Hey Family and Merry Christmas 2 days later!
Wow crazy crazy week this past week. 3 dinners Christmas eve, Monday we had a zone Christmas dinner which was awesome, talked to all of you for what felt super super short and........ Had a white Christmas!!! By that I mean is that I was in all white when I baptized this girl Raquel. Ya it actually happened. It took a lot to get there. We planned to start at 3 so we told her we would meet her at 2 at her house. We got there at 2 and she wasn't there. We ended up waiting 2 and a half hours for her. We called and contacted around her house and we thought she ditched out.
Finally we called her and she came and we got to the stake center at 5:30, Started at 6. She was freaking out with bad cold feet. I was scared she didn't like have a testimony, although I have heard her testimony so we kept going.
She calmed down and I baptized her and after we talked and she said she felt better. Yesterday I taught the Gospel Principles class and she was there and I asked her how her baptism was for her. She is like a different person. It is crazy. She was ready in the morning to go to church, participated in the class, and said that she loved the calm feeling of the spirit she felt after the baptism.
So that was one of the very very crazy days this week. We didn't have a very good week of like contacting and finding new investigators. It was difficult to work at times cause my comp is "sick" also.
Our zone Christmas party was awesome though. We all went to this members house and they made us this awesome steak. We took a whole bunch of pictures. Right now my computer is way trashy so It is not letting me upload pictures. I will try to send a separate email with pictures though. We also watched some of the Mormon tabernacle choir Christmas videos. It was a lot of fun.
We also had our mission Christmas party. we just watched videos that each zone had made. Actually really boring, but it was way fun to talk to Elder Koller, my comp from the MTC, just about the first change. Things are crazy for him too.
Looks like New Years is just about as crazy as Christmas. More fireworks and we have been invited to more dinners, but these one actually sound good. Carne asada at one and another they are going to make us tres leches which is freaking my favorite food right now. SO tasty!
Sorry the call on Christmas was so crazy. I didn't know how the time difference was. I thought it was opposite than what it really is. Is was SO SO good to talk to you all. sounds like all of you are doing so good! I felt bad I talked so much. I wanted to hear all of you, but there was so many and it was hard to hear all the time. Nonetheless it was awesome.
So onto other things. I just finished ¨our search for happiness¨ by Russel M. Ballard. Every night I read a little before going to be and that book was awesome. I would recommend that book to everyone. It is a simple understanding of our church. I started Jesus the Christ this week also and that book is giant. I hope I finish it haha.
I saw a sign on the way here that said "Respete al señal" which in English means ¨Respect the sign¨. I thought that was hilarious cause the sign is telling me what to do. I don´t even know how to explain it.
Well love ya all a ton and it was fun to hear from you all. I am glad you are all doing so well and I pray for you all every night. Those blankets Debbie made sounded nice. And the story of basil about to kill the fish is funny. Derek good work with the knife. Love ya all and Happy New Year 2011!
Elder Gillette
Monday, December 27, 2010
Monday, December 20, 2010
December 20th, 2010
Merry Christmas Everyone!Wow Christmas already?! I can't even believe it. Time has already flown by like crazy. We got news of our changes today and the result is.......................................... I am staying here in Trebol for another change which I am stoked about and I am with Elder Bonilla again which should be... fun? I am super glad I will be here for Christmas That will be way fun.
The thing I am way excited about is that we have 2 baptisms set up for Christmas day. One of them is this old guy named Francisco who is like my favorite person ever. He is a professor in San Salvador and whenever we talk to him he always goes off on random topics. Like asking what the churches stance is on music and if we have a choir he could join. But he was the first person I door contacted, so he is special and I am so glad I will be here to watch him be baptized.
The other is this 20 year old girl named Raquel. We are working with her mom and she just started to come to church with us and accepted baptism. It should be a cool week, that is if they both follow through.
Sounds like things though up in SLC are pretty crazy. Sorry Dad and Debbie about your house that sounds way crazy. I hope they find your stuff. Hilary and kelsy, I bet the Christmas concert was way awesome. Joff and Kylie I am super stoked to find out about the gender of your kid. I don´t even know what it will be. I pray for a girl though.
