Jason's Christmas call

By Jason's mom:

Early on Christmas morning, the phone rang and on the other side of the phone was that wonderful voice that we missed so much: Jason!

Everybody else in the house was still in bed but, as soon as they heard the phone, quickly came to the master bedroom to talk to Jason. That call wasn't long, just a short time to let us know that he was going to call later when everybody was in the house.

When his next call came, Pam, Meli and their families were there, everybody talking to Jason at the same time from different phones. It was crazy but this is what we learned from his call:

• Jason's spanish is pretty good, he even has a Peruvian accent.
• he has not been mugged (at least he says he hasn't)
• he ate horse and guinea pig - Jason says they Don't taste like chicken. But so far that's the worse he has eaten but he knows one area of his mission where they feed the missionaries cats.
• jason still buys star wars toys if he finds them and can afford them
• he doesn't play as much soccer since his knee is still swollen and hurts. But he does play.
• he misses ice cream the most since it's very expensive and not widely available.

Otherwise, he is doing great, he loves the work and Peru. He loves being a trainer.

Jason is not sure if he will stay in Peru or will go to Bolivia - they expect the relationship between the US and Bolivia will get better once we have the new president in office.

He sounded great and happy. But somehow his voice was most animated when he was talking to Amanda...I wonder why. He said he could not watch the Star Wars movies without her or fall asleep during General Conference without her (but I think that last part is a good thing)

Next phone call: 5 months away, on Mothers Day

We were illegal in Peru for 2 months

ok so we have a ton to go through today since it's been a while since I've written. not my fault by the way, i had to go to Chile and ya.

so what happened, two weeks ago utia had a cambio to lima tambo. he's there in a trio and seems to be more or less happy with it. with him gone i got a new comp. elder chafloque who's pretty chill. we've had some problems these first two weeks but things seem to be getting better. he came with a warning though it was kinda funny. when the pres announced the change two of the elders in his old zone came up to me and said you need to have a lot of patience with him and just don't yell too much. but he's not as bad as they made him seem. I've never been one to judge anyways. i just work and he does too so i don't mind. o but i became comp mayor. or senior comp in English. kinda cool but not something that i really care about. it just means that i get more money and have to be in charge of the area. so ya, that's the cambio.

so then this last week all the missionaries from my group, from the ccm the 17 whose mission was Bolivia all were illegal for about two months or something like that. so to get us all legal we had to leave and come back in. to do that they took us Sunday night flew us to tacna, which is the sur of Peru and we stayed there the night. did some shopping in the morning and went to Chile in the afternoon. stayed there for a couple of hours and just enjoyed our pday. but that Monday night we flew back to the mission. got the the mission home at about 1 in the morning and stayed there and at 8 and consilio. and then back to work.

this week our numbers in surco were very good. like numbers nobody here has had in a very long time. some are good and others not quite but we're progressing a little bit. it helps that i have such a long time here in surco and i know what works. so i do that and nothing else. the problem is that we still don't have ward missionaries which means we don't have a lot of people to get our investigators every Sunday and so we have few in the church.

and now since this week is Christmas just soes everyone knows. Peru does celebrate Christmas and does it like us. so ya. this Christmas we're gonna visit some members and call home. they say we have 45 min to call. lets see if i obey that rule. but ya i'll probably call in the morning and or in the afternoon. depends on when my comp will but guaranteed in the morning a little bit and then maybe in the afternoon. so around ten i'll call. ten in the morning. in the night we will visits members and so i can't call then. and that's that

Christmas ¡this year has a very special meaning to me. it fulfills 6 months in the mission. kinda cool. one fourth of the way done, but they say the first six months are the hardest and i believe it bc i can already see the hardest is behind me. i'll still have problems and challenges but i know how to handle them. so it helps . I'm a lot less stressed and just happy to be doing the work. for all the future missionaries there just get through the first six and you'll be as happy as one of these Peruvian dogs who has skin diseases when they die. kinda a bad example i think but it's true. the first six are hard then it is easier.

o and i did see the doctor and we'll see. didn't help much but basically gave me permission to act for myself so i will and i'll get it better.

o and more importantly my packets came. yay me. i was so happy . after three months. one had a ton of ties and coloring books and stickers, thanks for all that i was so happy. and the other was one from the church i forgot what it's called. so ya thanks guys. i don't know y i like stickers so much but i do .

so ya that my time. thanks everyone and have a very happy and merry and feliz Christmas. or navidad. thanks for everything.

we went to Chile to get visas

hiya. sorry i couldn't write this week, we had a lot to do. i went to chile and had to get some visas with the other americans from my group. and so we didn't have time to go to internet. so i'm gonna write this little bit soes y'all know i'm ok and whatever. esta lunes i'm gonna write to everyone and i'm explain whatever. my new comps name is elder chafloque. i'll put more detail this monday. gotta go love ya

(Sent on Wednesday, 12/17/08)

I'll go where you want me to go...Bolivia or Peru Lima South

and the results of this cambios cambio is...................

