Larry and Carol Cheesman Family Blog

New Job for Dad

2010-07-21T03:42:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally got a new job this week. I am now working for Leads by Fone based in Snellville. Their website is leadsbyfone.com. My title is VP of Sales but I am pretty much the only sales guy in the office. We do plan to grow by the end of the year so I will be hiring more sales people and will have more to do. All of my work is on the phone so I get to work out of the house with Jack at my feet. I have to keep my finger close to the mute button when we have someone visit the house and Jack starts barking but so far, it has not been a problem. The work we do is generate leads for companies who service water damage restoration. We do this by creating a website that gets to the top of a Google search so that someone who has a water problem in their house will call them. The customer only pays when there is a qualified lead. The way we know that is we record and listen to every call and determine if it is a lead or just a junk call. Right now, we have about 180 customers and hope to get around 500 around the country by the end of the year. As we go forward, we will add more vertical markets. The next vertical we will be adding is back pain so we will be calling all the chiropractors in the country which will keep us busy for a while. We look for markets where there is an immediate need and the revenue generated for the customer is substantial.

I am excited to be with a young company like this and have the opportunity to help them grow and establish a solid base of business. It should be fun. We will see.

My New Job

2010-01-18T15:19:00.000-08:00

I started working 2 weeks ago at Aramark Uniforms as a customer service rep. My first week was pretty uneventful and I just had to look over everyone's shoulder to see what they were doing because my computer was not up yet. Last week, however, was a little more eventful. I went out on the routes with the truck drivers! All week I had to be in Gainsville, Ga. early in the morning. (5:30-6:00). I had to get up at 4:00 a.m some mornings 4:30 other mornings. It was so cold last week that there was still ice everywhere. I knew I was in trouble when I got to the depot and all of them but one were smoking and talking with some pretty foul language! I went with a different driver everyday and when we were on the truck together, they were such nice gentlemen and we had a lot of fun! I insisted on getting right in and working with them so I could understand that side of the company and so we could get done sooner. Well, I can tell you this, those guys earn their money and some of them make really good money! I was so dead the first night I think I went to bed by 8:30 p.m. Tuesday was hard as well, but by Wed. I was starting to get use to it and did fine the rest of the week. By Friday, the weather was nice and didn't mind it at all. Of course Friday was the day I got the non-smoker and it would not have been cold with the window down. The rest of the week when it was in the 30's that's when I had the smokers that would open their widows to smoke! The scariest to ride with was the 23 year old that smoked and text messaged at the same time while he was driving!

Today I worked at my office and got my computer up! The rest of the week I will be working at the downtown Atlanta location in accounting for two days and then at the plant for 2 days, sorting and doing laundry (or at least observing). I haven't decided yet if I will join in.

I do love the fact that Aramark wants us to know the whole company so we can do our jobs better. It's been an adventure!

It's been great having John home! I loved having all of the kids home and hated to see them all leave! I missed Spencer, but am thankful for the service he is giving our country!

John's Email 14 Dec 2009 [last one from the mission!]

2009-12-14T09:05:00.001-08:00

Well this is pretty crazy… i will be seeing yall this week! Im pretty excited. Last week was pretty cool, we had a conference with Elder Gavarret from the 70. It was pretty good and I talked to him for a little bit after and he thanked me for all the serviced I have done and made me feel really good. Yesterday was cool to see some of the families I baptized giving there testimonies. All the kids talked about me in there testimonies. I think they are sadder than anyone. But I have some good bye lunches and dinners with them as well. Wednesday im going to santa cruz, and Thursday is at the mission home. So today and tomorrow are my last work days, most of it is to teach new members to make them stay active. Friday im getting there around 1130 in the morning. I leave here at like midnight. Im doing pretty well of working until the last day. Its kinda of hard though. Im thinking of the things I want to do when I get back but it seems like too many things. As for the roast I am find with that. as long as it doesn’t have rice. I know it would be amazing with rice but I think im 30 percent rice now I have eaten so much. Im not picky anymore. About my clothes, I think I only have that huge box, I don’t think I have anything else. Im actually pretty nervous to come back. I got culture shock going to santa cruz I cant imagine America. I realized that I cant decide on anything anymore. There is a place there like wal mart, and I couldn’t deside on anything to buy because there were a lot of options. Riberalta is a little different. You don’t have any choices, there is one kind of everything. So we always get the same. Which made me bad at decision making. Im excited that everyone is staying home for a while when I get back. It will be a lot nicer though calling instead of waiting every week to write a bunch to everyone. Im trying to update my journal. I haven’t done too good at doing it but I think it will be enough. Well I guess I have a talk next week, but you didn’t tell me a subject. Just Christmas stories? Well I guess you will just answer that in the airport. Its sad to say bye to everyone here especially being here for so long. Im not too excited though about there way to say goodbye. The culture is here is to either, through water on the person, smash an egg on there head, or through flower on the person who has a birthday or is leaving. I don’t enjoy it too much but I cant really do much. But that’s all im going to write because I want to be able to have stories for Friday! Im pretty pumped for that. well see you this week! Love yall
Elder Cheesman

John 12-7-09

2009-12-07T09:30:00.000-08:00

Congrats mom on the job. What is it exactly that you will be doing? Kinda crazy that next week I will be back, it still hasn’t hit me that big yet though. I don’t think it will till im on a plane. The zone leader conference was really good actually. I had to give my testimony in front of everyone which felt really weird because for 2 years I have seen other missionaries do that. And we came all the way back on the famous bus ride and plane. But it’s the last of those buses finally. The plane flights were pretty miserable actually because it was raining and really humid. So it got really hot in the plane and was moving around a lot. So im ready for being done with those. I really don’t like them that much anymore. Im not sending anything home because I don’t trust too much in the postal system. Im just going to leave a lot of clothes that are ruined now and I will have some room. Im just worried about if im allowed to take 2 carry ons and my guitar to santa cruz. I will figure it out some how, they are my friends in the airport now. Yesterday were the elections for Bolivia. And evo morales won, again. So we are all praying that we don’t have to leave again. But tomorrow another exciting thing is happening. We are going to Trinidad to have a conference with a 70. Elder Gavarett is coming. He is pretty new but I hear he is a really cool guy. And then next Tuesday or Monday we are having a regular zone conference. So I don’t have that many work days left. I have a feeling that they are going to ask me to do all the practices and stuff in front of the 70 because im one of the only people going home. Well elder Vandyke from my group will be there as well. Yesterday for the elections we didn’t leave the house allllll day. Because its against the law to do anything on elections day. You can only vote. So me and elder annis played a lot of cards, chess, checkers and I read some as well. I finished the book of mormon again. That’s my 2nd time in Spanish. So that was pretty awesome. I learned a lot more this time as well. I don’t think I will have a baptism before I leave but there is a lot for when I leave. Its not that hot today but always right at noon it gets really hot here. But I love the rain because there is no dust and it makes the day a lot cooler. Im kind of jealous you guys got to go to a concert. The masquerade is a pretty gross place as well. Funny to imagine mom and dad there actually. But I bet it was fun having them at home. Brooke I am pretty excited to see mason, apparently he will be talking in Spanish when I get home huh? And is it expected to snow this year in Georgia? Or just like ice and sleet? I don’t know how I will react to the humid cold of Georgia. But im excited either way. Well anyway have a good week everyone. And mom how long is everyone staying for when I get back? I love you all and see yall next week!Elder Cheesman

John 11-30-09

2009-11-30T08:26:00.000-08:00

Well thanks everyone for the letters this week. Today we are heading off to santa cruz for the zone leader council again. Its pretty weird because its my last one! So im pretty excited about that. Sounds like last week was a pretty exciting for everyone. I bet the BYU game was pretty sweet. About which room I want I think I would like the basement again. I do kind of miss that room. Not that I don’t want to be close to yall or anything but I did like that room. I will keep it cleaner this time…I hope. Im trying to look at the pictures everyone sent me but they talk a long time to open. Next week by the way are eleccions here and we aren’t allowed to leave the house all day Sunday. There isn’t going to be church in the whole country. Crazy huh? O ya by the way mom I would like a little bit of ..¨dinero¨… cause im going to be buying some stuff today. And in the next few weeks. Maybe for some Christmas presents. Brooke cooking turkey sounds like an adventure. I don’t know if I have ever eaten food cooked by brooke. Last week that couple did get married and the husband was baptized. It was a pretty crazy baptism as well. Because people would show up late and stuff. But the worst part of it was that the church didn’t have any water to fill up the Baptismal Fount. So we figured out there is a tank of water below the church and we heard that it was little dirty which we didn’t care too much. It didn’t look that bad when it was filling up…..but…. when it filled up it looked bad. It was pure river water and really really dark green. You couldn’t even see the ground, so that was pretty funny, but there were no other option. So we asked the people that were going to get baptized if it was alright to get baptized in that water and they said it was fine. We made a joke out of it that Jesus was baptized in a river just as dirty as this and now your following his example even more. But everything turned out fine. What I was happy about is that he showed up the church the next day with a tie on. He had never wore one before. So that was cool. For a person to wear a tie here is a lot more difficult then you think. And for thanksgiving, we went to the cool looking restaurant and it was awesome. They made really really good food. We invited two other missionaries to come as well. And we ate a lot. It was pretty expensive but worth it. Well for bolivan money it was really expensive. It was like 30 dollars in total. I shared a filet mignon with my companion which was very good. The coolest thing about the place is that it has tiger skins everywhere and anaconda skins that are 25 feet long. So I enjoyed myself. Its weird to think im only going to church here one more time before im back home. Im kind of nervous to get back actually cause im not use to the life back at home. It will be a little weird at first like not inviting 140 people a week to church. But I don’t have anyone on my mind for the little home coming party I would invite. I think most of my friends will be home for Christmas so im happy about that. I got to start thinking of where to work as well while im back. Um but so a little bit of money as soon as possible would be nice….maybe today? Because I wanted to buy a few things while I was in santa cruz. O ya I didn’t tell what we sold for a fund raiser. We sold empanadas to the missionaries. And I made them eat a lot. It was funny. But they got enough money. Anyway im staying pretty happy, just a little worried about the baptisms for December. Anyway i got to go. Everyone have a good week. Love yallElder Cheesman

