Not much to say this week

Like I said, not a whole lot to talk about today. I'll just go through it right now.

INVESTIGATORS

Aaron - We confirmed him on Sunday! He's a member now, which is really good, because it means we're finally able to finish up teaching him. He's a good kid, and we're excited to see him grow. The ward is working hard to help him stay active.

Javier - Said he couldn't come to church this week, but next week, he will for sure. So this week is all about getting him to church. He's a really nice guy and really active, but he's got a few problems we're going to work on.

Pablo - He's a new guy we found a few days ago. We taught him again yesterday. He's 18 years old and he has two sisters that he has to help and take care of all the time because his parents are out working. He's SO nice though. We hope he'll be able to progress.

Luz - A lady that came from another area that has now been to church twice. Really nice and timid, but lives HASTA LA GOMA. In other words, FREAKIN FAR AWAY. Oh well. That's the price we pay to help people. She'll probably be my baptism on my last week. Her date is for the 16th of June. She's been to church twice and seems VERY happy with what she's seen and heard. Already has read the Book of Mormon, but the other missionaries couldn't teach her much about it, so we're going to teach her a ton and get her the answers she wants to know.

MEH

1.) It rained SO much this week. Honestly, it rained so much that it flooded the streets. I took a picture of an intersection so flooded that you could go in it in canoe. Ridiculous. We got really wet.

2.) My bike broke. The actual FRAME broke. They had broken it before, but they welded it back on, and then sold it to me.

Well, turns out that they didn't weld it enough, because I was just minding my own business, doing missionary things when all of a sudden I hear this CRACK and my seat just shoots up to try and punch me or something, and my bike stops working.

I got off and looked and saw nothing, but when I sat back on my bike, I felt what happened.

Oh man. I had to replace the frame, and that cost me a bit of feria (change). And then my tire went flat at the end of this week, so now I gotta change it.

3.) I left my jacket with the Zone Leaders in the North, so I didn't have my jacket with me during the rain. It was horrid. I got so went that I shook my head and sprayed water everywhere. My companion did it too, and since his hair is longer and more stringy, he sprayed even more. It was just dumb.

4.) My companion is a really cool guy! His name is Elder Cruz, and he was companinos with Elder Luna. He really likes Pokemon.

When he first got here, he didn't say much, but Elder Luna had told me that he really liked Pokemon, so I started asking him about it and BOOM! He started talking SO much about everything there is in Pokemon. I like it too, so we just talk about Pokemon all day. Well, not really, but at night, he talks to me about it and I listen, because I don't really know or remember as much as he does.

He is so funny though. When it was raining, he told me,

"Just watch. The President is actually praying and fasting so that it rains more."

He's really witty. It's awesome. He also was with Elder De La Torre in Mexicali, and honestly, after what he's told me about what is going down there, Elder De La Torre is making me one proud trainer.

5.) I played tennis a few hours ago. It was so sad to see how far I've dropped. From almost beating Andy before the mission, to now winning by pure luck after 2 years... It's depressing.

Well, to finish up, I just want to say that I'm honestly putting in everything I can. I was giving all I could before, but I was saving a bit of energy. Just like in a race, you push hard, but save your very very best until the end, where you know you won't have to give any more when you're done. That's what I'm doing now. I'm just using any spare energy I can find and using it to just go hard until the end.

The best part is that I'm with a good companion, so I get to enjoy my last transfer with him. He's actually got a year in the mission, so we're going to make it last for him as well.

Have a good week everyone. I'll try to have more pictures tomorrow.

Elder Carter

Transfer #16. Here we go!

The moment has arrived. The last transfer of the mission has begun. Starting today, I shall begin the last 6 weeks of my mission. It's just so incredible and impossible that I just can't wrap my mind about that yet. Well, I'd better start doing that, because these next six weeks are going to go by way too fast.

INVESTIGATORS

Aaron - Se bautizo! He got baptized! However, the baptism was on Sunday, so we have to wait until the next Sunday to see him confirmed. His dad baptized him, and I'm hoping he'll be at church to see him confirmed. Cool kid. We're excited for his progress.

Javier - A guy we taught a couple days ago. He's really cool. Didn't come to church because a family was supposed to stop by for him, and we didn't notify them... So we're going to have to tell them this week. We actually passed by his house a couple days ago, and we were going downhill on bikes, so we pretty much passed by in about 3 seconds, but in those seconds where we were by him, he yelled, "I'M STUDYING WHAT YOU LEFT ME TO STUDY!" Looks like he's going to progress pretty well. We're excited about that.

Roberto - We're not so sure about this guy. He's an older man that we found when some kid gave us a wrong address which was his. We taught him really quick, but honestly it doens't look like he's too interested. Most likely we're going to leave him.

