)

for this cambio i am but only at 14 (which is still quite a bit in a week...not to mention how many of those were grande pupusas...)

we ran into the familia chavez while getting pupusas. sorry for the poor quality foto....

heres my bed! mosquito net! its like camping every night!

Week 12 Layco District, El Salvador--October 12, 2015

It's Christmas right?


So this week felt suuuuuuuuper long. Mostly just these past two days have felt really long. but a lot happened this week so that may be the reason. also this week i realized that we are already like halfway into october and i didnt even notice. that means all the stores over there in america are already putting up the valentines day candy right? i know christmas trees must be in everyones house at least. crazy americans. okay so this week we had a multizone conference. we only have em every other cambio so it was cool to have one in my first cambio. it was super good and i learned a lot about how i can improve the work that im doing here. on friday we had intercambios again and elder jack came with me to layco once more. it was actually his last intercambio because he goes home this week! its crazy because i can still perfectly remember talking with him the whole ride here on my first day. only 6 weeks ago. but we had a super good time and did a lot of stuff. and we got caught in a crazy big storm too while in the fosa. (the fosa is an area here thats kinda in the trees and stuff and all the houses are close together and its nothing but callejones and therefore the water pours down from the houses and the roads turn into rivers.) but it was super fun! we finished off the night with a celebratory pizza for his last intercambio of course. we have a couple of investigators here that are excited for baptism. one guy came to us conference weekend and said he wanted to be baptized that day! we are teaching him now and he has a goal for the end of this month. also we have a lot of positive investigators that we are trying to get to church so they can progress. always something to do here! okay love you all! i wish i could say more but my mind is a little blurry right now. miracles happen! be good and stuff!

elder abilez



Pupusa Count: 123 (because this cambio ends tomorrow this could potentially be the final count for this first cambio. i will begin anew with the next cambio) also you know whats better than a queso y loroco pupusa? a frijol con queso y loroco pupusa! and i had a grande arroz one this week and three de maiz too! i just cant decide which one is my favorite!

I hope all of you guys took the time to ponderize a scripture this week! I did and it was a huge help in our work. My scripture was Mosiah 28:3 "now they were desirous that salvation be declared unto every creature; for they could not bear that any human soul should perish; yea even the very thoughts that any soul should endure endless torment did cause them to quake and tremble". i applied this scripture along with the admonitions of elder renlund, that we must view everyone as our Heavenly Father sees them. it really changed some of our lessons and how we taught this week. there were a few investigators that, this week, were unwilling to accept baptism or complete their commitments. i thought immediately of this scripture and began to feel terrible at the thought of becoming lost when i was there, capable of leading back home. i would share my testimony to them of this and how much we loved them and wanted them to be able to live with us, our Father in Heaven, and with our Lord forever in happiness. and i only cried for 20 minutes! (if you get the reference you are the best and are a master of all the yugos (if you get this spanish to english pun you are legendary)). ponderizing is a powerful tool for us and i exhort all of you to do it and look for the changes in your life because of it.

 outside the temple after our multizone meeting. zona layco!

el templo de san salvador! (actually my 3rd time being here but my first time having my camera)

the biggest pizza from pizza hut (it was the promotion of the night okay) elder jack y yo at the end of his last intercambio!

Week 11 Layco District, El Salvador--October 5, 2015

I don't even know what to say to sum up this week

dang this week was quick. i was so excited for conference this weekend so i was just sure it would drag on. like how the night before disneyland or christmas just drags on you know. but it was not so i suppose. okay this past week we had exchanges again but this time with barbarena where elder mio and elder harris serve. elder mio came here with me so again i was in charge of the area. having done this last week i was a little more prepared to take charge. unfortunately, every single appointment that we had fell through. every single one, including the back up plans. and so we spent about 8 hours doing straight contacting. but it was a really fun day and we found this one guy that we went back to teach yesterday and he is really positive! saturday morning we had our baptism for Merly! the branch president baptized her and it was super great. this next weekend we look to confirm her and gerson. while at conference this weekend a lady in our ward brought her non member husband. and he told us when he met us that he wanted to get baptized. that day! we called president to see if we actually could but he counciled to teach him first and all that. we have already had a lesson with him and have many more planned. he should be baptized the end of this month so im praying i will make it through this change next week to see it! now how great was conference? so cool to see elder rasband, stevenson, and renlund be called. truly inspired. and the talks of course were fantastic. i especially enjoyed elder hollands and elder martinos talks. however, i think my overall favorite were the comments of elder renlund. his talk was literally an answer to a prayer and question that i had going in to conference so it was so powerful to see how directly the Lord answers our prayers through the prophets and apostles that He directly calls. i hope that all of you were able to have a similar experience in conference. if not, i invite you to think of something you want to learn about the gospel, a doubt, or a question, and go back and watch or read the talks to find the answer. or, with this recipe, do it the next conference. i promise you that the Lord will answer you with his inspired servants. stuff is cool here and its hard to believe im coming on to 3 months out just in this next week. love you all!
-elder abilez

