Dear Family,
So I moved into the Camden apartment last night. We took the train down from New Brunswick which was quite an ordeal. We took a train from New Brunswick to Trenton and then we took a train from Trenton to Camden. I didn't have that much stuff to take on the train but one of the english elders from New Brunswick was also coming down to Camden and he had a ot of junk. I am not his biggest fan and this will be transfer three with him in the same apartment so we will see what will happen.
I was sad to leave New Brunswick but Camden is really cool. I am glad to get away from some of the elders that are in New Brunswick though. The one engish elder that was staying has really been wearing on my nerves so I am glad to be starting over new with people that I do not know.
The Camden apartment is in the old RCA building called the Vector. It is a really nice place, definitely the nicest apartment in the mission, and also that most dangerous area in the mission. (don't worry mom I will be fine) Later today we are going to cover my bike in seran wrap and duck tape to make it look like it is not worth anything so that it will not get stolen. I bought an extra lock and my new companion has two locks all ready so I am sure that we will be fine. Elder Rhoton is my new companion and he only has one less transfer than me but for what ever reason they made me senior companion and district leader over him. I am going to have to work really hard to live up to the new resposibilty. He seems like a really nice guy but he does not know any spanish at all and I have heard that his trainer didn't help him out much, so that should be fun. I am really excited to be able to work down here and we will definitely baptism someone this transfer.
Brunswick will have a baptism this coming sunday. A lady named Gabriela is going to get baptized. She actually ordered a finding faith in christ video and that is how we found her. I have been teaching her all along the way and it is cool to see her get baptized. I don't know if I will be able to go to the baptism because I am down here now in Camden but I will ask President Winegar and hopefully he will let me go. I really like president winegar; he has done great things for this mission. I will be alot closer to him now that I am in Camden. Sometimes in New Brunswick you feel isolated from the rest of the mission. I don't really know if that is a good thing or a bad thing but done here in Camden we are really closer to everything that goes on. We also are at the intersection of two train lines that take us anywhere in New Jersey which is pretty cool. The river line goes from here to trenton and the Patco goes from Philly, through Camden to Atlantic City. (There is a great view of philly form the roof of our apartment)
And in the midst of everything that work progresses. It is really amazing how the Lord's hand is in everything that we do. I am just going to leave it at that and then I will write a letter explaining myself because we have to go to transfer meeting.
Love,
Elder Haslam
PS Mom, I am sure it would be fine to forward Mahonri's emails and mine. I really want to hear from him and if you could send me his address I would appreciate it.
#1 Christmas gift: socks "you can never have too many pairs of socks" - Albus Dumbledor
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Transfers
Dear Family,
So first off I am getting transferred to Camden, NJ. It is the city right across the river from Philly. I am really excited to go there. Everyone that I talked to that has served there says that they loved it. I am going down there with Elder Rhoton, who was a greenie last transfer so I will be senior companion. I was pretty surprised when I found out because I was pretty sure that I was going to be staying in New Brunswick for at least one more transfer with Elder Johnson but I guess not. I am going to moving down there next week Wednesday so I will put my new address at the end of this email so that you guys can just send everything to that apartment down there. I am going to miss New Brunswick because the people here are really great and I love all of the Hondurans that are in our branch here(especially their cooking). This past monday we had baleadas at la casa de la familia Paz, and they were really good. There are kinda like tacos but honduran style. They use flour tortillas and cover them in frijoles and then put in eggs, cheese, and sour cream in them. They were really good, I at five of them. I am not sure how to make them but I am sure if you look up on the internet how to do it you can find the recipe. And you can just buy flour tortillas and make everything else.
I fixed my bike and it is running really well. I went and bought a new chain so everything should be up to working order now. I have been told that I have to make some adjustments to my bike though so that it won't get stolen. I guess the missionaries usually wrap their bikes in trash bags so that the bikes look like they are not worth anything. I am also going to buy a new lock for my bike (probably a U-lock) so that I can lock my bike to the pole and then but the lock I have right now through my tires. It should be really fun so I am way excited to be going down there. Elder Ritchie (my trainer) with be my zone leader down there so it will be really cool to be around him again.
