Two meetings with the special speaker

Fun with the zone on Pday

Elder Aidukaitis with President and Hermana Villalba

Hey everyone!!

Mom, it sounds like your birthday was a fun experience for everyone!! Happy birthday!

Whew, today I am so tired! I hope I don't fall asleep as I'm typing. I'm very excited to be writing you all, of course, but we just got done playing some intense soccer and "flying." For soccer we played Utah vs. everyone else, which ended up being 4 on 4. Unfortunately, we lost by one, but still had a lot of fun! We also played some dodgeball, mini dodgeball because we had the hermanas playing, but we played it with the kind of flat soccer ball we played soccer with, but it was fun. Then we learned how to "fly", which can't be described well, so just know it's pretty cool. It's basically just a psychological trick that someone taught us that makes you think you're flying.

Yes, I received the Priesthood Line of Authority and love it, thanks, but not the Pruebas book yet.

Well, I guess the coolest thing by far that happened this week was the training meeting on Tuesday with Elder Aidukaitis of the 70 and the Zone Conference with him on Wednesday. Both meetings were awesome and way cool! He's definitely the best public speaker I've heard from personally. The leader meeting was probably the best, because he has this gift to be able to bajar la cana, in English "drop cane" the whole time (or criticise) in a funny way that makes you really want to do better, and doesn't make you feel bad. It was an intense four hours straight of him talking to the district/zone leaders in the mission, dropping cane for 4 hours, but I loved it because we learned a lot!! Throughout the time he would have us stand or sit, if we did something or didn't do something, and if we were lacking he'd come up to the elders who didn't do the certain task good enough, ask them if they needed some sugar or if they wanted it straight and direct, and then dropped cane on them. I'll be honest, I really flew under the radar. In fact, I was just about the only one who didn't get cane dropped, instead I got a personal congratulation due to goal setting, and then the next day at zone conference he personally congratulated me again, but with my hijo that time. I'm not telling that to be prideful, because I'd be lying if I said I was perfect and couldn't use plenty of cane droppings. But I will say that I got VERY LUCKY and I LOVE GETTING LUCKY!!!! P.S. The reason I got congratulated was because I was the only person that made or exceeded the goals I set on the certain day he chose. Anyway, so it was way cool to be able to shake his hand and all that, but really it was just because I got very lucky.

He's a really funny guy, too, but also very serious about his work. He tells us that we should be baptising every week, so I'll really have to pick it up and start baptising weekly!! So that's kind of scary, but we're going to have to start baptising every week, I don't know how, but we'll do it!!!

Anyway, though, he's a really cool guy, he speaks good Spanish, although he said a few things kind of funny because he's from Brazil so speaks Portuguese, but overall speaks really good. He can also speak some English. I'd love to see him go up as an apostle. We didn't get to take our own pictures of our zone with Elder Aidukaitis, because he was doing back to back zone conferences, and he didn't want to take the time to have everyone setting their self-timers on their cameras and stuff, so he wanted only one picture taken, with the mission camera. They were supposed to email it out to all of us, but of course they didn't, so I don't know if we will ever get that picture. While they were taking a different zone's picture, I grabbed that picture I am sending you with my camera, so you can see him in the picture next to President.

So this past leadership meeting wasn't technically training, it was just cane dropping to whip us into shape, and this Wednesday, in two days, we're having the official leadership training with President Villalba. I'm way excited because I love these leadership training things, so I'll surely let you know how it goes.

Well, the work here is going well, also the hijo and the district are doing really good. I'm excited because tomorrow I give a taller (workshop) which I still haven't planned yet, but I will. I love this area, it's sooooo good, and just everything is going good. Our church assistance (attendance) is growing, and we have a few investigators attending. We have the perfect area, we have both extremes, it's rich, but not too rich, and it also has an awesome villa (villa is the ghetto slum area.) Most of the area is super clean, and like half our area is paved, and half is dirt roads. LOTS OF DOGS DOGS DOGS DOGS DOGS! In fact, last week I got nipped by a little one. Dogs are always barking and threatening us, in which case we do the baile (pretend to pick up a rock to throw) or we just let them be because they're just territorial and won't attack, they're just acting like it. But one little dog, just out of nowhere, as I walked by nipped my pants! It was crazy, and now I have a pair of pants with a bite hole in them! Don't worry, he only got the pants and didn't touch the skin or do any damage to me, it was pretty funny though.

Well, I've got to get going now. I love you guys, and wish the best. Thanks for all you do!!

Love,
Eric

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