un año, y actividad de estaca - One Year & Stake Activity

Well gang it has now been a whole 370 days sense I have seen you when you dropped me off at the cárcel que también se llama la CCM. But it's all good jaja.  I miss you guys a ton and hope you know that I  think of you all the time, everyday! But it's fine because I'm doing something amazing! Something I've always wanted to do and I'm so happy I'm here! Just always remember that and know that I love y'all! So as you can tell from that note that I have passed a year and I may have or may not have celebrated it by burning a shirt. It's kinda sad cause I have to do my laundry by hand so why burn it? well.. It just seemed like the right thing to do!

More than that we had this huge activity in the stake this week where on Saturday we had a talent show with everyone it was a huge success! We had up to 500 people there! We  had about 20 different shows with people and songs it was a huge hit and the last show was a play by the missionaries, and guess who had the main roll, yup this guy! The guy who has never acted in all his life! So that was fun, someone has a video of it somewhere so I'll try and send it to you. What we did was the story of two people that knew each other in the pre-mortal world and then they find each other in the world through the gospel!  It was dope but I think my acting career is over.  But the activity was until almost 11 at night and our mission presidente called us and was so happy cause he has never heard of something with that many members and good so he was way happy and fine that we were out so late, kinda funny.

Also this whole week has been a huge party if you have seen my area is about 30 minutes from a city called Quillacollo where that is about 40 minutes from Cochabamba so it's really far and this week was a huge party in Quillacollo almost the whole city goes there and just drinks all day and sleeps all night. After that, they do it again. for about 5 days in a row so it was just about impossible to find people home and even harder to find them sober ha-ha but the party is over and now its my time to call them to repent!

Yeah sorry kinda lame week the big hit out of all things was the activity we now have about 10 new references from our ward and a ton of happy members it was way awesome!

All is well here love you guys!

--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

Mana Tiempo - Quechua meaning no...Translation - No Time

Well if you don't know Quechua, like many don't mana means ¨no¨haha and Arì is ÿes¨ so as you can tell I didn't have much time this week.  As you might have seen from maps in Cocha I'm very far from all the missionaries here, my zone leaders live about 40 minutes away and my mission president is about another hour from that. so it's far.  But this week we had just about everything going on, as interviews, zone conference and our weekly reunions. but its cool we just don't have anytime to study which is kinda hard I'm still making my way through the Bible and Book of Mormon. I'm in Juan 6 y 3 Nefi 12, both are so awesome I love reading my scriptures!

Well let's see here new things this week. We had a really cool contact this week with this dude who lives in the same house as an investigador, we shared the message of the restoration with him and he stopped us half way through and just gave his testimony of the fact that Jesus was a prophet and had 12 apostles and the true church has that... and we were speechless cause lots of times nobody knows that and it was way cool to hear him say that! Turns out he was a Evanglico preacher! he knew his stuff, but we had a good conversation with him and he said we could pass by and talk with him anytime which was cool and nice of him to say.

Oh yeah! the other week we found a Muslim! Here! in South America home of the Catholics! He is one of 30 here in Bolivia! and he lives, and works in our area! He is way cool and also knows a ton about religion! He was black, not very many of them here. But he was way cool and we just pass by and talk with him every now and then for a few minutes which is cool.

Something kinda cool going on this week is we have a huge activity coming on where we have the whole stake doing a talent show and they have been working like animals to get it huge and us too, we are doing a play, about a missionary.. real original but its about a dude and a missionary and they knew each other before in the vida preterrenal and now they have to find each other in this world its cool I'm the main dude kinda lame cause I got a truckload of parts but it's cool and will be a way big success.  It's this Saturday!

Well gang sorry that is like all I got for you I got some pics in my drive with zone conference, my normal breakfast and today we went to this really cool like forest and had a BBQ with the zone!
ALLISWELLHERE LOVE YOU GUYS!
SO HAPPY YOU GOT THAT LITTLE PACKAGE! LOVE YAALLL
--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

Zone Conference

My normal breakfast 

Oh, how we love pictures!!!

Members Giving us Referrals and a Visit from someone from Home

This week we got a wonderful surprise from a friend that I met from my work who had her kids in treatment and is from Cochabamba.  She was traveling there and circumstances ended up going back to the area that was sort of in the area where Caleb was serving.  She found another set of missionaries who gave his contact information to her and she called him and asked if he wanted to send anything home to his family.  Which he did.  A wonderful picture of the Savior, ties for Wayne and his brothers and the best; handwritten letters to each one of us! I will forever be grateful to Lorena for seeking him out and bringing these treasures home to us. She says he looks so great.  She said he is so funny, his shoes are very dusty, his Spanish is fluent and he needs new shirts; he is so thin...ha-ha.

We had a pretty weird week the truth. now that I'm in a trio it's so weird like when you start the mission you have your comp and you are always with him, and then when you are in a trio it's with your comp and then your other comp. it's kinda weird to now have three of us always together but its OK for now.  We had to move the whole house around to get him fitted in we now have our beds all together in the main room and had to change our room around and put all our closets and stuff in there. It's really weird but it's alright so far. 