As far as news goes for the work of the Lord, it is amazing. This past week we found a really cool family and they are reading the book of mormon. It is always really cool to teach families because they are few and far between (the ones that are married at least). Usually most people are single and working here to support their families back in their own countries. And more often than not they break lots of commandments because they are lonely. But it is always really amazing to see the changes in people as they realize that the gospel is true and they want to follow it. There is a member in our branch who is from Nicaragua and his wife and daughter just got baptized back in his city there. And it is really incredible to see how excited he is to be able to go to the temple with them. He hasn't seen his family in 3 years and I love to listen to him talk about his wife. He is always really concerned about how they are doing and how he can be a better man to help them out. He says that he is going to go home in another year and that then they will all go through the temple together. His name is Denis, and I am so grateful to have gotten to know him.
That is the best part about being a missionary; seeing the hand of the Lord in other people's lives as they learn and grow in the gospel. Nothing has made me happier, and I am so glad that I have been given this opportunity to be a servant to the hispanics here in New Jersey.
I hope that everyone is doing well. And please spread the word that my address has changed, thankyou
Love,
Elder Haslam
Elder Haslam
One Market St. Apt #439
Camden, NJ 08102
So first off I am getting transferred to Camden, NJ. It is the city right across the river from Philly. I am really excited to go there. Everyone that I talked to that has served there says that they loved it. I am going down there with Elder Rhoton, who was a greenie last transfer so I will be senior companion. I was pretty surprised when I found out because I was pretty sure that I was going to be staying in New Brunswick for at least one more transfer with Elder Johnson but I guess not. I am going to moving down there next week Wednesday so I will put my new address at the end of this email so that you guys can just send everything to that apartment down there. I am going to miss New Brunswick because the people here are really great and I love all of the Hondurans that are in our branch here(especially their cooking). This past monday we had baleadas at la casa de la familia Paz, and they were really good. There are kinda like tacos but honduran style. They use flour tortillas and cover them in frijoles and then put in eggs, cheese, and sour cream in them. They were really good, I at five of them. I am not sure how to make them but I am sure if you look up on the internet how to do it you can find the recipe. And you can just buy flour tortillas and make everything else.
I fixed my bike and it is running really well. I went and bought a new chain so everything should be up to working order now. I have been told that I have to make some adjustments to my bike though so that it won't get stolen. I guess the missionaries usually wrap their bikes in trash bags so that the bikes look like they are not worth anything. I am also going to buy a new lock for my bike (probably a U-lock) so that I can lock my bike to the pole and then but the lock I have right now through my tires. It should be really fun so I am way excited to be going down there. Elder Ritchie (my trainer) with be my zone leader down there so it will be really cool to be around him again.
As far as news goes for the work of the Lord, it is amazing. This past week we found a really cool family and they are reading the book of mormon. It is always really cool to teach families because they are few and far between (the ones that are married at least). Usually most people are single and working here to support their families back in their own countries. And more often than not they break lots of commandments because they are lonely. But it is always really amazing to see the changes in people as they realize that the gospel is true and they want to follow it. There is a member in our branch who is from Nicaragua and his wife and daughter just got baptized back in his city there. And it is really incredible to see how excited he is to be able to go to the temple with them. He hasn't seen his family in 3 years and I love to listen to him talk about his wife. He is always really concerned about how they are doing and how he can be a better man to help them out. He says that he is going to go home in another year and that then they will all go through the temple together. His name is Denis, and I am so grateful to have gotten to know him.
That is the best part about being a missionary; seeing the hand of the Lord in other people's lives as they learn and grow in the gospel. Nothing has made me happier, and I am so glad that I have been given this opportunity to be a servant to the hispanics here in New Jersey.
I hope that everyone is doing well. And please spread the word that my address has changed, thankyou
Love,
Elder Haslam
Elder Haslam
One Market St. Apt #439
Camden, NJ 08102
Thanksgiving is tomorrow...