WEEKLY BUSINESS

1.) First things first, at the beginning of the week, I ended up playing some tennis. And honestly, the way I got to play was just straight up a miracle. I keep seeing miracles in my own life, and not those of the investigators. Strange, but still awesome.

So, Elder Luna and I, at around 8:30 were just looking around for people to contact near the house. At that hour, we don't want to go too far away because we won't be able to teach much, and if we don't do anything and we go home, we end up losing an hour of proselyting, so basically, we just start knocking on doors and contacting when we can't get anything else near the house.

We contacted like, 4 or 5 people, and by then it was around 8:40. I looked over at Elder Luna and was like, "Lets head home."

Elder Luna looked around and said we needed to just go for a little more time to find people to talk to.

Basically, we end up going by a park with some tennis courts, and I sit there and watch two people play some tennis, and I realized,

Holy Cow. I miss playing that sport SO MUCH.

Just as I thought that, one of the members with his dad showed up to play with these two guys I was watching, and I looked at Elder Luna and just took off to go play.

I showed up and asked them if they would let me play a few games. First to 3.

I got up and was confident that, albeit a long time having since played, I would still be able to play decently.

I was 100% wrong. I played horrible. As we say in Spanish, "Fue un asco total." Honestly, probably the worst game I've played since I've started tennis seriously. I was kinda ashamed, but I found out they wanted me to play more, so I told them that if I just worked in the mornings on P-days, I would be able to play with them at night. They said it was good and we set off again. I felt really good after that. I really miss that game.

2.) I also got to talk to my Mommy! It was a pretty awesome call. Especially when the internet worked. Basically, I just kinda got a bit trunky after that call. I'm so close to home, but still a bit far off, you know? But it's fine. I'll end working hard.

3.) Elder Luna finally finished his mission. I'm really going to miss that guy. He was so funny. We got along really well, and had almost all the same interests. And basically, he and I had the same views on almost everything. We never had any arguments, and we never had any point where we fought or anything. There wasn't even anything about him that annoyed me. He's the first companion I've ever had that was like that. It was pretty cool. I'm going to miss him so much. But it's fine, he has my email and everything. I'm going to see him later on.

4.) Elder Cruz showed up! He's my new companion, and my last, at that. He'll be the one to see me off. He's from the State of Mexico, in a little city outside of Mexico City. Nice guy, and it seems like he's a little quiet, but that's fine. As long as he contacts and as long as he teaches stuff that isn't apostate, we'll be just fine. haha

5.) Just before getting my companion, I got together with Elder Kessinger and Elder Giles and we hung out a little bit before getting my new companion. It was pretty cool, and we went downtown, where I took the pictures of these gigantic heads of people who were like, the George Washingtons of Mexico. I actually went to the street where we walked when we visited Ensenada on the Cruise. There was no cruise ship there though...

And, to finish, I just wanted to talk a little about how I feel right now.

Sometimes, I feel like, out of all the things in my life that I could have done during these 2 years, there are a lot of things that I would have liked much more to do than serve like this, and sometimes, I feel like there is nothing I would love doing more for the rest of my life.

However, one thing is sure: There is nothing more worthwhile that I could have done.

I could have studied for 2 years, but that would have barely scraped the surface of the knowledge I've gained here.

I could have done Humanitarian Work in Asia for 2 years, but that wouldn't have even reached the depth of the richness of service.

There's a bunch more, but honestly, during these 2 years, I feel like I have gained more and learned more than in any other way in my life. I know now why a mission means so much to people when they go home, and why they all love it so much. It isn't necessarily that they loved doing it, or that they just had a total blast all the time, but it's more that they appreciate profoundly the things they received there. I feel like I will treasure my mission forever. Even after everything is over, I will still appreciate this small chance for service.

Thanks for all of your prayers and fasts in my behalf. There were a lot of sacrifices that many of you had to make for me, but know that those sacrifices were worth every drop of energy you put into them, be them small or big. It's helped me a ton.

I can't wait to see you all in 6 weeks. Bye!

Elder Carter

REJECTION! I hate that word...

And I'm without pictures this week! What a surprise? A lot of funny things happened, but I took videos of them to show back at home.

Okay, well, lets just cut to the chase, shall we?

INVESTIGATORS

Aaron - He's progressing, but he's just SO THICK. Like, honestly, we have to tell him around 10 times just one idea so he understands it. It's really slow working, but he comes to church on his own. His baptism is scheduled for this week. We'll see if he makes it or not...

Adriana - She's a contact we made. We haven't been able to find her very often. We put a baptismal date with her, but couldn't get in contact again to be able to teach about Sabbath Day so she would come to church... So we're kinda just stuck trying to find her again so we can actually start working with her. She seems pretty nice. Just doesn't want to read anything out loud.