Utia is leaving surco and elder taliercio is staying. another six weeks in surco for me at the least. it's really good bc I'll be here for Christmas and new years. and if i stay one more I'll be here my bday too. that would be the best but that's thinking too far ahead. we find out today at 2 where he goes and who my new comp is. I'm scared and excited at the same time.

but that's part of the mission I'm sad thought that elder utia is leaving. he's been a great comp and has taught me a lot. he left with 5 of the 8 baptisms in the ward so far this year. so the ward really loved him. we spent the last two days saying goodbye to investigator and members. and they're giving him a lot of gifts and whatever. so I'm sorta excited for when i get changed. all i need to do is get more baptisms than he did.

and on that note, its very likely that i will bc, we found one family. that is like golden. they contacted us, and almost all her family is member but in arequipa, another part of peru, outside the mission. so they are a family of 4. also eloy really wants to be baptised we're just waiting for the time to get to the end of dec. or a little later. we have a bunch of other people we're teaching. this new no contacting system is really help the work in surco. some number that don't count for us as missionaries that have really gone up is inactives returning to the ward. this cambio we had like 10 families return to the church. it's been good. we might not get all the baptisms but we building up the church. so i think its still good work. and they're giving us lots of references so its working in a sense. but people progress slowly here in surco. i love surco though. id be happy staying here all my mission. but the time will soon come for a change and I'll be happy wherever i go. it's the same thing, i wasn't happy with being in Peru Lima sur at first but now i love it. i almost don't even wanna go to Bolivia even if i get the chance. but what I've learned is that we go where God wants us. it's that simple. there is a plan and the steps are in front of us. all we gotta do is keep going ya know. and it helps to have a good attitude bout things. the mission is hard and missionaries have a lot more problems than i though they did, but with a good attitude the problems become easy to overcome. so keep a good attitude everyone and just keep going. the problems are for our good. I've learned that.

and ya on that good note time is almost up. thanks for all ur prayers support and help. as always i wanna let u all know its very appreciated and it helps a lot. . till next week

Baptisms and new way of getting contacts

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that's to sayge and alexis. it says hi back and that they are both pretty amazingly awesome too. and so are the other sobrinos que tengo.

so how's everyone doing. thanksgiving this week and peru doesn't celebrate it so we did nothing for it. it was good though. another day of work.

so this week we had two baptisms again. but this time they are officially my investigators and i taught them all the way through. it's cool to find them, teach em and baptize them. and i did baptize both of them. the other missionaries sorta said i should and both agreed. utia just didn't wanna get into the cold water. and it was cold. but after the first 5 min in it it seemed normal. and why was two baptisms taking longer than 5 min? because since one was really old and sorta fat, she didn't bend. so i attempted to baptize her 5 times. that was isabel. but the fifth time worked fine and that was that. poor linda, ten years, was so cold that right after i baptized her she came up and jump on me. like how a girlfriend would jump on a boyfriend she hasn't seen in a long time. it was kinda funny. so i had to carry her out of the fount and ya. it was really cool. sunday they both got confirmed and a lot more friends. so we're really excited.

so i don't think i mentioned that our zone is trying something different than the rest of the mission. we didn't wanna count contacts and came up with a strategy, which is pme, which doesn't talk about contacting at all, and we are focusing on pme the indicadores claves. so it's focus on what's important. the reason is bc the leaders would burn the missionaries if they weren't doing their 100 contacts. and in surco u can't do 100 contacts. but we were getting better numbers in the key numbers, like with member, others, references, and new members. so we talked with the pres and pleaded our case and he gave us permission to try this new system. and this first week all the numbers have increased across the zone. so we're all really excited.

on that note, cambios this week. probably elder utia is leaving surco and i stay but you never know. next week when i write i'll know only if I'm getting changed or not. i won't know where or with who. but if nothing changes, not likely, i'll let u know.

for that reason I'm kinda scared. me and elder utia are getting really good at teaching and with this new system we're having a lot more success. so I'm just worried a new person or area will change that. but we'll see. no matter what happens the work goes on and we adapt.

so it's kinda cool, a lot of the people have Christmas lights on their houses and Christmas trees. so it's one holiday that peru and us celebrate the same. finally. i was getting tired of celebrating holidays with 5 other people. but ya i hope i stay in surco two more cambios so that I'm here for Christmas and my birthday. that would be the best. so we'll see how it works. i'll find out on saturday nite

and that's that i think. anything else. i don't think so. thanks everyone for ur support and letters and all that other good stuff. it helps a lot. i'll talk to u next week