5/30/2011

Dear family,

First off, my letters will be shorter from now on because we just started writing our weekly letters to the president on the internet this week, but we don´t get more time to do it, it comes out of our hour for writing the family. It´s a little stinky, but oh well! Lopez Albujar is the area that borders mine, like ten minutes away. I think it´s still technically chiclayo. It´s like our area but a little more ghetto! I´ll be going there tomorrow on another working visit with elder burton, while orco works with elder zepeda in our area. It´s fun being the district leader´s companion because you get a little more variety in your schedule! And yes, on working visits you sleep in their apartment and stuff. I love going to the zone leaders´apartment because they have warm water to shower with! In zone conferences we basically just talk about how the companionships are doing, they give us news from the mission president, etc. Nothing too exciting. The multi zone conference was awesome though! President and Hermana chipman talked and the assistants too, President Chipman is an amazing man, and completely inspired. My interview went well with him, it was all in spanish. I forget i´m speaking in spanish a lot. I´ll be talking and telling a story or something and wondering why it´s so hard then i´ll realize that i actually speak english.. Oh, and about packages. I heard it´s way cheaper and way faster if you send everything in those big padded envelopes rather than boxes. Yeah i sewed up the shirt i ripped, my shoes have a guarantee, and i use my handkercheifs every day! I wouldn´t be able to live without them! i´m constantly wiping sweat off my face and fanning myself with it. they say it´s winter here... but it still feels like summer! Everything with the family for memorial day sounds super fun, and makes me remember that awesome time of starting the summer in Utah.

Sad news, Asunciòn decided to not get baptized. She is super indecisive! She said she wants do it in August... Bummer. And this sunday we have to stay in the apartment all day again because it´s the final elections for president of peru. it´s down to Keiko Fujimori and Ollanta something. Everybody says they´re both terrible. So, because of that we can´t have baptisms on the 5th.. But we will have between 1 and 3 baptisms on the 7th. Elio, the dad/grandpa is super fijo aka solid i think? he´s set in stone to get baptized the 7th, but his daughter and granddaughter still aren´t sure. Everything is going great and Orco is getting trunkier every day! haha it´s fun to keep him on the straight and narrow though. Have a great week!

Elder Hatch

5/23/2011

Family!

Wow, it´s so weird to think about it being cold in Utah.. Sometimes I wish it would be cold here, then I realize every morning I get five minutes of cold when I shower and that´s plenty. And dad, that sounds like a crazy few days with the truck. I had a feeling the boat wouldn´t come in.. haha. I´ll answer your questions.. No, there are a few americans in our zone. I don´t know about that picture, but i´ll try to send one with our new zone soon. In our zone now there is Elder Rigby from logan, Elder Schrivner from New Mexico, Elder Stewart from Arizona, and Elder Burton from Idaho. There´s actually a lot of us from the states in my Zone. I´ll try to send some pictures of the streets, etc. The problem is that if you take your camera out in the streets you´ll probably get robbed. I´ll do it though.

As for the kisses, yes it is because the custom here is to greet with a kiss. They almost always do it, so it throws people off when we give them a stiff handshake from far away, but they get the message usually. and of course they just can´t resist me.. Ooh dad, that´s awesome you saw the new pirates of the Caribbean! When i was in hawaii I heard they filmed a lot of it like 20ish minutes away from BYU Hawaii! How was it? Today for p-day as a zone we watched the work and the glory movies, yes, three of them. I slept through the second and orco and i left when they were starting the third, they´re probably still watching it now.. But we also had pizza hut and ice cream as a zone, it was a pretty awesome p-day! And orco and I just went and got haircuts.

This upcoming week is going to be really busy, i´ll give a little outline: Tomorrow morning we have district and zone conference (which is one of my favorite parts of the week, because that´s when we get our mail!), and from there Elder Orcohuaranga is doing a working visit with elder Burton. That means Elder Burton is coming to our area to work for 24 hours with orco, and I´ll take his spot in López Albújar for a day. I like the working visits, it´s like a sleep over. Then on thursday We have a multi-zone conference this thursday with the mission president from 8 am to 3 pm. Friday I believe I´m doing a working visit with one of the Zone Leaders. Elder Rigby´s new companion, Elder Aroni is super cool. He´s from Cuzco (where machu picchu is) but he´s never even been to it! we talked on sunday for like an hour while orco was interviewing someone for a baptism. Then on saturday in the morning we have interviews with president chipman, which i´m kind of nervous for. Lots to do! and we have to solidify Asunción for her baptism on Sunday! it should be an awesome week.