John 11-23-09

2009-11-23T07:58:00.000-08:00

This week actually went better for us as a zone and area. We had more people in the church this week as well. So I am a little happier this week. And I don’t walk under too many trees anymore so I wont get attacked by snakes. Im trying better to take some good pictures of Bolivia. Im not going to lie there are some really cool places. It hits me that im in the middle of a jungle when I see a couple things like…. Naked kids running free in the street, kid with a monkey on his head, when everyone invites us bananas, and the other day it was funny because we heard like a screeching animal noise and my companion and I both knew it was a monkey. So we even know how every amazonic animal sounds. But its crazy how time is flying by. Only like 3 weeks left. And on the 6th there is no church and we stay in house. But I don’t think there will be as many problems as last year. There are a few problems with some candidate stuff with like teenagers coming and throwing rocks at them but that’s about it. And mom I haven’t been gone for that long.. I do remember what pie night was. Haha but im thinking of doing my own kind of pie night here. I don’t know what I will do but I know thanksgiving we are going to a cool restaurant here. So im pretty excited about that. O ya lately I have been learning how to cook some stuff here as well. I learned how to make some really good cheese empanadas and as well a side dish called Rice with Cheese. It is really really good. I hope I will be able to cook it at home. But I don’t know much else to cook. Because we rarely ever cook here. This Saturday we have a baptism of a couple, the wife is already member and we need to get them married first before we baptize him. Today we are doing a little fundraiser so that they have money to get married. So im pretty excited about that. But there isn’t much else going on, im staying pretty happy and still trying to work hard. My last zone leader thing is the first week of December, and the zone meeting will be like the 11th but I will be here in riberalta till like the 16th I think. That’s if I don’t have a change on the 3rd. but I don’t think I will. But anyway that’s about all that’s going on. Lisa im not really sure on my waist size but I do fit in all my clothes still. So I don’t think I have changed too much. Im trying to keep myself disciplined on what to eat but there isn’t much choice for me out here. Well I love yall and I will be writing again next week!Elder Cheesman

John

2009-11-16T08:13:00.000-08:00

Well i got a couple stories for this week, yesterday was the most exciting… after the first branch in the morning we went and talked to a member to plan to pick up and investigator. So we were talking outside under a mango tree, and something fell on my shoulder then to the ground. I didnt think much of it but my companion kind of yelled and i looked. It was definitely, a snake! Haha it was hunting a tree frog and they both fell down. The member was freaking out telling us to kill it. Me and my companion just wanted to watch it. It was like 3 feet long and pretty skinny. It looked like a long garden snake, so it didnt look to dangerous, but apparently its one of the most venomous snakes in the area. But the story doesnt end there...while we looked for something to kill it, it got away from us. So once it was gone we got back to talking like normal. My companion was about to lean against the fence and screamed (like a little girl) there it is! It was on the top of the fence sneaking up to bite my companion. It was the first animal i have seen that has come back for vengeance. So at the end of everything we got a huge log and we killed it. And it was an awesome adrenaline rush. Also last week we had zone conference with president maynes. And it was funny when he flew in because the same day a senator running for elections was coming in as well the same day. So we are walking to the airport and there are a million people in the streets, as well in the airport. I think there were at least 5,000 people there. And president maynes gets there and sees all the people and just laughs. We told him it was all for his arrival. But we were stuck there till the senator actually got there and everyone went crazy like it was a celebrity. Stormed the airplane and everything. I got a good laugh out of that. And president did a really good conference this time again. It was really weird though thinking the next one is my last one. This week I will only have a month left. President told me I will still be here probly when I finish. I will be going back to santa cruz like the 16th and have the dinner and interview. So that should be pretty fun. As a zone we are doing pretty well. Our area is kind of going down. The people that were going to get married and baptized are having some problems and the members are not getting animated. There was a problem with some new member kids watching some movies that are against our church and doubted there testimonies. But i think we helped them out some. Last Monday we went as a zone to Tumi Chuckua which is a big lake. I have gone before but the whole zone is new so we went again. And we played a little bit of soccer. And of course the Americans beat the latins again. So we are always making sure that they remember that. The cool thing was at our half time we just went around picking up mangos on the ground for a snack. I forgot to tell dad that. Its mango season and for the past month there has been a ton of mangos everywhere. And all types of mangos. Bolivian, rose, Japanese, grape, papaya, pineapple, all sorts of mangos. I think the best are the Japanese mangos. Had some mango juice that was really good. I filled myself up on it and didn’t eat much lunch. But don’t be jealous dad. It hasn’t rained too much lately but it was cloudy a couple days and then it gets really really hot and goes back to a little cloudy. This morning started out pretty cool, but its already getting hotter. Here in riberalta there isn’t really seasons. The people say seasons like, the rainy season and dry season and maybe a dust season. Nothing else. There is only a time for the south winds to come in like may when it gets cold but for only like 2 days. But im kind of use to getting home really really wet from sweat and filthy from the seats people give us from all the dirt here. Um but there isn’t much else to tell. Sounds like it was a good fireside you had from that guy. There was a saying that president maynes used that is close to what he said. He said ¨good is excellent´s worst enemy¨ just to not settle for being good. But that’s about all that’s been going on. O ya james gosling is going to the mission of an elder in my zone. He said its amazing there and he will have a good time. And that’s cool that bj is going to long beach. That would be an interesting mission as well.Elder Cheesman

John 11-09-09

2009-11-09T08:18:00.001-08:00

Last week was our little conference with the zone leaders again. It’s always pretty fun, even though the trip there was not fun at all. 2 nights in a row without a bed is not fun. 2 nights on a 10 hour bus ride and hot is not always the best thing to do. But the conference was really good. Sad to see some of the guys home this change though. Kind of weird the next one im finishing. And by the way im getting home on the 18th. I was looking at the flight plans and I leave at midnight Thursday/Friday and I get home Friday morning at 1130. Not on Saturday. I am pretty excited to come back, but don’t worry I plan going out with a bang. This month could be the best month the zone will do since I have been here and as well in my area. So im pretty excited about that. At the conference last week, I got to sit next to elder taylor, whom I have not seen since march. So that was really fun to see him again. Sounds like dad had a good week up there in Utah im trying to get through the pictures so I can see how it was. Kind of weird only have like 6 more weeks left. Today I complete 22 months in the mission. Weird to think its been that long huh? Im pretty much a bolivian now. But I am practicing my English to be able to communicate to people when I get back. Yesterday I gave a talk in sacrament again about the atonement and I thought it was pretty good. I think I might get nervous for my coming home talk though. There people actually know if you are speaking true doctrine or not… but I do pretty much have a calling here. In the morning branch I teach the Youth/Investigator class every week. So I get along pretty well with the youth. I made them do practices of inviting there friends to church, and it went pretty well. Im pretty excited to come back and seeing some basketball, it has been a long time since I have seen a game. Its doesn’t even make the papers the news or anything at all. Also want to see some high school ball as well. That’s cool that max is the only white guy, and Mormon on top of that. I liked your experience brooke about the ¨mucho gusto¨ it would make since in our language, but its funny to see the changes they make in other. Like the other day we were talking about a verb change that’s really weird. Like Bañarse means to bathe yourself…. When you change it too.. Nos Bañamos, it has 2 meanings one… we bathe…..or two ….we bathe each other. So I think its funny we tell people are schedule sometimes cause it would come out like this….we get up, do some exercises, and then we bathe each other. Spanish is a funny language. So im going to be living at home for college, that’s good to know. I think I can save up a lot of money doing that. Um the weather the past week has been amazing for me. It’s not too hot and it rains at random times but its always cloudy I love it. The surprise rain kind of messes us up because we don’t have umbrellas-(but your prepared son always has a poncho) and so I never get too wet. And my shoes aren’t too great anymore anyway so it doesn’t matter if they get wet. They are still lasting pretty well. But that’s really all that’s going on this week. Thanks for everyone that wrote and I will be writing again next week! Love yall have a good week.Elder Cheesman