I have been hearing a lot about Christmas hear. A bit different then in the states. I guess everyone celebrates Christmas mainly on Christmas eve with like huge parties and fireworks all night. Not like Utah fireworks where we just use a couple flowers and whistling petes. I mean like huge stuff. Kids have like sticks of dynamite in their hands. It will be a Christmas to remember.
And about "the call". I will call Christmas morning some time. The good thing is that E. Bonilla will call on Christmas eve his family so I will have more an option of when. I was thinking of trying around noon. I think they said the rule is only an hour to talk, but everyone here talks to there families for like 2 or more hours. So we will just see, cause one hour is nothing. And I was wondering if we could just use one giant call, cause at the airport I did a call for mom and the kids, then dad. But just to save time I was wondering if we could just join everyone!
So I decided this week to buy myself a memory stick. Cause what I am going to do is put the pictures you send on it and go and print them out at a nearby picture place.
Crappy stuff has happened this week though. I have been getting sick from the climate hear. It will be freezing in the middle of the night and in the morning, then mid day it is way hot. Then cold again at night. So that has sucked. But I am on the mend and never let it take away from my teaching or take time.
They say the first 2 changes are the longest and that is really hard to believe. Cause this change was crazy fast. I am glad cause the 2 people I really get along with are Elder Stone and Elder Finlinson and they will both be here again next change.
Not much else though to say. Going to work like crazy this week like also. But I love you all so much and thank you for all the letters. I pray for you all and think about you. Gennie a special thanks goes to you, cause this week I started using that little picture book you gave me a lot more and everyone LOVES it. There is two things everyone does when they see it. The pictures of the nephews everyone is like, ¨AWW!! so cute!¨ then the picture with me and my long hair, no one believes that it is me. It is crazy to see that picture now though.
But love you all and thinking about you especially this time of season. I am sending some photos so you can see that I am still having a Christmas. The guy who is santa is HNO Kolindrez, super awesome guy. The other pic is my zone and the last is me and E. Stone making pupusas.
Once again love you all and have a good Christmas. Talk to you Saturday!
Elder Gillette
PS that was awesome hearing from pepe, chance and brian. Not gonna lie thought they forgot about me. haha
PPS Hilz I got your package, but still am not opening them!
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
December 13th, 2010
Hello family in all parts of the world,
I feel our family is really spreading out. It's is cool we actually all have stories and are doing such cool things. Jof and Kylee, holy smoke Europe looks awesome and Basil is so so stinking cute in those pictures. Joff... ¿porque tiene un bigote? What's up with the beard man? You look like a hobo, but for all I know that is what you are going for haha. Krik, Randy, and Gennie. Those pictures of asher are adorable. Disneyworld is like my favorite place. I was like asher their. I hope to go back. Last, but not least, family in Utah. Sounds like everything is good. Kelsy! That story of you falling on your face is like the funniest thing I have heard. I was actually laughing outloud. I hope you are ok.
But over here in El Salvador has been crazy this week. We only have this next week and then its changes the 23rd of december(Which sucks cause I may be in a new area for christmas and not really know anyone). But everyone thinks I won´t get changed and I hope so. We found 17 new investigators this week and they are awesome. There is this family that I contacted my first week and joked with them and we set an appointment for the next tuesday. We never showed up cause that was when me and my comp had some problems. We were on divisions and we werent finding much. I started telling the elder I was with about this family and how i wish we would have gone back. Right at that moment I looked over and saw a door open and was like, "That is their house!¨. So I walked directly over and the whole family was there. The dad came over and was like"Elder Gillette, nosotros esperamos para usted martes y usted nunca ha visto." He said he waited and we never showed. I apologized and he let us in and we taught him and his family. It was an awesome lesson. We have had some good ones this week.
We had stake conference this week and our mission president decided to show up for it. We had 3 investigators come to it and all went really well. I still don´t understand much when people give talks.
Last night we were invited over to have pizza with this family. They are so nice and we made homemade pizza. It was so stinking good, but the mom just kept giving it to us. I thought my comp was going to burst. We started leaving and we asked if they needed any help with anything and they said only to pray for them cause they don´t have any jobs. It seriously made me so sad when they said that. Cause they just fed us all that food and stuff when they don´t even have jobs. Shows how nice the people are.
