Tilguant!!

Hey guys!

Man what a week!   This is the main highlight... 
Remember that family Carter and I found? That we found by pretty much pure inspiration? 
Well we have been working hard with them for a very long time. Trying to reactivate the mom, and teach the girls everything. Its been hard because they starter their business, its a smoothie shop in front of a university.
 we decided that is the only place to find them, so we always taught the girls there! haha Ive gotten a little fatter eating smoothies everyday! haha But yeah, the Tilguant Family is amazing! There are 3 little girls, Maria Jose(8) Adrea Sofia (10) and Michelle (12). So anyway, they are really smart and learned everything fast! They passed all of the interviews and when the ZLs asked who they wanted to see baptize them, each individually said ´Elder Madero´! Awwwww!haha 
I was so happy because i honestly care alot for that family. So we set up the baptism and everything and it all came out as a success! The spirit was honestly really strong there! You shouldve seen me do the 3 baptisms because I got pretty good at it lol I did it perfect, smooth, and clearly.
t was an amazing experience for everyone! My leaders were so proud of us. My ward mission leaders were VERY happy for me. But were kind of sad because they realized that this is my 5th baptism in my first area, its very very very possible that I am leaving this next change in March! Which will be really sad. But I also want to explore more of Honduras so its alright! haha Man, you guys have no idea how much I love this ward! Theyre incredible! Well anyway, now we just have to baptize the Tilguant dad and its mission complete :) then theyll go to the temple together and hopefully ill be able to go!

Adán!!!!

Well, where should I start...

My second sunday being here in the Ward I remember a member coming up to me and Westberg and asking us if her grandson could be baptized in this ward even though he doesnt live in the ward boundaries, but he goes every week here. We just kind of said I Dont Know, especially because i honestly didnt know anything at all! I was trying to remember all of the members and now that i think back i remember that i just shrugged it off and didnt think much of it. But then recently they gave us Las Brizas right?  While Carter and I were there we were meeting everyone and we found Adan. 

Adan was thatttt grandson she was talking about, and hes been wanting to get baptized for a long time. But since there is so much contreversy in this area its always been hard for the missionaries. So since we were there we worked hard with him and tried to work on the baptism. 

We talked to President Bowler and everything and it wasnt until this week we got the papers filled out!   Adan is 12 years old, lives with a poor family in a shack type of  house. He doesnt have much friends because he cant really talk, i think he was abused when he was younger. 

I always get sad seeing people like that. So the time we would be at his house we actually got to be pretty good friends! Hes a jokester too! haha We taught him everything and he got it all!  As well as another joven, Daniel. We set up their baptismal dates for last satuday. 

So the day of the main interview comes up and we have the ZLs with us in Las Brizas, and during the interview I get a call from President Bowler asking me about that area and what the ward is doing about it. (Because its gold mine here!) and he says that there is a lot of contreversy in this area between barrios and other misions and we are not allowed back there until further notice. (estimated time, months) But we got everything signed and we are ready for the baptism.

 And it made my day when Adan specifically wanted ME to do the baptism!   Ohhhh mann!!   haha    my first one! 

So the baptismal day comes around and it was an amazing time! 

A lot of people came and we had a great time! My favorite moment was before the baptism, when we were taking pictures. Me and him were taking pictures, then him and his mom, then his grandpa comes in and he just starts balling. He was so happpy that he was finally getting baptized and he knew his grandpa was sooo proud of him. 

It felt amazing that I had that oppurtunity to make his dream come true. The ward was really happy for us too.

 It was a good week!!!!

