I enjoyed the phone call muchisimo and only another 5 months till the next one

Hey what is up guys, I enjoyed the phone call muchisimo and only another 5 months till the next one. It was great to hear y’alls voices and to hear that all was going well. I had a good Christmas week, it is a little weird going into full gear after the Christmas week and talking to y’all, but I got to do it.

This week was fun, but the past 2 weeks have been some of my more spiritual weeks of my mission so far. I have fasted 3 times in the past 10 days, and I have learned the power in the fast, and I have seen the Lord’s hand in my work for the past couple of weeks. We are really working hard with the families we have, and especially with Raulin and Andeti. Monday we put a baptismal date for them in February, but if all goes well they could do it in a couple of weeks, but you know how people are about picking their baptismal dates. But one of the things I have fasted for especially is that they can give up their drinking habits, and they didn’t drink anything during the Christmas week and they have a desire to get rid of it, so it is cool to watch them as they overcome this. We are still working on finding people and contacting everyday so we can continue to have a pool of people to teach. This week I think I came to the conclusion that Satan has power over little children and little dogs. During our lessons this week it is so frustrating and hard to teach when kids go out of their minds and way just to test the patience of their parents and us. Oh well, everything else seems to be going good.

Things are pretty chill around here now as normal, but we will see what happens in the New Year. I just know right now I can’t feel my body, we went over to the other side of Cotui and played some basketball with all of the elders in our district and some members from their side. It got pretty intense as it usually does with Dominicans. Dominican Ball is something else, but I made it out alive. We played for like 3 and a half hours and I thought that was demasiado - too much.

I hope all continues to go well at home and that y’all are enjoying y’alls vacations.

Love, Elder Smith

Since I couldn't send him Dr Pepper in a package, he got a DP shirt for Christmas

Family he is teaching. They had Christmas Eve dinner with them

Pride of the Dominicans.

They like their loud music 

Won't complain about road around here again

Glad that's peso's and not dollars!!

Companionship Study- Lehi's Dream

It is probably just another drill!- Christmas!

Hey what is up guys, and how is the swimming? Right now I’m freaking tired, I got about 5 hours a sleep last night and we had to wake up before 5 to get to Santiago for the Mission picture of all of the missionaries, and I just got back from helping somebody move for the past 2 hours. They decided that I was the biggest one there and that I should be the one to carry all of the appliances and bed frames so I got my workout in today. It was cool I got to see a lot of my friends in the mission that aren’t in my district so that was fun.

So for Christmas it should be like a normal day, but it won’t because everyone will be partying and we will keep in the house and the chapel for most of the day. Usually people celebrate their Christmas festivities on the day before, so that day we will eat at a members house, and we have some plans with a family that we are teaching. So we can’t really do what we want, but the schedule is flexible. For the call I will call anywhere from noon to about 3 your time, and it will be an 809 or 829 number. So I will call the home, and have y’all call me back so I don’t have to pay for it, and we will get to talk for awhile so I am excited to see how y’all are doing.

So we have had quite a bit of branch activities this week, so we have had some fun with the branch the past week, which means a lot of food and gift exchanges. I got a tie and some socks for my gift exchange. But it has been sweet this past week we are working hard with a family with parents named Rauline y Adneti and two kids Larisa and Ryme which are just awesome. We are spending Christmas Eve with them, to make sure that they don’t have their wine to celebrate Christmas. We taught the Word of Wisdom this week, and the only problem they have with it is that they drink a little on special occasions so we are working with this because that is the only problem they seem to have. They are reading and praying as a family and coming to all of the church activities and practically our whole branch knows them so we are lucky! They are the only couple in the whole neighborhood that is legally married where they live so we had luck contacting. So hopefully all goes well with this family.

Today we had a fun day in Santiago, we didn’t get to go to Chili’s because it is wayyyy expensive here and we didn’t have time, so I took Elder Franco to Taco Bell for my Christmas gift to him. I almost had a close call today, the store I usually buy my Dr Pepper was out of it, but luckily we found another store that had it but it was like a dollar a can, but when I had the craving I bought the last 8 they had so I can celebrate my Christmas the right way.

But guys I am way stoked for Este Sabado, I can’t wait to hear y’alls voices. Take care and only a couple of more days, I hope y’all enjoy the pics!