So I have realized something here about El salvadoreans. From talking and the things they say that they really like micheal jackson and love vanilla ice. I swear I hear Ice ice baby like 4 or 5 times a week. I just laugh though. I just think that is a random thought.
But next time i write I should know about transfers. Everyone is positive my comp will go to be a zone leader, so hopefully this means I will stay here. We also have our mission christmas party the 22nd and that should be fun. We just played soccer this morning and I was going to take a picture of the "cancha" or the soccer field, but i totally forgot. I am going to just upload some other pics I thought you would like. one is of the branch that is in our stake. Not ours but the one my friend Elder Stone goes to. It is crazy. Not sure what else I will load up haha.
I have started to figure out what i like to eat, so I am starting to eat more and more. Which is really good for my weight, but really bad for my budget. My goal is to not have to take out or use any money that is in my account. So if you give me money for christmas. Thank you! I will just have more to come back to. I am trying to teach myself like discipline with money and budgeting, cause you all know I need to learn that haha.
Everything is good though and the weeks are going by crazy fast. I swear I wrote to you all yesterday and for that fact came here yesterday. Love you all though and thanks for the support. OH and the package I received was from......... JOFF! Not gonna lie i was a bit surprised. Happily surprised. I directly put it in my suitcase and am not opening any of the packages til christmas to make christmas that much better. But I love you all again. I could say it a billion times and it wouldn't be enough. Hope you all the best and especially with all the plane flights I pray for you to be safe. Talk to you next week!
From EL SAL,
Elder Gillette
I feel our family is really spreading out. It's is cool we actually all have stories and are doing such cool things. Jof and Kylee, holy smoke Europe looks awesome and Basil is so so stinking cute in those pictures. Joff... ¿porque tiene un bigote? What's up with the beard man? You look like a hobo, but for all I know that is what you are going for haha. Krik, Randy, and Gennie. Those pictures of asher are adorable. Disneyworld is like my favorite place. I was like asher their. I hope to go back. Last, but not least, family in Utah. Sounds like everything is good. Kelsy! That story of you falling on your face is like the funniest thing I have heard. I was actually laughing outloud. I hope you are ok.
But over here in El Salvador has been crazy this week. We only have this next week and then its changes the 23rd of december(Which sucks cause I may be in a new area for christmas and not really know anyone). But everyone thinks I won´t get changed and I hope so. We found 17 new investigators this week and they are awesome. There is this family that I contacted my first week and joked with them and we set an appointment for the next tuesday. We never showed up cause that was when me and my comp had some problems. We were on divisions and we werent finding much. I started telling the elder I was with about this family and how i wish we would have gone back. Right at that moment I looked over and saw a door open and was like, "That is their house!¨. So I walked directly over and the whole family was there. The dad came over and was like"Elder Gillette, nosotros esperamos para usted martes y usted nunca ha visto." He said he waited and we never showed. I apologized and he let us in and we taught him and his family. It was an awesome lesson. We have had some good ones this week.
We had stake conference this week and our mission president decided to show up for it. We had 3 investigators come to it and all went really well. I still don´t understand much when people give talks.
Last night we were invited over to have pizza with this family. They are so nice and we made homemade pizza. It was so stinking good, but the mom just kept giving it to us. I thought my comp was going to burst. We started leaving and we asked if they needed any help with anything and they said only to pray for them cause they don´t have any jobs. It seriously made me so sad when they said that. Cause they just fed us all that food and stuff when they don´t even have jobs. Shows how nice the people are.
So I have realized something here about El salvadoreans. From talking and the things they say that they really like micheal jackson and love vanilla ice. I swear I hear Ice ice baby like 4 or 5 times a week. I just laugh though. I just think that is a random thought.
But next time i write I should know about transfers. Everyone is positive my comp will go to be a zone leader, so hopefully this means I will stay here. We also have our mission christmas party the 22nd and that should be fun. We just played soccer this morning and I was going to take a picture of the "cancha" or the soccer field, but i totally forgot. I am going to just upload some other pics I thought you would like. one is of the branch that is in our stake. Not ours but the one my friend Elder Stone goes to. It is crazy. Not sure what else I will load up haha.