John 11-02-09

2009-11-02T18:02:00.001-08:00

Well right now im in the city of trinidad. On my way to our zone leader meeting. But today was pretty interesting. Well we get all of our stuff ready to leave and we call santa cruz elders for some questions. And they tell us that our flight got canceled, and we will not be able to come to the meeting this month. So we both got pretty depressed because we were really excited to go and we didn’t plan anything for the next 2 days. So it was really funny… we kind of got in denial and did not believe that there were no other flights today.(o ya I forgot that today is a holiday here, day of the dead, that’s why they thought it got canceled.) so we are in our room mad, and we decide just to go to the airport anyway. There was nothing else to do because everything closes down the whole day. So we get there and we ask some guy if there is a flight leaving today and said there will be one at 2 o clock. So we go home call the secretary and tell him that. He replies that he will call us back before we go. But an hour goes by and doesn’t call. And our flight was leaving in 20 minutes. So we just decide to leave. We went to the airport and found out we have tickets from riberalta to Trinidad. The santa cruz flights are allll booked. So we come up with the idea that we will come to Trinidad and take the long bus ride down there. And so we are here now and just bought our tickets for the bus and we will leave at 9pm and we wont get to santa cruz until 6am. So tomorrow will be a very long day for us. But im excited that we are actually going. And yes mom, the tropical rain storms are starting. Last Tuesday, a huge storm came through. It rained really hard for about 6 hours. And it got up to like 2 feet of water! And luckily we were kind of near our house to grab our umbrellas and go back outside. But they didn’t help too much just kept our heads and shoulders dry. We had to walk a long ways too because the motorcycle taxis don’t work when it rains. And there are no cars there. So we walked and got really really wet. But it was really fun though seeing rivers flowing through the streets. Some had there own rapids. And it was thundering and lightning pretty hard. Reminded me a little of Georgia. And I will figure out what date they think im leaving here so I can know for sure tomorrow. I guess I cant forget about lisa and kristis birthday. Your all getting too old. Its going to be weird when I get back. Im pretty excited about school though. Don’t know where im going to live. That might be the next thing to work on huh? But everything is going pretty well for me. Im staying busy with the people we are teaching. This past week went a little better. I think we are doing better than a lot of the other zone leaders still. So I think this council I wont feel too bad. Me and elder annis are getting along as well, I think I can deal with him for another month(joke). Anyway I love yall and I want to see some Halloween pictures. Por favor. Thanks for writing everyone and I will write more next week. Elder Cheesman

John's Email 26 Oct 2009

2009-10-26T09:30:00.000-07:00

Well thanks everyone for the letters this week. Im glad you enjoyed the pictures. Well changes were last week and im………still in the same place. Which I was pretty happy about. Elder annis and I will be together for another change. I think its because we are having some good success together up here. But the down side….its really hot and these little bumps always come out on me from the heat. But I can handle it a little longer. I bought some cream so that they go away don’t worry about that mom. Next week we will be going to our zone leader meeting thing which is always fun for me. Apparently elder Taylor is a zone leader so I will be able to see him finally after like 8 months. And are you sure we leave on different days? Because our secretary told us that we are going back the same day. I think it’s the 19th now. But that is not that far away which is pretty weird. It also started raining a little bit and we are getting a little bit of the rainy season. Im fine with that because its not as hot. But really really humid. Its kinda of funny you mentioned the people might not sing that well here. Yesterday me and elder annis wanted the members to start learning new songs so that they aren’t singing the same. So we tried singing some and it was just bad. Every singing there own tones because they don’t know how to read notes so that was an experience. I don’t know if I will be able to write steven on his mission but if you write him just tell him. He needs to have a tone of patience and have an assurance he will eventually learn the language. And ask a lot of questions to his companion. And just talk a ton in lessons even if they don’t understand you, you learn a lot faster by looking dumber I have learned. We did get to baptize that family last week. It was soo awesome. They have gone through a lot. He had to stop his smoking addiction and find a better job that’s not on Sundays. I think they will be good leaders for the church down here one day. So that was a fun experience for me. O ya apparently I got accepted to GGC and they are asking for some paper stuff and that I need to take a test right when I get back. But I will tell lisa to go into my account. That got me pretty excited though. Im kind of ready to start studying different stuff again. I have learned that studying is a lot of fun here. I have read the book of moron like 5 times now. 3 times in English and going to finish in Spanish for the second time before I leave. And I got a new bible and marked it all up nice to teach better with and study better at home. But im glad I have learned to take advantage of my study time. And I don’t know what you are talking about mom that I didn’t study in high school or something. I got pretty good grades my last year if im not mistaken. That stinks that BYU lost that bad, I thought they were doing pretty good. Brooke thanks for the pictures of mason. He is already getting huge. Looks like he will be able to say my name when I get back I have been gone so long. Me and elder annis have made plans for thanksgiving dinner. There is a tropical restaurant here that is pretty nice. It has tiger skins every where and anaconda skins. It’s a cool place just a little expensive to eat there all the time. But I think that is what we will do. O ya and about the missionaries who have left the zone. The one I was sad about elder evans left. We got to be really good buds be he is in santa cruz now. I think in the zone of elder taylor. But good news we have 5 new Americans in the zone. So now we are 5 and 5. (today its gringos verses latins) in soccer and we are going to win. There names are Elder Cope(not from my group), elder askar, elder Schweinke(tongan). They are pretty cool guys. The tongan is pretty new and struggles a little bit with Spanish but he will get better here. He will lose a lot of weight as well. Im not too bad my self I might have as much muscles as tarzan like brooke says but im not as fat as I was in lima. So im pretty happy about that. Im sure If I would have had a change to santa cruz I would have ate a lot more and get fat again. Well that’s pretty much whats going on thanks for everything. Love yall and have a good week.
>Elder Cheesman

2009-10-22T11:36:00.001-07:00

I am better from last week, i dont what bug i had but i got better with lots of pills. This week there are changes and I have a feeling I will not get changed. I had a dream the other night that im staying here. But who knows. It was pretty funny when lisa wrote me about a Halloween party, cause that was the first moment of this month I remembered that Halloween is this month. I usually would recognize with the cold but its just stays hot here. It rained some last week and really hard. Knocked over some tin roofed soccer courts and stuff. Pretty intense. Lisa I haven’t got any emails from the schools yet only one from polytech that said Thank you for submitting your application to Southern Polytechnic State University. In 2-4 business days you may follow the status of your application at our website www.spsu.edu and click Banner Web. Use the ID lookup form to find your new SPSU ID number. If you have any questions please email us at admiss@spsu.edu.. Crazy that I only have 2 months left huh? Its going to fly by. Elder Rubio went home the other day. He was pretty sad but happy at the same time. He left baptizing more than any other missionary. The zone is still doing really well. Even president called me the other day and asked about the goal we put was 7 families with 25 people. And asked how much we really are going to have. I said I think 9 families with 25 people. He paused and just said excellent and keep doing that. And that’s all he called for. But I think we might only finish with 18 now. But im still happy about it. It’s the best we have done since I have been here. Um today I think we are going to play some basketball. What was nice about getting sick last week is that I lost a lot of weight so I am kind of back into shape. Sunday we had a little more people in church but still not enough. We baptized the family Vaca a few weeks ago and they are the most faithful of any member here. I am really proud of baptizing them actually. This week we also made 20 liters of Kool Aid in our water dispenser. Its pretty awesome im not going to lie. The other night as well we made grilled cheese sandwiches which were really really good. Its been a long time since I have had those. We might have a baptism this week as well of a family that we have been working with for a very long time. Last week I went on an interchange with elder evans again to help him out in his area. It was a prett fun change not goin to lie. I will be sad to leave this change because I have already gotten use to the people in this zone. But we will see. I will go and do right? Im staying pretty focused as well even though every now and then I catch my self thinking that 2 months isn’t anything in the mission. This time the pictures will go through of me in the jungle of my area. It’s a pretty cool place. Just really hot. I don’t got much else going on. Just thanks for writing me and I love you all.
> Elder Cheesman

John 10-12-09

2009-10-12T09:10:00.001-07:00

Dad that was a funny story. Elder calle(the secretary) calls me one day and ask..your ending flight is going to be in Manchester right? And I kinda of freaked out and said .i don’t even know where manchester is, im going to atlanta. He kind of went silent and just said I will call you tomorrow. Luckily he is buddy of mine and does a lot of favors for me. So I think its all worked out now. The santa cruz flight coming back was really nice actually. Just the fact we were on a bus for forever again. But im use to it now. Not to brag or anything but we figured out in the meeting(we were the best zone leaders in the whole mission last month) the asked we could baptize and marry 2 families. It made me feel good about myself. I don’t know if it will be the same for this month but I hope it will. Yesterday was probly one of the worst days of the mission though it just seemed everything fell apart. We got done fasting which was very very hard this time because of the heat. But once we ate.. I got a little sick. But im getting better now. Just a bug in my stomach. O ya I want to send yall some pictures of the jungle in my area. Its pretty cool im not going to lie. Family getting baptized this week I have been working with for a very long time, she is the one that just had a baby and just waiting till she is better to get baptized. But I think this week it will happen. So im pretty excited about that. Changes are next week and we will see if I just stay out here till I finish. In santa cruz I got to hang out a lot with elder Hanks who I havent seen in a long time. So that was fun. O ya yesterday me and my companion felt like branch presidents apparently something happened in the afternoon branch and we got the sacrament ready and my companion directed the meeting and I passed the sacrament to like 15 people. While I had to leave every 10 minutes to the bathroom. So that was an experience. i forgot to tell yall I think that I met a Georgian here in riberalta last week. It was really funny. He is from thomasville georgia. Passing out bibles to schools here. He doesn’t speak a word of spanish. So we had a good little conversation with him about georgia. About how the airport here is the size of a bathroom in the atlanta airport. But that was fun. But im really enjoying the mission work and its weird from this Sunday I only have 2 months left. I forgot last week to follows bednars talk about bearing testimony to family. Just I know this gospel is the true gospel and the book of mormon is true. No natural man could ever write that, it was inspired for us to use daily. My companion says…someone who reads the Book of Mormon every day will not go inactive. It’s a book with lots of power and lots of teachings. I bet dad you are loving teaching that seminary class. And last week I bought the new bible that has come out here. And transferring some scriptures from my old bible to the new one. Getting the testimony I did of the teachings of Jesus Christ and how amazing they are if we apply them. Studying a lot about faith with works lately as well. There is a cocaine addict we are helping right now and it is interesting how the book of mormon teaches you have to have faith si o si( I don’t know how that is said in english.) but that’s a little something I wanted to share with yall maybe I will write more next week. Well I love all of you. And have a good week.Elder Cheesman

