Hola a todos!
I’m still at the CCM and counting down the days until I get to venture out into el campo. As I previously mentioned before, I’m antsy as heck to get out there to preach the words of mi Padre Celestial. There’s one thing I didn’t bring with me that everyone here has (besides shampoo) and that’s pictures of their families! I have some pictures of a few of my friends and a pic of Maggie and Tilley, but none of mi familia! So if you don’t mind, I need a few decent pictures of our family to tape into the back of mi libro de mormons. If you send them to PR there’s more of a chance that i’ll get them. I still have not received the letters from dad or gma sue… so I’m hoping they’ll get here before I leave.
When the last transfer happened yes a lot of missionaries left, but more importantly the CCM presidents left. It was crazy starting out this whole new era for the CCM because literally the new president couldn’t be any farther from the old CCM president. He always scolds me for shaking his hand with my left hand, apparently left handed-ness is undignified, and he has a scary likeness to a certain man of power with the initials DJT. I pray everyday for paciencia y paz, por que he really tests me sometimes. I really want to love the people in this transfer and the new presidente, pero it’s just that I can’t stop feeling like they’ve been specifically sent on this mission just so Padre Celestial can test my patience. I just keep reminding myself that they must have some other reason for serving a mission besides pestering me constantly about the conjugacion de ‘pasar’.
I had a good friend that taught me two important words at the CCM.
- freca/o. frecas son los personas who constantly are flirting with you and they sometimes get really close to stalking you. There are loads of them down here in the DR and it’s mostly a problem for the elders actually because they have girls who try to flirt with them in basically no clothing. (It’s reallllllllly hot here, no one wears clothes) but it’s also a problem for us. Usually frecos are the people who casually walk by five or six times while you’re contacting en la calle and whistle at you. It makes me feel disgusting, but a lady en la calle en frente de la templo said we should just scowl at them and they’ll get the message. (Unless they’re really determined, then they stalk you home). P.S. Mom don’t read about the frecos. I promise, I’m good at handling myself with them.
- chismosas. In spanish a chismosa is a ‘gossip girl’. Mi compañeras and me call ourselves chismosas because we literally feed off of the gossip we hear in emails. BTW what’s up with the lack of Donald Trump updates? I need to know what is happening in my pais right now!
P.S. When I went to la playa the other day we say with a taco bell and a krispy kremes. We couldn’t go in, but I felt very at home when I smelled the taco bell fake beef smell wafting through the streets.
Speaking of la playa! We went contacting there the other day and we got three phone numbers! We’re supposed to call them later today and set up appointments, pero it’s hard to understand Spanish over the phone! They talk so fast!!!! They all said they wouldn’t mind knowing more, but they were all Catholotica and said they haven’t been to church since they were kids or something like that (Spanish is so hard). I hope they answer the phone when we call them up!
Here’s a problem I seem to be having lately, freaking English. I’ve gotten to a point where I think in Spanish during class time now so speaking it has gotten easier. But as soon as someone breaks my Spanish train of though with english I feel confisio. I know that el don del linguas es verdadero pero I can only speak one language at a time. And don’t even get me started on English grammar. I mean crud man, I can’t remember why we use the grammar we use anymore. I use such bad broken English and my Spanish is broken tambien so it would be lovely to receive prayers and thoughts to help me with both languages.
Also, I have a few books i need you to send me for my birthday maybe or whatever, I’ll send you the titles next week.
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In the words of my Haitian sisres, nou renmen’w
Hermana Thelin