So first off that one family we are teaching are way awesome but literally have no time for us they have gone to Sucre for almost the whole week and could not come to church again with us which was sad but they are way awesome and they still want us to visit with them which will be good, but nothing new for them this week. Sorry gang. 

But we also got a reference from our Elders quorum presidente last week and we finally found a time to meet with them on Tuesday. It's a young couple who are 20 and 21 they are way cool and best friends with the Elders quorum pres. We went to visit them last week and the whole family was there, cause they had a brother pass away just a few days ago so we shared a short message with all of them and then yesterday, Sunday they all came to church, well like 5 people but that is a lot for a ward of about 40 so that was awesome and we visited them again in the night and we ate some Steak!  It was really good everyone was laughing cause I was talking to them in Quechua but I only  know like 15 phrases and that's it ha ha but it was a really good time and again shared a cool message with them. 

Yeah nothing really new this week but all is good here, love ya guys and hope everything is going well up north, something funny it snowed here, well in the mountains, its really pretty and looks like the mountains in Utah when there is snow on them.  I also forgot my camera so i have no photos sorry gang but all is well here.  Love ya guys!ª 

-- 

- Elder Clayton

Bolivia Cochabamba

Triooo...Sipe, Sipe, Sipe

Well like I said before my comp is famous for emergency transfers but this time we are not leaving but we will be in a trio! The E. Miller was training a new elder but he went home early. So now he will be with us for the next four weeks! I'm excited but not really ha ha, its hard enough to get in houses with two people now three. But it has be good and I hope it all will go smooth.

well a funny story my comp ate something really bad on Wednesday night and he payed the price cause he was throwing up like crazy all night in the toilet, the sink, and all over the floor. Nasty right. but to make it worse we had no water! For now three days! So do you know how that water went down or how we cleaned the sink¿ we didn't cause there was no water! When things got chilled down I woke up and had to use our good drinking water to clean everything up and flush the toilet, freakin sucked, didn't get water back until the next day! How is not having water here in Bolivia... normal¿ if this happened in the states the whole world would know about it, and be a national dilemma! But I got it cleaned up and we are all good now.

Okay good story. The family that I talked about last week we visited them again and are so excited and love us, we shared the plan of Salvation with them and they loved it and had tons of questions for us they are so awesome, and have a baptismal date now which is cool they how ever could not come to church this week because they had a meeting cause they own some company in Cochabamba it was cool and we will teach them again this week super prepared!  When we were leaving they asked us for something to read and we gave them a book of Mormon and were really excited to read it.

Yeah that is like all I got today the Sipe Sipe trio will be hitting you guys up next week call us Sipe Sipe Sipe, love you guys have a good one.  All is well here! And I added some more photos too! (note from mom: I could only find this one)

--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

De Oro - Of Gold & Riding to Church in a Car

Whats up Fam? -  I just wanted to start out this letter by telling a really cool story that happened this week.  So it was I think Wednesday and we were knocking some doors when we came to this really big house in the middle of nowhere. so we knocked it. and out comes a dude maybe 50 years old and his wife, they invite us in and we share a message of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, they loved it and the Book of Mormon.  They had a few questions about the Sabbath day and the Word of Wisdom we told them and showed some scriptures, and they were amazed when the wife looked at us and says. you know I have lots of friends with lots of other religions and I have lots of doubts. I prayed yesterday, to find the way of Christ. and here you are. The spirit was so strong! It just filled the room, We told them this is the spirit testifying to you that our message is true. We ended in a prayer and told them we will get you guys for church.  Sunday came and we were knocking their door again to get them but nobody answered we started walking away when they come around the corner in their car! and said they went almost 20 minutes early (better than our bishopric) to church and then remembered that we would come get them, so they came back, and picked us up! first time I went to church in a car sense I was home! It was awesome. but they loved church and we have another lesson with them this week!

Also I got my package! That was so awesome this dude calls me up on night at like 6 and says hello I'm looking for Mr. Clayton, well I'm Elder Clayton but I can answer to that too. ha ha we met with him and he gave it to me! Now I'm stoked with Reese's and a new chess board, I've played my comp a few times and he's never really played before so it's kinda easy. so I made it easier and I play without my Queen... I still win.  It's fun and he really likes playing ha ha

Some of the photos that I sent in are of my comp and I in this pueblo called Parotaní it's super country just dirt roads and it's really like Betanzos and we found a cool bridge about 40 feet in the air and crossed it, also it was my Pensionistas birthday! and we ate some more cake! This is now my fourth Birthday party here we eat a lot of cake in this house haha, I don't mind. Yeah all is good here no complaints love y'all.  Take care and all is well!

-Elder Clayton
Cochabamba Bolivia

 New Companion

Just Workin....and Smiley Faced Shoes!