As for this last week, it was one of my favorites of the whole mission!

First and saddest of all, Elder Orcohuaranga got dear johned officially last week. A few weeks ago she kind of hinted at it, but last week in an email she dropped the bomb that she was dating someone else and in love. That, combined with the fact that he has 27 days left, have made him get pretty trunkie, but i´m keeping him in shape :)

Last Tuesday i was super pumped to finally get the package from home and i was expecting it at the zone conference, but it didn´t come. I was bummed.. Then that night while orco and i were eating at our pension the zone leaders showed up and said there was an emergency transfer and i had to leave with them right then and orco was mad because we had an appointment right then, but it was a joke and they were special delivering my package that came in later that day! it came!!!!! Thanks so much for everything. When i opened it, the inside was filthy dirty and i thought it was dirt that had gotten in, but the packet of oreos had just opened up and gotten all over. And in a marvelous showing of self-control i made the candy last all the way until today! I loved it, and i love my family :) Also, as for the package you sent with the wrong name, it´s fine. the office will send me a paper with a power of attorney thing and i have to put a finger print on it and sign it and the new elder can pick it up.

A random fact, I accidentally bought a battery powered tooth brush, and those flosser things came, and i´m using some awesome toothpaste megan conley sent me, and with all this awesome stuff i have now, i´ve found a new passion for dental hygiene. I love love brushing my teeth now haha.
Random... but people always vend fruits in the streets here, and on these fruit carts there are always huge piles of these little red romano tomato things, and i would always see little kids eating them and i was so confused why the kids loved them so much, then one day our pensionista gave them to us. Turns out they´re called ciruela and they´re amazing! it´s like a plum mixed with a peach mixed with a grape... haha i can´t describe it. but they´re orange inside and so good!

Now the story of yesterday, which i think has been the best day of mission to date.

We had planned the baptism of Fernando Cotrina, and everything was all ready for him, but anderson told us during the week that he wanted to wait a while to get baptized so we were kind of bummed. then after sacrament meeting anderson told us he wanted to get baptized that day! so we hustled and found some more pants, got him interviewed by the zone leaders, etc. And we had two baptisms yesterday! sorry i forgot to bring my camera today, but i´ll send pictures next week! and Elio, an awesome investigator we have, went to the baptism with his wife, and they talked to the bishop in his office for a while, and when they came out the bishop called me over to them, and Elio said he wants me to baptize him! it´s such an honor! he´s going to be the most unreal member ever. He already studies the book of mormon every day, the bible for an hour every morning. Give him two years and he´ll be a stake president or something. Then a 25ish year old member came up to us and said he is just reactivating, and his non member wife wants to get baptized and asked if we could teach her... we grudgingly accepted... haha we taught her last night and she is the definition of golden! she answered all of our questions better than i could have, seriously. And she has a baptismal date for the 12th of June now! The field is so white all ready to harvest it´s unreal! i hope it stays like this my whole mission!

also yesterday i spilled some weird fruit on my tie, shirt, and pants, got gum all over my pants somehow, and when orco and i were racing up the stairs my shirt got snagged on a metal thing and ripped the shoulder haha!   bad day for the clothes. this is long enough now! Love you!

Elder Hatch

5/16/2011

FAMILY!!

It was so good to hear from mom and dad! And wow, that trip to europe sounds unreal! are you flying from place or what? tell me more details, etc! I hope you told corbin to actually write me, he still hasn´t! And david leaves in two days! Provo will be so much safer once he leaves.