pupusa count: 105
on saturday i got to my 100th pupusa! to celebrate, i made a giant pupusa!

Merly! Ft Presidente Alex

Making my 100th pupusa!

About to enjoy my GIANT 100th pupusa

comparison to my hand...maybe it doesnt look that big here. but it was at least the size of 5 pupusas. (and i ate numbers 98 and 99 before this one)

Week 10 Layco District, El Salvador--September 29, 2015

It must be the wet season...

Ay sorry for not writing yesterday we had no internet all day but we are blessed that we can write today! So this past week weve been getting quite a bit of rain. But on sunday i got absolutely soaked. in the baptismal font cuz we had a baptism! after church we baptized our investigator Gerson. due to unfortunate circumstances we wont be able to confirm him until after conference in two weeks. so pray that everything will go well from here. this past week was super fast cuz so much happened. wednesday we had the meeting for the new missionaries so we had a nice reunion with distrito pedro from the ccm. the messages from presidente and hermana hintze were excellent. we also got our orientation meeting since we came so late our first day. thursday we had exchanges but this time elder jack (the zone leader) came here with me so i was in charge of the area! definitely intimidating to have to do that but it was a great day and we had a lot of success. sunday in sacrament meeting i had to give my first talk in spanish! it was on the obra misional. it went really well. one member even told me he understood everyting and there were few mistakes so thats a relief. i will have to give a talk every month it seems so it was good practive. i also got to teach an english class on saturday to this less active member family. the lesson went really well and that family is super good and they have a daughter that wasnt baptized so we are working hard with them. i love them though! ive been in the field for about a month now (4 weeks) and it hardly even feels like it! i know all of you back home may feel differently but it still feels like i just got off the plane in guatemala! time is really weird here. i really appreciate all your letters and emails always! sorry that i cant respond to everyone every week because time is just my worst enemy here. Love you all!
Elder Abilez

Pupusa count: 81
(we got pupusas from a member on sunday and they were so bomb! they were queso and loroco and also made of maíz instead of arroz. first time having maíz pupusas and loroco. I think thats my new favorite kind now)

Gerson!

while cleaning the apt yesterday my comp found this flag in the corner behind some stuff on the floor. really terrible and he just laughed and i got kinda mad cuz thats disrespectful. we cant retire it here (obviously cuz we cant just set fire to this flag) so i at least decided to hang it up in our apt