I got a really good question this week,
 ´´i am really interested hearing how you are learning to deal with adversity. Whether it is a door slammed on you or a less than enthusiastic comp.´´
 I really liked this because i was thinking about this this week. well lets put it this way. Ive been in this city for about 3 months now and im compeltely used to it. Elder Marin just came from the South. The people in the south are REALLY humble and loving. When you contact down there they usually always let you in. Here, not so much. So his style of, being a missionary, was really different then how it is here, and it was hard for him to transition.
 I took him contacting once he got here and show him around and in about 30 minutes he was already desanimado.
 He said     ”Wut da Hake? Why doesnt anyone talk to us, or let us in, or even wave back?!” 
And at first I didnt take him seriously but then i realized that he REALLY didnt understand. I had to remember that this is almost a different culture. The people here are really rich and snotty. Just picture Scottsdale here.
 Then i realized how much i have adapted to all of the adversity here. All of the slammed doors in a day doesnt faze me at all anymore. Elder Westberg, my dad, taught me something really important, we are here to find the prepared people that the Lord has for us, we just have to be obedient and work hard to find them. When people openly reject us, it means they were not them. And this early in my mission I can clearly see and testify of that. Many times we know that certain people were put in our path for a reason. I was talking to a member about this the other day and they were laughing saying I am really lcuky to be starting here because my next area can only be easy as far as contacting goes. lol which is true! Being with Elder Marin also helped me realize how much ive improved with patience, like theres ¨no worries´. I guess I used to be really impatient with people in general, and when things dont work out like theyre supposed to. But i was just say ´well.... ni modo´. and just keep on going. haha
 My comp is still working with this and im trying to help him because he easily gets frustrated when things dont work out. We help each other out alot actually, even though out of my 3 comps, this has been the hardest lol. 
He especially helps me with my spanish and my knowledge of the gospel.
 Ive actually gotten pretty good with my spanish.


ADAN AND ME!!!

ADAN AND HIS MOM

Picacho!

Hey guys!

  Everything is going great here! I am having a blast every week! Yeah there are a lot of desafios but you learn to overcome them and just have a great time! 

We have been getting a lot of progress this week. Probably because of my new comp, Elder Marin. He is from Nicaraqua and has 20 months in!

Hes not baggy at all either lol. But yeah I heard hes one of the fletchest in this mission, so its been a really hard transition from Carter to Marin. I guess its good for me though, and im already getting used to it. 

The hard thing is teaching our whole area to someone againnn... he got confused alot at first but he got it down. I never really realized how much I love the people here and the members and them back to me until Ive had a comp like Marin. Hes a little more duller and straight to the point, not much love lol. When I contact people I make sure to let them know that I care about them, he sounds like a robot sometimes lol. But we´re working on that. Weve been having a lot of success lately. We can EASILY see that the Lord is putting prepared people in our path! This one time we were contacting streets that i have already contacted before, and then we arrived to this small street in Colinas, at first I didnt want to even try there, but then I got a small hunch to just do it. Annnnnnnnd of course, the second house I contact the dude lets us in instantly and says Wow! Missionaries! I havent talked to missionaries in forever! Well it turns out that hes a previous progressing investigator that no one knew about. And he even says, hes ready for baptism and he believes in everything already. I just looked up and said, Really? haha I just love the blessings the Lord gives us for our obedience and faith.

 We have found a lot of investigators lately so the obra is going good!:)

  Oh! You know how in movies there is always that scene where its raining and someones car breaks down and people come to the rescue and help? Welllll yeah that happened and it was epic! haha its been really cold here lately,and its been raining. And this one day we were contacting and we are coming up to a house and this lady is like Elderes!! Come help please! And you know us, we went and helped! It was a really fun experience changing a tire in the rain :) 

   With these changes that happened, our zone is so cool! Elder Westberg,my dad, is back as a Zone Leader here! woohoo! and there is the other chicano here too! Hes really cool and is from Utah.
Well today is P-day and as a Zone we decided to go to Picacho! It was a lot of fun! You can literally see the whole city from here and the statue of Jesus is huge!

This ZL, Elder Rosario from Dominican Republic, 

He loves me and we are always messing around doing the flexing stuff ;D

I CAN NEVER GET TIRED OF THE CITY!!!   I LOVE TEGUC !!

3 Months!

  Hey guys! guess what? Well you probably guessed by now but I finally hit my 3 month mark!! woohoo! That means im all done with training and ready for the big boy stuff! haha Which also means that changes is coming up! But ill get into that later... This week was awesome! It all starts with Monday playing soccer at the canchas and having a blast with the Uyuca zone and making a bunch of new friends, and mejorando my soccer skills. Then after we went to Olanchos Ballads!