I don´t really know what to write about for this week. Elder Orcohuaranga and I are still working hard every day. He and all the elders in his group call each other while we eat every once in a while and they all are getting trunkie. Right now we´re with two other elders who leave in five weeks too, and they´re all talking about the details of the day they leave and stuff, it´s funny. And it surprises me all the rules missionaries break, a lot use facebook, go places alone, watch movies with members, etc. But don´t worry, i´m a good little boy and i´ve already made up my mind to follow the rules.

Fernando decided to get baptized this next sunday, the 22nd, which is fine and we´re teaching him the bits and pieces he still needs. Anderson´s baptism was supposed to be this last sunday, and we had everything all ready and then he didn´t show up at church sunday morning, and we were thinking uh-oh, but it´s fine, he´ll come soon. So we called him, and he was super sick with a stomach ache, and we had to cancel it after they had announced it in sacrament meeting, and uninvite our investigators who we had invited to attend... it stunk, but he´ll be baptized this next sunday too. We have been challenging people to get baptized like crazy, and one of our new statistics we keep daily is a count of how many people we challenge to get baptized in the first lesson. The baptismal challenge is my new favorite sentence in spanish. it goes like this: ¿Seguirá el ejemplo de Jesucristo al ser bautizado por alguien que posea la autoridad del sacerdocio de Dios? And you´re supposed to say it like that every time because it´s super direct and binding. it´s like saying you will be baptized, not would you be baptized. it´s hard to explain, but i love seeing people´s faces when we challenge them. It´s like the split second where they have to decide if they´re in it for real. I challenged two people this week, and they both accepted, but only one will really go through with it on the date we have planned. Her name is Ruth Fernandez. We gave her a book of mormon a few weeks ago, and she´s been reading it starting at the beginning, but still hasn´t prayed because she told us she knows she´ll get an answer and is scared to change her life! But she is super ready and i´m excited to work with her more.
I got kissed again this week by a 19 year old girl, but i turned my head so she kissed my hair, it was funny. We are teaching her and her dad, who´s an engineer and knows everything there is to know about the bible, but is still super humble and teachable. He read 3 nephi 11 and said he knows the book of mormon is true, but he thinks the book of mormon teaches that God, Christ, and the Holy Ghost are one being, which is a tough point. So we´re getting him to pray about the book of mormon to know by the spirit it´s true, and not just his own understanding, and when he gets his answer he´ll believe that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and Jesus. It´s so awesome how a testimony of  the book of mormon automatically brings a testimony of everything else with it. I´ve really grown to know for sure that the book of mormon is true, and how God has brought it forth as the shining symbol that this is the true church. Any person can go door to door reading from the bible and teach people how to be better people using Christ´s teachings, but the Book of Mormon is so clear in what we need to do, and there´s no way around it. I love it. Elder Holland´s talk on the book of mormon from a few conferences ago is amazing, and that´s exactly how i feel about it. I love you and i hope i get the packages someday :) don´t worry, i´m sure they´ll show up.

Elder Hatch

PS, I saw a 9ish year old girl with a shirt that said in english "my head is in the digital bad".. haha i love it. but im sure that´s how i sound to the latinos here. oh well.

This pic is of ocro with his shaving cream on, he only grows that perfect mustache and little goatee, and doesn´t even shave the rest of his face! classic latino.

This pic is of our zone before transfers:

This pic is of me and Elder Orcohuaranga in the central square of a little town called Túcume like an hour from our area where we went to those pyramids, and of course with the classic catholic church in the background.