Dear Family,
So first an update on my foot. I am doing perfectly fine and it is healing up nicely and I took the stitches out this morning. It looks like it will be a pretty good scar. I am being careful on it but I am definitely not letting it slow me down at all.
In other news I have had some bike problems this past week that have left us stranded far from home. The first major problem that I had was that we were biking home form the far side of our area and I stood up to pedal fast through an intersection and as I tried to pedal my chain snapped. I was able to control the bike so that I didn't fall but the pedal did whip around and give me a big bruise on my thigh. So I got out of the road, picked up my chain, and we started walking. We walked for about 45 min before the english elders could bring me the bike tools I needed to fix the chain. I then tried for about a half an hour to fix my chain in the cold. I couldn't really do anything because a couple of the links in the chain had frozen up (the chain has had a lot of abuse) so we called a member to pick us up and our bikes. So by the time we got home about two hours had gone by and I was very cold and dirty. Sergio (the member) was nice enough to take us to the rest of our apointments that night. I came back that night and throughly cleaned my chain and put it back together. Unfortunately it was about 3 links too short so the next day I was limited on the gears I could use. But the bike made it all the way through the day until 7 pm last night. This time I was pedalling up a hill and the chain broke. Fortunately it was right next to our next cita so we just locked up our bikes and went in. So after that we walked home, it only took us about 30 min because parts of it were down hill and I could coast a good part of the way. So today we are going to go to the bike shop and buy a new chain. It was a pretty eventful week.
So this Thanksgiving I am grateful for warm jackets, helmets, and great members that are willing to help out the missionaries.
For dinner tomorrow we are going to a member's house. She is from El Salvador but goes to the english ward so we will see how it goes. We are having a preThanksgiving dinner tonight at a member's house (Hermana Paz) which I am very excited for. She is definitely one of the best cooks in the branch and is a really nice lady. She is always helping us out so last Sat. we went and cleaned out her garage for her. It was a huge mess so we went over in the morning and took everthing out, sweep it, threw lots away and then re-organized it. (Thanks Dad, saturday chores are helping me out) I really had a good time doing it and she made us hot chocolate which was nice especially since it was some in the high 30's outside.
It has definitely cooled off and the humidity will cut right through you if you are not careful. Thank you for the sweater it has really helped. When it is really cold I wear my longjohns, a white shirt, sweater, jacket, gloves, beanie, and scarf. I have gotten really good at wrapping my scarf and I can get it so that only my eyes show when I am riding my bike. I really love it here on the east coast. I have never been happier in my entire life.
We are teaching are really cool lady from Honduras, and she is going to be baptized on the 6th of Dec. It is really cool to she her take the steps to get ready to be baptized and she is really excited. She has a really crazy personailty but is pretty funny when you get talking to her. She told us a story about how a couple years back she got in a fight and broke another girl's nose. She is a live wire but willing to change in anyway so she can go to church and be baptized.
So I think that is the main news from out here in the east. I hope that everthing is going well back hope and that everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving.
Love,
Elder Haslam
So first an update on my foot. I am doing perfectly fine and it is healing up nicely and I took the stitches out this morning. It looks like it will be a pretty good scar. I am being careful on it but I am definitely not letting it slow me down at all.
In other news I have had some bike problems this past week that have left us stranded far from home. The first major problem that I had was that we were biking home form the far side of our area and I stood up to pedal fast through an intersection and as I tried to pedal my chain snapped. I was able to control the bike so that I didn't fall but the pedal did whip around and give me a big bruise on my thigh. So I got out of the road, picked up my chain, and we started walking. We walked for about 45 min before the english elders could bring me the bike tools I needed to fix the chain. I then tried for about a half an hour to fix my chain in the cold. I couldn't really do anything because a couple of the links in the chain had frozen up (the chain has had a lot of abuse) so we called a member to pick us up and our bikes. So by the time we got home about two hours had gone by and I was very cold and dirty. Sergio (the member) was nice enough to take us to the rest of our apointments that night. I came back that night and throughly cleaned my chain and put it back together. Unfortunately it was about 3 links too short so the next day I was limited on the gears I could use. But the bike made it all the way through the day until 7 pm last night. This time I was pedalling up a hill and the chain broke. Fortunately it was right next to our next cita so we just locked up our bikes and went in. So after that we walked home, it only took us about 30 min because parts of it were down hill and I could coast a good part of the way. So today we are going to go to the bike shop and buy a new chain. It was a pretty eventful week.