 Ill attach photos of these baleads because theyre HUGE! And they were soo good! Man im eating like a king here! :) 

And then Tuesday my comp Elder Carter got a call saying that he is up for his migration stuff, meaning we have to go to the Migration office so he can get his citizenship here. Usually the companion of whoever is going has to wait in the waiting area at the Mission Office, but my comp knows everyone and has connections and so I was able to go too! Man the Office elders are soo cool! I met one from Mesa AZ and another from Tennessee and Cali, we had alot of fun together! The best part of the whole trip was that we went out to eat after, where? Dennys! Thats right! I walked into Dennys and it even smelled like Dennys! Everything was just like the state´s Dennys except the language of the menu and some tipico plates that were on there too. I ordered a big fat juicy burger and it honestly, it was very states type of good. It made me very baggy because i remember all of the good times when my friends and I would go to Dennys late at night. Oh! And you know how in the States restuarants when its your birthday the workers ususally sing to you and clap their hands? Well not here. Thats too boring! haha At Dennys its was the ladys birthday and the workers went around the table and started singing right? But then the have a special dancer who grabs the girl by the hand and starts dancing with her, like for a whhille. I was shocked but the elders all said that was normal! haha We found our mission president in there too while we were eating so we had to be on our best bahavior...which is kind of hard sometimes! lol

 Anyways, So Sunday came around and guess who shows up? The Tilguant Family! woohoo! The whole family! It was awesome! (The mom is inactive, but all of the others are not members) And our ward is soo cool this is how it went down: So they show up, we greet them and they wanted to sit in the front row right? Sweet! Bishop stops whatever he was doing and goes and introduces himself. Then a whole bunch of others did the same. And we were worried that the opposite would happen! My comp was telling me we need to find people to sit with them but the members beat us to it! So we start Sacrement and it had incredible talks! One made the mother get teary eyed. Towards the end my comp and I were thinking how we were going to get the whole family into their correct classes and stuff. But the moment the closing prayer was finished the family got swarmed! Primary teachers and Young Womens teachers found the girls and too them all to their classes! It was awesome, mostly because it made our job easier! haha this isnt the first time we have investigators that come to church, but it is the first time a whole family has come! Ok, so this past sunday was the 5th sunday, that means the 3rd hour everyone was together and the Bishop wanted to give the class. FYI, our bishop just got called to be a Mission President in Texas! And everybody loves him here! So everyone is pretty bumbed out thats hes leaving. So the topic of the class was awesome! He shaved all of the members, or in other words, el nos machatio! (Meaning he scolded us, laid dont the law, told us how its done, you get the idea) He told everyone that just because hes leaving, doesnt mean they can slack off. Time to grow up and take care of ourselves. It was an INCREDIBLE talk! and it was perfect for the inactive mom! Man, so many things went right this sunday! We also always have members come up to us giving us references, or introducing us to kids that are ready to be baptized!
   So changes, Changes happen this Wednesday but since we dont have changes meetins anymore, they told us who are new comps (if we have changes) will be. And we finally know! Wow! Ok, just to recap, my last comp was Elder Westberg, he was DL, and when changes came he became Zone Leader! And now, my comp is Elder Carter, and now with these changes, he is going to Porvenir and is going to be Zone Leader too! I keep making everyone ZLs ;) But because my comp is leaving, that means im staying! Another 8 week change! Another two months in the cityyyy! And my new comp isssssss: (drumroll here) Elder Marin! Who is my grandpa! (Elder Marin trained my father, Elder Carter) So thats pretty cool! He is going to my second Nicaraguaian comp! This should be fun haha 

I havent met him yet but I will on Wednesday. OH! And we are finally recieving Hermanas to be in the Miraflores area! Finally! Ill let you guys know further details next week! 

I miss all of you guys!

This is part of our area! This shows what the city is like here. Oh! If you look at that left corner of the mountain in the back, you can see The Picacho! A status of Jesus that oversees the whole city pretty much! We're going there some time.

