Elder Matt Smith: The weeks here in La Vega are getting more interesting

Hey what is up guys! The weeks here in La Vega are getting more interesting while I am here. Happy Birthday Jacob! That sucks that you are still sick but get better bud and enjoy the day for me. Thanks so much for the package! IT was a great help and the candy is awesome. But this past weekend Raulin got baptized, it was his son that had the operation there was a little miscommunication on the phone. So the first fruit I have produced got baptized, so I got to talk to him the night before his baptism and he was way excited for it. So they have a piano here, and I’m still the only one that knows how to play, but it is way out of tune, and hardly any of the black keys work so I gave up playing, it just sounded terrible, and I don’t have to give talks only if someone can’t do it I might have to give one.

But this week there was a fight in front of our house during lunch on Friday and some guy got shanked in the back of the head and died which made for a gruesome lunch but an interesting one. Also we got robbed this week, someone busted one of our windows while we were at church on Sunday, but they only took money thank goodness. So I was only missing 200 pesos and Elder Reyes the same. Good thing we had our other things hidden so I only lost about 6 bucks. We came home from church and I always carry 200 pesos in case we get robbed and I couldn’t find mine and neither could my comp, so we thought we just misplaced it. So we prayed as we got ready to leave and when we looked up we could tell our window was busted. So we got lucky.

We have an awesome family that we are teaching that is so smart. They understand everything we teach and I have to change my style of teaching because they are so intelligent and it is fun teaching them. We had a family home evening with a bunch of members and the branch president that went way well. This family will be the next members of the church in this branch. Also we have some other awesome families and investigators. This area is fun, because we get to teach people that know how to read and can understand everything for themselves. We have had some set backs with people, but for the most part everyone is progressing, next transfer will be the bomb if I can stay here.

There are three things here that just push my buttons sometimes - The Virgin Mary, everyone while we are contacting that is the first question that they ask, what is y’alls belief in Maria? The second are dreams, everyone here think that dreams are the answer to them. Yesterday we had someone that told us they didn’t go to church because they had a dream that they shouldn’t go to church. The third are Jehovah’s witnesses, these people are the most brain washed people that I have seen.

But I am doing great and our area is progressing like none other. There is some weirdish going on with all of the carnaval stuff, but we just try to avoid it and work. Also this week we ate lunch at a member’s house on Sunday, and the wife and husband live here for the most part but have another house in Sandy. She asked me, do you know where the Chucky Cheese, Nordstrom’s and Chipotle are, and I almost died as soon as she said that. I was like you have got to be kidding me, she lives right next to the Cosco there and it made me a little trunky when she said that. But enjoy the BYU/TCU basketball game for me, and hopefully they win!

Love Elder Smith

More pics from last week