October 8, 2012

well im in panama! we arrived tuesday night and met president and sister ward at the airport. they were awesome. the assistants piled us into the back of their truck and thats probably the picture you saw. we slept that night at the assistants house. i was sleeping on the ground with about 20 other missionaries. so ya i didnt get much sleep. next day we woke up and went to the church building where changes are and president kind of introduced the mission more and stuff and interviewed us and then we went into the changes meeting. before when he was talking to us he told us that some were going far and some were going to be staying close in the city. immeadiately i began feeling like i was going to be going far. well...im about a 10-11 hour bus ride from the city. im in the province of chitiqui and my area is called puerto armuelles. we have the beach in our area and its way crazy. panama really is the jungle! im like the farthest part of the mission that you can even get. im right on the border of panama and costa rica and we actually crossed the costa rica border for a second on the ride into our area. the church here is really weak. at conference saturday there was 4 other people besides the 4 missionaries here in puerto. so ya my trainer says this is a tough area to be in at first and maybe one of the toughest in the mission, but im excited about it and just hope my companion will work hard. like weve been in at like 830 or earlier everynight so far pretty much. we do have a cocinera here and she cooks pretty good. its kind of weird at first getting use to the food but its alright. all the hermanas in the ward call me james bond. the cocinera is convinced that i am an actor and i came staight from the movies and she told all the other hermanas at church yesterday that i look like james bond and so thats my nickname right now. its pretty hard to understand people and sometimes i dont understand one thing they said. we visited one less active family the other day and they were pretty mean. after, my comp told me they were talking bad about me and thought it was funny cuz i cant understand. but its alright. we had a nice experience last night. we visited a recent baptism and shes 15 and we found out she hasnt been reading the book of mormon like she needs to and so my comp let me take it over and it came to my mind to read part of the intro. the part where it says we can draw nearer to god through the bom than any other way. even with my limited spanish abilities you could tell she felt the spirit and she even almost cried. it was pretty cool because i know i was guided. i had no idea what to teach her and it just kind of popped in my head. its good here in panama though. i sweat like crazy because it is soo humid. natives laugh at me cuz im dripping and theyre just use to it so they hardly even sweat. oh yeah, my house i live with my comp elder small from colorado who has 14 months. elder haynes from canada who has 8 or 9 months and elder ortiz who doesnt hardly speak english and is from nicaragua and has like 13 months. i like living with him because the only way to communicate with him is spanish. no hot water here so all cold showers and im also in the only area of panama where you arent supposed to drink the water! but im fine and its pretty safe here i think! conference was awesome. i actually got to listen in english which i was really glad about and there were awesome talks. i cant believe the missionary thing! there was lots of talks on conversion faith testimony and families. i loved it more than any before!anyways, hopefully thats enough info for now but i love you guys and have a great week!