April 25, 2011: Semana Santa

Hello!

Well crazy crazy week. This week was one of the craziest, coolest, most cultural filled weeks of my life! So this week is Easter right? well here they don't celebrate Easter. They celebrate the whole week and do stuff for like everyday. Like no one here has work or school or anything for the whole week. It is a really big deal here(although I here it is just INSANE in Guatemala). But all in all a really fun week.

We started off going to the lake (and most of the pictures attached are from the lake) and after we played basketball and stuff. We had a training thing in San Salvador this week also that was really sweet. It was fun to see friends of mine and even better that now that I have almost 8 months (CRAZY!) I actually know people now. We left from there and went contacting that night and I had gotten reminded something so important during that training thing and that is how I should always be myself. I started to get into robot mode the past couple weeks just trying to get so many things done. It was crazy. but this week I decided to relax a bit and start joking with the people and have fun and really it has made the difference.

So many people rejected us this week cause they were busy or something and it was sucky, but I would start to joke with them and talk about our lives, just like normal people and in the end we got invited into a lot of houses and found a couple really sweet families. One of the families we found the dad was a soccer player in the world cup for El Salvador and now is one of the coaches. He has a son that played soccer too and there were them two and the wife and we taught them. It was probably the most powerful lesson I have ever felt. We just talked at the beginning a lot and he showed us this like scrapbook that his wife had made of all his soccer stuff. Like all these newspaper clippings and crazy stuff. It was awesome to see and after it like directed some how to the gospel. I started referencing the gospel to his work. Like how prophets are like referees and how would any sport be without referees? crazy, without order, lots of stuff. He after really understood the significance of a prophet and her really loved the analogy.

This Friday was the day of the most craziness. This is the day when Christ dies and stuff so everyone makes red carpets and puts them all through the town. Then everyone gathers and walks around the town with like idols and stuff. It is crazy. I didn't see to much and I here it wasn't as crazy because that day when it was suppose to start it rained really bad.

It has started to rain a lot here and I believe the rainy season starts in may and the good news is that this past week is the hottest week in the whole year. So now I just have to make it through the rainy part.

So crazy other part. I have just finished my fourth transfer in the mission. We got the call last night for who is going to leave and all. The people in the ward are super sweet and I have grown to love them so stinking much. We received the call and because of how great we are doing here and I thought that neither of us would leave. We got the call and the news is that I am finally leaving Santa Ana! crazy right. I am going to a place called Ahuachapan. I am going to place which I hear is like towns and stuff. Not a ton. But I am super excited. I also got moved up to senor Companion also. I am going to be with another Latin I believe he is from Guatemala. His name is Elder Romero.

But ya so this week has been a bit crazy. I am not excited at all to tell the members here that I am leaving. The Ascencio family is going to kill me. their nephew is going to get baptized this Saturday and Erick the dad is going to Baptize him! So I am going to ask special permission from president to come back and see that. Wow I am going to miss that family they are awesome!

Well that's about it for this week. I love you all and Happy late Easter. Sounds like things were crazy over there too. Love you all and talk to you next week!

Elder Gillette

April 18, 2011: Lago

pues, I don't have a whole bunch of time today because my computer right now is freaking out and erased my whole letter that I wrote. So this week you all get a run down of what happened this past week and next week I will send some sweet pictures that I took.

This morning we went to this really pretty lake near Santa Ana and it was awesome. We took some really awesome pictures and got soccer jerseys for our zone because we were one of the highest baptizing zones in the mission last month. Bad part is they are pink and on the front it says "Modelo" Which means "Model" but that is our zone name and what the sisters in our zone wanted.

This week was a lot of fun. We bought pupusas for these young men that have helped us a ton out here and they all loved that. They have been asking to help us since.

We also have gotten a lot more help from the members this week and really have gotten the confidence of the leaders.

I received Dad and Debbie's package this week and it was great. Loved the big bag of candy. I have been going everywhere with candy and giving it to all the little kids. They love it.

We have a couple good investigators also this week so I hope things keep going well with them also.

Things have been better with my comp this week and I feel I am starting to love the kid more. I have a feeling I will be with him next change, so I am preparing myself to be the best companion ever!!!

Also I have been thinking and Krick I was wondering if you would start a Skype account for this Mother's Day so that we can talk over Skype? I thought that would be super sweet.

But I love you all and I can´t even believe what is going on in UTAH! Jazz didn't make the playoffs! what a stinker. I talked to some guys here that know sports really well and they filled me in on all things NBA. It was a lot of fun.

How is Kylie doing also? Baby almost ready or are things a lot calmer?

Kelsy... haha, You have grown up a lot since I left haha.

Well I love you all and sorry this letter isn´t all that great I will write better next week and send the pics. They are awesome ones of the lake we went to today. but I love you all and Next week will be a great one to write I can tell you now. But i will talk to you next week and love you all.

Elder Gillette

April 11, 2011: Feliz Cumpleaños

Hola Familia!

Wowowowowowow! I am officially 20 years OLD!!! Crazy huh? I feel so strange. It is really hard to believe actually. I had someone we met on my birthday ask me how old I am and I was like "Ninet... TWENTY!" It felt so strange. I am not a teenager anymore. Only one more birthday to go in the field. Crazy stuff.

It was a pretty crazy week though. Super fast. We contacted a group of guys this week and they were really nice and we shared a message and talked a little bit. We got on to the subject that my birthday was this week, but we talked to them Wednesday so it was still before my birthday, and decided that Friday (cause we already had plans Saturday) we were going to bring a cake and they were going to bring the soda and we were going to have a little birthday party.

We passed by Thursday and they were all stoked to have the birthday party. 2 of them brought there dads and friends to meet us too. It was awesome. We gave them each a Book of Mormon and said we would pass by the next day.

Friday came and we invited our elders quorum president to come and eat cake with us and the investigators. We got the cake and everything and ate and it was a lot of fun. I sent some of the pictures that we took this week.

On my birthday birthday on Saturday I really didn't do anything different. We ate chicken pot pies that our cook made that were way good and then cake with this awesome family. After I pulled a ¨Daniel¨and got sick haha. I am all good now though.

Well I was thinking about Gennie and Asher this week. People that it was awesome how me and Asher shared the same birthday. I was telling my comp how mad I was when he was first born and now I love the stinking Ash-man.

Although I do want to hear what you all did for Gennie and Ashers b-day's? nobody told me. All I heard about was the craziness with Kylie (which I hope the baby can wait those like 2 weeks) and about all the snow. Which I really wish you would all share. This week it started to rain, so it has started to be more humid. This next week and the week after (which the week after is a holiday here called Semana Santa and nobody has work or school for the whole week) are the hottest two weeks of the whole year here. So I need to get myself prepared. I have been drinking so much water lately.

I am still learning a lot of patience over here. My comp is a really really great guy and really nice, but he has a problem of copying the exact words that I just said and the exact same scripture too, but he doesn't really know the scripture so he kind of butchers the scripture in the end. I talked to him about that after one of our lessons and he said he hasn't realized he has copied all that I said. I am really trying to help, but it is hard.

I feel like I don't have all to much to say this week though. We had some really good lessons and we are learning to be better. I went on exchanges this week with one of our Zone Leaders and he is from Peru. Pretty awesome guy but he is like 5 feet tall haha. He is going to end his mission this next month which is crazy to see people that I know end there missions.

Speaking of which. I already have 7 months in the mission!!! Wow that last month went incredibly fast I can't even believe it haha. The time is going so fast.

Well I am going to try and send a cd with all my pictures this week. Cause my SD card is full right now of a whole bunch of videos and pictures.

Almost done with the BOM also. I am starting Moroni tomorrow.

The other day a guy tried to bible bash us and in that lesson I realized I can really speak this language!

Well not much other. Sorry this is so short, but I love you all and hope that your weeks are great. Good luck Kylie with the baby. Talk to you all later!

Elder Gillette

April 4, 2011: General Conference

Hello family,

Wow another general conference already over. The 10 hours were super super super fast. I swear I sat down and they were gone. They were a lot longer at home. The conference was awesome though. A lot about marriage I thought. Temples also.

So this week was really up and down. We found some pretty positive people and also had to drop some people. 3 of our most positive investigators have a friend who decided to show them all anti-Mormon stuff. So now they just have a TON of questions. Like they say in UT there is a golden temple underneath the temple in Utah were we worship the devil and Moroni. I don't know they are crazy now. But we will keep trying and praying for them.

This week also, my backpack that was way awesome and comfortable, was having problems and in the end the shoulder strap snapped. Kind of sucked, so I am going to try and find a new back pack today or a new strap. We will see.

Other than those two things, everything has been going really good. I was teaching an investigator the other day about the bible and we were having a really great conversation, but he asked if I have read the whole bible and I haven't so I said no. I lost all of the confidence in him. So I started the bible this week... in Spanish! I actually read now faster in Spanish then in English. I read about 6 chapters every morning in the bible. I want to finish it in a couple months. I am almost done with Genesis right now. Interesting stuff.

This morning we went and played soccer against some of the other zones. It was super fun, but SUPER hot. it is getting humid here right now and it is always hot. I am in one of the colder areas too. I cant even imagine how it is a bit further. Last night I was sweating all night.

But we had one investigator come to conference. I was kind of hoping for more, but at least someone came and she is pretty awesome.

The best thing that happened this week is we are teaching erik ascencio right now about the priesthood. He came Saturday night to the priesthood session of conference and I got to sit by him and watch it. I like wanted to cry. Just the change I have been able to see in him and his wife. I loved how conference talked so much about marriage cause I think it helped them. It was just a really cool experience to sit next to someone that you guided to this place. I imagine that is what it is like when you go to priesthood session with your son.

I really liked the talk from Sunday I believe in the afternoon, about the difference between be and do. Luckily I got to watch this one in English, cause I wouldn't of understood it in Spanish. It had a lot of great examples and helped me understand that really I need to start Being better and if I do that i will DO better. DO is a symptom of BE.

I did really miss those donuts this week though. Our cook said if mom sends the donut recipe to me she will make them for us. SO mom if you would send that that would be awesome.

OH YA. I didn't even know April fool's was this week til just now when you all wrote me about that. Crazy that it went so fast. Sounds like it was a crazy fun one for everyone. Well just crazy for some haha.

This conference was the first time my back has hurt since coming out here. Just from sitting down to much it kind of sucked.

OH ya somebody asked me and the sun is crazy. I don´t know if you have seen how tan I have gotten. Luckily I don't get burnt. Only once I have gotten burnt, but the mosquitoes out here are crazy though.

Well I think that is it. Fun week, I cant believe this week I will also complete 7 months and the day after 20 years old!!! Crazy. Well love you all and be safe. Read the scriptures they are awesome. talk to you next week.

Elder Gillette