Well family another week has passed. Before I get started I want to give a big shoutout to Bailey (future Elder Stark) for getting his mission call. There were a few elders from the Dominican Republic here in Sonzacate and they were really cool elders. Bailey, welcome to the Spanish speaking crew. you´re gonna love it. Start studying Preach My Gospel right now, especially chapter 3 and 6. It'll help you out a lot once you get in the field. If I remember right the food from there sounded way good. You´ll love it.
Well a little bit about my first child, He´s a gringo, his name is Elder S, and he´s from Mesa, Arizona. Super cool guy. He comes from a family of 8, and has a sister in the mission, His parents are also mission presidents (that freaked me out when I first heard) in the New Hampshire manchester mission. They got there the first of July along with all of the new mission presidents. Haha no pressure or anything. We get along really well and we won´t have any problems with obedience or laziness. It's always interesting to have a gringo companion for several reasons. 1. all the kids tell their parents "the gringos are here" whenever we knock on a door, 2. all the drunk people think we have tons of money so they always come up and talk to us. (more to come on this later) 3. sometimes it's nice to take a break and speak in English at night which always makes things feel a little more familiar. Right now we are working most on his Spanish, he got a little frustrated with not being able to understand people, and having people say that he can´t speak spanish, but we'll work on it and get better. He knows the scriptures pretty well which is probably the most important thing.
So this Sunday we were walking to some of our citas, and it seems like every drunk on the street came up to talk to us. One shook our hands like five times and on the last time he grabbed my hand and kissed it. I wasn´t sure whether I should laugh or scream, but I held it in and once we were about a block away we both burst out laughing. That's one thing I can check off my bucket list.
I´m taking this opportunity to start a new leaf here in Izalco. Looking for brand new people and trying to teach a little differently than I was before. Hopefully it will help us have a little more success. President Hintze really wants us to work with the less active members here and try and strengthen the wards. So that's what we are going to try to do. This week is going to be difficult though because it's the August festival here which is one of the two biggest celebations here, there are some pretty cool authentic food and crafts stuff to buy but almost no one is home. Should make for an interesting week. R A gave me this stone that supposedly the indiginous people used to sharpen/make arrowheads, and as a hammer. He found it buried in the back yard of his grandparents house, along with a broken mill stone. I think it really could be authentic, its a volcanic looking rock and is super round and smooth. I'll try to send a picture next week and maybe jim could help out to know if that's what it was used for.
Anyway sounds like you guys are all getting ready for school and the grind. Sorry it had to come to an end. But there´s always next summer. It's crazy to me to think that this next week I will hit the one third mark. I´m trying not to keep track of time, but its really hard not to be aware, and jake hits a year on the 26th, craziness. Time flies. Best of luck you you all and have a great week. I'll be on for another half hour or so, so if you are free shoot me an email. Alright take it easy everyone!
Elder Schriever