John 10-05-09

2009-10-05T17:27:00.000-07:00

Well as of right now im in Santa Cruz for the little conference we have. The flight in is always really scary. The planes are tiny and if there is wind if bumps around like crazy. We call it the big mosquito. Cause it just gets tossed around by wind. But im getting used to it. Some of the missionaries really freak out sometimes when they get on. We just got done playing soccer with all the zone leaders on artificial field. It was pretty fun the only down side was they didn’t bring my shoes so I just played bare foot. I didn’t get hurt don’t worry. Dad that’s a pretty cool idea you got with the shirt thing. I didn’t know you were going to start doing that. And yes I did see all the conference sessions in English, me and elder evans and elder annis watched it together. And it was pretty amazing. I did like bednars talk and hollands a ton and uchtdorfs as well. We were talking about how there seems to be a lot more stick giving in the conferences. I love being in santa cruz to write because the internet is 10 times faster to read everything. Thanks by the way everyone for writing me. Im still working in my area. Im doing well about staying focused. We will just be planning sometimes and the phrase “do you remember when….” Will come up and we kind of get off topic. Glad to hear Grayson is doing so well in football its about time we stand out like that. Me and elder annis are still getting along. We are working pretty hard. We just need a little more people that actually complete with compromises in our area. A lot say one thing, but will never do it. So its hard to see the people that really want to hear us. We work hard and every night we get back we are dead tired from the heat and walking around. Its pretty difficult. Just hope we can find some more people to baptize for this week. We should have one this week but we will see how she is doing when we go back. The heat kind of gets me down sometimes but im staying in there. I have to always be an example to everyone in the zone. (im the second oldest in mission time in the zone) crazy huh? But I think I put a good example on how to do things. and I don’t have much problems with anyone. So im figuring that none of my friends are living at home now. Trevor sent me a message about he is savannah and everyone else is in Utah. But I hope all we be back for Christmas. Umm there isn’t much else to write until I come back from conference. But thanks for all the letters. I love you all as always. Have a good week. Elder Cheesman
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2009-09-28T09:00:00.001-07:00

>Sounds like things have gotten exciting with the flood stuff lately. I do miss doing that kind of service actually. Im thinking the rainy seasons are going to be like that here, but the thing is its alllll dirt roads here. It takes a long time just to cross a road sometimes. Last week we went to guayaramarin for conference and it was pretty amazing as always. President kind of hinted at me that I might be here another change and he might send me elder taylor. So that would be fun to see him again. We were in the church there from 930 in the morning till 730 at night. With a five minute break. Without lunch as well. So it was a long day. But its worth it. For my birthday one of the branch presidents threw me a party and invited a bunch of members and we played a little game and ate cake. And the famous tradition here is to bite the cake with your face for your birthday. And there is always someone that has to shove your face in it. So I might send some pictures of that next week. Then on Friday the other branch president I have where we eat lunch had a big lunch for us with cake. And they made me bite the cake as well. Also they like to get the birthday people soaked with water. So we had a little water fight as well. Pretty interesting day. Im pretty excited everyone will be home for me, I think that will be fun. And thanks for the package you sent me. You too stacy even though it wont get here. It’s the thought that counts. Im enjoying the starburst and skittles. I did like the ties though. And socks of course. This week I will proby be using the leatherman as well to fix a shower so it was good timing. I told you mom that I took both tests. But I didn’t score very good on them. So I hope all that goes well. The thing is it would be bad if I don’t get accepted.. I got no where else to go. Today I think we might be playing a little basketball as a zone to make everyone get into shape haha. But the zone is doing the best the week than all the other weeks I have had here. President is happy with the work we have done. So I hope that keeps going. We would have baptized a young couple last week. But the wife gave birth. So that kind of put stuff off. But we went and saw her in the hospital. It was so weird to see her baby because it already had a full head of hair and hair on his legs. It was pretty fun though. My health is better as well. That rash isn’t bothering me anymore. I still kind of have a cough though but I will be fine. Im staying happy even though its hard to stay in a small area like this for a long time.(but im a pro of that by now) but me and my companion get along good. That’s how the days go by better because we make jokes about everything. But there isn’t too much else going on for me. Next week im going to santa cruz again. And im going to be buying the new Spanish bible that just came out down here so im kind of excited. Well have a good week and I love you all.
>Elder Cheesman

John 09-21-09

2009-09-21T10:15:00.000-07:00

>Well it sounds like everyone had a good week. If you need help with the house, if i go to school close than i can rent out the basement. That might help a little. And i might be interested and doing that job with dad. Im pretty excited to get back to work. So it wont matter to much what i do. Im good now with talking with everyone. Working with hansen might be a plan c or something beacuse i didnt make very good with him. But we will see. Today i just got the birthday package just in time for me birthday. I did like the picture of mason a lot i think he should wear that everyday. Just an idea. It kinda cooled down a little bit yesturday because it rained hard for a while. But the family of 5 did get baptized and married. It was awesome. And now they are giving us referals to teach there family. They are the family Vaca(cow) its a common name here and i love it. Me and elder annis are getting along really well. We went and celebrated Saturday night eating a big burger and milk shakes. So that was pretty fun. For my birthday one of my branch presidents is going to make us a dinner in his house and invite some other members. I think it will be fun. And then Saturday the other branch president will do something for us as well. I havent opened the package yet because all these missionaries will just steal from me. But thank you very much for sending it. The only bad thing that has been hapening lately is that i have had a little reaction to so much heat here. Aparently its normal. Just little bumps come out all over your body. And they kind of itch. Its kind of like poison ivy but not as bad. But i bought a cream for it and getting better. And i will probly put on some sun block some days. This week we are going to Guayaramarin it’s the boarder line of brazil. To do zone conference. So that will be cool to get to know all the zones in the district Beni. I will try to send a picture of the baptism. This week we have a young couple that we are trying to get baptized that we have been working on for a while. If we baptize them we will would have baptized 3 families with 8 people this month. That does not happen very often in the mission. The whole mission baptizes like 8 families a month. And just us have maybe 3. Pretty good not going to lie (but staying humble of course) lisa. I don’t have my license stuff with me but tomorrow I will try and send it. Mom I did take both the act and sat. I took one and the other week I took the other. But I did take them both. About my social security I have no clue. Annnnnd high school stuff I don’t know how I would take those out from south America… haha but I do feel old turning 21. I should start acting like an adult pretty soon huh? You guys might want to bring me like a jacket or two when I get back cause its going to the middle of winter there right? Im going to freeze like crazy. Im learning a lot of English lately. Elder annis is teaching me. Every day I have some really messed up phrase or words I don’t remember. But everything is going fine. Thank you lisa for everything.( I will bring you something from here) I love you all. And thanks for everything.
>Elder Cheesman

John 09-14-09

2009-09-14T10:00:00.001-07:00

Well im not upset that you want to sell the house, but im not too happy about it as the same time. You want to live by a lake now? Which lake? I think there would just be more bugs and what not. But just take down the for sale sign till i get home then we can put it up would be a good idea..hint hint. I dont want to be one of missionaries from the movies that are lost when they get home. Last week was very interesting. Changes were a lot different then expected. Elder Rubio went to another area in the zone to be a zone leader to make it better over there. And im staying but my new companion is elder..Annis from ogden Utah. Its pretty funny because exactly a year ago i had elder taylor. And now another american. He is pretty cool kid. He talks better spanish than me and he likes to work hard. So we are having a good time. Also yesterday we had district conferance and president maynes came. There were about 460 people in the chapel. They didnt fit in there they had to lit outside and look through windows and what not to see. So it was good that we filled the chapel . Saturday we married a couple and baptized the wife. The husband was already member. This Saturday im even more excited that we have a family of 5 that is going to get married and baptized. So we will see how that goes. I have been with a little cold lately because some south winds came up but im getting better now because its got again. I know i say this every week that its hot but last week was a record for this city. Even the locals all talk about how hot it got that day. It was 115 degrees Tuesday and it felt like walking around in a microwave. And at night it stayed at 98 degrees. So i was sweating taking a cold shower and trying to sleep that night. I had the fan right next to my bed. It was bad i hope it doesnt get back to that. They say the rainy seasons are going to becoming this month, so im pretty excited. I kind of like it but it does make the work a little harder. Pres maynes talked about in the last conferance of zone leaders that God loves us sooo much that he lets us have a hard mission sweating, walking in rain and mud so that we can get the best of the mission. Pretty interesting if you take it at that point. Im excited to have an american companion becuase i can learn english again. Its really funny the phrases that we say that dont exist in english. The other day i wanted to say that “o that was coincidence that we found him” but i ended up saying “o well that was a casualty that we sow him.” As if casualty that he died or something, in spanish its “casualidad.” But that’s way off , we had a good laugh afterward. Ummm nothing much else happening. Dads letter never got here but mom and Kristi did write. Glad to hear that we finally won in the 3 on 3 tournament. We never get to finish out those. Im still not sure if im fine with the whole changing house deals… maybe if it was explained to me why I might understand a little better. Well say hi to brooke for me and glad to hear they will be back when I come home. Is everyone going to able to be at home when I come back? That would be nice. I hope next change I go to santa cruz to send some stuff home that takes up a lot of space. I have a lot of junk now that I need to send. But im happy staying in riberalta because we have lots of families progressing. There were 4 missionaries that left this change and so a lot of new guys came. And it looks like we have a good zone this change. But that’s all really going on lately. Thanks for writing and I love yall. Tell me if you guys want anything specific from here. Love yall and have a good week. o ya by the way what is left for schooling? just apply me anywhere or is there anything else i need to do? thats all thanks
>Elder Cheesman

