Yes, we will get to talk Sunday! I get the phone at 6:00 PM, which will be 10 AM your time, and I'll have it for 30 minutes. I thought that would be good timing, because it's right before church so everyone should be home and hopefully together. Expect a call!
Thanks for Elena's parents' address. I kind of doubt she's still living at home, but I'll mail her a short letter in Spanish and maybe they'll forward it to her current address. It would be nice to see how she's doing!
Don't worry about Elder Ogden's address. I learned that I can just take it to the office here, with his name written on it, and they'll send it to him from there. Easy beasy! Light and breezy!
I'm going to get mail??? YAAAAY!!!! Mail always makes me very happy. And I haven't gotten a whole lot here, but I suppose that's to be expected considering the whole trans-Atlantic thing. But it doesn't necessarily bother me that people send mail before I've been able to send them any *hint hint*. There's nothing in particular that I miss from the United States (except for Dad's chocolate chip cookies) though I do miss lots of people. How about sending me a couple of my friends and maybe Ethan in the mail? :)Yes, I've met Elder Ketchum! He seems like a pretty awesome missionary. He only arrived yesterday, so I'm still getting to know him. We both think it's pretty weird that our mothers know each other and we don't... :)
The missionaries here are awesome, especially my district. We've got a new Elder Ames who's been 'assimilated' into our district. My companion Elder Langston and I are getting along even better, which is really saying something because we get along great already! And then there's the 4 Hermanas: Sharp, Gum, Oliphant and Nuckols. The fact that we have more Hermanas than Elders has really helped keep us more on task and well behaved, because they are generally more mature than us. It's a known fact.
Either way, I've really been enjoying my time here. It's a rare opportunity to be able to study the scriptures so frequently. I realize that I'll never be able to do this again, so I'm doing my best to 'suck the marrow' out of this experience. Also, my ability to teach simply and in a smooth manner, in the Spanish language as well, is improving greatly. I'm starting to gain a great appreciation for missionaries out in the field and their ability to teach by the spirit, in Spanish. I'm normally OK at teaching in English, and I can speak Spanish pretty well, but put the two together and I start having some issues!
Alright then, time for the futbol update. We won against the natives again!! It was amazing. Difficult, but amazing. These ones looked scary! These ones were all 26-30, shirtless, tatooed, and growing ferocious looking beards. In between games, they took swigs from their beer bottles and took a couple drags on their cigarettes. They were basically anti-missionaries. But they were really fun to play with and hopefully we made a good impression, if they weren't too crushed by the fact that we beat them! :D I'm sorry, I shouldn't boast in my own strength. It was just a big deal.So I hear that there's some kind of Mexican Swine Flu going around. I haven't heard about any nearby occurrences, but then again, I don't hear a whole lot in here. We're still kind of partitioned away from mainstream society.
EXCITING NEWS!!! I have located Elder Ogden. He's serving in Cacares. My mission president and his wife, Pres. and Hermana Farnsworth, came to address the CCM missionaries a few days ago and Hermana Farnsworth told me that Elder Ogden was very excited to hear that I was in Spain! I sent a message back down the grapevine that I was also very excited. Hopefully I'll get to see him at least once while I'm here. I feel like I've been on his trail this whole time. Hopefully that results in me finally finding him.
The work is wonderful here! Last Saturday at the park, I talked to an accordion playing man and asked him to come and listen to us sing on Madrid Temple Square on Sunday. He seemed really interested, but he didn't come! I think I'm going to follow up this coming Saturday and ask him why he didn't show. Maybe I can get him to come. Who knows!I went to the Brigada today and signed the papers that make me an official resident here in Spain, at least for a year. I'll need to go in again halfway through the mission and then I'll be all set.
I'm so excited to get out into the field! President Farnsworth seems like an amazing man and I already have a lot of respect for him.
Well, time is running short. I love and miss all of you! Take care of yourselves and each other. The Church is true!!!
-Elder Knorr
