Jello Pics from Elder Alba's Mom

I gave a haircut

Everything is going pretty good over here. I love the music here.

So one day we were walking and this guy said hi to us and we started talking to him. His name is Keni and he is 29. He is super cool and we have been teaching him a little bit. He is really nice and pretty shy. He came to church with us this Sunday and he said he felt good. He is pretty different and he needs friends so I'm really happy that we found him and he is just a really cool guy.

I don't know what the missionaries that were here before us did, but there are these two kids, Papo and Carlos, that have been going to the church for two months and hadn't talked with missionaries yet. Carlos' family is pretty cool but they are a little bit of a challenge, but I like that a lot.

It is starting to get hot here again and sometimes it is horrible. Nobody is ever home from 3 to 5 so we have a hard time finding people to teach and just walk in the hot sun forever. But also it's really cool here and I love living in a tropical climate.

I cut Elder Guajardo's hair and it looks amazing. He cut my hair and it could've been worse for his first time. The other picture is of me and a few missionaries from our zone.

The mission is going good. Sometimes its hard and I still have challenges but I feel very strongly that I am supposed to be here and that this is the best thing for me right now. I feel like my perspective on the world has gotten so much more broad. Life is hard and we all have challenges. We can choose the easy paths that bring short term happiness, but that will never take us where we want to go. If we are willing to take the harder paths and do the things we should be doing we will always be happier. Its not always easiest, but you will never regret making the right choice. This has been some of the hardest 6 months of my life and it is still hard sometimes, but I am so happy that I came to the Dominican Republic. The church is true. God is real and he loves us. Jesus loves us and we can find real lasting happiness through him and his suffering for us and our sins and trials. 

Elder Eliason

Jell-O

Hello Everybody

This week has been pretty good. We are still working hard and we have found so many people to teach. We are so blessed here in La Española and there are so many people that are ready for the gospel. 

One of our first days we contacted this one house and this guy and his wife let us in and we had a good lesson. He said that he always saw the missionaries pass and they were always ready to accept them with love, but we finally found them. He prayed and said he feels good about the church and he has been reading and said that he could try to get work of on Sunday so that he could come to church. His name is Junior and his wife is Ofelia and they are both probably 20 years old. I'm really happy for them!

We were walking on this dirt road and these guys asked us if we wanted coconuts so they cut one open for me and I drank it under a palm tree! All the people here are so nice and will just yell "God Bless You" at us when they are driving by.

We also have been making a lot of jello this week and decided that it would be a good idea if we filled the fridge. So we did. I love Jello and the Dominican Republic!

New Area!

Sorry I didn't write last week. I didn't have a lot of time, but...the last two weeks have been crazy.

Transfers were this week and so I left my first area Flamboyanes. There are so many cool people there and it was really sad saying goodbye to all of them.

I got transferred to La Espanola which is to the north east of

Santiago. Me and Elder Alba from Utah both got moved here and so we are both new here. There haven't been missionaries here since December so there is a lot of work to do. The area is super big because there should be 4 Elders here but it is just us two. We live with other Elders super far away from where we always are because some not so good stuff happened in the old house and it was expensive. I live with Elder Guajardo who was my companion in the MTC and Elder Hooker from Trinidad and Tobago. We all speak English so I'm not getting a lot of practice in Spanish haha. 

This area is super cool and there are a lot of hills and a giant river and some big cliffs. The members are super cool and we have already found a lot of people that are ready for the Gospel. Everything is going pretty good right now and I'm excited to be here in a new area with so much work to do! It is pretty fun.

The first picture is of me and Elder Cortez, Hermana Estofanero and Hermana Niceler.

The second is a picture of Alejandro. He is super cool. He got baptized right before I got to my first area and he is super funny and old. He is really good at dominos and he got kind of emotional when I went to say goodbye. I love him.

The third is me on a cliff in this neighborhood. It is super cool. I love this place!

This place is NUTZ

Hey

This week went by super fast but also super crazy. Just so everybody knows a little more about where I live, here is what happened this week...

At 4 AM we heard a crash in our house and one of the windows was broken. There are bars on the windows, but still somebody was there. We called the zone leaders and they called the cops and they didn't find anything. But there were like 7 cops in our house at 4:45 in the morning.

We were teaching a guy in a colmado and these 2 dudes started beating each other up. They stopped and one ran away and the other came back yelling with a machete, but nothing happened.

We walked past a cock fighting ring slash stadium.

We almost saw 2 big dogs kill each other in a fight.

But something really good happened. We didn't have anything to do and we felt like we should go to this one house that we contacted a long time ago. We shared with the whole family and it was super good. They have a lot of questions and are super prepared. I'm super excited for them!

Also we went to Wendy's in Santiago!

I love you all. The church is true!

The DR is cool

I said I was going to write more this week but I don't have a lot of time again haha. The Dominican Republic is super cool and everything is going good now.

The other day we called the old investigator named Joan. We went to his house and he told us he finished the Book of Mormon completely and he is finally ready to get baptized. If everything goes good he will be baptized the 17th of this month!

This week we went contacting in this giant neighborhood and there are so many rich people here. Nobody wanted to talk to us but we got to see some gigantic houses and nice cars.

Yinelis got baptized this week! I baptized her and it was super good. She is 9 and she is super smart and has a lot of faith. We have been working with her grandma for a while but she isn't progressing a lot but I know Yinelis is going to be blessed because of it. We had to move 2 times because of this giant party called Carnaval. I don't even know what they celebrate but they just drink and do wild stuff. 

