Email 2/9/2009

Hello from sunny California! I mean…rainy California. It’s rained like the past 5 days, which is like how much Elder Swenson has seen his whole mission, but I can deal with it.

Mexicans are funny. They have a super hard time pronouncing English words. Like most words don’t start with “S” so when they say an English word it comes out with an e sound in front. Especial, estart, esmart, etc. They had a super hard time with the “w” in elder Swenson’s name so he finally ordered a name-tag written like this: Suensón and they’re like “Oh, Swenson!” It’s funny. They have a really hard time with Curtis too. “Coortees.” I think they might be like Thai people because when they eat fruit, they like to have every kind of flavor on it. The fruit is sweet, then they put lemon juice on it (sour) then they put salt on it, and then chile powder (spicy and bitter). It’s pretty crazy.

There are tons of little shops on all sides of every main road and you wouldn’t believe how many donut shops there are. Like seriously, every other corner has one. Same thing with Liquor shops and Animal hospitals. I mean I’ve never even seen very many animal hospitals in my life and here they are all over the place—along with donuts at every turn lol. Motorcycles don’t seem to have any rules to follow because they always just do whatever they want—weaving in and out of cars to their pleasure. At stop lights they just go in between everyone right up to the front—it’s ridiculous. Instead of speed bumps there are dips all over. I’m mostly sure they are intentional because they are all over the place.

I finally cleaned the bathroom, and we bought a new shower curtain so I don’t have to breathe mold every day. It’s so much nicer. Tuesday I had my first Zone conference. It lasted most of the day and was pretty inspirational. We got new phones and had a clean car competition. We cleaned our car last Monday, but everyone else did too so we didn’t win anything. The meetings were good though and I played the piano for a musical number accompanying about 8 elders and sisters singing a Tongan hymn so that was cool.

The work is going pretty well though. We don’t have anyone that is super interested, but we still teach plenty. We also had lots of service activities to do this week. On Wednesday we helped someone move so we were hauling lots of stuff. That day we also taught a lady and her husband. She is Julia, but I’m not sure of his name. They told us once they know the Gospel’s true they’ll be baptized so that was cool. They’ve been meeting missionaries off and on for like a year though. On Wednesday and Thursday we got to do some more “service.” I put it in parenthesis because Elder Swenson said it was the best service he’s done his whole mission. We went to this house that this guy bought and wants to redo a lot of it so we went to tear down the old stuff. Demolition is actually pretty fun. Just grab a hammer and start whacking down cupboards and stuff. It was pretty crazy. We knocked down door frames, cupboards, walls, and we even took out a whole kitchen island thing that had like a stove and drawers etc. in it. We tore up carpet, tile, and all kinds of stuff.

We’re also teaching a less active named Hno. Castro who wants to be good—he just has so much in life distracting him from going to church etc.

We got to eat out two or three times this week because members just took us out instead of cooking for us. We went to a burger/chicken place one night and Chile’s another. We also ate at member’s houses two times this week. As usual they made fun of my poor Spanish comprehension. One lady even told a story to make me feel better about a time when she didn’t know what people were saying (in English) but I didn’t even understand the story—it was pretty pathetic, elder Swenson had to translate it for me. I feel like a little kid who doesn’t understand jokes so I just sit there and smile wondering what they’re laughing about, when half the time they’re laughing at me and I don’t know it. Some days are better though and I feel like I’m improving and understanding a lot. Some people are just easier to understand I guess.

Elder Stewart, who was in the threesome living with us, got transferred out to be with an incoming Elder (from another mission) so now out apartment is back down to four. It doesn’t make a huge difference though. They still stay up late, burn whatever they can find WHEREVER they are (and Rachelle thought I was a pyro, HA), play with their little air-soft guns (the word soft should not be applied. Those little plastic bb’s come out at a couple hundred miles per hour and sting if you get hit), and look like they are dead in the morning. My comp is good though—he always gets up on time. They’re good people though so I try not to judge them—they always make things interesting and fun.

Yesterday morning we stopped by a bunch of people’s houses, but they either weren’t there or had an excuse not to come to church. It was sad. I had to play the opening hymn in sacrament meeting again lol. Some missionaries in our district had a Baptism yesterday so we went to that (I played the piano).

We played indoor Frisbee at the church today with a bunch of other elders so that was a blast. The ASL elders were even there and one of them is actually deaf so that was fun.

Anyway, love you all. Hope your week goes well.

Elder Curtis