John 09-07-09

2009-09-07T09:37:00.000-07:00

The zone leader conference was pretty amazing last week like always. Not just because I taught a class but the other lessons when really really good(im humble I promise) president talked about HOPE at the end and it was interesting. We should have hope in everything we do. When we talk to someone we should have a strong hope that, that person will get baptized. He talked about his son who just got back from his mission in Honduras. He baptized about 180 people in his last area for 8 months. And they were all referances from members that he hoped all would get baptized. He says that he didn’t knock doors his last 6 months because he was baptizing every week and taught like 60 lessons.( I teach about 30 which is the excellence number for the area. The mission now has 180 missionaries. Which is a ton. So things are going to look better pretty soon. I have no clue if im leaving this change but I hope im not because we have some families getting baptized soon. My body has been pretty dead lately. We are doing services every week. And we helped again to do a water well….in this sun its crazy. I sweated like 20 liters of water. My companion doesn’t leave till October by the way. And that’s awesome that BYU won elder evans celebrated when I told him that. Ya I forgot it was labor day im not going to lie. The only days I remember are my birthday and Christmas I think. Good to hear trevor went to church. I thought he was going before but I guess not.. and it was really funny in all your letters that said ïm sure dad will tell you about the game¨ and he didn’t say anything. I found it pretty funny. Yesterday me and my comp were fasting… and I think it’s the hardest place in the mission to fast. Everyone wants to invite you something and walking in the sun just makes me hungry(im not whining or anything) I will try to send 2 pictures…. Me and elder lopez at lake Tumi Chuqua and the zone painting my chapel. Crazy that we are already in changes and I have only 2 more to go. Seems like a lot but at the same time its not. I talked to elder hanks(from my group) the other day and it was the first time in like 7 months that I have spoken with him. That was really fun we figured out that our whole group is going back the same day in the same plane(that’s what we wanted) and I doubted that we could because they came late but I guess not. About the time I get in mom they have no clue. But maybe in the morning. Im sure everyone can just come in the 17th at night to be there for the next day…. And for school… there is something I need… a computer haha. And it surprised that lisa has a mac now. I have been thinking about if that is what I want for school and have a regular pc. There weren’t very many questions this week so there aren’t many answers. I think im going to be trying some new foods soon. Like monkey, raccoon, turtle eggs, stuff like that. Aparently there is a member that sells that stuff. But anyway that’s about all thatnks for everything and I love yall as always.Elder Cheesman

John 08/31/09

2009-08-31T17:20:00.000-07:00

Well Dean im very sorry for not remembering about your birthday last week. But this Week i remembered. right now im in santa cruz for the zone leader conferance. and we just got done playing some basketball with president. and i realized that i need to start doing some running in the morning because my legs got winded fast. but i enjoyed it a lot. the only bad thing today was our flight coming in. they are tiny planes and they bump up and down and side to side the whole way. and this time it was worse because of the wind. and one of the elders with us was throwing up...for a good amount of time. so that makes it always exciting. its nice being in the city again. good food good weather. but i feel kind of lost being in the city again. i cant imagine what it will be like going home. changings are next week. and we still dont have any idea of where im going. but i think i might go with someone from my group. but who knows. we had service last week doing a water well. digging out dirt pulling it up dumping it out. for like 2 and a half hours in the sun.... it was pretty hard but never have done a well before so that was cool. crazy to think only 2 changes left huh? but i think i will be working fine till the end. about what time i get in i do not know just said the 18th but i will ask tomorow. now mom dont freak out but... the 10th of december are elections again...like last year there might be a few problems. we have no clue yet but everyone is praying it wont turn out bad. so i might come home even earlier. but nothing is for sure thats just a rumor. i liked the pictures you all sent. sad to hear markus and mary are moving but im suuuure they will come back to see me right?... dean i want to hear what you did for yourbirthday and if you got any new toys. im wanting to come back to the city before i go home so i can send some stuff that will take up room in my luggage. so i can bring back cooler stuff. like a hand made hammock for 10 bucks. not really else happening this week. im staying pretty happy. president has asked my comp and i to give a class on the atonement tommorow and he wants it to be the best class of the conferance. so i think that will be fun. we taught the last time too on how to plan right and i think it made a differance. lisa about school stuff im sure kristi can pull my papers and stuff and mom has my sat and act scores i think. i think i got an 22 on the act. lisa can also put that i was an assitant teacher in an elementary school for a year as well. i dont think i have done any crimes....or got caught doing them (thats a joke mom) it was good to hear from everyone today. i didnt get the message from markus yet....it has been a very long time since i have spoken with him. thanks lisa by the way for helping with my schooling i will try and do some stuff right now. thanks for the package mom i think it will get here next week. and i will see what i can buy for my birthday here. but thats all really thats going on. i have baptims the next saturday and i think we can have a very good september. i love you all and hope you are doing well. brooke i cant wait to meet mason i think we will get a long fine. im loving the scirptures lately im very surprised of the stuff i can remember now. i think i have changed the movie quoteing talent to remember where a scripture is.. weird huh? o ya there is a family LOBO in my branch maybe they are realatives of luis lobo. his name is limberg. anyway nothing much more but i love yall and have funElder Cheesman

John 08-24-09

2009-08-24T08:49:00.001-07:00

Last week was pretty fun for me. I went on splits with elder evans and played some basketball at 630 in the morning with him. he plays pretty well. he plays like a big man and i play like a wing. so he would over power me sometimes and i would be faster and get jumpshots. so we stayed pretty even. the funny thing was i was sore the next few days becuase i havent used those muscles in a very long time. but it made me really happy to play again. i still have a shot going for me. and got a nice compiment at first when he told me he thought i was left handed. so thats good my left hand is still working. as we played i was remebering more and more how i played before. he is a really cool kid, we talked a lot about basketball. he has heard of luis williams and it was funny to tell him i had to play against him. dad i like the talk you gave me last week. and there isnt the talk in spanish at all? my companion wanted it. i started to translate parts and he wanted the whole thing. or i always enjoy quotes and stuff from famous people. i have started a new notbook of sayings of random people, president maynes, my own sayings, and all the scriptures i have found interesting lately. so that would be a help to send some quotes. we are getting into the hottest time of the year and its hard. you can really feel the heat from the ground and the wind. its like florida getting up to 110 degrees and with hot wind. its very humid. im sweating just sitting here writeing yall. the picture dad sent me of the youth i recognized a little more this time but its weird how everyone has changed. my companion is one of the hardest working missionaries even though he is going home we still work hard. he talks about his girlfriend some songs from home but it does not show in his work. we have 3 families planned to baptize in september. the whole mission ususally baptizes 7 in a month.(we will have 3) so that will be pretty fun. and dad you will enjoy the humpfrey house. i did go there. it was huge! he has guards everywhere a small bush maze. like 30 bathrooms. and i only saw a little tiny bit of the house. i didnt get to see the bowling alley or the movie theater but i hear its pretty awesome. i will see if i can do the pictures of them on boxes to be the height of me and elder evans. that would be pretty funny. i didnt know elder taylor wanted all of our parents to come down here. that would be fun but there isnt tooo much we can do. maybe for a day or two would be fun. but there isnt much touristy stuff here. in peru there was a bunch. the plaza in santa cruz with the huge catholic church is all people go for really. but im done with it if yall are. so i wont be able to go to atlanta temple when i get back? when does it open? schooling i was thinking of studying a little bit in georgia then transfering out would probly be my best option. georgia gwinnett college or gwinnett tech or i dont any one of them that i would be able to enter. but it would be nice to study for free for a little bit before i have to pay for schooling. but any suggestions from anyone are accepted. crazy to think i almost only have 3 months left huh? my birthday is in less than a month as well(im old) almost a year since we have left Bolivia. crazy how time is going by now. only 2 changes are left. i think im going to be styaing here but its really not for sure. i hope i stay here because i dont want to happen like last year when noone knew me for my birthday. i had to buy a cake and eat it alone. but what comes, comes. sounds like everyone is doing well at home. well i will look up some more stuff for school but i love yall. and hope everything goes well this week. o ya maybe a favor Lisa maybe can send me some guitar tabs of the songs i liked that i can learn every now and then....thanks.Elder Cheesman