Santa - Old investigator that honestly doesn't look like she has too much promise. Other elders that served here kept telling me that they wanted me to baptize her, but I honestly don't want to, because as far as I can tell, it looks like she just likes missionaries, not the actual church. I mean, when a missionary told her she had to stop worshiping the Virgin Guadalupe, she got really offended and didn't come back to church... I highly doubt we'll see progress, but Elder Luna wants to continue teaching her. No baptismal dates, because she says she only wants one when SHE feels ready, so... yeah. Kinda slow.

The hardest part about what's going on right now is that our leader is just telling us that we need to work harder and get more stuff done, but when we contact and knock on a bunch of doors, we end up losing time and lessons, and so then we just end up with nothing every day because we keep losing appointments because they fall through and stuff. It's kinda annoying to have leaders tell you to work harder when you don't have anything to work harder with, you know? Eh. Ya me voy.

FUN

1.) So, last week, for a day, Elder Luna and I changed bikes just for fun.

It was the worst decision of my life. My bike is made of aluminum, and it's got a good chain and sealed bearings in the star, so it is SUPER light and easy to get up hills.

My companion's bike is made of steel, has a rusted chain, and sealed bearings, but the bearings don't move as smoothly.

Oh man, I about died that day.

I managed to stay at my normal pace, but I had to kill myself to do it. Going up the hills on my bike was hard, but doing it on Elder Luna's bike was impossible. Elder Luna, who has been using that bike the whole time, just shot up the hills and kept telling me how easy it was. It wasn't really fair, because Elder Luna is a lot stronger than I am, and a LOT better on a bike.

2.) That brings me to another point. Elder Luna is just like me, just better at everything. He's better at computers, bikes, sweeping, opening doors that have locks, speaking Spanish, and contacting. Just you name it, and he's better at it. Even piano! He plays some REALLY cool songs on the piano. He can't sight read, but honestly, who needs to? Just learn some cool songs and you can get any girl to fall in love with you.

3.) I hit a dog with my bike the other day.

I was riding, and I saw this dog on my left start running at another dog across the street on my right.

Well, he started running and I started to pedal harder to pass him, but just when I pedal harder, he starts running faster!

Basically, I had no way to avoid him, and just as I pull my brakes, I feel my front tire collide with his neck, and the dog makes this weird noise like,

"bleejjjhhhh!"

And it stops and lets my bike pass by.

I laughed so hard at that that I had to stop and wait so that I wouldn't fall off my bike. My companion laughed really hard too. Serves the dog right. It was pretty ugly by any means...

4.) Well now, we come to one of my favorite happenings of the week.

We were at the chapel for our CES meeting (Correlacion Ejecutivo del Sacerdocio) I don't know what that means in English.  And in this meeting, we had all arrived on bikes, and we left them just outside the door of the chapel because we figured that it was inside the gate, and that if someone showed up, someone would see and be like, HAY! YALL CAN'T TAKE THAT JANK!

As we came out of the meeting, one of the brothers came up and asked us,

"How many Elders are there?"

And we answered four. Then he said something that made my heart stop:

"Well, that sucks. There are only 3 bikes outside."

My bike was the nicest and most expensive of the 4, so I knew my bike had been stolen.

I rushed out the door to check, and to my surprise,

It was still there! They had stolen the bike of our District Leader!

I felt a little bad, but at the same time, he HAS been being kinda dumb lately about contacts and stuff. We laughed so much about it, and the best part was that he was actually SO prideful about being our leader that he said he wasn't even mad. But we all know he was because he didn't want to even be at the church anymore. He started sternly telling his comp that he had to go.

I was honestly just happy that they didn't take MY bike. haha

5.) Also something really cool that happened:

There was a gas station that blew up!

Here, there are two types of gas stations, 1 which is the normal gas station like in the US for cars and stuff where you can pump it.

The other is a station of propane gas. Basically, it's just a place where they have very large reserves of propane in really big tanks.

Well, we were sitting with a member, talking about the mission when all of a sudden, we hear this soft boom.

We looked around and were like, "What the heck?"

Then we hear another one, and the brother looks outside his window and sees smoke, and he suddenly says:

"Woah! The gas station is on fire!"

We all ran outside to see, and sure enough, there was black smoke coming from just over the ridge, and we could hear the explosions from the tanks. there were quite a bit of them. We even saw the flames from the explosions rise over the slight incline. It was such a big explosion that we saw the flames. It took so long for the sound to arrive to the colonia we were in that we saw the flames, and then 5 seconds later we heard the explosion. It was insane.

No one died, but there were 8 wounded and 1 in critical condition, according to people around here. It was pretty cool.

Okay, so in just a week longer I'll be able to talk to you guys again. Did I just talk to you a couple months ago?

