Monday, May 2, 2011

Greetings from Candelaria

Hola familia,
Here I am in Candelaria(actually I'm in Santa Ana right now to write but my area is Candelaria) Candelaria de La Frontera is where we live and it is really a huge area, even bigger because we don't have bikes or cars and buses are pretty scetchy. (sometimes they come by and sometimes not) We had a baptism of a 13 year old last friday and he was confirmed on sunday. He lives with his aunt and grandma who are ´menonita` that means they wear hand made dresses all the time and the aunt wears a white head scarf over her hair and their hair is always braided and up. I haven't really noticed any other differences. He has a whole ton of family that are members but the ones that live in candelaria are inactive. He was baptised by his uncle who is active and lives in Chalchuapa.
We also have a date for another investigator. He's been coming to church for 3 months now and finally all the papers are in order, almost. We are waiting for his birth certificate which has to come through the pouch from the other mission, we are planning that it'll come this wednesday (the zone leaders go to the office on tuesday and get the stuff that comes in pouch and we'll get it at district/zone meeting on wed)
If that comes we'll have a wedding and a baptism this weekend. His future spouse is positive but she hasn't been able to get work off yet, so she hasn't come to church. We're praying that she'll be able to find other work. She's been looking but hasn't been able to find anything.
ON another note-I'M BEING EATEN ALIVE!!!! The mosquitos are so thick. I have dryer sheets, which is a little helpful and a miracle becuase they don't sell them here(the NA Hermana before me went to Belize and left them for me :) ) and I put on off every 4 hours and my legs still look like I have chicken pox or something. Ah they itch.
Anybody have any ideas about how to not be bit?
I did laundry today... by hand. It probably wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't just switched from having pday on friday to mondays so I had a week and a half of laundry and now it is hung up all over the property. Its a good thing my comp and I are the only ones that live there.
Its really hot up in the mountains(where Candelaria is) but it rained last evening/night which meant that for the afternoon and evening it was refreshingly cool.
Candelaria is very rural and everytime we walk through the pastures and fields to get to another persons house and I see the cows and step over the pies I am reminded of home.
We are working hard and communication is interesting because my spanish is leaps and bounds better than my comp's english. But we manage. I think I am here to help her develop patience. Some times she'll say something and I don't catch it and I ask her to say it again so she does but she raises her voice too. Its funny but I didn't realize that when you speak louder you slow down. More than anything it is that she slows down when she repeats it that helps me. Not because I didn't hear it, but because she said it so fast I didn't understand. I do get a little frustrated at not understanding but all I can do it laugh. Especially when we're somewhere and someone starts talking to us and I focus so hard so that I can understand that they start talking to me(then I'm in trouble becaus they ask me the questions and I have to go ´ummm...¨ (look at hna fuentes) and she answers) and I laugh inside.
I still need to go find OFF because the little store(owned by walmart) in candelaria didn't have any.

Love you all and its been good to hear from you all.

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