5/9/2011

Mi Querido Familia!
Ah, hace tanto tiempo que hablamos, no se como empezar... jk. It was
so awesome to talk last night with the whole family! except kari and
aaron, but i know they were there in spirit. Yesterday I was thinking
about how blessed i am to have an entire family who are all strong
members of the church and who all completely support me on my mission,
and on top of that all of my friends too! There is an elder in my
zone, Elder Pacori, who is the only member in his family and he didn´t
even tell his friends he was going on a mission. Yesterday he tried to
call home and they didn´t answer, but he´s still so so positive. I
can´t even imagine that, i´m so blessed! Last night when we called we
were in the house of the ward mission leader. We were going to call
from our pension but their phone wasn´t working so we had to walk all
the way back to campodonico. But their family is so great and they were all listening to me talk and they
thought it was so funny to hear me talk in english. Afterwards they
were all trying out their english words on me. It´s so hard to
understand people when they try to speak english! Way harder than
spanish haha.
Actually it was mother´s day here in Peru too. And mother´s day is
HUGE here. It blows american mother´s day out of the water. Everyone
goes and visits their mother, even if they live hours away. And in our
wards they put on huge programs the nights before, and there were
parties in the streets, etc. And yeah elder orcohuaranga got to call
home too. He wasn´t really that excited because he´ll be home in six
weeks anyway, so he didn´t talk too long.
I feel fine mom.. i´ve had a little cold that won´t quite go away, but
overall im just dandy. I have my vitamins but i haven´t been taking
them, i´ll start. And yeah im pretty sure you did the package right!
they just take forever. And yes put the name of the secretary first.
But there were changes and now just put Elder Cox, that should be
good. i don´t know his first name and orco said that should be fine.
Today were cambios. I want to say changes in english because that´s
what it translates to, but i´m not sure what they´re called in
english. Elder Orcohuaranga and i are staying in our same area like we
thought, but now he´s district leader. Like half the zone was changed,
but my life will still be the same for another six weeks when i get a
new companion and probably a new area, and maybe a new mission too! I
may even get the chance to open up a new area, that would be so cool!
Other than that not too much has happened! Anderson´s baptism is
coming up this next sunday and we´re hoping to get Fernando baptized
then too! also, Tania´s mom, Asuncion, who was super super super
catholic when we first met her has a baptismal date too! for the 29th.
She has this agenda that the church put out that she´s secretly been
reading and totally agrees with all the doctrines and understands
everything. I´m excited for her! We should have another solid cambio!
I have truly come to love this work. Sometimes it´s so hard and
discouraging, but looking back those are the times i´ve grown the
most. I know i´m still a baby in the mission and have lots to learn,
but for now i´m loving it!
I absolutely know that the church is Christ´s church restored today,
guided by Him through a modern day prophet. I can´t think of anything
i´d rather do than teach people this amazing message and watch their
lives be changed through Christ. What an incredible opportunity it is
to be a part of this work! Have a great week everyone!
Elder Hatch

5/2/2011

Hey Family!

Time is absolutely flying by now.. I basically only have time to think when im in the shower, so it seems like i shower then next thing i know im showering again. But this last week was absolutely amazing. Sooo many things happened with our investigators and not a single one of them was bad! Fernando got married on saturday, and it´s so awesome to see how happy their family already is. They had a little party that night at their house, it was cute. And Fernando should get baptized this next sunday, but he might have to travel for work, so we´ll see. but he´s set in stone now. It was kind of tough to get maria to the font. She had heard some gossip stuff about the church and we finally found out a few days before her baptism and explained it all to her so she felt a lot better. She´s the type that hasn´t really gotten out of her house ever, and when i baptized her she didnt plug her nose and when she came up i thought i had killed her! she was coughing like crazy and flailing.. it was kind of embarrassing and i didnt know what to do! but it went fine. Anderson is chugging along, and jefferson is too. On saturday we met the most golden investigator of all time! Her name is Soledad she´s like 45ish; her parents are very faithful members of the church, but her mom died about three years ago, and she misses her a lot. Soledad started to wonder which church was really true (she told us all this in our lesson with her on saturday, the first lesson mind you) and so she prayed really earnestly to find out. A little while later she had a dream one night, and im dead serious, this is how she explained it. I saw a pillar of light, directly above my head... just kidding. ok seriously now. In her dream her mom was talking to her and told her she needed to prepare herself, but soledad didn´t know for what. Then in her dream she saw a long hallway with a door at the front, then down the hall she saw another door. when she opened it there were two young men carrying books of mormon. Yeah. She said she knows the church is true, and she´s been preparing herself for two years waiting for the missionaries to come to her. We challenged her to get baptized on the 15th and she said no, because she wants her whole family to get baptized at the same time and her husband didn´t want to listen to us that day. But she said she knows she will get baptized. Her 15 year old son and 28ish year old daughter also accepted baptism, but they still don´t have dates. So that will be super fun to work with them over the next few weeks!