I have started to figure out what i like to eat, so I am starting to eat more and more. Which is really good for my weight, but really bad for my budget. My goal is to not have to take out or use any money that is in my account. So if you give me money for christmas. Thank you! I will just have more to come back to. I am trying to teach myself like discipline with money and budgeting, cause you all know I need to learn that haha.
Everything is good though and the weeks are going by crazy fast. I swear I wrote to you all yesterday and for that fact came here yesterday. Love you all though and thanks for the support. OH and the package I received was from......... JOFF! Not gonna lie i was a bit surprised. Happily surprised. I directly put it in my suitcase and am not opening any of the packages til christmas to make christmas that much better. But I love you all again. I could say it a billion times and it wouldn't be enough. Hope you all the best and especially with all the plane flights I pray for you to be safe. Talk to you next week!
From EL SAL,
Elder Gillette
Monday, December 6, 2010
December 6th, 2010
¡Buenas!
¿Como esta mi familia? yo espero que to este bien. ¡Todas cosas aquí son excelente! I actually really don´t want to speak in spanish. It is fun, but I like to utilize the time when I can actually say all I want to haha. Nah, but seriously things have been really good this week. We talked to a lot of people, found 3 new families to teach that I am excited about, and we had dinner with a family and they made us like 8 big papusas each and they were SO good. I love the people here.
We had a multizone conference this week and I was able to meet a lot of the missionaries who have served in my area previously. They were so excited to here about their converts and only had good things to say about the area. They all said it was their favorite area they have served in. I thoroughly enjoy it right now. It is like the perfect area. I know I will also like my other areas, but for now I want to stay here. Which I actually thing is a really big possibility. We are all almost positive my comp will become a zone leader this next change and I will probably stay here which is what I am praying for.
Things with the Elder Bonilla have gone good this week. He has an old set of scriptures and I had an extra set that I had recieved in the MTC so I decided to give them to him and he was super excited about them. He has spent all week just marking it up. It felt nice to help my comp. Our lessons have started to go a lot smoother also and especially when we go on splits I have gotten a lot better. Everyone has said my spanish has improved a ton. I can understand almost everything now. Which is a blessing.
What has been nice that I realized I never told you was that a companionship in our zone has an area were their is no houses good enough to actually live in so they have both been living with us lately. Whats nice is they are both americans and one was in my district at the MTC, Elder Stone is his name. It is really nice to have somebody to come back to and talk to in english. It has been fun. We all decided for christmas we are going to make a stocking for someone else in the house if we are still here after transfers. We thought that would make christmas here a little better.
It was cool last night we got to watch the christmas devotional. It was great to hear the MoTab and see the lights of temple square. Although we listened in spanish and they were translating super fast so I didnt understand a whole lot it was still cool. I pointed out that I new Tamera Oswald and he just thought that was so cool.
But it was a good week, but also a bit disappointing week. We found a girl who took the lessons 5 years ago and she remembers like everything and reads all we give her. She is like a golden investigator and she accepted to be baptized. But she ended up not coming this week to church which was a major bummer. Really hard to get people to go. But I am still excited to go teach her.
We also had a stake open house for all the recent converts and investigators. We didn´t find out about it till like days before and we didn´t have a whole bunch of time to really tell anyone about it. The place looked really nice and the members put a lot of work into it and no investigators or converts from our ward showed. I felt terrible. Our ward mission leader wasn´t to happy, but I wouldnt of been either. I am not gonna let that happen again.
But other than those two this week has been great. I am getting to know my ward and zone a lot better which is really fun. The ward mission leader for our branch is 19 and he is leaving on his mission to argentina the 30 of december. His name is Elmer and is like one of my favorite people. We go on splits a lot on He wants to come to america after his mission and I said he could stay with us and like visit the temple. He was super excited.
But sorry this is like a way long letter. We are going to play some soccer after this with another zone so I am excited and I will talk to you all next week! ps I got a notice I recieved a package this week. I won´t get it til wednesday, but it arrived quick. I will try not to open it til christmas
Love you all and think about you and pray everything is going great. Everything here is good and I am safe, so don´t worry.
Your bro, son, friend, missionary in El Salvador,
Elder Gillette
Ps sorry I don´t have any pictures this week. I forgot my camera at my house which is alright cause I didn´t really take any pictures of anything exciting.