The wait between January and May is a lot shorter than May to December, so it seems much faster between the calls. But I'm fine with that. I'm sure you guys are too, right?

See you all next week.

Elder Carter

Bautismo de Infro!

We got a baptism this week. It was pretty cool. I'm going to talk about that a little bit, and a few other things that go with the pictures I took and all of that. But first, I need to go with the first things.

INVESTIGATORS

Juana - We are really going to leave her here in a bit. She's just not talking with her son. He's come 3 times now, and after the scares of the fact that he went to jail and everything, you'd think she'd just take any opportunity to talk to him about it. According to her, she was going with him TODAY. So We're going to see what happened later tonight. If he didn't come, we're going to share 1 Ne. 3:7 and end it right there.

Aaron - Teaching him is REALLY hard because he just understands nearly NOTHING. So we have to be really patient and teach the same thing like 5 times so he gets it. But he goes to church on his own, so it's pretty darn cool. He'll be baptized in 2 weeks, I think.

Outside of them, we're sitting on nearly nothing. We keep contacting and going to houses where it turns out they don't want anything or aren't there. It's an endless cycle.

FUN

1.) Alright, well, this week, my district leader assigned me the Christlike Attribute that we have to give in our District Meetings. Normally, we just get assigned to do it, and we choose what attribute we want. Well, our leader decided he was going to assign me one because he thought it would be a good idea. And he assigned me:

Altruism

What the heck. Like, that word doesn't even show up in scripture. I don't even know what it means, much less in Spanish. Not only that, but what in the world does that have to do with missionary work anyway?

Well, I called him a couple days later after looking for the word and I just basically sat down and was like,

"Look, if you assign me this attribute, I'm going to look like a complete idiot. I don't know what the word means, and it doesn't appear in scripture either."

he thought for a second and then said:

"Okay, then you have to do it on Bravery."

Oh yeah. Much better.

Whatever. I just whipped out Sons of Helaman and said what I could and called it good. I guess I'll just have to deal with it. Ni modos.

2.) The baptism! It was cool! We actually had to SCRUB the baptismal font, because our chapel was recently renovated. What ended up happening is they replaced everything, literally EVERYTHING.... but the baptismal font. And it's pretty gross. There is dirt or mold or whatever it is that has been there for so long that you can't even get it off the tile. I guess that's fine because it doesn't go up with the water either, but still... It's kinda gross, you know?

Anyway, so we SCRUBBED that font, and then the next day, started to fill up with water the font.

We opened up the valve for the hot water, but it came out cold. So we started calling people to find out which one was hot water, changed back and forth between the two valves like 10 times, and then finally found that the one that was hot was the first one we had opened. But it was still cold.

So we went back to check the boiler, and we couldn't open the door because no one has keys to it. Just wonderful. More problems.

Then, we manage to peek through the cracks to see that it's good, and all it needs is to get gas to start heating. So we grabbed a broom, stuck it through one of the holes in the fence that was keeping the tank, and then pushed the valve handle to the "open" position. Then we rushed back to the boiler to see if it was working and....

There's no gas.

We just gave up then and filled it with cold water. 2 hours of running around for nothing.

3.) Elder Cepeda, now Ivan, speaks to me in Tu. It's kinda weird, because he spoke in Usted before. Sometimes I can't understand what he's telling me because I'm used to hearing the Usted conjugations.

4.) It's decided. My dream calling in the church is to be the Primary pianist. I would love that calling.

I have played the piano in Sacrament Meeting now 2 weeks in a row, and I actually like it. It's hard, nerve-wracking, and quite honestly makes me feel like I make things worse rather than better, but I end up doing okay, and I like the idea of just playing piano for people.

After thinking a bit, i realized that there was a calling that would just be awesome in the church: Playing piano in the primary. Of course, I wouldn't get to listen to good lessons, and I'd have to deal with kids all screaming during "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" on the part where they're like: suuuunnnn BEAM, but it would be so fun for me. I'd love to practice piano every day just so I could fulfill my calling. Plus, it'd be something fun for me to do with my kids: just sit down and play whatever song i wanted. (Yeah Mom, I regret not practicing piano more at home...)

5.) We found out a couple days ago that my companion had less than 20 days left. That made me SOOOOOO trunky for a bit. Like, MAN! I've still got a full 8 weeks left, and he's sitting on only 15 days! Wow. It's going to take a long time it seems like....

6.) We found this bus that says "Transportation for Turistic Missionaries." I took a picture just because we have bikes and they have a bus. And they're turists. AND better looking than me. (Who knows how they did that...)

Um.... And, well, nothing really that important apart from what i've explained here. Just normal stuff. Knock, contact, get rejected, write down some address that doesn't exist, beg people to take cards, etc.

But honestly, thank you all for your support and love in my behalf. I don't feel like I deserve so much, but I get it anyway. That means a lot.

