1.21.2008

Hey fam, yes my letter last week was really short. the library computers were extremely slow. but this week im in a internet cafe because its presidents day... so its a lot better. real quick before i forget, could you send me one of those "hold to the rod" key chains in spanish. we have a lady who is commited and she LOVED the lesson we had on the tree of life yesterday, she took my scriptures and looked up about 25 different scriptures and read along with her finger following the words as we read. the sunday school, branch, everything is AMAZING here. they have real correlation(well its not perfect but its 100xs better than brooklyn) and people are really excited about the work. i really enjoy my companion elder valdez. we are doing really well. all my companions have had lot of cool stories, its been fun to learn about them and my testimony gets stronger with each one. i had the opportunity to teach all the districts about planning. (its something that we are changing in the mission, we did it so wrong before. the brotheren from salt lake came and helped us realize how we can improve. ) i touhgt it 3 times to 3 different groups for 20 min. and each time it was different. the whole zone really liked it, everyone is so excited to change things around here we want to double our baptism like the prophet desires! (in realality it will be like 4xs the baptisms...) jamaica is so crazy, its 18 degrees today but looks like its at least 80. really wierd. my hand almost fell off carrying groceries back from the store. we had a new investigator in church finally! her name is felicita. she is from a tiny town in mexico. she actually speaks "chatino" which sounds like chinese, there is no written form of the language and only about 13000 people still speak it. and im not sure if they are mixing some spanish words in with it when they talk or if some words are similar. either way i understand about 1/10th of what they say. its crazy. we actually have to use her cousins husband name aureliano, he went to school and learned spanish. most chatinos dont they just farm and live and stuff... aureliano is amazing elder Walston found him in the park drunk and his wife wanted to divorce him, with a little 7yearold daughter. now they are happily married, its one of those miracles stories. he has read the entire standard works in 7 months!! so we love having him teaching felicita with us. peoples lives here are so sad, the gospel is such a blessing. i could say that right now in my mission its the high point, im the happiest i have ever been in my life. im working harder and seeing more miracles, this is finally LIFE for me, i feel at home here. i remember driving through jamaica with elder petitt on our way home to freeport and wanting to pee my pants! its was terrifying to me. now its a cake walk, it is so much bigger than it really seems, its just like living in an older utah, with more people, and no one is from the us. ha ha. I love you all. i am in the lords hands. he guides us when we are obedient. remember this, this week, service is what allows us to feel the love of christ. until next week. andy

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