Hey whats up fam?  We got some new transfers here and my comp is leaving to head to Potosi and I'll be getting my new comp E. Brieño from Peru, he has like 9 months in the mission or so, I know him a little but he;s kinda famous cause he has had problems with all his comps.. and five emergency transfers, I'm really nervous but hope I can just get along with the guy, but it's all good tengo fe  (I have faith - translated)

We have been teaching this one dude named Juan Carlos for a few weeks ago and now and being vacations we haven't seen him for like two weeks but we finally got to talk to him this week again and he is still really excited about the church and we are going to get him a baptismal date this week! he is really cool just kinda quiet is all. But we will get him some homies and he will be golden!

One thing that was way cool this week is I went on on a split with a Elder Rugel from Ecuador and we got up and went to this little pueblo in the morning my comp never wants to go there so I go when I can in splits and we went and just knocked some doors and contacted for a few hours and we found this one girl started talking to her told her we were misionaros and the church of JCoLDS and after like 10 minutes of talking she goes well actually I have a church [the Mormons[thats what she said! I started laughing and said we are the Mormons and she showed us her BoM she was a member! ha ha just visiting this pueblo for the weekend ha ha super funny and told  her it was nice to meet  her but way funny contact.

If you have ever looked up my map here, in Sipe Sipe it's almost as big as all of Cocha not kidding and there is a little place called tres cruzes where lives a family of 6 who are members but live almost 2 hours from the nearest church so they have the ordenanza (ordinance) en there house to take the sacrament so we went with a member and he took us there we shared a message with them and they were so humble! they have a house maybe as big as our kitchen and it;s just full of bunk beds they were so happy we came and it was really fun to talk with them I wanna go there one Sunday and take the sacrament with them but it will be hard, they don't speak Spanish.. I think my whole mission will be like this just Quechua every where I go!

This week and every second Saturday of the month we go to the temple with our ward! It's awesome cause if we get investigadors to go we can go too, so we got three people there and shared a message about the temples that we have, it was way awesome the spirit is so strong and we didn't even go in! Something that is really hard here is we almost never go to the temple, the missionaries last time I went was maybe in February to do a session but it's all good I'll go a ton when I get home! and I'll take all you guys too!

Something that I've started is in my studies I'm studying 30 minutes of the Book of Mormon and then reading the New Testament for 30 minutes I'm now in Mark 10 and I love it the life of the Savior is so awesome, He was perfect and just wanted to help others and that is just what God wants for each of us is try to be like Him, follow Him. Try our best to do what is right and help others whenever we can. Rey de Reys (King of Kings -translation)

  Elder Rugel and I; he's dope

 This is the house I was talking about and a fun hat I got to wear

 The work and la felicidad (the happiness, translation)

- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

Vacaciones y copa mundial - Vacations & World Cup

Hey whats up fam! Another week has gone by and it was a pretty hard one. So as you know the World Cup is right now and I'm in South America where, everyone is watching it; like everyone. You can walk down a street and every store has the game on ha ha so its been fun but really hard to find more people to teach and to make it harder this week and the next one there is no school so it's even harder cause everyone is on vacation and visiting other areas with there family, so I don't really have much to report except for a lot of contacting and trying to find people in any way that we can!

But I do have some funny stories.  So one day in the morning I was making Mate, because I love mate and I was heating up the water and I heard a huge bang! like a firework or something so I turned around and I look at the plug in the wall and its just a huge flame! like two feet high just in the wall where I plugged in the water heater so it's just a huge flame and i'm blowing it out with my mouth ha ha but luckily this flame knocked the power out, so the flame went out too it was really funny but my comp was really mad cause he was showering and the hot water for the shower turned off but whatever haha our Dueño fixed us up and he thought my story was funny but it's all good the power works and our house is fine.

So one thing that is really hard here is we have kinda a spider problem here. Last week I killed a spider that was about three inches in diameter and when I first saw it I though it was a mouse! Well I found another one this week and it was about the same size I threw my tag by it to show the size but this one is smaller! but when I killed it (cause my comp is too scared, both times) it made a huge like crunch like stepping on cereal! it was so nasty I hate Spiders.

Another photo that I put in my drive is me with Abarkas these are a type of shoe that everyone has here! like everyone, haha they are made from tires and are way heavy people use them for everything, making cement, working in the field or what ever they want haha and I had to get some they cost about 6 dollars so I felt fine about it.

Something that is really hard here in Sipe Sipe is working with the members they are all really cool and help us a lot but we try and meet with them too and visit them but there are only about 40 max members here so its kinda hard to find time to help them all, but I'm working hard on that and finding time for all of them, we had some lessons with members this week which was really dope and I love teaching members and its perfect for asking for references! but I love the work here and the ward, I hope I stay here for a while. But life is good my interview with President was really good and he told me my comp will leave this cambio (transfer) so I'm  happy for that.  I love you guys.  All is well!

I had photos of all the things I just talked about but i think my memory just got another virus on it, so I'll try and send them but I've been working on it for like 15 minutes and I can't figure it out, but I can retake them.

Love you guys.  Sorry, go look at the folder with E.Baros en Betanzos I put a photo of me and my Pensionista and her mom, they are the nicest people I have ever met and I love them so much.  Real bummer I only have one photo of them but it's better than nothing! (I didn't get any photos; so hopefully next week)


--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba