Pictures

An Abundance of Cake

Hey Familia!!!!

This week was actually pretty interesting and hopefully I can give you
all the good highlights. Thanks for all the updates on the world back
in the states, also thanks for making me a little trunky by giving the
heads up about Thanksgiving. Unfortunately they really don't celebrate
that holiday and when I try to explain the meaning of the holiday to
the Peruvians they kind of give me this look like, "Wow that's lame.
There wasn't even anything to do with the Virgin Mary in that story!"
But, pretty much every day here they eat way too much so I feel at
home. This week is the Day of Moquegua on the 25th so this past week
they have been celebrating. There was a food convention in the plaza
with a ton of food, so I kind of felt like it was Thanksgiving. Enough
about food, I'm getting the munchies. Also, I'm glad that Dad is okay
and that the ward is still alive and okay too.

Like I said last week, we are teaching a man named Otmar. He is super
cool!!! The Lord really does prepare people and I'm so glad that every
once in awhile I can see that here in the mission. Otmar is from
another city named Juliaca but moved here thirty years ago becuase its
super cold there and his knees are messed up. He lives alone now
becuase he got divorced when he moved here to Moquegua and has one
son. He never liked the Catholic church and never agreed with the
things they do. He is super good at sports, especially soccer. He's
kind of like Mr. Miagi from Karate Kid becuase he said he almost went
pro here in Peru when he was 17 but his Dad didn't want him to live in
a big city. He got hurt after that so he didn't go pro. He just wanted
to know more about the Book of Mormon and once we taught him about it,
he read it every day. He accepted everything we taught him and kept
his commitments easily. He said he was going to talk to us but he was
scared to come up to us in the street. He saw us twice walking in the
street but didn't come talk to us. Then one day he saw our whole zone
together for P day and he knew it was a sign from God that he should
talk to us!!

Otmar got baptized on Saturday and it all went well. There weren't a
ton of people there from the ward which makes me a little frustrated
but he didn't care. IF THERE ARE EVER BAPTISMS IN THE WARD, YOU HAVE
TO GO!!!!!! It helps the new converts so much if they see people there
to support them when they are taking steps of faith. We asked a member
to bake a cake but she didn't show up so we ordered one. An hour later
she came to the service, so we had two huge cakes. There weren't many
people at the baptism so we took a cake and a half home to eat this
week.

This week I also was given the opportunity to speak in Sacrament
Meeting. I didn't really know what to talk about but then on Saturday
I kind of felt inspired to talk about one of my ancestors, Levi
Savage. I didn't really know why but after awhile I felt that I should
really tell his life story and put emphasis on his mission. I talked
about his life and told the ward that almost all of them are pioneers
and that nowadays in the States we don't really have the opportunity
to talk to pioneers anymore. I said I was really grateful to be here
in their presence. It went really well and the Spirit testified to me
that it was becuase of my ancestors that I even have a testimony and
that's why I'm serving the Lord. After church we went to a birthday
party for a little bit and ate more cake!! The bishop's wife was there
and said she really appreciated my talk and really liked the story
about Levi Savage. She wants to see that movie, 17 Miracles too, so I
hope she can find it.

Thanks so much for all of your prayers and support. I feel
strengthened in this work that I know I can't do by myself.

Hope you have a good Thankgiving and you can send me tons of pictures.

Love,
Your Elder,

Child

P.S. Didn't get the package yet, hope it comes this Thursday. Have you
sent my Christmas package yet? If not, you could include a new Mo Tab
CD, or a Cardnials hat, or a jersey, or Mormon Doctrine. or a Sports
Illustrated, or a car, or a Playstation, or a TV. Just a suggestion.

Otmar: Weird Name, Cool Guy

Hey family,

It's good to hear from all of you like all the other Mondays. We have
a little bit more time each week to write now so I'm not stressed
about being able to read my emails and trying to write too. It sounds
like you're all doing okay so that-s good. Sorry about the apostrophes
again, hey, its Peru what can I say. (Just found out that the question
mark doesnt work either, that-s cute).

This week was a lot better than last week. The Lord really wanted me
to learn a lot last week and I kind of didnt so thats why it was
difficult, but Im good now. Thats intereting to hear about the leaves
falling there in the States. It doesnt ever get that cold here so Ill
never see that. Well, if there were trees, that would be a little bit
different, they dont exactly plant too many trees here, or grass, or
plants in general. We saw a house with plants on their porch this week
and my comp was like, wow I want to live there, it was pretty
hilarious.

I love my companion. He is a hard worker and he makes me laugh all
day. He knows some english and his accent is so funny. Hes from the
capital Bogata and hes comes from a well off family but hes actually
humble enough for me to train him. He actually listens to me and we
get along well. He has actually taught me a lot too.

This week I got to do splits with the big baseball fan in the zone,
Elder Hansen. He has a month and a half more than me. We pretty much
just talked about sports the whole day, it was a good break from the
norm. His area is a lot like my first area, Characato!!!! I really
miss that place. I hope that one day in the future I will be blessed
enough to be able to go back there and visit all of the members of the
church and visit the places we always went to.

Well, this week I was really grateful for our fan that keeps us cool
at night. I was grateful for sports in my life that Im convinced was
given to us by God so that we dont go insane. Im grateful for semi
warm water. Im grateful for paved roads. Im grateful for shade. Im
grateful for cold soda. Im grateful for sunscreen. Im also grateful
for my mom for cooking a lot of interesting food becuase some people
just dont like the food here but I love it!!! But all joking aside, Im
most grateful for my savior and redeemer Jesus Christ. I think about
how ungrateful sometimes we are because of our actions but He doesnt
care. He will always be there for us no matter what we do.

I love you all. Have a good week.