John and pictures! 08/17/09

2009-08-17T17:05:00.001-07:00

Last week we had zone conference with president maynes and it was amazing as usual. Talked about a lot of interesting things. Like why did joseph smith have to be attacked by satan before the first vision? God had power to protect him. But let it happen so that joseph could see the lowest and worst state of sin and darkness to see the highest glory of God. If was very interesting for me. We are going to start putting together a book about the sayings of president maynes. And Brooke I loved the example you have about the new members it was funny and im sure I will be using it very soon to teach the leaders here. The organization here is horrible and we are going to start training some people. President said the companion I have now was my gift for suffering with the disobedience problems in the zone the past couple months. I am learning a lot from elder rubio. We have 3 families that are planned to get baptized at the end of the month or in the beginning of September. Im teaching a little better with him as well which is nice. We have a lot of goals to get things better here. And as for my birthday I think I just want some candies that you cant buy here. There is snickers and m&Ms here and that’s about it. Maybe a few new ties(never can have enough) I don’t like the ties that are very bright in color. The darker ones I use more. Plus president is getting more strict on the ¨party ties¨ umm but not much else. I think Thursday im going to go on changes with elder evans and we are goin to try play some hoops in the morning. So im pretty excited about that. Nothing really much is happening just still thinking if im going to finish here or no. its possible I can or no but we will see. That’s crazy that the school year is already started and im hoping to see some basketball when I get back.. that means Kristi needs to play. I am really missing basketball. I think im losing weight little by little. I have started doing harder exercises which will help a lot. The Americans are all back. Elder hanks ive heard is opening a new area in SATELITE which is half of my old area. Its been doing so well there that president put more missionaries there. So I was happy to hear that. But im staying happy. I figured out the secret is singing hymns all morning to wake you up. And better Christmas hymns which are my favorite to sing them very loud. (good thing we don’t have very close neighbors. And if you search in google earth it’s by the main park in the city next to Ganadero Bank. It’s a sweet house and we have made the room a lot better. But im going to search some more stuff about school ( im likeing a lot the system design and system development options but we will see. Well thanks for everything I love yall very much and dad I will print out the quotes to read later. Elder Cheesman

John 8-10-09

2009-08-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

Once again we did not get a picture!

Its good to hear everyone had a good week. Yesturday i completed 19 months! Crazy huh? Dont worry my companion are working very very hard. Probly the best i have worked all my misson. An american did make it up here finally his name is elder Evans. He is almost as tall as i am and he is from minesota. He played basketball for SUU for a year before he came out here. And he is telling me it wasnt too hard to get on the team. I dont know why everyone just wants to mess with my mind on where i want to go to school. I read a little what lisa sent me last week and like the Software development stuff. Its something pretty broad i can work on. Teaching would be a back up plan i thought about how i dont like doing the same thing everyday and teaching the same thing every year for the rest of my life my be a little difficult for me. So i was thinking of applying to the fallowing places Gwinnett Tech, UVU, SUU if i would go to utah i could try to walk on to a team next year, (it gives me time to get back in shape) today i got permision from president to search some more stuff about school to print off so i will be doing that right now. But he said that my family has to do the papers and everything. We went to santa cruz last week and it was pretty fun. Little scary coming in on the tiny planes but we made it alright. I stayed the night in the house of elder magnum and elder anderson who are my good friends that just got back from peru. They were talking about how lima north has gotten worse. And they saw elder ridge and he aparently gives all the credit to me for teaching him spanish. He is aparently training someone right now. And my whole group is here finally! Elder taylor went allllll the wayh on the other side of the missoin in yacuiba. Today i will take some pictures of the river that is near our house to send it next week. Alright i will try to send a picture this week but i dont promise anything. Last week it took forever becuase i didnt make it smaller. But i will see what i can do. I cant wait to see my nephew he sounds like he fits in the family way to well. About blake being in the airport is not my idea, i dont think i want that either. But she does write me quite often and some time brea but noone elses besides that becuase everyone is off and married. But i will live. Im willing to start over new when i get back if i need to. Has anyone heard about Evan in California? I have been wondering how he has been. Crazy to hear that school has already started, dad is going to enjoy seminary classes. I knew i was getting him ready when he woke us up all the time for seminary. When we went to the class with president maynes last week he gave a really really awesome lesson about agency and will of God. How even mormons have flase traditions about the will of God. A lot of missoinaries have been saying it was Gods will to leave Bolivia and go to Peru. But he said something very interesting. ¨bad things happen to good people by the bad use of agency ¨ like if someone decided to get drunk and wrecked with someone and killed them. Explained that is not the will of God to kill someone. Someone just used there agency wrong. It was very interesting for me. Talked about what all happend in the pre existance. About how the Celestial kingdom is no walk in the park. There is a joke here that there are not Hammocks( i dont know how to spell that) in the celestial kingdom. We are still going to be working there. He said imagine living in the celestial kingdom when the war in heaven was going on. Im sure it wasnt too easy. But he explanined a lot better than me and i enjoyed it. My companion and i also taught a class about how we should plan every day. It was pretty good im not going to lie. But thanks for writing me this week i hope i got to answer everything. But im going to print off some stuff. Thanks for everything and i love yall have a good week.Elder Cheesman

John 08/03/09

2009-08-03T18:57:00.000-07:00

I did buy a camera so i will send some pictures from now on. I did enjoy the paint pictures but its sad i dont have a clue who these kids are. Thanks lisa for sending the college stuff. I have been thinking more about it. And im going back to thinking about computer design stuff.(why i cant i ever decide anything) but i think the papers you sent will help. I did get a new companion last week. Which wasnt planned, because we havent had changes yet. My new companion is the ex assitant that is going home in 3 months. And so the work here has really changed. He gives stick to everyone. But surprisingly we are getting along well. His name is Elder Rubio also from Ecudador. He is 26 years old and only has 3 years as member(got baptized and a year later went on the mission.) so he has some cool stories. It will be good for the area here. He is already helping out and has 2 days here. He works really really hard in everything which is good. Its starting to get hot hot. They werent lieing about august and september. Time is going to go by even faster now working this hard. The americans are going to be coming this week. There were problems with the visa so that means i dont go to santa cruz till Thursday. I have been pretty well with health lately besides the normal runs every once and a while from eating something weird. I have eaten a weird animal from the woods i forgot what it was called but it looks like a ant eater without the long nose and a little smaller. But it tastes like chicken. And very soon i told our pension that we need to try Monkey. So that will be fun. I will take some pictures of my area this week so you can see what i get to see everyday. Its really awesome, all types of bugs birds flowers trees fruits. I have tried a few new fruits as well that dont look like they would be fruits. There are some for when you want to go to the bathroom really really fast.(i stay away from those) but most fruits are really good. I really dont have much to talk about (as you can tell) this week. My companion says that there will be an american here finally this change so im pretty excited about that. And i might only be here till september. We will se what president says. But its funny if im here after september i cant leave till i go home. So next change determines it all. But im staying happy. And i will cut it a little short this week to print out those papers and to send a picture. But i love yall and hope everthing goes well thi s week. Brooke i really enjoyed your pictures by the way… Mason is huge! Cant wait to meet himElder Cheesman

John 07-27-09

2009-07-27T14:56:00.000-07:00

Glad to hear that your trip to destin went well. I told you the place was nice. Last week was pretty good. It was hot alll week and then came the famous south winds. Its interesting how this place can be at 120 degrees and drop to about 50 in one day. It was really really cold. Friday night it kind of snuck up on us and we didnt have jackets so we went to every house and they let us borrow a blanket. But now its getting a little more hotter. I keep hearing that august and september are the worst months of the year due to the heat so we will see how that goes…there was a little problem with a companionship last week and one had to leave early and his companion was with us a couple days. So that was a little more difficult doing everything with 3 people. But he left this morning for santa cruz so we are back to normal. We have changes this week. And they are sending me a new compaion so im not alll alone up here. Im pretty sure the americans came back but im not for sure for sure. I will know next week when i fly back to santa cruz. Its crazy to believe i have already been here in riberalta 3 months! I didnt hit me till last week until someone told me that. The zone finished pretty well in baptisms as well. So im pretty happy overall. My health has been pretty good, i got a little runny nose/sore throught for a day because of the cold but other than that i have been good. The cough drop HALLS here is sold as a candy and for pretty cheap. So i buy them often to keep from my sore throught. And i will be buying a camera today i think it will be coming out to be around 200 dollars. Which isnt too bad for here, its a cybershot. Thats really all thats been going on the big thing was the cold last week. And we did have a baptism of a 16 year old and she looks like she will stay in the church. She made a lot of decesions to change and get baptized so that was good. Thats about all thats going on thanks for writing and i will have more for yall next week. Love yall…. The church is true (aint no doubt about it) o ya before i forget. Maybe there is someway you can send me the site of somwhere i can go fast to about college and print out stuff so i can read when im in the house (that would be a lot of help) please, thanksElder Cheesman

