Christmas Week

Well christmas week. not a whole lot to say because we´ll just talk over skype this week. We had the mission christmas conference which was fantastic, they sent us a link, we had to give a special musical number as a zone, all the zones did (some better than others) and the choir was fantastic.(you can tell who the choir is)  If I can, I´ll try to attach the link to youtube. Yes they gave us permission to go on youtube and watch the christmas conference if we wanted too. We also had the zone conference with interviews with president. Those are always fun. That same day, thursday, I had to do an intercambio with one of the elders in my district. Elder Gordillo from peru. He is a pretty interesting elder. We had a good time and I had to do an interview for a baptism while we were there. We were walking in the street and I got a call from the sisters who are in my district saying they were still at the bus stop. It had been a good 3 hours since the conference ended. I guess there was another protest at the bus company so I had to come down to the bus stop and call the offices to see what we could do. They were all pretty hungry so I left to get them some chips and drinks, but when I came back, they were getting on the bus. Oh well. So we just had junk for dinner that night. Glad it all worked out. We are working on the skype thing, we are pretty sure that we will be getting on to skype here at about 5 uruguay time. I don´t know what time that is there but ok. so 5 christmas day. If anything changes, we will probably email you the day of. This week the little children started to bring out their Judas´s. I dont know if I already told you, but they have a tradition here where you make a life size effagy of judas iscariot, beg for money, then burn him on christmas eve. I don´t know. I dont really understand it, but there always little kids coming up and going through our pockets looking for coins for judas. Sunday we didn´t have the turn out we wanted because it was pouring rain. In a ward that has close to 550 on thier list we only had 36 show up. Ugh, its hard to get the investigators to church when the members dont even want to. Its what we got. Laticia didn´t come to church, who is our most firm investigator right now, but I´m not too worried about it. She wants to be baptized, I´m just not sure if I will still be in this area when she does because changes are next week. I think that´s about it for now.

See you on christmas!

Elder Webber

The "Stick-Up"

Yeah! I got both packages! woohoo. I´m yet to hem the pants but I will today during p day. I told my self I was allowed to open one present, so we opened the two small planes and the fridge rover car thing. Then I opened up one more which was the sketch pad and then I figured I had to open the pencils as well to finish it off. Then my companion wanted to see what was the one that sounded like a box of nails so we opened that one too. The puzzles were super cool. Took us a good half hour or so to figure them out, then we used them in our lessions this week to explain ¨the mysteries of god¨ yeah yeah. Well monday we didn´t really do a whole lot, p day so we just played soccer with some of the other missionaries and went home to clean and sleep. I guess I fell onto my bed alittle too hard and broke the bed. Now it is being supported by a pile of old ensigns and friends. Woohooo. I also received a letter frommmmm MIRTA!! my first convert! she´s getting ready to go to the temple and my trainer told me it will probably be this next saturday! I´m so excited for that because we will get to go with her. Good ole mirta. But yes, we are teaching english classes here now and wednesday we went to the church to wait for people to show up, half an hour goes by and nobody. Then this stranger comes walking in all dirty and torn up. So we went to greet him and welcome him to the classes but he didn´t want to learn english, he just came in to beg for food and money. Ok dude, well we dont live in the church like you all think, and we never carry money with us, especially not in Bella Italia. So what does this guy do? (obviously on drugs) sticks his hand under his shirt and uses his finger like a gun and tells us to give him everything or he´ll shoot us. Ok man, we know you don´t have a gun, we just saw you put your finger in your shirt, but ok, come with us to the kitchen and you´ll see, because there is never anything in the kitchen. Sure enough, nothing, but he searches the garbage and finds half a watter bottle and two suuuuuuper moldy empanadas, (like a meat turnover) and he eats them and leaves. Well, we locked the doors behind him. He wanted back in, but that´s too bad. Stay classy. Our investigator Laticia is doing very well, we are teaching her the word of wisdom and she is trying to stop smoking. I think she can, she should be down to one or two cigarretes a day now. Woohoo. Maybe her baptism will be next saturday because today she didnt come to church. We will see. She´s great, she will be a great convert. It got really really hot friday and saturday, we got alittle sunburned so we went back to the house to splash water on us and we found some old straw hats in the house. Ohhh yeah. We got called yankees too many times that day. That´s this week, we are thinking of doing Skype on christmas around 3 or 4 our time. We just need to find somebody with a computer. We have a few ideas but we will let you know in the next coming weeks for sure. 

 

A few photos, christmas tree that I´ve carried around with me since my first area, cool hat, and my comp touching a baby cow we found.

Love,

P.S.  Oh I forgot to say my companion had some really bad blisters this week. His shoes have already gone to shreds. Poor guy, but we managed to work and we found this cool flower. 

A Good Week....

