it smells like... a cleanly spirit! actually, thats our new bathroom

Pops,

  I miss you! dang, i love getting your letters and hearing about your week.

I must tell you... it happened again. my pictures got erased again. its a long story. let me start by saying... WE HAD OUR BATHROOM RENOVATED! Yes, our bathroom was all messed up, and the pipe that left from the toilet would rise in our shower drain! sometimes we would go flush the toilet for fun because we had our very own old faithful right here in zona 18, guatemala!  sucio, no? pues, we told are awesome duenos, and they were like lets get that all fixed. bueno, saturday the men came, and got to work on our house, and put in new tile and it is so pretty! Well,  I didnt know these men, and we live in a place that is... lets the it is a smidge different from Mayberry. I decided to take my bank cards and all along with my darling camera to a members house. i thought this member was trust worth, but... lets say, people that speak dont speak english shouldnt mess around with cameras that are set in english. its not like i just threw the camera in their house and didnt say why, i said i dont want anybody touching it, and well, a bunch of the baptism pictures are gone and pictures of my area. i am pretty upset, but, oh well. i guess i know i am not a picture hoarder, because i have these clean ups all the times.

  

the bright side is that we have a new bathroom. We are pretty excited. now our house doesnt smell like the sewer. bye bye yosemite. 

so there area  few young recient converts here that rea just pilas, buut pilas pilas, so awesome. well, one of them was with us doing visits the other day, and i asked he (hes 15) what was the reason he wanted to change and be baptized. He told me how when he was 13 or 14, he went to this funeral ans there were about 15-20 people. we was at the wake, when these thugs came in and started busting rounds into all the people there, and he tried to hide. he said only about 6 people survived, and he is gratefult hat he was one of them, and he decided to change, and not be affiliated with those things anymore. so he changed, and through his friend who is also a RC, he was introduced to the church. i feel very grateful to know such grounded young people of the church. 

we went and visited una hermana, y ella es buena onda, enserio, buena gente. muy amable, y bien chistosa. she lives in a very humble house.. by humble, i mean it literally is just scraps of tin. well, she makes all these things to sell for this group. o think she said it was called cuarto mundo guatemala. she makes all these cute things, and i bought some stuff from her. she is so nice, these things are so pretty, and when her boss comes and thakes them to be sold, the crafts are sold for about 80 o 100 quetzales. well, we asked her how much her stuff costed, and she gave it to us for 20 quetzales. i wanted to pay more, but she said "noo, hermanita, somos hermanas. no se precupe!" she was telling us about her child hood, and how she lived in a little pueblo outside of the capital, and she said that her mom left her. she didnt have a dad, and she would go and be baby sat by a another lady, and one day she was waiting at the wondow for her mom to come back, and it was late and she was worried, and the baby sitter told her " i dont think your mom is going to come back." the next morning the lady kicked her out and said her mom isnt gonna come back. she didnt. so this sister went and lived with her grandma, and said they only ate cut up onion with sald on a tortilla. anyway, this sister is amazing, because she helps us out and visits with us, doesnt complain at all. the thing i love the most about her is that she laughs! she laughs, and enjoy life even though she lives in a shack of scraps of tin. I love this sister so much, i feel blessed to know her. 

We ate caldo de pata. its cow stomach soup. i herad it was good, and i decided to give it a try. i sounds gross, but lengua also sounded gross and i actually llove it, so i went right in and ate it, and ohh my word... it was horrible. it tasted and smelled like the cud the cows chew. clearly it would, but i thought it was going to be good. such a let down. it messed my companion and i up for a few days, and the worse thing was that we couldnt use our bathroom this whole week. yep, the best timing. anyway, my expectations were too high, and the caldo de pata was gross. 

Hermana Feik and I have been cooking a lot, and we love to eat. We also like not being fat. So we decided to stop eating like we usually do, and this week we are going to cut out platano frito, crema, queso, galletas, rellenitos, y solo vamos a comer sanas! I hope this goes well, becsue, well, lets face it.. I am in my latter days. i have to get is shape. i was never thin, but dang, i feel like the michellin-man. We are going for it this week!