Johnboy 07-20-09

2009-07-20T14:58:00.001-07:00

Last week we had conference with President. I think that everything went well. I had to everything pretty much. I think I did pretty well with my message to help everyone OPEN THERE MOUTH. I used a lot of examples from the book of mormon. Saying if some of the prophets didn’t want to open there mouth what would have happen. Especially the example of Abinadai(my favorite) if he didn’t testify a lot of the Book of Mormon wouldn’t exist. In my intereview with president he said he is happy with the things that are happening in this area. I had 3 baptisms last week of a amazing family. There are 2 more planned for this Saturday. The zone is baptizing a lot more now a days. We have one finishing his mission this Thursday we will see how he works before he finishes. Pretty weird having only 5 months left. And changes are already coming up next Thursday. President said he will be sending me a new companion to make things a little easier for me. President did talk to me as well about college and if I will play basketball. I told him that its still a maybe if I want to play. Because I would have to walk on to a team. He told me intramurals might just be better. And about studying im not sure about the design stuff because I wasn’t very good at it but maybe in computer repair stuff I was thinking. Either one would be fun just don’t know what all I have to take. It was funny president said that his son was applied by his sister doing the papers and this week lisa happends to send me sites for the schools. I thought it was pretty funny. It was awesome to hear about your baptism last week. That would have been fun to be at. Maybe pictures of that would be nice(hint hint). Sounds like yalls talks went over last week. Dad I like the quotes you used as well. Glad to hear ¨GIRLS Camp¨went well. Even though to hear that it wasn’t much of a camp. My house doesn’t even have air conditioning and im not camping. Its starting to get really hot here. They say that august and September are the hottest months of the year here. And im starting to believe it. So we will see how that goes. Didn’t get my hopes to high when I knew I would be here in September. I love the zone but the heat gets really bad sometimes. I sweat from head to toe just eating lunch. I did take out some money from my account I might need a little more for the camera I think im going to buy. Its about the only decent one they have around here. Not sure on the price yet but I think I will buy it tomorrow. Me and my companion get along fine. He really just likes to lay back and watch me do zone leader work. He is a follower missionary. Just does what his companion does. Elder taylor wrote me a little not saying he has his meeting with the ambassador of Bolivia and is waiting to hear the reply to come back here. So im pretty excited everyone is coming back. I think president will send me an American next change. There is a new rule that you have to be in santa cruz 2 changes to leave out to the jungle. (I left early) but there aren’t any problems with that. But elections are in December and some are thinking things are going to get worse (but I wont be here) so everyone is praying that nothing goes wrong. Nothing much else happened last week. This week I just have to do the financial stuff for the zone which takes forever to do. But its only once a month. Its so weird that I have about 3 changes left. That still hasn’t hit me completely yet. But don’t worry its not effecting my work… o ya we have started to play soccer every Monday morning at 6 and I have been playing a lot better. I feel better now playing sports though. I have a lot of goals to lose some weight this year. I still have a lil pot belly going on here. But I hope everything goes well this week to have a good month in july. Because June was a really bad month for us. And about the mikes house on the beach I have been to. I put the carpet in the 2 bedrooms( you can look at my work while your there) but its beautiful and has a good placing. I hope I answered all of your questions the internet didn’t let me do too many things today. But that’s about all. I love you all and I haven’t heard from Deano in a while ( I know I didn’t write you either in the mission but you didn’t have internet) but hope yall have a good week. And im doing fine. Love yall. Elder Cheesman

John 07-13-09

2009-07-13T15:07:00.000-07:00

Hi All,
If you look at the end of John's email you will see his release date. I need everyone to post when it would be good for you to be home. I'm okay with it not being on Christmas Day if it is a problem with the in-laws, but it would be nice this year. Just let me know what works. I want everyone home at once. I know Spencer may have a problem with that, (lets kidnap him from where ever is going) but everyone else at least.
Love you,
mom

Well the last week was pretty another travel week for me. I went to Santa Cruz for 2 days for the zone leader conference. President Maynes told me thanks for all the commentaries I gave during the conference after. So that made me feel good. Well I did get a new companion his name is Elder España(Spain) every member thinks he is from spain its pretty funny. He is from Ecuador and has 10 months in the mission. He was with elder parra and his trainer was elder rojas(both my old companions) but im doing good with all this responsibility on me lately. President even did jokes when I was leaving santa cruz like (don’t feel pressure but…. Alllll…. Todo….allll the responsibility is on your shoulders and you cant mess up for one minute) so that made me feel better. But they are sending me a zone leader at the end of the change. July 30th. But it sounds like everything is going well at home. Hey the mission president that came back didn’t happen to know Elder Zack Collins. Because he went to that mission a week before I left. So that would be cool to see how he is. My zone is also getting better. We had one of the best weeks we have had in a very very long time. As a zone we have 11 baptisms planned for this Saturday, so im pretty excited for that. Dad I like the tongue twister. There are a bunch here I cant do. They gave me this one in the CCM RR con rr guitarra, RR con rr carril, rapia corre los carros, rapido el ferrocarril. Try to do it in one or 2 breaths and its impossible (for me at least). Ive gotten use to the living conditions here I think we might be changing houses very soon to a better place so I hope all that goes over well. We have conference this week and president is going to come here to riberalta. So that will be fun this week. O ya I did get my package thank you. The socks weren’t the exact exact ones but they will work. The ones I have are the wool ones that are really really thick. Thanks for the ties I get comments about them from lots of people. Um I still would like some moron tab choir music. Because I don’t have any and we cant listen to anything but that. So as many as you can send of them would be great. Or better if all can be put on a mp3 cd. But whatever works. And man I wish that Bolivia was like Africa. People being in the meeting early. They have an Bolivian hour where everything starts an hour late. The church should start at 3 but no one is there till 310 so we start and people file in the whole meeting. But its getting a little better. I should have some baptisms this week of some teenagers of a family. It should be about 4 of them. And one more for the next week. So the area is getting a little better as well. I have been really well off with health lately. I haven’t got sick from anything. So I have been really lucky with that. And dad im fine with going to Hawaii any time. Now about school. I heard that gwinnett tech is pretty cool and perimiter is ok. But I have no clue which is good or which I would be able to enter. Something I need to get back to thinking too huh? But next week I will have better answers. Pretty soon we will have permission to enter school websites. But I will see. That’s about it. I will write more next week. But I love yall and hope all goes well. And by the way,… the church is very true. Elder Cheesman

o ya by the way im going home december 18th you should have got an email...if not tell meElder Cheesman

John 06-06-09

2009-07-06T14:22:00.000-07:00

Well this past week has been an exciting one…. My companion had an emergency change and had to come to Santa cruz. So i will be going with interchanges for a little bit i think. That means with teenagers from the District. So this will be interesting. My comp had to come for some serious personal problems i will tell yall when i come home what it was. But everything will be fine. Sounds like everyone had a good week last week. I celebrated my 4th of July eating a milk shake. So that was fun for me. Im in santa cruz right now and dont have much time to write. Im with the ex asistant thats going home this change. Tomorrow is our meeting with the president. I hope my package is in the office im planning on taking a bunch of stuff back to riberalta. And dont worry about the snakes they never come out. They are only in the deep deep jungle. No near people. Lisa i enjoyed your letter. Seems like you and brooke are traveling everywhere lately. And o ya about elder taylor and the other missionaries. THEY ARE ALL COMEING BACK at the end of the month. I talked with president and said alllll the americans that are over there are planned to come back this month. So that will be pretty exciting. I like being in the city again.(its not as hot) i did hear about michael jackson and it was a big deal here because everyone listens to his music. O and about my card i tried to take money out and the machine wouldnt let me. Im not sure if it was just the machine or somethin but it said the card was invalid. But i will try somewhere else. And i wont buy the best camera but in the jungle they are way expensive for one that is not good at all. Thats crazy that stephen is going on his mission already. That will be fun for him. I love how everyone is asking for pictures of out here but i cant for right now without a camera. My house brooke isnt bad at all really. (the zone leaders always have the better house) they are actually going to kick us out pretty soon to make it into a nice hotel. So i have no clue where we are going to go. I will figure somethin out. But im going to cut this short and write more when i go back to riberalta. I only have had 30 minutes to write. But i love you all and hope you have a good week.Elder Cheesman

John 6-29-09

2009-06-29T09:06:00.001-07:00

Well last week was pretty fun. I heard a bunch of interesting stories. Im not sure if i believe them but i had 4 different people say the same thing. It was about the snakes here in Bolivia. Apparently its a big secret they have. Well not secret just not well known. They have seen snakes here that are 3 and a half feet in width! And about 60 feet long. Huge anacondas that live in the jungle where no one ever goes really. Only the hunters go out there. They all say no one ever believes it when they come to Bolivia but every boliviano knows about them. So i asked around of course and everyone says that there are. So those were some good stories to make us feel safe… but i want to see some pictures of those first. We also found a place in our area that is awesome. Its a lake that use to be part of a river. Surrounded by pure jungle and has all types of birds, some tigers ive Heard about, and crocodiles. So im going to go back with a camera(when i fin done) to take some pictures. It got a record col here i think last week. The south winds came in and it was cold for 3 days! That never happends it comes for one day and then leaves normally. It did rain as well. It was a flash flood kind of deal. All of a sudden the clouds form and it pours down rain for about 30 minutes and fills the streets with water and stops. But of course we are happier tan anyone to have rain to cool off from the sun. It looks like kristi had a good time at EFY. I always did enjoy them. Im sure they recognized the name cheesman when you went. I met a ton of people there and are my friends even today. And mason is already huge! I see babies around here and always ask how old they are to see how big is my nephew. We had to do the Money stuff for the zone last week and it was very stressful. I didnt think it would be that hard but it took a very long time. I couldnt sleep good thinking of what we had to buy. My companion is going home the end of July and I think he is happy to finish here. We are going to Santa Cruz next week so maybe we can have that money ready to buy a camera please… I hope I have time to go get one. I have a little more respect from the zone now I think because they ask me a bunch of things and listen to what I say. (which is hard to do) its hard trying to keep everyone in line and not yell at them too much for the things we know they are doing. Nothing is really going on besides that. And yall didn’t do too many questions this week so im running out of things to say. It was funny to see mom and dad rushed to write short letters this week. But thanks for the picture mason is awesome and Jack is really big. Im still loading the other picture. Kristi I guess has a new crush but where does he live? That’s always a problem with efy the people live far away sometimes. Well I am having a good time. Staying happy. Which is a big challenge for some. But the conference talks that just got in get me excited again. I have almost read all of them because I didn’t have the chance to hear them when I got here. I was dead tired during the whole conference because I was in a plane the whole day. But im getting a lot out of it. Scriptures im getting down pretty well. I am starting the Book of Mormon again but this time im studying it. Marking up everything and analyzing. Its waaaay more interesting that way. But I don’t have much time left, thanks for everything i love yall have a good weekElder Cheesman

