Thursday, June 12, 2014

Summer is starting in Cartagena...

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Paige Walton

Jun 9 (3 days ago)
to me, Elliot, Tyler, Luke, Whitney
Hey there Fam! How´re things going at home? I hope everything is well and more relaxing now that summer has started. Then again with baseball, it may take a little bit longer to get to the relaxing part of the summer. No, we all love you baseball games, Elliot. Don´t worry.

Well let´s see! This week we started teaching a less active member. His name is Francis. His wife is also a less active member named Lydia that we´ve been teaching for a while. They´re from Ghana and I love them to death! We had a really cool lesson with them last Monday and felt the spirit really strong with them. Then we went back later in the week and we had a short lesson with them. But at the end Francis told that he had an african gift for us, but we had to promise to take it. So we closed our eyes wondering what in the world he was going to give us. Then he gave us legit african braclets! They´re so cool! He´s an awesome guy. It made both of our days. 

We also finally got back in touch with a recent convert this week. Which was nice. We´ll see how it goes with him. He travels a lot and is hard to get a hold of, but we´re going to keep trying. 

We had zone conference this week. And it was so nice just to be able to walk outside and have a 2 minute walk to the capilla and be there. A big change from the 4 hours of traveling that we had to do in Badajoz. 

We taught a lesson this week to a man named Cali, too. He´s way cool! He´s part Jamaican, and African. But he´s way cool! He invited us to come back sometime and he told us he´d make Jamaican food and African food for us. YUM!!! It was a really good lesson! Too bad he doesn´t live in our area so we have to give him over to the elders, but that´s ok. We all work as a team here. 

Anyway, so this week we´ve been having a lot of visitors in our piso. Some lovely cockroaches have decided to come in this week. I think we´ve had 3 or 4. They´re pretty nasty! Luckily we can just flip them on their backs and leave them there until they die. Then we get rid of them. haha, yeah it may sound terrible, but that´s what we´ve found that works best. I do have to admit though that I´ve thought a few times about your Tahiti stories, Dad. I don´t know if lighting Raid to kill them works in pisos, but maybe if the proble, gets too bad. But come on! We live on the 5th floor! What cockroach wants to climb all the way up there?

Anyway, it´s been a little slower of a week again, but we´re doing well. Summer is coming and we´re getting the heat started, but it´s still not too bad yet. Well I love you all! I hope you have an awesome week and that everything goes well!

Hermana Walton 

Monday, June 2, 2014

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Paige Walton

5:16 AM (13 hours ago)
to me, Elliot, Tyler, Luke, Whitney
Hello! So I´m sorry this is going to be a shorter one again. I´m running pretty short on time. But we had some cool things happen this week. It was kind of a rough week, but there were some good things too.

On Wednesday we went to a cita with a member. She´s incredible! She has no fear of opening her mouth and does a better job of contacting than I do, haha. Anyway we went to this cita and we watched a video about the temple. We wanted them to feel the importance of the temple and why we have them. We were talking and one topic lead to another and then the member asked them why they werent´baptized yet. They explained their reasons and we calmed them down and explained why they had no reason to fear. Then we set baptismal dates with them! It´s a really cute old couple named Neli and Juanito. They have a lot of family that are members and they´re just great! We later found out from some members that they may or may not be actually married, but we´re not sure yet. For right now the date is the 21st of June, but we will for sure have to move it back as they didn´t end up coming to church on Sunday.

Then on Saturday morning we went to a conference with our stake president. He´s incredible. He talked to the ward missionaries the whole time and of how they can do a better job and what they need to be doing. The stake goal is to spit the stake by 2018 so we´ve got some work to do, but he´s so incredibly excited about missionary work and knows what works and what doesn´t. It´s nice to have a leader that´s so gung-ho about missionary work. 

Well I´m sorry it´s a really short one, but that´s all for this week. Thank you all for your prayers and your love! I love you and think of your often! Have a great week!

Hermana Walton
Last weeks email...

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Paige Walton

May 26 (7 days ago)
to me, Elliot, Tyler, Luke, Whitney
Hey fam! 

Well I´m running a little short on time today so this might be a little shorter than normal. But things are going well here! I´m finally settling in to the new area and getting to know it. It´s a lot different than my other areas and the work is different too, but it´s a good different. It´ll just take some time to adapt to more than anything else. There are a lot of Africans that live in Cartagena and in our area and they speak a lot more english than they do spanish (although their english can be really hard to understand) so it´s interesting to teach in english. It´s actually a lot trickier that I thought it would be. After having done everything gospel related in spanish for the last 10 months, it´s weird to have to say it in english again. But I guess it´s good practice.

Well nothing too exciting to report this week. Hna Samuelson left early Tuesday morning and since then we´ve been just a 2-some again. Of course trios have their pros and we really did have a lot of fun together, missionary life lends itself a lot more to just a normal 2-some companionship. So yes, we do love Hna Samuelson and miss her, but at the same time things are going a little smoother with just the 2 of us. 

As for investigators, there are 2 that are really great and have potential! One is names Pepe. He´s a middle-aged Spanish man and he´s great! We just started teaching him this last week and he´s so open and excited to learn. He´s had a really hard life but I think it´s about time he found the gospel and let it change him. 

The other one is Alícia. She´s a young spanish mom. The hermanas found her through english classes. She´s way cool! She´s got 2 really cute little kids and is super open. She says she doesn´t think she´ll ever convert to our religion, but then at the same time she asked at the end of our lesson last week what she could do to make her life better and to be in better standing with the Lord. Haha, well of course we bore testimony of the church and how it really is so much more than just another religion. We think it might take a little time, but she´s going to know it´s true. She´s reading the Book of Mormon and has no doubts or anything like that. She´s starting to get her testimony, she just has to recognize it now. But we´re really excited about her! 

Well I´m out of time, sorry this was a little shorter than normal, but know that I love you all and that you´re always in my prayers and I think of you all often. Have an awesome week!

Hermana Walton