Elder Child
P.S. We are actually going to have a baptism this week. His name is
Otmar and Ill tell you all about him next week but just know that the
Lord really is preparing people to hear this Gospel.

P.SS. The only thing I want for Christmas specifically is maybe a new
tie, and a Cardinals 2012 calendar (not just like their games, but the
whole year). Thanks.\

PSS Alex, what-s with the UTES

Missionaries and Members

MY FAM-A-LEE,
(You have to read it like GA-RO-SHER-REE STORE from the best two years, otherwise its kind of lame).

Hey everybody, it was so good to hear from two and a half of you this week, Alex counts as a half becuase technically he did send me a message but it wasn't from his email.... sorry. It sounds like all is good up there on the other side of the equador (not sure if that's spelled right). How's the snow going? I only miss the snow a little bit. If I could live in it for like 2 or 3 days that would be cool just because 200 straight days of sun and no clouds kind of gets old. I really do love my area though and the city that I'm in.

This week was one of those weeks that you can learn from but you don't really want to re live. I want you all to know that I still have a testimony of the gospel and I know that I was called to this mission for a reason. At first I thought it was becuase I had to learn specific things but now I know its becuase I have to give specific things. First of all, Halloween. They don't really celebrate Halloween here in Moquegua. They just barely, like 10 years ago, recognized it as a holiday. So they pretty much just have cheap costumes and have parties. They don't even have trick or treating (that would actually be pretty risky), so it was different. The main thing they do is just continue worshipping and celebrating the Virgin of whatever (its a different virgin in every different part of Latin America) and the saints. Several times this past week we have run into parades where they carry a statue on there shoulders in a big procession with music and stuff. It was a little annoying to see the children of Israel over again, I can only imagine what Moses felt like coming down from talking with the LORD and seeing that kind of thing. So that was a little bit different than the usual in the States.

This week was a little harder than usual just becuase almost none of our appointments actually followed through. You have no idea how frustrating it is to go to house after house and find out that nobody is there. At first I was just like, "Ya, we'll just knock doors and do street contacts until we find the chosen people". So we actually did talk to some cool people this week, but this pattern continued until sunday. It was a trying time and I learned a lot of patience and I learned how to make some changes in the way we plan. The brightest spot was Sunday. My ward mission leader actually started doing his calling!!!! He made this forms that all the Preisthood had to fill out of families that they knew that we could go visit. So this week we are going to work with a ton of families and get a ton of references. Then in the afternoon the whole priesthood left with us to knock doors and contact people. It was soo good to finally work with the members more. There is definately going to be a better missionary spirit here in this ward from now on. I really encourage you all to work as hard with the missionaries as possible. How much better it would be to have the missionaries teach and the members find so that we don't waste time.

Thank you all for your prayers and for your support. My time has gone, I'll talk to you all next week.

Elder Child

P.S. Go Utes. Hey Alex fill me in on the Ravens okay?

Happy Halloween/Mi Hijo Part Dos

Hola Querido Familia,
Hey Family What is Happening?!!!,

Firstly and most importantly I would like to wish my Grandpa Urbane a  very Happy Birthday!!! I can't believe he's still making everybody laugh. I thought of my grandpa especially during general conference when Elder Cook talked about a general authority named Alma Sonne. If my Line of Authority is correct I believe Alma ordained grandpa to be a High Priest which is very interesting. I find connections with people all the time.

Alright, of second importance. I'm a new father!!!! My son's name is  Elder Parra and he's from Bogota Columbia. He's actually really cool and we get along just fine. I think he was missing his family for a little bit but now he's working really hard. He inspires me to be a better missionary and to always set a good example. This week was really good. Something super weird happened at church. We walk around all day and talk to random people about the gospel and we give out free pamphlets and invite people to church. We were talking to a young police officer saturday night at like seven. We talked to him and his girlfriend for like a minute maybe. Turns out he actually came to church becuase he lives right in front of it. He's a really cool guy and I'm excited to see his progress in the gospel. It is very frustrating though because the ward boundary makes it so that the other side of the street in front of the church is NOT our ward, so he will have to be taught by some other missionaries. Oh well, the Lord does things for reason.

So, of third importance, Happy Halloween!!!!!!! I hope you all dress up as scarey people (just put on your normal clothes and people will be scared enough). Hahahahah. Somebody said the most popular costume in Utah is a missionary costume, maybe you could fake that. I hope you all have a good time, I hope to scare people with the gospel and the power of the spirit.

I wish we had couple missionaries in my mission. I definately  encourage mom and dad to do everything possible to be able to one day serve a mission. They can definately add a sense of maturity that sometimes is laking here in the mission. I know that with more sacrifice, your mission will mean a lot more to you. You wont waste time, and most likely will work harder and take it seriously.

Thanks for all of your support and love. I have definately felt my Father in Heaven's blessings this week and I know it is becuase of your prayers.

Till next week,

Elder Child












What? Did you think I forgot about my team? GO CARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can you hear me screaming in my mind???? Becuase i am really loudly!!!! That just makes my whole mission service worth it! Oh, and all the people I help too, that part is pretty important. But seriously, I'm soo happy. The only bad thing is that I'm not going to be able to see the games for at least another year. Oh yah, Happy birthday in the mission to me on Thursday. Can't believe it's actually been a whole year. Mostly because the weather here is always the same, warm and sunny. It seems like its been summer for like a year now. It's funny that mom said Alex wants to be a missionary when he grows up becuase 90% of the people here think he is older than me. Also, I've grown a little bit on the mission too. You can't really see it in my pictures but I've grown at least an inch maybe a tiny bit more. I measured myself against an elder that is 6 foot 3 and I'm almost the same heighth. Interesting!!!