Today for P-day we went up one of the mountains here. It was super cool and we played football on the mountain. It was super fun and I miss playing sports.

Pictures, me and my comp in the back of a truck and some wild thing they built in the street for Carnaval, me and Gabriel he is really cool, Me and Yinelis!

I can't believe its already February. Almost Valentine's Day too. And if you want to send me anything like a nice letter send it here!

SDQ 8013

PO BOX 025725

Miami, FL 33102 5725

Spanish Scriptures

This week went by super fast.

Rosa, the lady that found us, is super interested. She has so many questions and she is super humble and listens really good. The transfer ends in like 3 weeks and I think I might leave Flamboyanes which is really sad because I want to see her get baptized. 

Me and my companion are doing really good. He is super funny and I haven't been angry in so long. I feel really good and I like the mission more now. I stopped reading the scriptures in English because I can understand good enough in Spanish and need to learn more.

We had a zone conference this week and I got to see a bunch of my friends again. It has been raining so much the last few weeks and our street fills up with water up the the doorstep basically because the drainage stinks here. 

I'm doing really good. I'll write more next week. Love you all!

Hey

Hey everybody!

This week was really good. I love my new companion! We get along really good and we work so much harder. Three cool things happened this week...

We were walking along this giant road and there were these puppies that somebody dumped on the side of the road. We couldn't just leave them there so we walked to a colmado and bought milk and bread for them. They were so hungry! We took this box and put them in and carried them to this field where we know puppies live. So we were really happy to help.

We were walking down this street that we have walked down so many times and we felt like we should go contact this house. The lesson was pretty good and after Anderson told us that he prayed 4 days ago that he could find a church to go to. So that was super awesome!

The other day we were trying to find this girl the missionaries here used to teach in this neighborhood that I had never been in the last 3 months. We couldn't find the house and so we were going to leave the street but then there was this lady that asked us if we were with a church. We went to her house on Sunday and it was so good. She told us she talked to the missionaries one time and they gave her a Book of Mormon and she read a lot but couldn't find them again. She told us she has prayed so much because she wants to do what is right. She told us that every time she read the Book of Mormon there started to pop up on her phone stuff from the church and she got freaked out haha. But she basically has a testimony of the church even before we found her so we are really happy!

My life is getting a lot better. Me and Elder Cortez are working harder and we are starting to have more success. My testimony has grown so much and I know that God answers our prayers!

Love you all.

Elder Eliason

NEW COMPANION

HEY!

This week was pretty good. Transfers were on Wednesday and I got a new companion! His name is Elder Cortez from Nicaragua. He is pretty cool and even better we never fight! We have been working a lot harder in this area than with my old companion so hopefully we can start seeing some more success. 

This week it rained so much which is weird because it hardly ever rains here. The whole entire street on the side of you house got flooded and it was so cool. Whenever it rains there is always mud for like 3 days after too.

Our area is kind of struggling right now. We are going to start dropping people this week because they aren't progressing very well. Its kind of hard but also its really good because we will be able to focus more on finding people that are ready and we wont have to waste so much time.

My Spanish is getting really good and I can basically communicate whatever I want now. With my new companion, I realized that I can actually do a lot. I realized that Elder Mieses kind of dominated the conversation a lot and my new comp sometimes doesn't talk so I'm like oh, ok I can talk to these people. I've realized that I learned a lot with my old companion and even though it was really hard I feel like God has a plan for Elder Eliason and he knows that I would grow the most with Elder Mieses. 

The mission has started to get better and I'm starting to be more happy! The church is true and the Book of Mormon changes lives. I've realized that nothing is easy, but if we work through the hard stuff and do what we should be doing we will be blessed. 

Elder Eliason and Elder Cortez

Elder Mieses, Elder Eliason, Sister Niceler, Sister Lynch

4 Months

Hey everyone!

As of saturday I have 4 months in the mission wow! that means I have less than 20 now! Today is my last day with my companion and I really struggled with him but I also learned a lot. I feel like I was put in this position to struggle and to grow. Looking back I feel like I didnt know anything and I there was so many things that I could do better. Ive learned so much and I still have so long to learn more.

President Monson died this week and it was pretty sad. The last two things that he talked about it conference were charity and the book of mormon. I read both of his talks. Both were really short but I learned so much and he really was a prophet called of God. He said that we should read the book of mormon every single day and I know that if we do our lives will change.

The mission is getting better and better everyday and my spanish too. I can almost understand everybody now and Ive started to not be so young in the mission.

Also this is me in front of a giant catholic church.

See you next year

Feliz año Nuevo!

I had a pretty good week. Almost everything was closed yesterday because it was the first so that is why Im writing on a tuesday. Everybody just blasted music and drank a lot of beer new year eve but I went to bed which was a lot nicer. New years day was pday and we went to get our hair cut and I think the guy is done then he flips the chair back and starts shaving my face for me and he spoke english and was really cool. We ate at one of the only places that was open and went to the roof of the hermanas apartment building which was super cool.

We have been struggling lately to find people but also we are really lucky. We have to walk to this place at least 5 or 6 miles away to get to this neighborhood but there are good people there. We saw this old investigator in the street yesterday and asked her when she was going to let us baptize her and she said next week or something so we are lucky haha.

Everything is going pretty good and I get a new companion in a week which is nice because we really struggle to get along sometimes.

Elder Eliason