So this Thanksgiving I am grateful for warm jackets, helmets, and great members that are willing to help out the missionaries.
For dinner tomorrow we are going to a member's house. She is from El Salvador but goes to the english ward so we will see how it goes. We are having a preThanksgiving dinner tonight at a member's house (Hermana Paz) which I am very excited for. She is definitely one of the best cooks in the branch and is a really nice lady. She is always helping us out so last Sat. we went and cleaned out her garage for her. It was a huge mess so we went over in the morning and took everthing out, sweep it, threw lots away and then re-organized it. (Thanks Dad, saturday chores are helping me out) I really had a good time doing it and she made us hot chocolate which was nice especially since it was some in the high 30's outside.
It has definitely cooled off and the humidity will cut right through you if you are not careful. Thank you for the sweater it has really helped. When it is really cold I wear my longjohns, a white shirt, sweater, jacket, gloves, beanie, and scarf. I have gotten really good at wrapping my scarf and I can get it so that only my eyes show when I am riding my bike. I really love it here on the east coast. I have never been happier in my entire life.
We are teaching are really cool lady from Honduras, and she is going to be baptized on the 6th of Dec. It is really cool to she her take the steps to get ready to be baptized and she is really excited. She has a really crazy personailty but is pretty funny when you get talking to her. She told us a story about how a couple years back she got in a fight and broke another girl's nose. She is a live wire but willing to change in anyway so she can go to church and be baptized.
So I think that is the main news from out here in the east. I hope that everthing is going well back hope and that everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving.
Love,
Elder Haslam
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Winter is Coming Quick
Dear Family,
So a quick update on the weather here. It has gotten really cold in the last couple of days. It is pretty interesting on a bike with all of the wind and the cold. It snows on and off but nothing really ever makes it to the ground and it is all pretty mild so far. The wind is pretty biting and sometimes it makes it pretty difficult to ride bikes but that hasn't really stopped us from getting anything done. We just keep riding no matter what the conditions are or what part of town that we are in.
The other day we had a english speaking lady tell us that we shouldn't go to certain parts of town because the were to dangerous. I kinda started to laugh and told her that she just told us to stay out of the areas were we spend 90% of our time. I told her that that is where all of the hispanics are and that we would be fine. She then told us the bike route that we should take home to avoid a supposedly dangerous street; it added about 2 miles if we would have taken it so we just went home the normal way. It was kinda funny to think about how crazy that lady was and even though syhe was really nice she didn't seem to know anything about the hispanic part of town and was trying to avoid it as much as possible. I can understand not going to some of those parts of town at night if you are a woman by yourself but this lady was pretty ridiculous. Maybe we need to step outside of our comfort zone a little and try to understand the other people's side before making judgments. It goes the same for hispanics; lots of them have horrible stereotypes of white people and they don't really want to change them at all. We talk to a guy on the train yesterday from La Ciudad de Mexico and he said that he was kind of ashamed at the hispanics here that refuse to learn english. I just think that it is kinda sad that people don't want to learn about other people and their culture.