I am learning a lot about patience. this area is really trying my patience, and some times.. people just tick me off. i pray for help so that this ny sarcasim does come out when we are contacting. when i get frustrated, like saturday, i just think "serenity now!" also, i remind myself that we have anew bathroom! INDOOR PLUMBING IS THE BEST! THANKS GUATE!

Well, take care Dad, and dont let people touch your camera! EVER!

Keep on turcking, and enjoy life with airconditioning!

love always, 

 Hermana Ramirez

here are some pics my comp took with her camera. this was domingo en la jungla!

ps. I love the Holy Ghost, and my comp Hermana Feik. We make the best trio

ch-ch-ch-ch-changes, minerva is far awayyyy (MY AMERICAN COMP AND I)

I was changed out. yep, it happened. i felt like Minerva was the highlight of my mission, and i didnt feel the shock of the change until la hna.varela and i rolled up (fashionably late) in the taxi to the stake center in Molino. I saw Hna.Gomez, Hna. Ynjo, and the light of my guatemalan smog filled life, that darn Hermana Edwards. tha tgirl is so crqazy. anyway, she took my old area, she is sleeping in my old bed! Dang it Edwardsita! I love that girl, we split Puerto Barrios back in the day. Anyway, i knew it was true, becasue she had to come to minerva at one point, but her and i being in minerva, or even the same zone, at the same time... too darn good to be true. que freaking lastima.

   so, i re-read luke 10, and verses 16-18... wow. i like 18. Anyway. i have read that bhapter about 5 times this week.

   So i am in zona la laguna (mission name) but im in zona 18 in la capital. yep, i like seeing the fun and beauty that life in the 18 has to bring. you wont understand unless you've been there. sorry, closed club type of thing. ill tell you when i get home.

    MY COMPANION IS MAERCIAN! AHH! Wehn the assistant told me i had an american comp waiting for me, i heard Handls Messiah in my head. Could it be true? really, i would be so blessed to have an american comp. the last one i had was my darling Hermana hutchins, and now i have Hermana Feik. Okay, my comp is awesome. She is from Oregon. She was telling me about her life (i asked her about 100 questions about her life) in Oregon. She sadi that she got a revolver for christmas...i thought... wow, my comp is packing heat. but not anymore. She is awesome. she went to byu idaho also! she is actually nice enough to ask me how i am doing! Wow right? i felt like i have had somebody ask me how i was in a long long time.

   I miss my old house in minerva, mailny becasue of the view. I felt like sarah palin, because i could see memebers houses from my roof. I can see the zomna 15 from my house! sorry russia, zona 15 is pretty spiffy.

   i was reading our search for happiness, by elder ballard, and i was thinking about when we teach the first lessonthe restoration. well, i always mention how baptism withour authority isn the way the Lord wants it. When Christ established his church, it was in order. Well, i was watching people lined up getting baptized here in my new area, in the streets (not in our church). I thought, que lastima, dont owrry, one day you will be baptized by authority. i thought about it, and when i was baptized as a child, like 7yrs old. i was just doing what i knew at that point, to be correct. I see people as my brothers. these are just people, doing their best with what they have. How can i not try to help them? I know what i know, and i am doing the best with what i have, so when people come against us, as missionaries (happened a bit this week), i dont think they understand that we are doing this out of love. Just as other missionaries are doing it out of love (from other religions). This is a work of love, not a competition. The moment that this becasuse a competition, it is in vain, and offensive to do it in the name of Christ. I love this work, and everybody in this earth, is doing the best with what they know. i am here to teach, and open their doors to a new life. people that steal and commit crimes, they might be judged and hated by many, but do we know the reasons why they are the way they are? the conditions here are rough. understanding is love.

i love you Dad, take care!

 Read Doctrine and Covenants 112!

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