Church Activities

Hola,

Just so you all know, I love my new area. I think my new area is a lot better then my old one was. It’s more urban then my old area. I like walking and looking around and seeing buildings not just tiny little structures. Also when you get to the edge of the city to the north because its built in the mountains there is an amazing view, It has been rainy a lot here so there are clouds swirling around the mountain and down through the valley. The first time I saw that scene (and pretty much every time after as well)  I think of the Misty Mountains song from the Hobbit. 

It is really interesting here in Colombia with all the big catholic churches. A lot of the christ statues are bloody, since the people here combined the old ways of the ``Lamanites`` I mean Indians and what they knew about human sacrifice with what the Spanish ``taught`` them so they are a bit creepy to me. Its always a relief when I walk in to our church and there is the famous painting of Jesus in the red robe the first thing when you walk in. Its nice to have the restored gospel. I don't see why every one else doesn't think so.

The food isn’t very different here from my last area. We do eat a lot of lentils here. What is nice is that we have the same people for lunch every week (with a few days changing every other week between families) so they know that i don't eat mountains of food so they are giving me less. Im not getting much luck on not eating `salad of cucumber and tomato. I guess i will be forced to eat that for my whole mission.

The best part of the week was that our activity that we had planed for friday got canceled so Elder Mansilla, Sister Perez, Sister Cavero and I had to plan a new event. They wanted to do acts that were the typical lame church ones however I remembered the show “Who’s Line Is It Anyway” and all of the awesome acts they had on the show (yes i watched that show before my mission via youtube). So we took a few of the acts modified them slightly to make them be funny for colombians and it was awesome and I had a blast All the members said it was one of the best activities they had come to.

This week was really bad for teaching. There have been huge rain storms all week so nobody is in the mood to listen. It was really terrible : ( Although I think that the rain is going to let up (I hope) and we will be able to teach as we normally do. Although he here in Chinchina we visit a lot more less active members and I really like it. We are gathering all the lost sheep and it feels great. 

Oh and Dad, thanks for sending me my blessing. It will be nice to be able to have it for the rest of my mission. This time it will not leave the house. Whats funny is some of the members asked how I was going to get a copy of it here in Colombia. I told them I was just going to ask you for it. They asked won’t it take a long time for it to get here, I said no, my dad has it on his phone and can send it to me in a email. They were blown away that that you just had my blessing on your phone. 

Love you guys lots

Alec

P.S. I love Dad’s new orange puff coat.

Here is a picture of our bedroom/study area.

My mustache for my mission impossible skit at the church.

The ward gets together every Friday at the church, its so cool.