Anyways, so the story of my foot. First off I will answer a couple questions I am sure some people have: 1 Yes it was the same left foot that every other accident has happen 2 No I was not wearing anything on my feet because I was in my apartment. Ok so it happened this past friday. One of the elders in my apartment had recently bought a root beer is a glass bottle. He had placed it is the fridge to cool down. I had just finished lunch and went to open the fridge to get the pitcher of water and when I opened the fridge the soda fell out of the fridge and broke on top of my foot. It gave me a good long gash out 2 inches. I of course remained calm and hopped to the bathroom and washed it out in the bathtub. There was a decient amount of blood but not anything super huge. So then I wrapped it up and the english elders to us to the hospital( Robert Wood Johnson). We spent about 3 hours there and the stitched me up and sent me on my way. We went home and I jumped on my bike and we got off to our next appointment. So I have 9 stitches on the top of my left foot and it is not slowing me down at all. The first couple days I limped because I didn't want to bend my foot but now everything is fine. All of the members in our branch have given me advice on what I should do to make it heal quickly. I am not sure if everything they have told me is legal to do in the US. One member gave me 4 600mg penicillin pills from when she had a c-section (I am not going to use those). I actually didn't take any drugs except advil that night. It was all a every painless process.
So everything is good here out in the east. A little cold but really fun. We have tamales waiting for us back at our apartment, so we are going to go cook those. One of our investigators gave them to us so I am very excited. \
Love,
Elder Haslam
PS Mom, I really am fine. I tried to convince Sis Winegar to not call you but that did not work. I am perfectly fine and you don't need to worry. This is really just a minor injury, you have seen much worse.
So a quick update on the weather here. It has gotten really cold in the last couple of days. It is pretty interesting on a bike with all of the wind and the cold. It snows on and off but nothing really ever makes it to the ground and it is all pretty mild so far. The wind is pretty biting and sometimes it makes it pretty difficult to ride bikes but that hasn't really stopped us from getting anything done. We just keep riding no matter what the conditions are or what part of town that we are in.
The other day we had a english speaking lady tell us that we shouldn't go to certain parts of town because the were to dangerous. I kinda started to laugh and told her that she just told us to stay out of the areas were we spend 90% of our time. I told her that that is where all of the hispanics are and that we would be fine. She then told us the bike route that we should take home to avoid a supposedly dangerous street; it added about 2 miles if we would have taken it so we just went home the normal way. It was kinda funny to think about how crazy that lady was and even though syhe was really nice she didn't seem to know anything about the hispanic part of town and was trying to avoid it as much as possible. I can understand not going to some of those parts of town at night if you are a woman by yourself but this lady was pretty ridiculous. Maybe we need to step outside of our comfort zone a little and try to understand the other people's side before making judgments. It goes the same for hispanics; lots of them have horrible stereotypes of white people and they don't really want to change them at all. We talk to a guy on the train yesterday from La Ciudad de Mexico and he said that he was kind of ashamed at the hispanics here that refuse to learn english. I just think that it is kinda sad that people don't want to learn about other people and their culture.
Anyways, so the story of my foot. First off I will answer a couple questions I am sure some people have: 1 Yes it was the same left foot that every other accident has happen 2 No I was not wearing anything on my feet because I was in my apartment. Ok so it happened this past friday. One of the elders in my apartment had recently bought a root beer is a glass bottle. He had placed it is the fridge to cool down. I had just finished lunch and went to open the fridge to get the pitcher of water and when I opened the fridge the soda fell out of the fridge and broke on top of my foot. It gave me a good long gash out 2 inches. I of course remained calm and hopped to the bathroom and washed it out in the bathtub. There was a decient amount of blood but not anything super huge. So then I wrapped it up and the english elders to us to the hospital( Robert Wood Johnson). We spent about 3 hours there and the stitched me up and sent me on my way. We went home and I jumped on my bike and we got off to our next appointment. So I have 9 stitches on the top of my left foot and it is not slowing me down at all. The first couple days I limped because I didn't want to bend my foot but now everything is fine. All of the members in our branch have given me advice on what I should do to make it heal quickly. I am not sure if everything they have told me is legal to do in the US. One member gave me 4 600mg penicillin pills from when she had a c-section (I am not going to use those). I actually didn't take any drugs except advil that night. It was all a every painless process.
So everything is good here out in the east. A little cold but really fun. We have tamales waiting for us back at our apartment, so we are going to go cook those. One of our investigators gave them to us so I am very excited. \
Love,
Elder Haslam
PS Mom, I really am fine. I tried to convince Sis Winegar to not call you but that did not work. I am perfectly fine and you don't need to worry. This is really just a minor injury, you have seen much worse.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Just a Quick Note
Dear Family,
So today is going to be a really busy day so this email is going to have to be a pretty quick one.
So the news this week is that we are teaching a really cool lasy named Gabriela. She is from Honduras and she had requested a video from the church and we started teaching her because of that. We taught her about the restauracion and she was really amazed that some one had seen God and that there were preophets on the earth today. This happened about a month ago but then she disappeared and we could not get in contact with her for about two and a half weeks. So this past week we were finally able to talk to her again and when we were teaching her she told us that she knew what we were teaching was true and that she wanted to get baptized. I was really shocked when I heard her say that, because we hadn't taught her about baptism at all. The only thing that we had done was marked Mosiah 18 because she asked us what is our opinion on baptism. So she ended up reading the entire chapter and then marking a scripture in 3 Nefi 11 that says we must repent and be baptized. These lessons with her have been incredible. She is very excited to learn and she is willing to do anything to be baptized and be a member of God's kingdom. She is going to get baptized at the end of this month so we are working really hard to teach her everything and to get her ready. It has been a pretty amazing experience with her, and she was definitely prepared before we came along.
Well it is definitely getting really cold here. The high during the day yesterday 49 with a low of 29. So I have devised a system with my scarf and beanie so that no skin shows and only my eyes peak out. I also got the thermals yesterday(thank you very much Mom) so I think that those will help me a bunch while I am on my bike. We are also going to go to Burlington coat factory today and I am going to buy myself another scarf, another sweater, and some really thick socks. It rained at little bit earlier this week but fortunately it has been dry for the past couple of days. It is always pretty humid though with I really like. It does make the tempature feel more extreme but I definitely prefer this to the dry cold in Utah. The cold is kinda fun though because a lot of people call us crazy for riding our bikes but then it usually turns into a conversation about why we are here so it works to our advantage.
My spanish is coming along pretty well and I will try to send a tape off to today so that everyone can judge my progress in the language. I really love learning the different words that the different countries have for things. For example most hispanics call a bus a bus but Dominicans call a bus a wawa. Also mexicans use the work cambar instead of trabajar. It is also really fun to learn all of the words people have to say 'cool.' Just to name a few: chido, chevre, que heavy and there are a bunch more. And people all talk really differently especially people from Republica Dominica, Puerto Rico, and people from Honduras. It is fun to try to copy accents from different countries but I think that I prefer the Mexican accent because it is the most clear.
Other than that life is really good. Being a missionary is the best thing that I have ever done in my entire life. It is the funnest, hardest, coolest, most spiritual and overall best thing that I have ever had the opportunity to be involved in. Nothing has ever brought me more happiness and I am so excited because I know that I still have more time to work out here in New Jersey. Tal and Dallin, if anyone ever tells you a mission is not worth it (or asks to do something that would make you unworhtly to go) tell them that they are crazy and they do not have the foggiest idea of what it means to be a son of God. I know that Jameson and Dad will agree with me; just remember who you are and things our parents have taught us.
Thank you everyone for you letters and the things you send me. For the holiday season everything has to be sent to my New Brunswick address (10 Commercial), because the mission office cannot forward anything during the holiday season.
Love,
Elder Haslam
So today is going to be a really busy day so this email is going to have to be a pretty quick one.
So the news this week is that we are teaching a really cool lasy named Gabriela. She is from Honduras and she had requested a video from the church and we started teaching her because of that. We taught her about the restauracion and she was really amazed that some one had seen God and that there were preophets on the earth today. This happened about a month ago but then she disappeared and we could not get in contact with her for about two and a half weeks. So this past week we were finally able to talk to her again and when we were teaching her she told us that she knew what we were teaching was true and that she wanted to get baptized. I was really shocked when I heard her say that, because we hadn't taught her about baptism at all. The only thing that we had done was marked Mosiah 18 because she asked us what is our opinion on baptism. So she ended up reading the entire chapter and then marking a scripture in 3 Nefi 11 that says we must repent and be baptized. These lessons with her have been incredible. She is very excited to learn and she is willing to do anything to be baptized and be a member of God's kingdom. She is going to get baptized at the end of this month so we are working really hard to teach her everything and to get her ready. It has been a pretty amazing experience with her, and she was definitely prepared before we came along.
