November 25, 2013 - Villahermosa

Hey Guys!

Well this week was a tad bit better than last. We finally got a chance to fix a date for Hermano Daniel. Tomorrow is supposed to be his baptism. His mom went out of town completely unexpected and didnt tell anyone she was leaving, so it left Elder Gray and I in a bit of a rough spot. Tomorrow is the day for him! After that, transfers are on the 16th of December. We already know that we are getting transfered... Where to? I dont know. But they are bringing in 14 new Sister Missionaries that are American. First time in the history of the mission. So they are going to keep all of them rather close to the mission offices just in case something happens. So, theyre booting Elder Gray and I out... Awesome. But I am hoping for a new start somewhere else. I am hoping for the best with this. As far as everything else goes, we are trying our best with working with the ward to find new investigators. The ward we are in, Deportiva 2, has some amazing members in it, but it is extremely difficult to get references from them and we have no idea why. We are both really struggling in that regard, but still staying strong with what weve got. Its definitely tough.

We recieved word this last week when we had Elder Johnson (our Area President of the 70) came last night, that we are going to be going to Palenque next monday again! Wahoo! It was a lot of fun the last time we went and I am really looking forward to seeing all of the things I didnt see last time again. Should be really fun. Anyways, Elder Johnson came, along with Elder Walker (no idea who he was, younger, about mid 40s) and basically told our entire mission, including a lot fot he members, that we werent doing our job... haha. He was pretty much ridiculing the members because our numbers are so bad with member present lessons and our number of less actives was terrible. we have over 12000 members, but 9000 of them are less active... So he shoved that in our faces. It was actually pretty funny because it really is true. The members dont really helpe the missionaries other than feed them every week. But I cant complain, our ward isnt that big. About 60-70 in asisstance every sunday. But it was cool to hear the things he had to say. There were so many missionaries there, and so many other members of the church. It fillied the entire stake center.... Crazy!

Im sorry to hear that Sadie was sick this week.... Sorry Sades! Get better soon! =) Ill be praying for you! Sounds like everyone is staying busy and working hard with whatever it is that they have going. Keep it up! I know that it will be worth it!

To answer moms questions:

-I got the halloween package and I really enjoyed having those doritos... they werent smashed but it was hard to get them out of the containers without smashing them all... it was still great though!

- I havent really recieved anything else yet but Im sure that I will get something this week, and, if not, next week. I told the Sec. of Materiales, Elder Flake, to keep a special look out for me for the letters/packages that come in.

-I dont need anything right now really. I am looking for some new luggage though. The stuff I have, other than the bag dad sent me with, is pretty much a pain trying to pull around because the wheels are crap. So I am looking for another big bag thats under 100 dollars.... Sorry if thats expensive but I desperately need a new one. Thatll be my Christmas present. =)

Apart from everything else, things are going well. Better than last week thats for sure. I am trying to be strong. Doing my best with what I got. I love you all and I hope you all have an amazing and busy week this week! Time will only go faster! Pray for missionary opporunities because we need all the help we can get! I LOVE YOU ALL!

KIA KAHA

-EP

November 18, 2013 - Villahermosa

Hi everybody,

Well I dont have that much to say for this weeks letter because we only had about one or two major events happen. I will spend some time trying to send some pictures so hopefully that will compensate for it.

We finally had the chance to go contacting on thursday! First time ever because I was able to talk Elder Gray into going. We have been hurting with the ward to find new investigators so I finally told Elder Gray that we needed to do it the old fashioned way and start talking to people on the street. Low and behold, we were walking through the streets of Col. Sabina, and we found three new investigators that we are planning on teaching. Two of them have decent potential while the other was just.... well drunk. One is named Eric Lopez. He is from Costa Rica and speaks a little bit of english. He came here to get away from some drug problems that he had there but they lost his return papers when he wanted to go back so he is stuck here until they figure it all out. We havent taught him yet, but he has a drinking problem and so it might be a little tough with him. From what we´ve seen, he really wants to change judging by the fact that he started crying in front of us right in the middle of the street saying that he wanted God in his life. He seems like a great guy. The second one is a guy named Carlos. He actually came to us. He saw us walking in the street and yelled out to us ELDERS! He started speaking english to us and we started taeaching him the restoration in english. It was weird because I never have done it in english before. But we did our best. He has a lot of potential too. Hopefully the both of them work out because we desperately need them.

