Bon Dia! (That's Buenos Dias in Catalan)
So I'm here, I'm healthy and I'm safe! - that was for mom
So after my last e-mail announcing where I as assigned to. My companion and I stayed in Barcelona with some other sister missionaries while we watied till Friday. I found out my compañera was born in Madrid and lived here in spain till she was about four. Her dad is Spaniard but her mom is American. She since then has lived in Ohio mostly but her family is in Califrona right now. So she speaks Spanish pretty well, still with a bit of an american accent but its ver subtle. She is about 5 foot 8 and has short brown hair and pretty blue eyes! We have been gettig along very well, She has only been on her mission for 6 months but its good because that means she isn't trunky (homesick) which ive heard from other missionaries that when your trainer is trunky its really hard and different. I feel like we havent really diven into the whole missionary work yet. but I dont know because this is my first view to missionary work. I feel like there is lots of organization that we have been doing and planning. which now that I think about it is a lot of work and necessary when opening an area. She keeps telling me that this is not how a normal day is, or this is not a normal missionary schedule.... or etc etc. which is good she is telling me that. I do feel like this week we are going to finally get this ball rolling though. We have lots of personal goals and companionship goals and daily goals that are going to help us.
My district consists of four Elders, Elder Rios (colombian) and Elder Castillo (Dominican) and Elder Cuff (American) with Elder Schwartz (half korean) they are funny and are ver good at making sure us hermanas are doing okay and safe.
The Barrio (ward) is amazing!!!! everyone welcomed us with so much love yesterday! We basically are being every day this week by a different member, but i have a feeling it might just be like this for the first couple weeks... idk. I hope they give us reasonable proportions of food. ha. Either way I heard it gets SUPER hot here in the summer so I will just sweat it off. Out of all the missionaries here in the District - we are all in the same ward, there is only one ward- four of us are new! so we were asked to bare our testimonies during sacrament and it was good , its a decent sized ward.
On Saturday Elder Rios and Castillo had a baptism! It was of a 21 year old girl and Hermana Blanco and I attended and it was good, but kinda sat because it started like an hour later because the Elders were having some problems with printing out the program and only one of the counselors and his wife were there besides us missionaries and NO MEMBERS came!!! It sad because of that. But hermana Blanco and I are determined to change that, new converts need the support of the ward members and maybe its a girl thing but baptisms are a very special day for the person being baptized and well.. lets just say these Elders are in great need of the Sisters touch of making things a bit more special for the new converts.
Besides that , Hermana Blanco and I have been trying to get organized with our area book and try and contact menos activos (less actives) in the area. and old investigators to get started. Its been a rough start but Im looking forward to the work we are going to do this week. We were able to meet with a family that the Elders were teaching before but are now in our area. They have been having missionary visits for some time now but are in a tough situation where they are not married and its too expensive for them because the wife, Danny, wants her family from Bolivia to be there so she wont get married unless if its in Bolivia. .. at least thats the stroy the Elders told us. The husband, Jose Maria is spaniard and really loves reading the book of mormon and bible. He actually called us yesterday and asked for us to come that night because he had questions about what he was reading. They have two boys, well they arent his sons but Dannys sons, one is almost 14 and the other is 12. They all sit in on our visists, the two we have had so far, and listen and they know how to pray and all of that, Im thinking that even if they parents cant get baptized because they arent married that they boys are ready and hopefully the mom wont have a problem with them being baptized. We still have more to learn about them but they seem very promising. They are very nice and welcoming too and seem to accept all of the gospel and teachings.
Alright, Now to talk about LLEIDA, Its a very small town and has little pueblos that are far from the center. but the main center of lleida is all very close together. we walk everywhere and it doesn´t even take long to walk to all the places we have to go. I've been told that its not the pretties of cities here in the Barc mission but I think its just perfect. it has an old castle that we might go to later today and some old buildings and cathederals that are very cool looking. I love the ancient , old , historic looking buildings. So a little fact about my mission , a part of it is called Catalunya which is an area of lots of different cities but they are the part of spain that is wanting to become thier own country so almost everything in these cities is in Catalan , which is the language they speak that is a mixture of spanish, french and some portuguese. Its really interesting and we are kind of picking up a few words here and there. its similar to spanish but still with a weird twist to it. However mostly everyone speaks spanish, or castalleno which is what they call spanish. We are still in a Hotel its called the Camparan Suites and its on a street called Avenguda alcalde Porrquero (ya thats catalan) I dont have the exact address but if you google it maybe you can get on street view and is kiddie corner to HONG KONG haha a chinese restaurant. I do have the Church's address, C/Enric Farreny #42 Lleida, Spain.
Well I think thats all that is really new that I have to wrirte about. I still love hearing from everyone every monday and Im glad to hear that everyone is doing great! enjoy the summer!! I guess ill find out how hot it really gets here. I know that im in this area for a reason, that it really is where God wants me and I know that if I'm obedient and try my hardest that I will be able to witness many many miracles!! Keep growing in the Church and the Book of Mormon really does have the answers to everything and for everyone! Search, ponder and pray!
Love you all so much !
Love,
Hermana Hair
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