¿Como esta mi familia? yo espero que to este bien. ¡Todas cosas aquí son excelente! I actually really don´t want to speak in spanish. It is fun, but I like to utilize the time when I can actually say all I want to haha. Nah, but seriously things have been really good this week. We talked to a lot of people, found 3 new families to teach that I am excited about, and we had dinner with a family and they made us like 8 big papusas each and they were SO good. I love the people here.
We had a multizone conference this week and I was able to meet a lot of the missionaries who have served in my area previously. They were so excited to here about their converts and only had good things to say about the area. They all said it was their favorite area they have served in. I thoroughly enjoy it right now. It is like the perfect area. I know I will also like my other areas, but for now I want to stay here. Which I actually thing is a really big possibility. We are all almost positive my comp will become a zone leader this next change and I will probably stay here which is what I am praying for.
Things with the Elder Bonilla have gone good this week. He has an old set of scriptures and I had an extra set that I had recieved in the MTC so I decided to give them to him and he was super excited about them. He has spent all week just marking it up. It felt nice to help my comp. Our lessons have started to go a lot smoother also and especially when we go on splits I have gotten a lot better. Everyone has said my spanish has improved a ton. I can understand almost everything now. Which is a blessing.
What has been nice that I realized I never told you was that a companionship in our zone has an area were their is no houses good enough to actually live in so they have both been living with us lately. Whats nice is they are both americans and one was in my district at the MTC, Elder Stone is his name. It is really nice to have somebody to come back to and talk to in english. It has been fun. We all decided for christmas we are going to make a stocking for someone else in the house if we are still here after transfers. We thought that would make christmas here a little better.
It was cool last night we got to watch the christmas devotional. It was great to hear the MoTab and see the lights of temple square. Although we listened in spanish and they were translating super fast so I didnt understand a whole lot it was still cool. I pointed out that I new Tamera Oswald and he just thought that was so cool.
But it was a good week, but also a bit disappointing week. We found a girl who took the lessons 5 years ago and she remembers like everything and reads all we give her. She is like a golden investigator and she accepted to be baptized. But she ended up not coming this week to church which was a major bummer. Really hard to get people to go. But I am still excited to go teach her.
We also had a stake open house for all the recent converts and investigators. We didn´t find out about it till like days before and we didn´t have a whole bunch of time to really tell anyone about it. The place looked really nice and the members put a lot of work into it and no investigators or converts from our ward showed. I felt terrible. Our ward mission leader wasn´t to happy, but I wouldnt of been either. I am not gonna let that happen again.
But other than those two this week has been great. I am getting to know my ward and zone a lot better which is really fun. The ward mission leader for our branch is 19 and he is leaving on his mission to argentina the 30 of december. His name is Elmer and is like one of my favorite people. We go on splits a lot on He wants to come to america after his mission and I said he could stay with us and like visit the temple. He was super excited.
But sorry this is like a way long letter. We are going to play some soccer after this with another zone so I am excited and I will talk to you all next week! ps I got a notice I recieved a package this week. I won´t get it til wednesday, but it arrived quick. I will try not to open it til christmas
Love you all and think about you and pray everything is going great. Everything here is good and I am safe, so don´t worry.
Your bro, son, friend, missionary in El Salvador,
Elder Gillette
Ps sorry I don´t have any pictures this week. I forgot my camera at my house which is alright cause I didn´t really take any pictures of anything exciting.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
November 30th, 2010
Hey Family,Wow another crazy week in Santa Ana. Lots of walk/running everywhere, I have been eating more papusas which are so STINKING good. They are 25 cents each so we will get like 4 every night. There are also these things called pan dulce which i eat a ton. They are like cookies. So good though.
Crazy that it is snowing so much there. It is definitely a sunny christmas here. I am sweating everyday. But the nights and morning are like hawaii. Perfect temperature. I love it!
