2013-06-03 It didn’t have rabies so that’s good.

Hey everyone,

Last p-day we went to the Christus statue.  It was closed though, so we couldn’t actually go inside of it.  

After that we went to La Cancha.  I guess it is the world’s largest market.  It is huge and there is so much stuff. They have everything.  I don’t have any pictures though because it is a little dangerous so they said we probably shouldn’t take out our cameras.  I heard that they have blue lasers that are powerful enough to pop a balloon so I’m excited to look for one of those.  We might be going again today.  We also got to eat at a fast food place that was really good.  I had a chicken sandwich with fries and a drink for 3 dollars.  I miss American food a lot.  I don’t like eating rice for every meal.  It’s also always fun to spend time with the other Americans from the MTC.

My companion got bitten by a dog this week.  It didn’t have rabies so that’s good.  He’s been driving me crazy and he hasn’t gotten up on time once this week.  We still get along though, I’m glad I have Elder Chavez to talk to at night.  It keeps me sane.

This is pretty typical of Elder Howlett's first area in the mountains of Cochabamba Bolivia

We get at least one extra meal every day.  Everyone likes to feed us.  This week was the holiday Corpus Christi (Body of Christ), which they celebrate with more food especially soup.  That day we were served 5 meals between 1:30 and 7:30.  I’ve never been so full in my life.

  

We do a lot of service.  Here we spent 4 hours tossing brick from the ground up to the
2nd story of an apartment building that some investigators are building.

Johnny is my favorite investigator right now.  He is 16 and has been going to the other ward in the area for 6 months with his friends.  He has a stronger testimony than most people in the church and we set a baptismal date for later this month.  We are also meeting with the rest of his family who are all very nice and considerably more educated than most people here.  His parents are very Catholic and even though they are supportive of Johnny, I don’t know if they are going to join themselves.  I hope so though we’ve only met with the parents twice so it is hard to tell. 

It’s kind of weird that I’m not getting ready to head off to Nebraska.  Fireworks are always legal here and I hear them every day.  I think people do them at the bloquades.

I really will write more later--'have to go.

Love,

Elder Howlett

LATER  -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hey Everyone,

Part way through this week I noticed that my Spanish is a lot better than it was a few weeks ago.  I’m able to understand the majority of what is being said when we teach and that makes it a lot easier to participate in the teaching as well.

In my patriarchal blessing there is a very specific promise regarding prayer and my mission (you may remember, parents).  It is something that I´ve thought about a lot since I began my mission but in spite of that it was only this week that I realized that the promise has already begun to come into effect.  In the CCM Elder Bednar spoke to us about prayer and it gave me some new insight that has changed the way I pray.  I´m excited to see that blessing fully realized.

The only letter I’ve received since being here was from Sara Wilcox.  However, I’ve been told that there are some here for me that I’ll get sometime this week.  The mail is absolutely terrible—slow and unreliable.  I’ll let you know what I get on Monday.

Fast and Testimony meeting here was awesome.  Even though the ward is less than half the size of ours, there were always at least 5 people on the stand waiting to bear their testimony.  They were really good testimonies too.  My favorite was probably Fabio who I read the Book of Mormon with every day after lunch.  He gave a powerful testimony about the power the Book of Mormon, especially for a ten year old.

 

road in Elder Howlett's area

I’m also excited to teach a girl who I buy fresh bread from every day.  I asked her yesterday if she would listen to us and she was really excited too.  I thought she was in her mid 20s but it turns out she is only 14.  oops.  I have a hard time telling people’s ages here.  I almost always think they are older than they are.

Happy end of the school year everyone!

Love,

Elder Howlett

PS.  Something I liked from my personal study. Jacob 2:17-19