L.A. - Primera Semana del Campo! Maywood: Feb. 8, 2010

Hola Familia!

I'm in Los Angeles! I made it here safe. :) I got in Wednesday morning. It was a beautiful day. We had some orientation stuff, an interview with the president and then we hit the doors tracting with a temporary training companion while our mission president prayerfully decided who we should be with. I came in with a group of 14 missionaries, three of them sisters. My first tracting experience was really great- I thought I was going to be scared but i wasn't at all. All day i felt like the Lord just carried and supported me- I wasn't nervous or stressed or anything. That night we had dinner at the mission home and found out about our area and companion. I was assigned to an area called Maywood with my companion Hermana Salazar. She has been out for six months and this is her first time training. She is really great- she expects a lot out of me which is good, and pushes me to work hard and be 100% obedient, down to the minute and without any exceptions. Our mission president is extremely focused on obedience.

We have a lot of extra policies, one of them is that the zone leaders only get the mail on Tuesdays from the mission office and only distribute the mail on Fridays, so I haven't received any letters if you have sent them and won't get them til Friday. The mail will always be sent to the mission home, not to our addresses. Its nice that we won't have to worry about it when we transfer areas.

Wednesday night the Zone Leaders were supposed to bring all of my luggage and stuff to our apartment, but they accidently dropped it off at another apartment. At first I thought they were just teasing me. It was ok though because I had an extra outfit and stuff in my backpack thank goodness. They brought me my stuff the next afternoon, so it was fine, just kind of funny.

My bike got here Thursday, but I still have yet to ride it because the last couple of days have been really rainy, and surprisingly extremely cold. I am really glad I brought my coat.

I am in an area called Maywood. It is a little city in South Los Angeles that reminds me a lot of Midvale, except with more Latinos. Our apartment is actually pretty big, for a missionary apartment. We have a lot of muslim neighbors, and it is funny because I feel like we have an understanding because we both dress weird, so they always say hi and are really nice. We also have a rooster for a neighbor that is really noisy in the mornings, but I'm starting to get used to that. That and all of the big city sirens. I really do love our neighborhood though; it has a lot of cute little old houses that are painted in crazy bright colors and have weird statues and stuff.

About 90% of all of our tracting and teaching has been in spanish, which is really great- i'm learning a ton really fast. The people are really sweet and loving, and even when we are tracting people are pretty nice and will talk to you even if they're not really interested. It is funny because even the stores and everything are spanish- a lot of the names are spanish names or a funny mix of spanish and english- like a store called the "Wateria." (Bob- it reminded me of that one time we were riding bikes over the summer.)

Thursday, my first real day in the field, we taught about six lessons. They went really well- amazingly I can understand the spanish even though it is really fast, and I can communicate back, mas o menos. Sometimes I fell like I am really blessed to speak really well and communicate what I need to, and other times it is really hard for me, i think maybe because the Lord wants to keep me humble, and also because sometimes it is more effective when people sympathize with me trying to speak spanish. There really have been some miraculous times though when I have really been able to speak pretty good spanish. Thursday night i extended my first baptismal commitment in spanish (we extend the committment every lesson), and she thinks she doesn't need to get baptized, but I felt really good about having had the courage to do it. There have been a lot of things so out of my comfort zone, but i have decided just to throuw myself in to it and go for it, because I know that the lord will help me.

It has been kind of a hard adjustment, and it has definitely humbled me, but i am definitely being pushed to grow and reach my full potential. It is really hard for me not really knowing all the rules and having to figure it out as I go along and also being told that I am doing things wrong. For the most part though things have been good. i am amazed at how well my companion and I teach together. We really are pretty similar in being motivated and driven, and so we have gotten along really well.

For church on Sunday there is a spanish branch that we go to first and there is also an english ward. I got up and bore my testimony in the spanish ward sacrament meeting yesterday, in spanish. It wasn't the greatest ever, but again I was just glad that I did it and wasn't afraid. I know that this truly is the Lord's work and he has been with me every step of the way.

I never realized how much there is to do and how much hard work it takes to be a missionary. But I know that it is worth the reward of being able to be part of changing peoples' lives and helping them be happier. There is a really sweet older latino man that just got baptized two weeks ago who had an extreme change in his life, he completely quit drinking and smoking and he loves reading and studying the scriptures, and he is so grateful to my companion and to missionaries in general. I am excited to help and be part of that.

I also have loved my personal study time. My companion gave me an article to read called "The Fourth Missionary." It talks about how there are four kinds of missionaries, the first is disobedient and gets sent home or decides to go home, the second is disobedient but makes it all the way through, and I just got finished reading about the third missionary, who is obedient but doesn't ever recieve the benefits, because even though they are obedient it says "you can't be happy if you don't want to do the things that make you happy, even if you do those things." I thought that was interesting, and it made me realize how our attitude really is important. I've had a couple moments where my attitude hasn't been the greatest, because this is hard, but I am excited to keep improving and trying to do my best and give my best to the Lord. I've also learned a lot about the importance of sincere, specific prayer. We pray so much. I know that it definitely is important though.

Anyways, what are your questions for me? I don't really know what else to tell you. All of the food I have had is really good. I love all of the authentic latin american food. I still have yet to eat something really spicy- apparently spicy is only a Mexico thing. There is an incredible restaurant here we just ate at that is a lot like the Red Iguana. It was so good. I'll have to take Angela there after my mission. :) I hope everything is going well at home. I will keep praying for you.

Love,
Hermana Dansie