This week was a different week because we didn´t church at our chapel because of the voting. Its hard to get investigators to come to a church that´s 45 minutes away in a bus and its even harder when its raining and they have to vote. 
Hard week, but we did see a good amount of success with our progressing investigators Laticia, Santiago and Walter. Tuesday we had a district meeting and I just went over some principles that I felt were important, one of which being diligence, and afterwards of course we had a snack. You gotta make sure the missionaries are happy and full if you want them to work hard. haha. Later that night during the varifications that I have to do one of the sisters told me that the meeting was truely inspired because they found a miracle investigator who talked to them about those principles and especially the diligence he saw in them. It was quite the compliment. 
During the week some goons on a motorbike tried to rob my companion, just driving by and tried to snatch his side satchel. Oh Bella Italia. 
We were teaching Laticia and we caught on that she has a smoking problem so we had to talk about the word of wisdom. Make it or break it. We went in and opened up with a review of the restoration just to get the spirit in there and to remind her that Jose Smith was really actually a prophet and chosen by God, then we came down with the commandments and she loved it. She made the decision to quit smoking and should be just about done this tuesday. She will be baptized the 20 of December with Santiago. Woohoo. I´m really looking forward to that, she will be a great member. 
Our other investigator, Walter, isn´t doing so hot, he is a slave to his addiction of smoking. He spent some hard years in the religion Makumba and drugs, messed with his noodle, its hard to keep his attention for too long. Really inteligent guy, but just not really competent. 
Not a whole lot more happened, its just getting really hot, and they say the first day of summer is the 21st of December. I forgot how terrible summer time is down here. 
I did get a bunch of free food this week, I don´t know what was going on, the churro vendor gave me a free churro when I only bought one and the veggie guy gave us 3 carrots for free when I wanted to buy 2. I don´t mind. 

Well that´s about it for now. 

Love,

Elder Webber

Stayin' Put

Yeah the shoes are perfect thanks. I just stacked the shoes on top of eachother, but it must have been a funky angle because the old shoe does look a lot bigger. But yesh, I am pretty happy to be staying with my oro. He´s a good guy and we had a great change together. I think, and am hoping that we´ll have a good amount of success this coming month. Changes were fun as always. My companion stayed and worked with another elder while I went to changes with the other district leader to get stuff for our district and for the leadership meeting. Got to see all the old boys, this was the first change where I knew most of the group that was going home. Sad stuff. Also, one of my companions from the MTC asked if I would extend my mission with him. About a week or two. I told him I would have to think about it. So we have a new zone leader as well, Elder Gutierez, so that means that we have to do our leadership meeting monday mornings in spanish now. haha oh well. I was pretty sad to see half of my district get changed out, they were working so well together, but the new district is pretty great as well. They changed my district up and now I have two elders who are working in an area called Barrio 14. So my district now is, Hermana Lanuza, Talbot, Denos, and Arriloga and Elders, Gordilla and morales. We´re going to have a good change. Friday we had a district meeting and it might have been my best so far. The zone leaders were in my meeting and said they were impressed. We walked by one of the borders of a red zone that we have in our area, we didn´t even go inside, and they started throwing rocks at us. Luckily, because they all play soccer, the latinos don´t have any hand eye coordination so they never even reach us. I almost forgot about thanksgiving. Good ole turkey. 

Kenny is going to Nicaragua? good luck. haha my last comp was from that place. that will be quite the experience. Of course, according to him, its the best country on the planet. So I guess we´ll see.

Well that´s about it, my companion has convinced me that I NEED a surpressor / silencer for my sig sauer. Sooooooo the papers for that take about 10 months. Just if you´re thinking about next years birthday present. haha. 

But really, thanks,

Elder Webber

photo, my comp got his first letter in the feild woohoo. 

New Shoes!

Yeah! I just got the shoe package this week! ahhh new socks and new shoes. Boy do those bad boys feel pretty good. And all the chocolates were appreciated. I would just have the box next to my desk during study hours and I would just eat a few here and there and they were gone in a couple of days.... oh well. Sounds all good at home. 
 This week was a good week. Keeps getting hotter so I keep getting sunburned. We had a double mission conference this week with Elder Christensen of the presidency of the seventy. A very learned man if I do say so myself. We really enjoyed that. He had some time after for some Q and A. Most of the questions were pretty garbage honestly, and alittle too much brown nosing. ¨how can I improve my studies¨ ok come on. But there were a few that were pretty good. This saturday we spent most of the day up in Belloni helping the zone leaders do their open house for their church. Really successful, but I was worried that spending a saturday up there would hurt our church attendance the next day. It didn´t really. We still had 5 in church. Santiago didn´t show up, lamentablemente. 3 of the other four can´t progress because they aren´t married and the last one is an investigator called Laticia who we have been working with for a good few weeks now, but every week something just mysteriously happens that made it impossible to come to church. Daughter gets sick, grandma dies, stuff like that. We were on the verge of dropping her as an investigator but we found her one more time and invited her and she showed up! woohoo. Then we invited her to be baptized again and set up another lession and it went really well. Shared the plan of salvation and she got all teary eyed and seems really excited for her baptism in two weeks. Hope it all turns out. 
Last night we spent at the zone leaders house so that we could be there when the changes came in. Change week. We didn´t think that the zone would be changed too much and we were wrong. Everything changed. Every companionship in the zone got changed except for ours. It will be a struggle these next coming weeks. We were doing so well as a zone, I don´t really understand why they would change the whole zone like that. oh well. We will just have to adapt and work harder. I think that´s about it. Not much happened this week. I´ll try to send some photos from this week too. 