As far as everything else goes, nothing has happened since last week. We teach when we can but most of the time its spent walking around trying to find people. Contacting seems to help, but apparently we cant do it unless we desperately need it. Elder Gray doesnt like doing it, but we occasionally get the chance to. To answer the questions that mom sent me... I dont have a gash, it was just a big goose egg. I am looking out for signs everywhere now because that one hurt. I am doing my best with everything here still. Its quite the adjustment to get used to everything. I am nowhere near fluent in the language. I have so much more to learn with it and its starting to get a little frustrating, but I am working on it everyday. Yo puedo escuchar y entender mas cada dia pero cuando yo hablo... es algo completamente differente. Entonces, estoy probando con todo yo tengo. As you can see, Im still learning grammar stuff because thats the hardest part. I hope that answers the questions. I cant see them and type them at the same time, so I am not positive if I have answered them all. Sorry if I didnt.

Well, CONGRATULATIONS TO KEATON! WAY TO GO BRO! I KNEW YOU COULD DO IT! KIA KAHA! GO GETTEM! NUMBER ONE BABY!

Thats awesome to hear about sadies experiences this last week! Sounds like it was a good time. I always wished I could have been a part of special needs. Stay involved with that sadie! It will benefit you so much if you i promise. Keep it up!

Well im gunna close this letter up now... Thank you to all of you for what you have done for me! You all mean the world to me and I couldnt do this without you! Stay strong this week and keep moving forward! You are all in my prayers and I cannot wait to see all of you soon!

Kia Kaha!

-EP

Watch out for the sign . . .

Alright Everyone!
Well I am officially done with training! Now I can actually feel a little bit more respected around the mission when people talk to me. I finished yesterday with it and I even had the chance to be the Senior Companion for the day. It was really weird having to make all the decisions on what we did, but overall, Elder Gray said I did a good job.

Things are going well, but we had a tough week this week. Hermana Monica, the one I told you about last week, decided to stick with the religion that her family was. Catholic. We went to go meet with her on Friday night to teach her just like normal. We could tell, as soon as we walked in the door that something was different. We started to teach what we had planned. After we had gone over everything, she started to talk about how she went with her grandma to a Catholic church service during the week. My heart dropped. She went on to tell us that she had a feeling that she needed to follow in her family's footsteps and remain catholic. She didn't want to change... Elder Gray and I looked at each other. I had no idea what to say or do. So Elder Gray just said that we appreciated her spirit that she brought to each lesson, and that we would continue to stop by every now and then to see how she was doing. I have never been so heartbroken in my life to see this happen. What is sad is that one day, her and her entire family will know the truth about it all. I was devastated. But, as a missionary, you have to keep moving forward.

Apart from that experience, we are continuing to teach Hermana Cinderella and Tomas. Both of which are really great investigators other than the fact that she is married to another guy and has been living with Tomas for over three years. She admits it that she has been living in sin for three years. We are trying to figure this out because neither Elder Gray or I have had the chance to teach someone who is committing adultery. So we are still trying to figure that out. Funny story though... we were walking to go meet with her on Saturday morning at noon and it had started to pour rain. I had my jacket and umbrella as we trudged through the puddles of rain. We were walking along the side of the freeway and I was behind Elder Gray. I had looked back for about two seconds just to see how far we came and if I could even see anything period. Just as I looked up I ran, face first, into a stop sign pole. I gashed my knee and had a huge goose egg on my forehead. Luckily, no one saw or heard the huge bang, but it hurt like a mother...

Anyways, those are my stories for this week. It sounds like all of you are having a great time! Staying busy with school and other activities. I am getting really jealous of not being able to watch Keaton and Sadie grow up. Sounds like Sadie is getting to be the popular girl in school! Dang I wish I had been Will at Mckenzie's wedding.... Super Jealous! I miss ya so much Sadie! Dont forget it. I cannot wait to hear from you on Christmas. That is going to be a great day. GOOD LUCK WITH TRYOUTS BROTHA! I know you can make that team. Give it your all. Kia Kaha! Just play smart. Thats all Alta wants, smart players who do what the coach says. I've been there. You can do it!