Love you all. See you later!

Elder Carter

Hablar en F

Okay, well, this week was pretty cool. I guess. I don't know. We had ups and downs and lefts and rights. Falls and get ups. Great stuff. Just kinda normal I guess. Not really anything super special, but I'm definitely going to try to get the best stuff I can in this letter.

INVESTIGATORS

Juana - Honestly, we don't know what to do with this lady. She just keeps telling us that she wants to talk to her son. She was supposed to do it this week, but what ended up happening was that her son got put into jail for fighting someone, and never came to visit her, and she REFUSES to get baptized unless she talks with her son. We keep telling her don't worry, she will have rides to church, but she won't do it. It's kinda hard to keep going now because she just doesn't want to do anything there... We're going to be praying a lot that her son helps her to church. She says if her son doesn't committ to taking her to church, she will not be baptized... We're scared of that.

Infro - Finally met this guy. Really cool. he's going to be baptized on Saturday. Really nice, and it appears like he's doing everthing right. I'll send the photos on Monday.

Aaron - This kid is really cool. We actually taught him once, and he was just so off. Like, he didn't even answer. We'd tell him: Faith is two parts: Belief and Action. What's faith? and he'd answer: I have no idea. It was really frustrating, but later we found out that he just had a bunch of questions about the mormons that we answered and now he's really excited to listen and go to church. We haven't talked about his baptism yet, so we're going to see what happens.

Carlos - A guy we found just a couple days ago. Really cool. We have an appointment on Tuesday, and he already told us he likes what we teach. We're going to try to get him to church this week. We just hope that we can convince him to go.

STUFF

I'm just too lazy to really put stuff there but the word Stuff. Deal with it. haha

1.) Okay, well, first cool thing was what happened with our bikes. So, we were supposed to eat with this hermano that usually brought us money to pay for the food. Well, normally he just gives us 150, but this week he gave us 250. Which meant, that after eating, we each had an extra 50 pesos.

Turns out that we needed those 50 pesos, because afterwards, the next day, my back tire went flat. We went and got it replaced and guess what the price was?

50 pesos. Pretty cool.

But it doesn't stop there. The VERY next day, MY COMPANION'S tire goes flat. Guess how much it costed him to get it fixed?

25 pesos.

And to get it fixed again when the patch didn't work?

25 pesos.

Boom. That was just so cool to me. Extra 50 pesos each and it's for the bikes. So cool. haha

2.) With Juana, something really cool happened. We couldn't get her to give us the address of her son so we could visit him, because she kept saying that it was better for HER to talk to him, and not us. Well, we tried and tried and the only thing that was left was planching her. Well, we didn't want to do that, so we just kinda sat there for a second, and I prayed and said:

"Look, Heavenly Father, we just don't know how to go about this situation. Please help us out here."

I began to talk to her, and I figured out the best way to tell her to give it to us, and we got it! So it was a pretty cool little miracle there.

3.) I figured something out that was really cool that I just love now.

So, in our Zone Conference, they were talking about being consecrated missionaries, and how we needed to leave certain things behind. I felt pretty bad and I was like, man. I'm such a bad missionary. Then I started thiniking a little more and I realized something:

They aren't telling me that I have to do all of that, they're just telling me what I need to work on doing.

I recognized that even though they are telling me what I need to be, that doesn't mean that I HAVE TO BE THAT WAY to be a good missionary. I just have to TRY to be like that.

It really cleared up a lot of doubts that I had, and it helped me to understand why it was that they were talking to me about that stuff.

4.) Honestly, Juana is just such a funny little lady. To give you a good picture of what she's like, (Katie will love this.)

Just imagine Edna Mode from the Incredibles, and combine that with one of the Purple Minions from Despicable Me 2.

That's what she's like. It's just so funny. Sometimes we'll just be sitting there, and she's this little old lady just shaking a little over there, and something will happen, and she'll just blurt out a single sentence. It's just so funny. Probably not over email, but in real life, it's funny.

5.) My bike broke again, so I fixed it with elecrical tape and a screw. I took a picture so you could see my efforts. My mission has taught me well.

6.) I fell off my bike too! It was nuts.

We were headed down a hill to help someone move, and I'm trying to call someone to let them know where we are, and all of a sudden, I hit this REALLY big bump. I'm going with just one hand, so my tire just shoots off to the right and I go down.

I hit the ground pretty hard, but the good news was that it was all cement that was pretty well worn down, so it was relatively smooth. I got a good scrape on my elbow, a really good bruise on my left hip, and a nice cut on my left ankle. Everything else was just fine. After laying on the ground for about a minute, I got up, got on my bike, and helped some guy move into a new house. It was pretty cool. haha

The cut on my elbow is in the shape of a moon kinda, so I took a photo so i could always remember Elder Luna. hahaha

Okay, well, I've talked too much. I've got to get moving. Love you all. Thank you so much for your love and support. It helps me out a TON.