Elder A-Smeet

Navidad Tree and Cards

Family moving from the Branch.

Do you see what movie they watched at the Branch Party?

Toy Story 3 (Matt needs to keep his Uncle Kent employed) 

Kids from the Branch

Matthew's buddy is to the right in the Nike shirt

Some of the Branch members

Elder Remington and Elder Smith(aka Matthew)

Matthew and the Relief Society President.

She drew his name for the gift exchange and got him the awesome yellow tie!

Matthew with the Branch President and Ward Mission Leader

Matthew and Elder Miller

He was Matthew's MTC and CCM Companion

They meet up in Santiago today

Santiago, Dominican Republic

Monumento de Santiago

 

Elder de Los Santos

Matthew's favorite Dominican!

American Elders

Tex-Mex, translation=Taco Bell

Elder Franco and Matthew

Ward Activity Planner

Hey what’s up guys? How is it in the Christmas season, here its been great and the weather has been bomb, actually got cold last night for the first time on my mission! And yeah, I have a big 5 months in the mission, and I feel somewhat older because we got 4 newbie’s in our zone and it made me feel better about my Spanish big time. But yeah, I got both of your packages this week, thanks so much! I took everything out of the Dearelder package and took certain things out of the other so I am going to see if I can wait for Christmas to open them, I saw the shirt and shorts and they look sick.

So for ward activities the branch president looks at us and says we should have a ward activity this week and every week. And it is always okay, and then he looks at us and says again we should have a ward activity, and we say okay, and then he says you’re in charge. So every Friday night we put on a movie and play domino's, so this past week we watched Up, so it’s fun, and it was good because we had a lot of investigators show up.

Yeah, I bet it is fun to talk with the Johnson's, I usually get an email from the twins every week and it is fun to compare the missions and talk about the stories we have had. But yeah good old Andrew, it will be fun to hang out with all of us when we get home.

But I sent a CD home this week with most of my pictures so far this year so you should get those in a couple weeks. And yes, we still have water and it makes life so much easier. They have washing machines here but they are semi automatic and are like nothing back home, so of it is still by hand. Elder Remington is from Nevada so he is good to have in the house so I can speak English often which is easier for me. But yeah, Bebiembre is just a huge party and everyone drinks every day which is not very good.

For Christmas I will be calling from a cell phone so I will call y’all and have y’all call me back so I still don’t know what the plan is for Christmas. So I will let y’all know next week.

Hey dad I actually used the understanding Isaiah CD that you put on, I had some questions about some of the things and it had what I needed so thanks for that.

This week was pretty good, we are doing good as a companionship and we have 3 great families, and our best one we found out this week that they are legally married so if all goes well with them we could have at least 4 baptisms this transfer which I would be way happy to get. So we are starting to turn the corner with our area, which I hope we do. We had our interviews with president this week and it was great to get some advice from him with our area, because he knows how it is.

I am learning patience more than ever this transfer, Elder Zouti the Haitian elder in our house is starting to push my buttons, and I will just leave it at that. But I am getting along great with my comp, he has got a good sense of humor and even though we are working hard we have fun.

But guys, 10 days and I will be on the phone with y’all! I hope all is good and that sports go good for y’all. I love and pray for y’all every day, take care!

Love,
Elder Smith

Good News! WE HAVE WATER

Hey what is going on guys, I bet it is great with the Christmas season and some cool weather. Good News! I got my pics off of my memory stick so there will be pictures today. I can’t wait to get y’alls package- Thanks so much! And it will be nice to be able to talk to y’all this month. So it sounds like we got some good news in sports with a little bit of bad news with Jacob’s team.

But yeah I got to watch the devotional thing so the talks were in Spanish but the music was in English so it was great! So Makenzie gets to speak this week, congrats. I have gotten over the fear of giving talks in Spanish and talks in general but it isn’t so bad when you only have 30 to 50 people listening, it seems like nothing after speaking in our ward at home. So they love their Christmas hymns here, and that is all we have sung since the beginning of November, this week the branch president tried to have me play Silent Night for the Sacrament Hymn, so I was like you really can’t do that so I had to change it.