Well it is definitely getting really cold here. The high during the day yesterday 49 with a low of 29. So I have devised a system with my scarf and beanie so that no skin shows and only my eyes peak out. I also got the thermals yesterday(thank you very much Mom) so I think that those will help me a bunch while I am on my bike. We are also going to go to Burlington coat factory today and I am going to buy myself another scarf, another sweater, and some really thick socks. It rained at little bit earlier this week but fortunately it has been dry for the past couple of days. It is always pretty humid though with I really like. It does make the tempature feel more extreme but I definitely prefer this to the dry cold in Utah. The cold is kinda fun though because a lot of people call us crazy for riding our bikes but then it usually turns into a conversation about why we are here so it works to our advantage.
My spanish is coming along pretty well and I will try to send a tape off to today so that everyone can judge my progress in the language. I really love learning the different words that the different countries have for things. For example most hispanics call a bus a bus but Dominicans call a bus a wawa. Also mexicans use the work cambar instead of trabajar. It is also really fun to learn all of the words people have to say 'cool.' Just to name a few: chido, chevre, que heavy and there are a bunch more. And people all talk really differently especially people from Republica Dominica, Puerto Rico, and people from Honduras. It is fun to try to copy accents from different countries but I think that I prefer the Mexican accent because it is the most clear.
Other than that life is really good. Being a missionary is the best thing that I have ever done in my entire life. It is the funnest, hardest, coolest, most spiritual and overall best thing that I have ever had the opportunity to be involved in. Nothing has ever brought me more happiness and I am so excited because I know that I still have more time to work out here in New Jersey. Tal and Dallin, if anyone ever tells you a mission is not worth it (or asks to do something that would make you unworhtly to go) tell them that they are crazy and they do not have the foggiest idea of what it means to be a son of God. I know that Jameson and Dad will agree with me; just remember who you are and things our parents have taught us.
Thank you everyone for you letters and the things you send me. For the holiday season everything has to be sent to my New Brunswick address (10 Commercial), because the mission office cannot forward anything during the holiday season.
Love,
Elder Haslam
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Transfers and Snow
Dear Family,
Everything is well in New Jersey and I think that I will start off with the weather report. It snowed yesterday in New Brunswick and it stuck to the ground which was pretty suprising. It was really cold but fortunately we were not out in the cold much because people would let us in. It has been raining on and off for the past week but that still doesn't really stop us as we go out and try to teach people. We just put on a couple layers of clothes on and we are fine. Most people think that we are crazy for riding our bikes in the rain and snow but we don't really mind. More often than not in helps us get into to doors because people feel bad about us standing outside in the rain. I have not gotten sick or anything from being in the cold so we will just keep doing it. The closest I have gotten to being sick was the 30 min I spent in the bathroom a couple days ago. We had eaten at a member's house and she made us enchiladas whic were very good and very spicy. Needless to say the next morning I spent a little bit of time in the bathroom.
I do really love all of the food the members give us and I esspecially love beans. They are a key member of every meal and I really like them. One thing that I also tried which was very good which I was not expecting was cow tongue. A little lady from Nicaragua made it for us and it was really good. It was nice and tender and tasted like a very high quality steak. It was just cut into slices that were shaped as if they came from a loaf of bread. I really enjoyed it.
My companion got transfered and he is now going to be the zone leader of the spanish zone in the south. I am in the north spanish zone so I really dont know when I will be able to see him but that is okay. I really enjoyed being his companion and we had lots of fun together. We worked really hard and did lots of good work together. I really liked him so I hope that my new companion will be just has good. My new companion is from Gremany\Japan and was born in Utah. His name is Elder Johnson and everyone says that he is really a great guy so I am really excited for this upcoming transfer. I will keep everyone updated on how it goes.