Keep it up!

Elder Carter

TENGO UN BUEN QUE CONTARLES

No not really, but I do have a lot of cool stuff that happened this week, I guess.

 

INVESTIGATORS

Juanita - We had to work a TON with this lady to get her to come to church. She's still waiting on her son to come so she can tell him she's going to be baptized. She just wants to do that before actually doing it... So we're just playing the waiting game now. Anyway, we worked with her a bunch to make sure she would come to church on Sunday, and Sunday morning, we called her and she said she wasn't going to go, when the night before, she said yes. So, we talked with her and told her that the Lord wouldn't help her if she didn't do what He asked, so she agreed and went to church. Gave us a heart attack. We're confident her son will come this week.

Aaron - He's a teen that we found by a reference. He's gone to church a lot, and came to church on his own. He's a pretty nice guy, but really distracted. He plays a lot of soccer too... We're going to see how it goes this week, because he said he wasn't going to be able to come to church anymore once school started up again.

Infro - Just got back from his honeymoon yesterday, so we're going to see him tomorrow to put another baptismal date with him and get him to church again so he can get baptized. We're positive he'll be baptized by the end of the month.

COOL STUFF

1.) When we showed up on Sunday, they immediately came up to me to ask if I would play piano. They picked some of THE hardest songs to play. First, they said Called to Serve. I can't play that worth anything. Second was I Stand All Amazed. Can't play that one either when it gets into harmony. That was a pure scare. After that came I'll Go where you Want me to Go. I guess I could play that one in a pinch. It was going to be hard, but I was going to try.

Then walked in the guy who can sight read piano like a boss, and I let out a sigh of relief. Phew. haha

Don't get me wrong, I like playing the piano, but I'm terrible at it...

2.) I forgot to talk about this! So, my last day in Primo Tapia, I was talking with the Branch President's wife, and we were talking about how my first talk, I said I was the most handsome missionary in all of primo Tapia. Everyone was laughing a ton about that. But this lady, after we talked about that, asks me:

"Do you think you're handsome? Or is it just a joke?"

I told her I was just joking, and she said:

"Well good, because you're not that handsome, you know that?"

Nice lady. She just floors me with that, and so I just change the subject, when all of a sudden, she says:

"You know, Elder Carter, I've seen a change in you here in Primo Tapia."

"Oh yeah? Cool!"

"Yeah, because when you got here, you were SUPER prideful, and now you're a little more humble."

Nice. Two in a row. Just one more to go.

Luckily, Elder Rose just planched the crud out of her before she could say more, because honestly, this lady was insulting me in my face, and i was just taking it. Whatever. I just laughed it off later. haha

3.) Final cool thing that happened this week is something that no one would ever expect...

ELDER CEPEDA CAME TO ENSENADA!

Turns out, he served here as a missionary, and he came back to visit! He walked into the ward, and I had actually heard he was giong to be coming and that he had arrived, but when he walked in, it blew his mind. He was so happy. We'll be talking to him later to see what he says. He doesn't know how long he's going to be here, but he gave us his number so we could talk to him later. He looks pretty good. Been home for almost a year and he's now back. Pretty awesome. Now I think I'm set to go.

I really didn't have a whole lot of cool things to write about this week. That was a lie. Sorry.

But I did want to talk a little about my experience again. I feel like I haven't done that for nearly my whole mission, so I'm going to try to do it a bit in each letter.

I feel like in my mission, I've learned a lot of stuff. I've also figured out many other things. I've learned things that I wouldn't be able to learn in any other place. I feel like that was one of the main reasons that God sent me here, was so that I could learn everthing that I've learned.

I also feel like I was sent here to be converted.

When I left on my mission, I really wasn't converted like I am now. I honestly believed, but I wasn't converted.

Now, I believe, AND I'm converted. I believe the church is true, but it's not just a belief in terms of something there, but a real, living, changing, but firm belief. If someone were to tell me it wasn't, I wouldn't be able to believe them. I know it's true. I know God is my Heavenly Father, and I know that Jesus Christ died for me. I never met either of them here on earth, but I know those things.

I finally have come to understand what it means to strengthen your testimony. It doesn't mean just review what you already know, it means to make what you already know even more deeply engrained within your soul. The fact that I know Jesus Christ is my Savior doesn't actually stop just there. There are a lot more things that I know about him that have made my testimony stronger. If you want a strong testimony, you need to study further in depth.

Basically, I feel like my mission has really helped me in a lot of different ways, but more than anything, I feel like I've been Redeemed. I feel like God has saved me, and that I have discovered who He is and who I am. I feel really good about everything I've done.

