Saturday, December 8, 2012

I'm so sorry that this is late--this week definitely got away from me. Anyways, Josh titled his email "Treat every day like Christmas." This is a quote from the movie Elf, which is an awesome movie. Enjoy!



Hey all,

The internet cafe that we're in stinks and the internet is awful, so we'll see how this goes.

For four months, I have played and lost time and time again in checkers against our ward mission leader. He is super old and I'm surprised that he's still alive. This week, finally I rose victorious. I crushed him, and he was at a loss for words. At first, I thought he was having a heart attack, but thankfully, he was just really shocked. I left feeling proud, and know that I brought honor to the Thomas family name.

Next week, we're going to Cotopaxi! We got permission today from President that we can go next week. We're gonna leave pretty early, and should get back around 2. I'm really excited, and hope to swim in lava or something really cool like that.

The baptisms went well this week, we had three, and our district had 5 total. Sneider didn't come to church, so we went to find out why and it turned out that he told his mom he's be home in an hour, and he didn't come back for 4 hours, so they missed church. His mom is really converted and knows how important it is to go to church, and she was really mad at him. She asked us to help her yell at him, so we did so lovingly and she did so not so lovingly. But I guess it's a problem with him, so we did what we could to help. Poor kid.

There are a lot of parades here, and while you may think that they rival that of the Macy's Day Parade, they don't. The instrument of choice, for obvious reasons, is the xylophone in every school band. The sound sounds like Christmas bells chiming beautifully. Wait, it sounds awful. All day long. No gracias.

This week was a little tough, because we couldn't find anyone new. It's really disheartening when we walk around all day trying to find people, and we just end up coming home really tired and with no one new. But hey, that's part of life. If we keep working, things will get better. But it is pretty tough. Plus, it's been unusually hot and sunny here, so we get really dehydrated, too. I bought a big 6 liter thing of water and drink a lot at the end of the day. I've learned to become grateful for all the really tough days we have here, because it makes the good days so much better. This is not an easy sector, and I've been here a while. I'm thinking that the Lord wants me to have a tough time here at first so that I can learn to really enjoy every good moment I'll have while on my mission. If that's the result of these tough times, then it'll definitely be worth it to keep pushing through. There is a small chance that I won't be here for Christmas, and if I'm not here for Christmas, I don't know when I'll be able to get packages or mail before Christmas because nobody went to the offices today, and next week no one will go since we'll be at Cotopaxi. So we'll see what happens, maybe no presents for Christmas. But the important thing is that we'll get to videochat, and anything else isn't nearly as important. Three week..can you believe it?

I have a really healthy breakfast now, Special K, eggs, hot chocolate or herbal tea, and sometimes oatmeal. I have 10 mangoes and bananas, got them all for 3 dollars. I broke my fast with a giant mango and Sun Chips, so good. I am all out of the Captain, hopefully more comes soon. Cheez-Its would be awesome, too. I am still doing Ab-Ripper and running, plus I'm trying to do 200 push ups a day, to become Batman. In a year and a half, I'll be totally ready.

Trevor, congrats on the calling, and Heather, maybe your calling will be to send me cookies or something like that. Nat and Alex, thanks for writing me. Oh wait, you didn't write me. Erica and Andrew, it must be so fun seeing Eliza growing up. Nikki, keep up the awesomeness, and Amber, stop talking to boys. Mom and Dad, don't get blown up in Israel, and other than that, have fun. It's going to be super, super cool, take lots of pictures and tell me all about it. I hope everyone else is doing fine, and sorry that the letter is kind of short, but I had to send pictures to the offices of the baptismal records and it took forever. I love you all, and hope that this week is more exciting and that I can write a better letter next week. I feel like this one lacks the flow I usually have, so please forgive me.


Love you all tons, and we'll talk in a week!

Con amor,

Elder Thomas



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