September 5, 2012

The Parla District with visiting zone leaders:  Left to Right: Sisters Farias, Carter, Piedade, and Elders Bauer, Perkins, Alvarez, Soriano, Cunningham, and Elder Rodriguez is in front of everyone.

Elder Perkins and Alex near the end of the exchange.

The Barbecue at the 3rd and 9th ward chapel.

Dad,

Well thanks for the news from home that was BLANK!! [see editor's note at the end of the e-mail!] I now know exactly what´s going on, haha!!! No worries. Thanks for the emails from the following wonderful people:

Cory Simmons (Elder Simmons)
Micah Hodges (Elder Hodges)

I appreciated getting emails from my RM District Leader Elder Simmons and RM Maquina y Fabrica del Universo [machine and manufacturer of the universe?] companion of mine and Zone Leader Elder Hodges. It was great to hear from those two great missionaries!! Well, here´s my week in a nutshell, but a bigger nutshell than what you guys gave me since nothing must have happened. =)
Thursday we had weekly planning and then had a new investigator which was pretty cool!! She´s a bit timid, but it´s okay, we´ll see what happens with her. Friday we had lunch with Yuliana, the investigator and her pareja [partner]. It was pretty good, especially since they had a hot sauce and that was really yummy!! At 6:00 we taught Melisa and it was really good!! We taught her that by small and simple means, great things come to pass so it was really good!!! Later we had Noche de Hogar [home evening] at the chapel so yeah. Saturday we had contacts, contacts, and more contacts.

Sunday we had Church and that was really cool! Not much after that. Monday we had two lessons set up, but both failed us. It was pretty sad, but it´s okay. Contacts. Tuesday was district meeting and we got two new/old Hermanas [sisters]. New because they came in by surprise, but old because they´ve both been in Leganes before. Hermana Sican, and Hermana Piedade are their names and it has been pretty fun! Elder Perkins, the Zone Leader, and his companion Elder Rodriguez came too so that we could do exchanges and Elder Perkins came to Parla while Elder Alvarez went to Barrio 3 [3rd ward chapel]. Later we taught Erik and Yuliana a great lesson!! We taught them about obedience and I used a kite example! If we´re obedient to God´s commandments (the string and the person flying the kite is God) we (the kite) will be able to fly higher, but if we cut the string because we think that will set us free and let us go higher, we will just fall to the ground. They then asked us a few questions and we answered them as best we could. We then ate with a member and it was really good!!!

Today was P-Day and Elder Perkins and I left Parla at around 10:15 to get to Barrio 3 to pick up Elder Alvarez and make the change. We then went to a BBQ at the Barrio 3 y 9 [3rd and 9th ward] chapel and it was pretty good!! Not much else happened today so yeah. So you see, my week was pretty uneventful. The exchange was awesome though!! Elder Perkins entered the MTC the same day I did, so we have just as much time as I do! Pretty cool!! What´s going on over there? I hope you send me an email tellling me everything before 7 pm my time so that I could see what´s going on. Take care and I´ll talk to you soon!! Love you all!

Elder Bauer

[Editor’s note:  I generally start writing a letter to Alex on Sunday, and it grows, so that by Tuesday when I send it, it is a substantial e-mail message.  I write it in Word.  Then I copy and paste into the e-mail program.  This week, I must have copied, but forgot to paste – since he got a blank e-mail.  I was online when his e-mail came, and had the original e-mail message, which I sent.  So he got it right after sending this.  I know he received it because I asked him specific questions to which he responded half an hour later.]