I hope I can convey a little about how much my mission means to me. It's honestly the greatest thing that has ever happened in my life up to this point. I will never be able to fully express what it all means to me.

Well, thanks for the love and support. i pray for you all every night. Have a good week!

Elder Carter

Holy... That's a lot of pictures

Yeah, so, because I forgot to send them last week, this week you guys get TWO weeks worth of pictures. I'll cut straight to the quick so that I can get everything written down in time. Holy cow. Crazy week.

INVESTIGATORS

Infro - Never met him. Right now he's in Veracruz, but he's going to be coming back next week. According to what Elder Luna tells me, he's basically a sure baptism

Juanita - We worked a TON with her, and she still has a certain doubt or something that doesn't let her get baptized... We still have a bit more work with her, but she's awesome. She reads the Book of Mormon and prays every single night, but still doesn't want to be baptized.... Who knows why.... We're going to be working to find her doubt this week. She says she's been praying for something specific, but won't tell us what it is.

They are the only two good ones. We found 4 news this week, but they really aren't that great... And they didn't come to church either.

COOL STUFF

Alright, this is where the letter is going to get HUGE, because I have a lot to talk about. First things first, the pictures.

1.) I got the package! It was awesome! These are the pictures, but I unfortunately had to take a backpack FULL of food just so I could eat the beef jerky, fruit snacks and rice chex. It was pretty funny.

2.) This place with rocks was near a guy's house, and it was pretty cool to take a picture there. The one with my arms outstretched makes me look SO gordo.

3.) Yeah. That sign says "Kids playing"

4.) The Carrito Loco! Basically, it's a promotion in a store called Calimax. Every time you spend 200 pesos in Calimax, they give you a scratch off ticket. It has 3 pictures behind the scratch surface, and if those 3 are the little cart, you win the Carrito Loco (Crazy Little Cart). That means that they clear out all the aisles of the store, and for 2 minutes, you are to grab as MANY things as you can, and the store gives them to you for free. In other words, you just gotta sprint and you gotta just shovel stuff into your cart. The store is your limit. It's pretty cool. Someone won it actually, here in the Calimax by our house, and we watched them do it. It's pretty awesome. I hope we win...

5.) We lost ALL light back in Primo Tapia, so we had to Mexicanize our light and shove a power cord into the neighbor's socket down below, and then move our fridge over to connect it so that we at least had that. Then, for anything we wanted to do, such as use the microwave, or iron, we had to disconnect the fridge and connect the thing we wanted and recconect the fridge again. It was pretty funny.

6.) This is a picture of me with Jesus and his sister, Monica. Jesus was with us with the Jones family from Christmas. Really cool guy. Looking forward to meeting him again. He is 17, so only 1 year more and he goes on a mission. He'll be the second missionary in all of Primo Tapia.

7.) I honestly don't know how well you can see it, but there's a car in that darker picture. Someone left a car in low tide, forgot about it, and then we found it down there. It JUST about went completely out to sea.

8.) This is a picture of Agustin and his familiy. The Vega family. That guy right next to me, in the grey shirt, he just started bawling when I said my last prayer at his house, and he even wanted to see me off in San Diego. Great guy. Love him to death. His mom started crying a lot too, and honestly, I just about cried myself.

10.) This is the Pech Family. The guy on the right is the only missionary that has left from Primo Tapia, and those kids are his nieces and nephews. I really miss them a lot. They are so cool. VP, the guy on the right (his name is Victor Pech) said he was going to visit me in Idaho and we were going to go snowboarding. We'll see if that happens.

11.) This is me on my last day in Primo Tapia. Bags packed and all.

12.) Me and Elder Rose in the bus station. Last day together. Cool guy. Elder Rose and I are pretty good friends.

13.) First picture in Ensenada! And YES! We have bikes. But I have to talk about those in a bit.

14.) GUESS WHAT I FOUND HERE ON MY FIRST WEEK! THE CARNAVAL CRUISE LINE! I took pictures of it! It blew my mind that I had been on that ship before! Ensenada was a lot smaller when we visited it....

15.) picture of my companion with one of the bikes stacked on the other. I'll tell you about it here in a bit....

16.) Panoramic of all of Ensenada from the very top of our sector. Pretty cool place right?

17.) Me on top of Ensenada. Just too cool.

18.) Last one is the Mexico Tijuana Temple right now. It looks so cool right?

Whew. That was a lot to write and explain, but now, it's the fun part. Now is all the cool experiences and stuff that have happened.

1.) First thing that happened was that my BIKE BROKE. yeah. On the third day of it's use, they berings popped out of place and the bike broke. We had to take it into the bike shop and there we left it overnight, while he gave me a small bike to use in the mean time.

