March 17th, 2010

March 17^th, 2010

Mom’s note: K.C. is my third child to go on a mission. After Ryan got home I realized how much was not told to moms. Evidently some moms worry too much and are too delicate to hear the realities of a third world mission . That is not me. I made my boys promise not to hold back on my account, because if I don’t know the particulars, how am I supposed to direct my prayers! If I have enough faith to send my boys on a mission, then I better have enough faith that they will be protected.

Well one more week down!

I will start off with my area, I’m still in the capital. I’m in zone 18, it is like one of the most scariest places in Guatemala. It’s really ghetto, and is really small, its like 2 square miles., haha dad you would like it, it’s like mini hikes all day long because we are always constantly going up and down hills. Another name for my area is Paraiso Dos, or Alameda. It is around an hour and half from the airport so i might be able to see Stacy Brimhall. If he comes, he will have to ask my mission president.

In my area 3 people have died from gangs about half mile away from me, so its pretty normal to hear gun shots at night, that is why our curfew is 8:00 and not 9:00. But dont worry I feel safe and use the spirit to guide me at all times.

Lucky for me I have one of the nicest houses in our mission except the ap´s, its two stories with 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. I love it! haha We even have a man made weight set so i work out every morning, nothing heavy but enough to sustain some muscle. I have lost some weight here but not much. The six elders in our house are hilarious. Half are latin, and make me laugh even though I have no clue what there saying haha.

I am eating really good actually, almost too good. I have only ate at two members houses so far. The first time they bought us these tortillas filled with cheese covered in salsa which were amazing and the second time they made us beans mixed with rice and some eggs which was also good. Other then that I make my own food. This last week i ate like a king! I had spaghetti, eggs, tacos, fajitas, these home made pizza pockets, and ham and egg sandwiches and a bunch of other stuff! so i haven’t really experienced the real guat food yet. I think the milk here makes me have b.u, I had it so bad one morning that we couldn’t even go out. I felt bad because we had people to see but my stomach was going to explode! After lunch I was fine so that was good. oh and since my area is like really dangerous I cant really take many pictures. We cant let other people see our cameras unless they are members so i have only taken like 20 pics

One funny thing about Guatemala that I never knew for some reason is that they burn everything here, some areas that just pile up huge piles of trash and set it on fire, it smells so bad because there are dead dogs and all kinds of nasty crap.

President Torres wants us to make a "go bag" because of the earthquake in Chili. Evidently, Guatemala has like a 90 percent chance of getting an earthquake too so that is kind of scary, and one of the quorum of the 70 came down last year and said soon as Guatemala has 6 missions in it, there will be a major catastrophe and we are splitting our missions in like a couple months so we will have six pretty soon.....haha so its very likely I will be in a big earth quake or something. Bing it!

Friday we had a bad day again where every body was canceling or just not there so we contacted for no joke 4 hours...longest day of my life, then my companion ask me where I wanted to go knock and I told him I didn’t know the area so I didn’t care. All of sudden I felt inspired to go up this little hill to this little house that sat all by its self and my comp was complaining because his legs are so much shorter than mine, but I made him go because he asked me where to go and I was inspired! We met this guy named Kevin and he invited us in immediately and we taught him the whole first lesson and he really liked and he wants us to go back tomorrow!! I’m so excited.

Another thing that is cool is that the area I am in is an area that is low in baptizing and making and reaching it’s goals. This week we made 87 percent of our goals and my companion said that is the highest he has gotten in 4 months!, we have 9 new investigators this week so im excited to see what happens with them!!

The language is going a little better and I am teaching a little more but im still not progressing as much as I want too. This week I am going to push my self harder to learn the language because I hate just sitting there with a big fake smile on my face not knowing what they are talking about!! I think it may take me longer then most people to learn the language but I have peace with it and i don’t get to frustrated. I’m just going with the flow and trying my hardest! So far the mission is good, nothing too bad and the days aren’t too hard but it definitely makes me work my butt off, and it feels good to come home and be really tired.

I like p days because we go out to eat for lunch. Today we had Taco Bell which is really good!

I love you so much and just know that I am doing fine over here. I’m actually starting to like it a lot already...except this dumb language!

Love, Elder Toolson