So if any of you are wondering why I am writing on tuesday instead of monday this is why. We went to a Volcano yesterday. Freaking craziest day of my life! so we left at about 8 in the morning and took this 15 passenger van up this like 4 wheeler road. It was scraping and bumping like crazy. I dont even know how it made it so high. We got out and hiked for an hour and a half. Realized we had gone a half an hour in the wrong direction. Back tracked and started going up this hill. This hill was like going up chases driveway for 2 hours. We were crawling on our stomachs and got scratched up pretty good from the needles. After the 3 and a half hour hike we finally got to the top. It was pretty crazy when we got to the top. We were in the clouds as one of the pics shows. I was sweating so bad. From the humidity and all. I took a ton of pictures but they are taking a while to load so i am only sending a couple and I took 2 videos, but they are to big for the email to send, but when i send the chip back you can see them.
It was chivo (cool in El Salvadoreño). But we were all so tired from the hike it was hard to enjoy. I am sending some pics also so you can see. We had to hike 2 hours back down and we all wanted to die by the end. There was a little tienda at the bottom and I drank like 2 liters of fanta haha. It was crazy, but an awesome experience.
This week has been crazy just because we have been running around helping other missionaries. Our area is doing the best in the zone right now so we are helping others. I taught with another person in his area and got 2 baptismal dates for him. ITs nice that I worked at wendys and things are coming back really nicely.
I am half way through our first change which is crazy. My comp is so fixed on wanting to be zone leader it kind of sucks, but we have been getting along a lot better.
Sorry I dont have a ton of time today to write. I want to write more, but we have got to get to work also. earlier today we had like a secondary meeting for the new missionaries. The presidents wife came up to me and was like. You have been working hard, how much weight have you lost? ya it is starting to show. I put my jacket on today and it was already a bit bigger and looser on me.
But Trebol is starting to feel more like home and to answer that question, my house is one of the nicest in the mission haha. I stayed at the zone leaders house one night and it was so dirty.
Well thats about it, one more thing if you send a package remember jesus stickers haha. We were talking about that the other day.
Love you all though and pray for you all! talk to you next week!
Elder Gillette
ps Sorry some of the grammar and stuff is bad. I am writing on a spanish keyboard and it is actually quite dificult haha.
November 30th, 2010, Part II
In response to some letters from the family...
LOVE LOVE LOVE the pictures! crazy! the snow. well i thought i would send a quick thing cause i just listened to your recording again and i forgot to tell about any tracting stories. Miracles have happened and wierd stuff also. tracting is very different here. What you do is yell ¡buenas! at the front door and they will usually ask who and then look out there window and do the contact through the windows. We will get invited into a lot of peoples houses just because they are so nice.
Everyone here no matter our religion just loves what we do. They all tell us. I love that you spread the word of God. We will usually say like, well can we share it with you then. They cant reject the word of God right? Everyone has there shirts off, well the guys. The woman just breast feed whenever. We will be teaching a lesson and the kid will run up and they will just whip it out. It is just normal here. Crazy stuff. Fun though.
I thought you would all enjoy that we have this guy in my area. we taught him once and he is like old! When we were leaving I said seeya mister (just joking around). Now everytime he sees us no matter where we are he yells ¡See You MIster! in his spanish accent. IT is hilarious. I feel like a tv show cause we call him the see-you-mister-guy haha cause we dont know his name haha.
Thought i would share that though haha. Love you all
Elder Gillette
LOVE LOVE LOVE the pictures! crazy! the snow. well i thought i would send a quick thing cause i just listened to your recording again and i forgot to tell about any tracting stories. Miracles have happened and wierd stuff also. tracting is very different here. What you do is yell ¡buenas! at the front door and they will usually ask who and then look out there window and do the contact through the windows. We will get invited into a lot of peoples houses just because they are so nice.
Everyone here no matter our religion just loves what we do. They all tell us. I love that you spread the word of God. We will usually say like, well can we share it with you then. They cant reject the word of God right? Everyone has there shirts off, well the guys. The woman just breast feed whenever. We will be teaching a lesson and the kid will run up and they will just whip it out. It is just normal here. Crazy stuff. Fun though.
I thought you would all enjoy that we have this guy in my area. we taught him once and he is like old! When we were leaving I said seeya mister (just joking around). Now everytime he sees us no matter where we are he yells ¡See You MIster! in his spanish accent. IT is hilarious. I feel like a tv show cause we call him the see-you-mister-guy haha cause we dont know his name haha.
Thought i would share that though haha. Love you all
Elder Gillette
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