Well, all was good until the next day, while we were heading to another appointment, wouldn't you know, MY COMPANION'S BIKE BROKE. This time, the axel on his bike just snapped in half, and we couldn't get it to work anymore.

So, when my bike broke, it was at night, so we didn't lose any time. We had to stack my bike on top of my companion's and then walk it back to the chapel and ask for a ride.

This time, when my companion's bike broke, it was in the middle of the day, and it was impossible to walk it back to the house. It was too far away, and we couldn't stack his bike on mine because the one I had was way too small for that.

Well, we called a guy who took us home, and we spend another hour trying to dismatle his bike to see what happened. Then we took the wheel the next day to the bike shop and got it fixed, and got my bike as well.

So now, we're riding on the same bikes as before, but they are both sold to other people, so we're using them until they come to pick them up. haha We want to get right of them right now before they break more. Friggin baikas.

2.) But wait, there's more! We are the ONLY SECTOR that has a hill in the WHOLE ZONE. Just imagine this: riding a bike up a steep hill. All day.

My butt was hurting SO BAD after a few days, that to go up the stairs in our house, I had to go kinda sideways, or else it just hurt WAY too bad. My legs hurt a bunch too, and my knees were destroyed.

I was honestly dead for about 2 days after going home, but that doesn't end the sad tale of death and destruction.

3.) I woke up a couple nights ago at around 3 in the morning, and my stomach told me it was time to use the bathroom. I went in, and SHOOOOOOM. It was like an explosion of water coming out of my rear end. I was in there for like, 20 minutes, just sitting on the toilet until I stopped.

I suddenly started shaking a TON, and I felt really cold. I finished up my business in the bathroom, and as I stood up,

I nearly passed out.

I was so close to falling to the ground unconcious that I sat back down on the toilet, and I just started praying. To top it off, our neighbors were still up, and they were screaming a bunch of swear words at each other over someone's boyfriend kissing another girl or something.

Anyway, I waited until I felt good enough again to stand, stood, washed my hands as fast as I could, and then practically fell into the room where we sleep and landed on my bed, and then I just woke up Elder Luna.

"Elder Luna, call Sister Garcia right now."

I was shaking so bad that my bed was trembling, and the matress actually moved with me. We called her, and my companion got some blankets and threw them on me. Then he pulled out some medication that he had and went downstairs, heated up some water, and gave me the pills. I just fell asleep, waiting for the morning.

Morning came, and I was in such bad shape that I couldn't get out of bed, honestly. I forced myself to do it, but it was terrible. I slept until around 1 because the sickness was so bad.

4.) Well, after all of that was said and done, I thought I was good. Well, turns out that I was. Except for the fact that I still had to go up hills and stuff with the bike... I hate bikes now. I'd rather die than ride a bike up a hill.

5.) General Conference! So many cool things happened. But a couple weird ones. First, president Monson only spoke twice... Once in Preisthood, and once on Sunday. And he didn't really teach, he just told stories. I thought that was so odd... But then, it was weirder with the new camera angles and stuff. What did you guys think about that format?

6.) Also, presidente Carreon, my old mission president, was sustained to the 4th Quorum of the Seventy! That was pretty insane. I was honestly kind of expecting it though. I mean, a very large majority of Mission presidents are later called as Seventies according to what I have seen and heard...

7.) Alright, well, last thing is that my companion and I are just awesome together. We're working super hard, and we like a lot of the same things. We talk a lot just about life and stuff and it's awesome. We're still working super hard though. Like, honestly, he works more than any other companion I've ever had on my mission. It's awesome. And here is the ward where I will finish.

Okay, well, that's a wrap. HUGE amount of text and stuff, but it was a pretty crazy week. By the way, even though we had a bunch of problems and stuff, we still gave out 66 cards for Because He Lives. That's only 4 less than the norm. Boom. And our District Leader STILL planches us for not having contacted on Saturday, the day where we didn't work because of the Conference... We just kinda laughed at him and ignored his lack of information.

I think that does it for this week. Thanks for the support. I've been really strengthened in the past few weeks. In fact, this General Conference had a few messages that were specifically for me. Honestly, I felt like theSaturday Morning speakers were almost ALL talking to me about what I needed to worry about now and in the future.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trunky, but I have been thinking about the future a lot. I'm only 11 weeks away from starting my life all over again, and I've got a lot of questions, doubts, and fears. But after listening to General Conference, some of them were answered, while others were explained a little more, and overall, it was a good conference for me. Coolest part was when I got to listen to 2 guys give their talks in Spanish. I love that I don't need a translator for them. haha

Thank you so much for everything. It's been a crazy ride, and I'm sure that it's been really tough sometimes back at home too, but I know that it was all planned. The Lord knows what I need more than I do.

Thanks again. Love you all.

Elder Carter