As far as we are doing with teaching people things are going really well. We are teaching this man and is family and he says that the Book of Mormon has changed his life. It was really awesome to hear him say that and the only thing that is holding him back from being baptized is that he is not married. That is going to be a long proccess but we are going to work hard to try and get him to that point. We just need to make him realize that he needs to have faith and act. That is one of the main difficulties that we have here with the hispanics is getting them to commit to change their lives. But we will keep at them and try to make sure that they realize that they need to act.
The hispanics are really great people it is just hard some times to get them to commit to somehting concrete. They always say that they will but then more often than not they forget to do somehting or they just don't do it. I really love being in spanish work and I am excited for everything that we can do here in New Brunswick. I feel like I have something of an idea of what I am supposed to do so now I will just try to do it. That is pretty crazy that Bernie is getting married and that you got a TV. I am not really sure which one of those is more shocking but I think that I will have to go with the TV being more unexpected.
I hope everyone is doing well at home annd I will try to get a tape off to everyone this week.
Love,
Elder Haslam
PS Mom, you can send packages to my apartment just send them through USPS(government) so that I do not have to sign for the package.
Everything is well in New Jersey and I think that I will start off with the weather report. It snowed yesterday in New Brunswick and it stuck to the ground which was pretty suprising. It was really cold but fortunately we were not out in the cold much because people would let us in. It has been raining on and off for the past week but that still doesn't really stop us as we go out and try to teach people. We just put on a couple layers of clothes on and we are fine. Most people think that we are crazy for riding our bikes in the rain and snow but we don't really mind. More often than not in helps us get into to doors because people feel bad about us standing outside in the rain. I have not gotten sick or anything from being in the cold so we will just keep doing it. The closest I have gotten to being sick was the 30 min I spent in the bathroom a couple days ago. We had eaten at a member's house and she made us enchiladas whic were very good and very spicy. Needless to say the next morning I spent a little bit of time in the bathroom.
I do really love all of the food the members give us and I esspecially love beans. They are a key member of every meal and I really like them. One thing that I also tried which was very good which I was not expecting was cow tongue. A little lady from Nicaragua made it for us and it was really good. It was nice and tender and tasted like a very high quality steak. It was just cut into slices that were shaped as if they came from a loaf of bread. I really enjoyed it.
My companion got transfered and he is now going to be the zone leader of the spanish zone in the south. I am in the north spanish zone so I really dont know when I will be able to see him but that is okay. I really enjoyed being his companion and we had lots of fun together. We worked really hard and did lots of good work together. I really liked him so I hope that my new companion will be just has good. My new companion is from Gremany\Japan and was born in Utah. His name is Elder Johnson and everyone says that he is really a great guy so I am really excited for this upcoming transfer. I will keep everyone updated on how it goes.
As far as we are doing with teaching people things are going really well. We are teaching this man and is family and he says that the Book of Mormon has changed his life. It was really awesome to hear him say that and the only thing that is holding him back from being baptized is that he is not married. That is going to be a long proccess but we are going to work hard to try and get him to that point. We just need to make him realize that he needs to have faith and act. That is one of the main difficulties that we have here with the hispanics is getting them to commit to change their lives. But we will keep at them and try to make sure that they realize that they need to act.
The hispanics are really great people it is just hard some times to get them to commit to somehting concrete. They always say that they will but then more often than not they forget to do somehting or they just don't do it. I really love being in spanish work and I am excited for everything that we can do here in New Brunswick. I feel like I have something of an idea of what I am supposed to do so now I will just try to do it. That is pretty crazy that Bernie is getting married and that you got a TV. I am not really sure which one of those is more shocking but I think that I will have to go with the TV being more unexpected.
I hope everyone is doing well at home annd I will try to get a tape off to everyone this week.
Love,
Elder Haslam
PS Mom, you can send packages to my apartment just send them through USPS(government) so that I do not have to sign for the package.
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