October 31,
2012
Dear
Family,
This week
we have contacted more and have had several good productive and successful
lessons. As a mission we are working harder to have all of the lessons that we
teach be productive and focusing less on the number of lessons and more on the
efficiency of those lessons. So we are working to have ´appropriate members´ in
every lesson we teach which means if we teach a family we take a memeber that
is married and has a family and not one of the young men because they can´t
relate as well and are only there because the missionaries brought them but
with an appropriate member they will become friends and help them and continue
to help and be friends and visit them after baptism. So that´s where we
are.
Elder
Escobar is a good companion and a good missionary. We get along better than
elder Yépez and I did which is good becuase that was a tense transfer....He is
fromthe capital of Honduras. He is 19. He has the same amount of time as I do
in the mission in fact we´ll be leaving the mission together in 2014. He helps
me with my spanish and I am helping him to learn English which is proving to be
difficult because he doesn´t know any English. But with a little patience and a
lot of repetition and practice he is gonna learn some English!
I don´t
think they really celebrate Halloween here.....there doen´t appear to be much
halloween stuff in stores, mostly just Christmas stuff. We shall see as the day
progresses and hallows eve falls to see if anything happens.
I got a
hair cut today. It needed to happen, it was too long. I´m back to military
style at least until it grows out a little more....
I need to
work on budgeting a little better. I´ve been basically living off of crackers
and oatmeal for the past little while because I spent too much money when we
went to the city for P-day Santiago.....I budgteted so well the last money
period and followed it up by not budgeting at all......gotta work on that. I
know I have my personal account if I need it but I also know that that account
is not bottomless and represents a lot of hard work and saving I did before the
mission and besides budgeting is a skill that I need to learn now not just to
live comfortably in the mission but to manage my money in my life afterwards as
well.
I saw the
pictures of the Robinson Halloween gang and you all look great! Taft just can´t
seem to let that pumpkin grow. He cried as a baby when mom put it on him and
now he wears it proudly. Noah is a classic ninja. That was a good year when
Taft and I were ninjas. And Claire wins the costume contest with
what´s-her-bucket from snow white! how did you do the thing on your forehead?
is that marker or that cool indian temporary tattoo henna stuff?
We are
teaching this woman named Dolores who is really good friends with one of the
members here and the day we contacted her was kinda cool: all our appointments
failed so we were walking around scouting out a house or two we hadn´t
contacted yet and Elder Escobar asked me ¨have you ever contacted those
apartments?¨ I told him know so we went. We contacted one of the apartments and
had a brief lesson and as we were leaving out walked this member from one of
the other apartments and upon seeing us motioned for us to come. So we went and
she introduced us to her friend Dolores who apparently just before we showed up
was telling Ramona (the member) how much she needed to find a church where she
felt comfortable and felt it was right. And there we were right on time. On the
Lord´s time. We talked to her a little and have had several lessons since and
she is progressing. She came to church on Sunday and the lesson was on the Word
of Wisdom which can be a touchy subject for brand new investigators but it went
really well and she loved it! In the lesson we had yesterday with her she was
telling how much she loves the Word of Wisdom and Doctrine and Covenants and
that she hadn´t drank her coffee for 2 days. I think Dolores has been prepared
over a period of time for the Gospel and I´m excited to see her progress and
possibly see her accept it fully and be baptized.
The hurricane had no real
affect on us, at least where I am. We got a break from the heat and the sun and
hada lot of rain and wind but that´s all. Nikelle´s roommate´s missionary is
serving in New Jersey and they are worried for him.... I heard all subway lines
are shut down because of the floods and a crane in the docking yards in New
York was blown over by the wind. Craziness.
Beef jerky, chocolate orange,
flavored and chocolate tootsie rolls, lots and lots and lots of pretzel m and
m´s. those are the things I want for Christmas. Also maybe a couple memory
cards for my camera.....If I think of anything other than snacks and junk that
I want or need I will let you know.
Workin hard
and Havin fun
Elder
Robinson