So today was transfers, and I am safe I still have Elder Franco and we are staying in our Area and we are looking to turn it up this transfer, it looks like I will probably have 6 months here unless they close the area which is a possibility. But yeah, Morrison went home this week, so we have a new American in the house which is sweet and he is a football junkie so it should be fun. So I will have another pizza buddy, my companion likes it a lot too so we usually go there or Pica Pollo for dinner every night which is kind of hard on the budget.
So today is a huge holiday and all of the Internet places were closed but the other elders in our house have an investigator that owns an Internet place so we got him to let us use his for the day, so we got lucky today. The past week and for the rest of this month is something called Patronal, which is just a huge party in the streets at night and the main part is just around the corner from our house so it is annoying with the noise until 2 in the morning. These festivities is just where everyone gets wasted out of their mind and fight each other in the street to celebrate a religious holiday, doesn’t make sense to me. And also at 6 every morning there is either a group of people marching around singing Christmas songs or some type of strike which is really annoying but oh well.

I am not going to lie, this past week was a little disappointing we had 6 investigators for sure coming to church and none of them showed up which was really lame. We have just been trying to find a new person through contacts which is not always the most fun way to do things, but if you don’t have people to teach you can’t teach. We have probably a good 8 to 10 solid investigator but we need to continue to find more. This week we had a zone conference with our zone, La Vega and the San Fransisco zone with President Lee which was awesome. It was how we could really apply what faith is in our mission and what faith actually is. Also how we can get Investigators to increase their faith through action. There is a lesson we teach which is called the Triangulo de Fe, which is prayer, scriptures, and attending the church. So I haven’t had to much new news in the past couple of weeks for the most part. I am getting better at teaching, so I can tell because usually my companion doesn’t review the principle I just taught and he just continues.

So I hope all goes well this week, and y’all enjoy the pics, I have a somewhat fast internet connection today so I should get a good number home. Also WE HAVE WATER, I took my first shower in 2 months today, and it was awesome. They finally fixed it yesterday so my Christmas wish came true.

Con amor, Elder Smith

House roommates

District 

Matthew and his companion Elder Franco

Thanksgiving in the Dominican Republic

Thanksgiving Feast

Scenery

Matthew's birdie

Teeing off

On their way to go golf

This is the actual car they drove in to the golf course. Yes it runs!

The critter he found in the shower. It was a foot long.

What’s up guys?

What’s up guys? Are y’all doing this week? This week was a pretty good week for me. Thanksgiving was the freakin' bomb, we had an actually turkey and mashed potatoes and it was delicious. A member in the others Elder’s Branch cooked it for us, it was a little pricey but it was worth it. It looks like y’all had a good thanksgiving with sports and smores. To bad for football this past week, BYU would lose the game with a blocked field goal.

So it is getting time for Christmas, here they call December, bebiembre, just because it is the month where everyone just drinks.

So my camera memory cards, both have a virus on it is what is sounding like because it happens all the time here from other elders, so I think I found a program I am going to buy to fix it, so hopefully I can send stuff home today.

So someone finally came to check our water pump but we didn’t have power so they couldn’t fix it, we haven’t had power since last Friday, apparently the power line fell or something. But at least they fixed it this morning so hopefully we can get our house fixed for next transfer. Also I got a letter from Andrew this week, which I was waiting for, for a while.

This week there’s not really too much that is new, my comp has been fighting with a sick stomach so it has been hard to stay out all day because we have to keep returning to the house. We don’t really have too many new investigators because in the time out we have to pass by the ones that we already have. We have 2 families that are progressing right now, so hopefully they will keep on progressing, and we have a couple of other individuals that have some interest. I continuing to improve my Spanish and getting to the point to where I can say whatever I want to say if I need to, which especially helps while I am teaching because I can use stories and analogies which makes me a more effective teacher. Elder Franco is really helping me out a lot, and corrects me when I say something that just doesn’t make sense in Spanish. I have gotten over my fear of speaking in contacts and in lessons. I would rather be the one teaching. Nothing really has changed too much in our area, just a lot of walking and getting to know people.
It sounds like the Makenzie and Jacob are doing well in basketball, and that is good to hear, keep on working!

This week we have a multi zone conference, and I should be able to see the Christmas devotional, it starts really late here though.

Have a great week guys! I will try to get my memory card figured out, so hopefully I should get some pictures home.

Love, Elder Smith