Mom you´re planning a trip to Europe!? Ah, jealous. But that sounds so fun! I saw in the newspapers today that they killed Osama bin laden! Wow, that´s so crazy that it took this long! And its been all over the news that pope jean paul is a saint now or something...? and Elder orcohuaranga couldn´t help but watch this special on tv while we were eating dinner yesterday at the pension. If he wasn´t such an unreal missionary i would swear he´s still catholic at heart.

Ok now a little about my week/peru in general. The most popular drink here is called Cebada, which is Ecco. At first it was nasty, but now i actually kind of like it.. as long as it´s cold. and yesterday i drank some hideous half fermented corn juice, and it´s been wreaking havoc inside me all day. Who would have thought my closest encounters with the word of wisdom would be on my mission...

In Maria´s house, there are basically two rooms. One where most of them sleep, and one where one of them sleeps/the kitchen/livingroom/family room that´s like as big as my bedroom. And there´s no lights in there. So, when it got dark outside every night while we were teaching maria, we ended up teaching in the dark! Haha it was great trying to read scriptures, then after a while we figured it out and used our scriptures at first and just talked after it got dark. And a few days ago Maria´s dad, Juan brought out this sweet oil burning lamp. I feel like im in the 19th century sometimes here!

We´re teaching a Jehova´s witness in training, and shes really tough. she wants evidence in the bible of EVERYTHING, which is frustrating and happens a lot here. but while we were teaching her her baby was screaming the entire time, and at the end of the lesson when we were getting her to pray she didnt want to because of the baby but we convinced her. Right as she started to pray i said a little prayer in my heart and asked for the baby to stop crying. The baby made one little peep during the prayer, then went back to screaming right afterwards! It was a really cool experience with prayer, when i could immediately and clearly see my prayer answered.

Just a little tidbit- working with Fernando and Carina and having them get married is probably the most satisfying thing ive done in my life! i still havent had time to think about it or let it sink in, but ahhh, the blessings are going to start pouring in for them!

A few days ago we were teaching Jefferson, and there was somebody watching tv in the other room. And elder orcohuaranga does not permit others to be in the house without personally inviting them to listen to the lesson. like i said, he´s unreal. so, he invites this girl to come listen, and she comes from behind this curtain that divides the house in two, and was kind of behind me. I stick out my hand to shake hands with her, and before i could sink into a little hole and cry she had kissed me on the cheek. Ah i about died. I tried to play it off as cool and i think i succeeded, but when it was my turn to teach i was fumbling over all my words and it was terrible! So that kiss plus a little old lady who kissed my hand brings my mission kisses up to two so far. i hope the tally ends there.

Ok i can´t believe i haven´t talked about this yet because it´s like the story of my life. I think every mother teaches their children to yell hello whenever they see a gringo. if the mothers dont teach it it´s instinct, because every, and i mean every child screams HELLO at me. or gringo! When they´re in groups i think they play a version of the slugbug game with gringos. The first one to yell gringo obviously wins, then all the others, to avoid the shame that accompanies losing, are forced to yell hello until the gringo answers. If the gringo doesn´t answer they all lose, so naturally they´re very persistant. haha i made that game up but it´s seriously how it is!

Today i bought a little speaker and a usb and another elder is going to load it up with music for me so i can listen to music. i miss music so bad! when ive done exchanges and the other elders have music i about die, so now im super pumped to have my own!

Every day I feel my testimony grow in some new way. Whenever im feeling down or questioning something I pray and i feel like almost immediately, or sometime that day, im blessed with exactly what i need. I know the Lord is directing us each day as we try our hardest. The church is the best thing that´s ever happened to me, and im so grateful for the amazing example you have set for me, family. I wouldn´t be here if i wasn´t taught these simple truths as a child, and im so grateful for who i am because of it. The church is the only true church, and the only one that Christ personally guides through a prophet. I´m so blessed to be able to take part in this work!

Elder Hatch

The baptism of Maria:

Elder Orcohuaranga and I and part of Tucume: