Characato!

Hey Familia!!!!
What's up guys? Sorry about not being able to email all of you on
Wednesday but it was my first day here in Arequipa and my P-day is on
Mondays so from now on you'll hear from me on mondays. Everything
here's has been crazy, i can't even remember what i did last week.
Well, I left the CCM at 2:45 in the morning on Tuesday and flew to
Arequipa. I got here at like 8:30 then the Assistants took us on a
mini tour of Arequipa, it was cool to see the city and the
architecture especially fascinated me. Then we ate breakfast at the
Mission Home. Then we just sat in a long training meeting from like
10:00 till 9:30 at night. Ya, I was wicked tired. We stayed at a
Peruvian Hostel that night, it was interesting to say the least. Then
the next day we all went back to the Mission Home to find out our
areas and our companions. 

I finally found out my area, Characato!!!
Characato is a brand new area. No members, no church, nothing. The
people there are way humble becuase they are pretty poor. All the
roads are dirt roads, and the town is built on a steep hill, so we
have to either walk up or down, no flat areas. My companion is super
cool. He's from Peru, his name is Elder Usseglio. He's been out for
nine months and has trained two other gringos like myself. He is my
Father, and I am his Son. Our apartment is in a member's home, the
Husmilda family. The wife is our pensionista (our cook/mom, if you
will) and the husband is the Bishop of a ward here. We live about
30-45 minutes away from our area so its kind of a pain to take a taxi
or bus every day. It cuts down on our proselyting time. We live with
two other missionaries, Elder Gammara from Peru, and Elder Ruggiero
from Salt Lake. He went to Bingham and he's pretty cool and always
helps me with Spanish.

The first day I got here we went proselyting and contacting. We taught
some lessons and everything is in spanish so i was pretty useless. I'm
continuing to learn more everyday but it's difficult for sure. The
people are so ready for the gospel for the most part. They are
escogido, or chosen. All but two people we have taught have excepted
the baptismal challenge on the first lesson. That is totally the work
of the Lord. We have seven possible baptism for this week and sixteen
possibles for next week. That is only if everything works out okay,
but still, 23 possible baptism in the work of one week is pretty good.

I'm running out of time so i'll try to close out now. Thank you so
much for all of your prayers and fasting, it has really made a
difference. I feel the savior's love for all the people i meet every
day and more especially for me. I know he will help me with the
language and with the teaching. I am humbled every time I enter an
investigator's home who have nothing, but want to follow the example
of the savior. We had an especially powerful experience on Friday. We
were literally walking up hill all day until like 7 when we decided to
go down hill. We were super tired and just decided to knock on one
more door at like seven fourty five. We found a family of five who
wanted to hear our message. We taught them the first lesson and
challenged them to be baptized, they accepted. The coolest part is
that, we don't have a chapel or anything in Characato, so we asked
them if we could have church at their house on Sunday. They accepted
that too and we had sacrament meeting and sunday school in their house
on Sunday with 12 of our investiagors. It was so cool. Imagine that,
to know of the gospel for 30 minutes and tell the missionaries that
they can use your house the next day for Church. I know that we will
have success there.

So much has happened in the last few days i can hardly remember it
all. I hope this gives you an idea of where i'm at. I'm doing just
fine. Hopefully i have the energy and strength to keep up with this
hard work of opening up a new farmland area. All the people are
farmers in Characato, with cows and horses. It has a ton of wide open
spaces and is absolutely breathtaking when we climb a huge hill and
look at the Andes mountains that surround us. We can see the vocanoes
too from Characato, its pretty awesome. And i can finally see the
stars out there at night becuase its out in the middle of nowhere.
Sorry but i have to go now. the Church is true, i know it for myself.
The Lord answers prayers and will lift you up if you lift up others.

Elder Child