This is what Las Brizas is like. There are poor houses all around. But on weekend everyyonnne gathers around the center of this colonia and watches the soccer games!  It's honestly a lottt of fun being in this place, but its also reallly dangerous so we stay out at night.

 This is the Honduran famous Baleada! Look at the size of these things! Can you believe they only cost $3 each?

 They're not always this bug, but we ordered the Baleada Extrema, which has a homemade flour tortilla, beans, eggs and ham, carne asada, quesito, avocado, fried banano, and mantequilla! Mmmmm :)

Yesterday we ordered at Tipicos de la Costa and look at the size of this plate! I only ordered a pescado mediano and I got all of this!

Tegucigalpa Temple

    What a week! A lot has happened!

 Like I think it was Tuesday we had a Worldwide Live Video feed in which we heard some apostles and important people talk to us. Doesnt sound like a big deal right? Well this was the first one that has happened in over a decade! So that made us a little more interested. They talked to us on how we can improve la obra and all that good stuff. We also had Zone Conference last friday, my first one! Everyone in the Cuidad Zone was there and it was nice seeing some old friends as well as making new friends. We got our regular scolding (lol just kidding). But the APs and President Bowler taught us a lot of important information that for me, a new guy, was very useful. We have been working hard, especially in Las Brizas! There is so much there that I cant believe past missionaries didnt take advantage of. People are there just waiting for us! We have Noche De Hogar´s all planned out and stuff. And we found out that there is this little girl who loves going to church and shes been attending for over a year now, but we never realized that she hasnt been baptized, or even if she wants to be. So we made a trip there to talk to her and ask her parents for permission to teach her about baptism and stuff, the mom was very hard with us, but she just ended up saying to ask the dad. So we did. (I was a little nervous because Las Brizas is a, according to EVERYONE that we talk to, a very dangerous place.) We go to the back of the house and find the dad and he is in the middle of sharping their kitchen knives using a spinny thing machine, i forgot what its called... But i know its not to sharpen knives! haha its for cutting metal but anyway the point is, it was a pretty scary situation and we tried not to get on his bad side! haha We talked to him about it and at the end, he put the knife down.Yes!lol He said he doesnt have a problem with it, so we should be baptizing her soon! But WAIT THERES MORE! We asked the dad if he would be interested in learning a little about the church, and he said Yes of course! It sounds interesting! And so we invited him to an activity me and my comp have been planning. A temple trip! In which we will give our investigators a ride to the temple and thing can look at it and stuff, ANNND enter it! We have connections....and the temple people are going to let our investigators enter inside a side room and just sit for a while and pray. This was going to be an awesome experience! And he accepted! And we invited our other investigators as well! We went of Saturday the 23rd and it was COLD! That night it hit 16 degress Celcius! So it was cold and windy with all of investigators at the temple but it was cool because we were all outside freezing, and when we entered the temple... nice and warm :) It was perfect! Ill attach some photos! This was a great time and our investigators loved it! We taught a little class after and then went to Dunkin Donuts after and had some coffee... I mean hot chocolate!
   Anyways, the rest of the week was cool. I gave a talk last sunday and supposably it was a good talk because everyone applauded after I finish. I dont know if they were clapping because it was good or because I finished.... (I´ll let you figure out if im kidding or not ;) haha I love my ward so much! Its going to be heartbreaking when I leave! The area is so amazing too! Oh! Me and my comp had a funny experience the other day. There is this bar that is by our house that always has their tv playing old classic rock music. So when we walk by we walk a little slow to see whos performing right? But this night, we walk by and what do we see? the BYU Channel!! What the heck?! hahaha I have no ídea whhhy but me and my comp were so confused! All we saw was a bunch of scenery videos and we kept double comfirming the little BYU logo at the bottom right corner lol. That was wierd... Well yeah, it was a pretty busy week. Oh!! And I received annnother package! Thank you Jones family!! Well, thanks to ALL of you! I really appreciated the regalos! We had an awesome holiday season!

These are our investigators that showed up to our activity, including a family!

Elder Carter and I teaching a short spiritual lesson after going inside.