Week 9 Layco District, El Salvador--September 21, 2015

It's inevitable

So lets start by saying how im kind of a germaphobe now. always clean my hands before eating absolutely anything and i only drink from my water bottle and im just super super careful. but im sick again. you just cant stop these things i guess. but i got sick last wednesday so im getting better. this past week was really tough though being sick. and we had very little success overall. our baptism on saturday fell through because the hermana got sick and didnt show for her interview. but this week we have plans to get two baptisms so im excited. supposedly i might be baptizing both so we shall see. i dont know exactly what things to talk about this week. even though it was tough it was super super fast. crazy that im writing you guys again actually. yesterday we had a stake activity with the youth preparing to go on missions and we went tracting with them. i got to be the senior companion for an hour and i wasnt really scared at all! and we got two future appointments out of it so it was pretty successful! but heres something that i really wanted to talk about. america. so obviously being here i miss america here and there. but what really gets me is when we talk about the restoration and joseph smith. that went down in america! you never really think about that. but when you see the members here having strong faith that some kid in new york had a vision of God and Jesus Christ you just know that there is some great power in that account. and realize how special america is. and now i mean especially salt lake. honestly i miss salt lake. i miss it because i never appreciated it like i do now. salt lake is fun but its a big city and i really dont like big cities right? but realize that salt lake is so rich in church history. look at the temple and see that it is the house of God. but also see the sacrifice that went in to the 40 years of building it. see the sacrifice of the saints who travelled there to establish it. see how the progress of the church in its early years brought it to salt lake where we base ourselves now. where the prophets and apostles congregate and receive sacred revelation for the world. the power of the church that is in america is great because of the history of the restoration. but the history of the church is strong here too as i stand in the lands of the nephites and the lamanites. here its harder to see through all the garbage and wickedness that runs through the street but i can feel it. so this week think of where you are in terms of history and in terms of how the Spirit resides there. i wish i could just go back to the salt lake temple and look at it to fully appreciate it. but that can wait 21 (nearly at 3 months already!) more months because there is a lot of work to do here. love all of you and i pray for only the best for you all. i know that this church is true and i am grateful that i can carry on the work that joseph smith started almost 200 years ago. ¡Salud!

He's only eaten 42 pupusas, up 13 from last week--major slacker! ;)

Week 8 Layco District, El Salvador--September 14, 2015

Las Cucarachas!

So there are a few cockroaches that live under our bathroom sink and it is so annoying. They dont really gross me out but i really just dont like having them there. one got a little too bold and started walking out from the comfort behind the sink so i killed it mercilessly to send a message to the others. also i killed a cricket thats been in our closet room for the last two weeks. and lots of other cockroaches and spiders and whatever. there are a lot of bugs here. but its okay. hey i finally got a mosquito net from the hermanas here so now i can actually sleep well! little blessings every day. so spanish is hard. not like speaking because for the most part i can teach lessons and talk with people. but its dang hard to understand people still. combined with the accents and how fast they talk it can be really difficult. there are certain members and investigators that we have that i am starting to understand pretty well now. im getting used to the language. and i learn a lot of the slang words. not necessarily to use but rather so i can have some clue of what people say to me. so this week was a roller coaster. on tuesday i got to go on exchanges with the zone leader elder jack in the central district. this area is the heart of the city so there were tons and tons of people. that was a super fun and really different experience. it was fun to be able to talk with elder jack in english and just share all kinds of things. i got to learn a lot from him. the next day the assistants came to our area in layco so elder palacios went with elder coates and i left with elder jack again for some splits. it was kinda intimidating because i pretty much became the senior companion and needed to take charge in our lessons with our investigators. well we didnt get lessons with investigators because one wasnt home and the other two dropped us that night. so that was fun to manage. but we went to a member family to teach a lesson and that went great. thursday was just a long tough day and i was really distracted for a lot of our lessons. friday and saturday are kinda a blur but we got some new investigators and then yesterday was just busy with the work and church. now its p day again and we getta play more soccer! so im excited. you should all be disappointed to know that in these last two weeks i have only eaten 29 pupusas. i hope that i can increase this number exponentially with each weekly update. so we shall see. alrighty you all stay sweet and stuff and eat pupusas cuz i wanna eat them for every meal now. mostly cuz im just hungry all the time even when i have 3 pupusas for breakfast and 3 for dinner and lunch with a member family. i just want more pupusas! and to work of course. if any of you have any doubts or fears about anything in your life right now just forget about them! every day i have thoughts of home or a small doubt just pop into my head for no reason at all! i know that this is just satans way to make us weak and turn away from the Lord. always have a prayer in your heart and when you get to the end of the day you will know that the Lord was supporting you the whole time. this is something that is so important to me here as we have to walk for miles and miles back and forth across town, take nothing but cold showers, and get rejected by tons and tons of catholics. but i know that i need to do this and that this is the one thing that is most fulfilling to me at this point in my life. i love you all so much and wish only the best. sorry that im one of those missionaries that has long emails but i mean ya know. so bless you if you read this. until next week!

Elder Harris y yo last pday!

quick look at my apartment. its not much but its where i will be for at least 10 more weeks