Love,

Elder Webber

Happy New Year...

Yeah what a crazy week. I did get your package. I opened with my companion and zone leaders and they were all pretty confused to why I recieved a bunch of toys and stuff. But that was good so thanks. I will need to pin for my card though.... and I use the glasses straw thing, its pretty neat. Sounds like stuff is going pretty good back home. Good old jajiva. Tell the boys that the scope on my gun is loose and if they want to use it they should tighten it first. And tell ben to put my address of the mission offices on my facebook so the homies can write me. My missionary packet should be home and my address in there. 

Yes, what an awesome week, I shall start at the begining, It was a hot and humid night, as usual and I am awoken around midnight by a very large man banging his hands against the window that my bed is up against. Obviously I am startled and the man leaves the window and begins to make his way to our front door and I hear him trying to open the door! By now I am out of bed and have awoken my comp and have a broom stick as a weapon, see the light change in the kitchen, like a door or window just opened and so I look down the hall, and I see a large maybe, six foot six  dark figure standing in our kitchen. yes alittle heart attack, but it turned out to just be our laundry hanging on the line. My comp calls our neighbors and asks them to come over, once the man has left. Yes it was just the neighbor wanting to talk to us about lunch the next day. At midnight? ok. New years was fun. Food is always always sketchy. and the water, but we just eat and pray. mosquitos at night, or i think, they might be bed bugs because they dont itch, and i never see the mosquitos. Just covered in random red dots. My missionary tan is coming along quite nicely, and we had intercambios, which is where I go with a different companion for a day and a night. and I got to go with Elder Do Santos, Zone leader. He was super nice, and played rugby before the mish, learned so much because he could explain things in english, he was from argentina. We had a really fun night at an inactive members house playing this weird stacking mini chairs game. Oh and it rained this week! So I got to wear the cool sweater that I found in our appartment. And our investigators are doing well. We had almost all of them come to church this week, and one of them it was her second time coming, know what that means? Thats right, an investigator only needs to attend church twice to get baptized, so hopefully we can keep teaching her and maybe this week?! We have Pablo and Lorena, who are not married and ancient investigators, which means they just like talking to missionaries, and we have Evelyn and Ismel who we found last week, and Ricardo who is in a wheel chair, alittle weird, but he has a ton of faith, and then we have Mirta who is the one who might get baptized. And We had 4 of them come to church. woohoo. 

Package was nice, and yes, more g's, and alot of u.s. postage stamps, super glue would be nice and family photos! Email me some family photos too. 

I have a weird indent on one of my teeth, not sure what it is or where it came from but its there, I figure if my tooth falls out, dad promised I could get a silver one. so Yeah. 

Good stuff! Good to hear about ben and rugby going nicely, and joshua, aaron is still just chillin, tell aaron to make me a cd with all the best songs, like a power cd. I need good stuff. 

Much loves, 

Elder Webber

Lost on The Bus....

This week went by way too fast. Last week I asked my companion for a blessing because of the sickness and I was feeling substantially better. 
Monday was P day and we didn´t do a whole lot, just slept and cleaned the house, it was a normal week until thursday because we had the new Elder Conference in Carrasco. So we woke up early to catch a few busses to get to Carrasco in the morning. I really enjoyed that conference, especially because they had breakfast and lunch provided. I feel like my Oro learned some important things and I feel like I did a pretty good job training him so far, one more change and he´ll be ready to go. 
After the conference we had to go to Portones shopping mall to catch a bus, that´s the same place I did my emails for 12 weeks while I was in Carrasco. We went in to take a look and thought about buying some ties but we opted to not. Got alittle lost on the busses coming back home because we accidently took the wrong bus that took us to the other side of montevideo, luckily I had served there so I knew which one to take to get back on track. Then friday we had a zone conference and an intercambio so I spent that day and night in an area called Libia. They say its one of the more sketchy areas in the mission, but they don´t have anything on Bella Italia. haha. I was with Elder Cervantes from Peru for that day. Friday was aslso the same day I completed my first year in the mission! woohoo. and I just happened to get my birthday package that day! All thems candys are super good, so I have to share some with my companion, so thank you very much, and both of the singing cards functioned and I got both of Josephs letters which were pretty awesome. I will have to write some back today then.
Finally saturday we had a full day of work to invite our investigators to the church. We had a 5 investigators in church, 4 of which cannot progress because they aren´t married. Ugh. Uruguay, why do you do this to me? They´re working on getting married, but by the time they do I will be loooonnnng gone out of this area. That´s that, next wednesday is changes so we should see if I´m going anywhere, I really doubt it but thats ok. We should have the baptism of santiago this next tuesday, so like 9 days from now. We just need to find more investigators who want to progress and are married. 

Elder Webber