I am doing alright with everything here. Like I said, I had a tough week, but I am not being transferred anywhere this month so I am here in Villa for another transfer. YAY! I got your package today and will be looking forward to the next one to come. I loved getting all of the candy. The problem is is that I cant read the books you send me because the missionaries can only read the scriptures, Jesus is the Christ and the true to the faith. I wish I could and I will keep them, but I just cant read them for another 20 months.
Things are going well. Missing home, but doing okay. I am just trudgin along here getting this work done. Spanish is coming day by day and I'm


becoming more and more deaf with all the car horns that go off from the impatient drivers.... HAHA I will close this letter for this week wishing you all an amazing week. I am so glad to have you guys supporting me and I am so happy that I can call you my family. I miss you all terribly and cannot wait until the day that I get to see you all again.
Kia Kaha,
Elder Proctor

Halloween in the Villa - November 9, 2013

Hola Everyone!
Seems as though this Halloween was a great one! HAPPY HALLOWEEN! I hope ya'll got a bunch of candy! What was funny though is that they have the same tradition down here. The kids dress up and gather in big groups to go out trickortreating! Its pretty funny to see their take on all of the different costumes. I am glad everyone is staying busy though!

I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that I cannot send pictures today... The computer is terrible and is slower than molasses so I am out of luck with that. Sorry everyone. I will take some good pictures this week and try to send them from a better computer next week.

The good news is that we have a baptism planned for this week for Hermano Daniel! After much trial and tribulation, we finally were able to meet with his mom and she finally agreed to let us baptize him this coming Saturday. CRAZY! It was really cool to see how that whole situation played out. He is such a cool kid and so much fun to talk to. That really was the only highlight of the week. We decided to drop Hermano Raul because he had a huge problem with smoking and drinking and wasn't progressing in any way... we thought he was, but he dropped the bomb that he had still been doing all of that stuff and taking advantage (in a bad way) of the law of chastity... Oh well. It was sad, but we did the best we could do with him. As far as other investigators go, we are teaching Hermana Cinderella (the lady who cut my hair two weeks ago) and found out that she is dating a professional baseball player from Venezuela named Tomas. He is jacked like no other! Holy Smokes the guy is a monster! His arms are the size of my waist... I am super jealous of him. Hes a cool guy and we have been trying to teach him so that will be our goal this week. We have given a lot of blessings this week also. We gave one to a sister that had been sick for a little while and what was really cool is that she was perfectly fine the next day we saw her. Insane how that worked out right? The second was when we took an ex-missionary named Jesus Zapata (yes that means Jesus Shoe in Spanish) and took him to teach an investigator named Monica that had had some contact with the missionaries from Tenosique a little while before I was there! She is about 17 or 18 and had been having troubles accepting the catholic faith in her life because she wants to change. She is really cool and so much fun to teach.

Apart from all of those events with teaching, I will answer those questions that you have. I have not received any package yet but I will be looking out for it this week. My missionary experience before the mission was a lot different than it is now. Nowadays we can only go through members to receive people to teach or to find investigators. Its a lot easier and gets our job done a lot faster. Before the mission, I thought it was only knocking doors for four hours a day and then asking people to be baptized in the first lesson. Here, its a lot different. We only talk to members and the people that we feel inspired to talk to on the street. I love it this way. We don't have to worry keeping track of a bunch of people that opened the door for us if we were to knock on it. Elder Gray and I have really been talking to every single member of the ward to try to get people to teach. A lot of missionary work has to do with how the members act with the missionaries. IF there weren't members, missionaries would be literally lost. WORK WITH THE MISSIONARIES BY GIVING THEM REFERRALS!

Well, Because I don't have much time here, I am going to try to send a picture or two, but I cant promise anything. Right now all I really need are some more of those milk chocolate powder 'breakfast essentials' things that you sent a little while ago. Those are amazing to have in the morning with a bowl of cereal. I also needed some more of those water-mix packets that give water a taste. The small thin ones that have different flavors. I would really appreciate it, if you can, to send me a small Preach My Gospel in English. I cant seem to find my old one. I may have left it at the MTC or something... Not sure. But I would love that. For Christmas, all I would like is phone call from you guys (through skype) and... an electric razor. I hate shaving with a razor here because of how hot it gets. It burns... Like.... bad. So I would love a three-ringed electric razor. PLEASE SANTA? Haha. Thanks.

Well I'm gonna wrap up this letter by saying that I hope you all have an amazing week and I hope that things stay good for you all. Know that I pray for each and every one of you guys everyday. You all mean the world to me in ways you cannot even begin to imagine and I would not be here right now, sitting at this computer in VIlla, if you hadn't been a part of my life. Thank you. Stay strong and always keep your heads up. The Lord is on your side.
Kia Kaha,
Elder Proctor