November 30, 2009

My Pdays are Mondays now :)
I'm in Uruguay, serving in the most dangerous area of the city Montevideo, it's so awesome! We're opening it up again, as theres only been 3 baptisms in the last year here, so we made 4 our goal for December ha. We're on the right track, we have a grandma set to be batized on the 12th but she has some medical stuff we're praying for a miracle she can actually go in the water, so keep Elena in your prayers. Her grandsons Cristoffer and Pablo (14,12) were baptized 3 months ago, and their mom died shortly thereafter, so Elena has been taking care of them and their younger brother and cousin. They all live in one tiny room with a canvas roof, cement walls, and dirt floor. The interior of my mission is cityish, but the outside (its a few miles in diameter and we walk it all hahaha its nuts) is pretty....campo in castellano. Countryish? Super old and pretty ghetto. We have 4 other investigators we think will be baptized in the next month or so as long as they attend church. we're only 5 days in, so things are looking up for sure!!

My comp is Elder Grau from Asuncion Paraguay. Hes a great missionary of 9 months, and we're beginning to understand eachother. He speaks NO english whatsoever, so I'm trying to teach him as he teaches me.

Daniel Leatham was in my district!!!! I love that guy!!! You got the picture!? I bought a copy to send to you haha cool.

As for Christmas, you really don't need to send anything haha. If you do, though, I'll get anything after some time cause the office elders can pick it up from customs, but just follow the guidelines and it will get to me here, they are way less strict than Argentina. I think the guidelines were something like under 4 lbs (well under to be safe), and mark it as missionary supplies, and put the value under $50 (again, pref well under).

Lets see...yesterday was elections here, tell Jason to look up Uruguayan politics, he'll get a kick out of it. These people are even more political than Americans, and I thought the whole Obama fanaticism in the states was wild, this is just ridiculous, the new president has generated more excitement than the olympics, superbowl, and election combined. I guess he's a hardcore leftist in a party that hasnt had majority in 100 years or something like that. People are psycho for him, there was partying in all the streets as soon as the results came in, fireworks going off like crazy, people running around screaming with their party flags as capes, stuff like that. We had to go into our apartment early last night in fear of opposition gunfire haha. The Presidential Palace is between us and where we went to church (our ward closed for the election so we went to our zone leaders) and there were tons of armed guards EVERYWHERE with M16s. Pretty sweet.

Lets see, I forgot my camera now, but next week I can send pics I think. My apartment is the worst in the city, but they say some of the country ones are way worse. Its so funny, I laughed at the thought of you, mom, walking in and seeing the mold hahahaha You would cry its so funny. I need flipflops, after this we're gonna go get some. We live behind a pet store. Kayli would be so happy. And I DO wash my clothes by hand, dad :)

So the weather here is nothing like what it said online. I think the online stuff was probably for the vacation cities on the coast. Here it gets up to 125 with 100% humidity its nuts I sweat so much hahaha but after it gets hot it rains like NUTS and cools down to like 55. It gets steamy with that kind of change. SO....sometime its super hot and super cold in the same day, weirdest thing in the world. I like it, though, I don't mind the humidity like I thought I would.

As for Rachel, shes in my prayers always, keep me posted I wanna know everything going on with her for sure, and always send me pics with letters please!
For the family newsletter, you can write mine cause I do NOT have time haha. Just make it sound like me as much as possible.

Oh ya, I forgot to tell you how I spent my Thanksgiving! I bought my favorite Alfajor (Surprise Negro) and covered it in another layer of dulce, and spent a good 15 mintues savoring it slowly. My comp thought I was weird. It was a good day though we met a ton of members. The members here are very few but very strong (about 40-50 active, like 7 good old families and tons of younger individuals), but the Bishop went off the deep end so we're also trying to help as much as possible in the ward. Hopefully things will be reorganized soon.

Oh ya! Michael Jackson has an AWESOME house/palace/mansion here. Well, had. I don't know who lives there now, but it's pretty cool. I guess missionaries have never been inside yet, so we'll try hard haha.

All in all, this is an awesome place with some outstanding people in it that are very prepared to hear our message, and I am blessed with an outstanding trainer! President and Hermana are also really really phenomenal, but unfortunately they will be leaving in July, so I'll have a new Prez most of the time Im here. :(
mmmmm....No super weird food yet, and most of the missionaries say they have never had anything too bad, so thats way nice to hear. I have duck eggs waiting for me in my apartment for dinner haha Elena made us fry bread and gave us 2 eggs from her duck to take home yesterday. Sweet lady.

Take care all, I love you dearly and am thinking about you! I promise I'm working diligently and obediently, and we're being blessed hardcore for it! The Spirit is a wonderful third companion and I encourage you all to work on having His accompaniment always.
Finally, I ought to mention I spent $130 on a sandwhich with fries today. It was so good!

Elder Magnusson

P.S. $21 Uruguayo = $1 American
P.S.S I ate an entire thing of dulce yesterday cause I physically was unable to stop myself its sooooo gooooooodd. Also, I ate an entire bag of vanilla yogurt. The yogurt and milk come in bags haha its so much tastier here than the states, too!!! I can't get enough milk I want to move here after just for it.