John 06-21-09

2009-06-22T15:38:00.000-07:00

Well first off happy fathers day. Last week was a little better than the one before. There were changes last week but only one elder got changed and the other one finished his mission. But we have 2 new elders here that they look like they will work. And I bet you feel like a king. I don’t even remember the last time I ate a waffle but I don’t think it will be too long till I have one. But last week I did find and ice cream place that makes an amazing milk shake for 2 bucks. So we might be going there every now and then. We have started to eat a little more lately because we haven’t had time to eat dinner in a while, just snacks. But the bad thing was we found a good chicken place to sit and eat. And the homeless people go directly to us(with the ties and American) is what they are thinking. That’s a problem here is everyone ups the price with me its really funny. We make a lot of jokes about it. I haven’t heard those old basketball names in a long time. They should be pretty old now. It made me laugh a lot when you said ryan smith is helping hal Wilson. (ryan did not like him at all) but that’s good they were doing better. Maybe for you guys it wasn’t that long ago I opened my letter… Im kidding time has gone by really fast I only have about 3 changes left. That’s crazy. Nothing much really happened last week. This Saturday we have 3 baptisms planned. So we are pretty excited about that. It’s a mom that’s amazing that has gone to a bunch of churchs and said from all of them this one has to be the right one. My health is fine just sometimes for a day stuff runs through us. We drink about 6 liters of water every day. So we stay hydrated so we don’t get sick too much. Im still the only American out here. I don’t speak much English. Hey mom can you write taylors mom again to see how he is doing every once and a while. He writes me like a sentence a week. And we don’t know if he is going to come back. Im trying to get my whole group back if I can. We will see about that this month. The elder that got sick is better now. He still gets some cold sweats. And he did have kind of a seizure but it was a shock. He is really really skinny now. But he is working again. Im going to start looking for cameras now because we need them for baptisms and stuff. Noone else has cameras here. And you can look for my house at….. I don’t know the number but the corner of avenida Nicolas suarez and Avenida Antenor Vasquez. I live on a second floor next to a old radio station building. You can see the big windows above. And stacy looks like she is doing well in her photos I didn’t know she was going to do more than what she was doing. But that’s good. But that’s really all that’s going on really. Thanks for writing and I love you all. Have a good week. Elder Cheesman

John 6-15-09

2009-06-15T09:26:00.000-07:00

Well last week was pretty interesting for us….. everything was going fine the whole week until Thursday night…we go to bed at the normal time 1030 and as I was sleeping we get a phone call in the middle of the night from one of our missionaries and I answer.(half asleep) and the elder very calmly is telling me that his companion had an attack. Of course I was confused and said what attack? And he said a heart attack… so I tell him to call the doctor. I hang up… sit down on my bed and tell my companion elder lopez had a heart attack like it was no big deal. We notice that I was a big deal at the same time… running around calling people and getting dressed to go over there. We get there and they take him in an ambulance to the hospital.(a very poor gross hospital) and we were there until 2am! So we left when he was out of danger and went back in the morning. He was there with a high fever. We figured out that he went into a shock because of the fever and he might have it again. But it got us for a scare. He is fine now. Kind of. He is a little weak so he has to rest for 2 days. So you can imagine running around doing that and then in the day time go back to work. We were really tired last week… the week flew by because of that. Other than that the week went really well. And yes the camera did get taken. And thanks to growing up with technology/and boy scouts. I was prepared and bought a usb memory a while a ago and been keeping all my pictures in that. Only like 2 pictures I didn’t have on there. So we are all good in that part. Just don’t have a camera to take more pictures. But im thinking of getting one in santa cruz because here they are really really expensive. The leatherman I had was taken and about 600 bolivianos almost 100 dollars(mission money). So that was not very fun. This morning was pretty weird. The office missionary calls me to ask what airport im going to arrive at when I go home. I asked if it’s a little early to be doing that? And he tells me they have to to avoid problems. So that was pretty weird to already hear about goin back. But the time is going by even fast right now. My companion goes home next change and I have a feeling we are going to be together for that. Mom that was a pretty weird dream you had but its funny at times my companion makes me mad but not that mad. Luckily I have gotten along with most of my companions. And I noticed today that there aren’t many more companion im going to have. At most like 4. well sounds like everything is good at home. That would have been neat to be at the ward reunion. And today I got a letter from the Stewarts. Tell them thank you very much and that it was good to hear from them. Everyone is getting married lately. The first year was fine than all of a sudden she got married he got married.. your cousin got married to your prom date. So I think I have heard it all. Hey dad could you the next time you send pictures make them a little smaller in Paint or something. Because it takes about 10 minutes for everyone to load here. I hope they will send my package soon because it wont be for about 2 weeks till I go back to santa cruz. Right now I don’t need much just want some money(like always). This week there are changes but I think not many are going to get changed. I hope to get more missionaries here though. I bet the NBA finals was fun to watch. So the lakers won it all huh? Kobe was playing really well when I left I guess he kept going. I bet it was fun to sit together in church. I don’t remember many times either I sat with dad either. When does seminary start again? Im almost done reading the book of mormon in Spanish. And decided at about alma 7 to start studing it not reading and I have found some of the coolest things. So when I finish im going back to the beginning to study Nephi. One I have been applying a ton is in Alma 26.27 it talks about suffering and then comes the success. I share that a lot with the people here. We are a little low in investigators but we are working with some good families. My health is fine I have had a little bit of the runs lately and my companion as well. I think its because of the stress from last week. But drinking water cures everything. But that’s really all that’s going on thanks a lot for writing. I got a ton of letters this week. But have fun be safe and I love yall.Elder Cheesman

John's latest 6-8-09

2009-06-08T09:32:00.001-07:00

Dad thats crazy that you already got realesed. But teaching the book of mormon would be just as fun I bet. I bet it’s a load off your shoulders and sad to leave at the same time. That’s awesome that br. Bolt is bishop. Im sure he will do fine. I bet it will feel weird to be back in the home ward again speaking and singing in English. It would be for me.. and its good to hear that the land in Athens finally got sold. What are they going to do with it? This past week was full of alllll sorts of things. First we went off to santa cruz for our zone leader meeting. That was pretty fun minus that we were traveling for forever and we get there and its really really cold. This time I brought my suit coat but it didn’t help tooo much. Then we slept at about 11 till 530 woke up and went to the meeting that started at 7. and it doesn’t end till 230. the good thing is we eat lunch in the presidents house. Now its moms turn(her letter just loaded) thanks for sending off the package who knows when I will get it. But its funny you sent me that art book. Because we saw one Sunday and I looked through all of it. And asked around to see where we can buy one. But now that your sending one will be better. Thanks for that. Last week was pretty fun for me. We get back from santa cruz at about 9 in the morning(travled the whole night) once again 10 hours in a bus and 1 hour in plane. I will be doing this every month by the way. So we took a little nap and worked pretty hard and found a lot of families last week. We also bought ourselves a little present….. a 10foot long… anaconda skin… its pretty sweet not going to lie. We were knocking doors and a lady asked if we wanted snake leather. Of course we just wanted to see it. And it was 10 feet long! Imagine seeing that cross your path. They found it themselves. so we went back the next day and bought it for 70 bolivianos which is about 10 dolars. Took it to the house to dry it out and we are going to get some stuff made out of it. and I didn’t know this markus had a girl friend. Where is she from? I haven’t heard from him in forever. O ya that swine flu thing is kind of a threat down here. They say it has entered Bolivia but none in Riberalta yet. President has told everyone not to shake hands if you don’t need to. And be careful with who you shake hands with.(its pretty hard) and to stay away from kids in the street. Luckily noone has had it yet. That’s sad that travis already got it. what mission was he going to again? Im staying in decent shape. When we do service and things im the big guy that does all the heavy stuff. So that makes me feel even bigger around here. And it was nice to hear from brooke as well. And im sure you have changed more wards than I have in the past year. Im not very famous for changing around that much. And the doctors can never figure out why cheesmans are tall and skinny it’s the name I think. But just get mason fat to be even taller later. The other day I got scared because my hips and knees were hurting me for no reason and I got really tired really fast for two nights. I told my companion that it might be some growth pains like when I was 15. and he laughed to think that the people now think im huge if I get even taller what would it be like. And im not skinny and im not fat now by the way. Im in the middle and getting better with what I eat(because there isn’t much a choice.) o ya I almost forgot a bug story. Last week we were cleaning up a little bit and I sprayed some bug spray in some wholes and such. And I went into the bathroom to clean and I see something following me…. It was a good ol…scorpion! Haha but it didn’t do anything but it did give me a little scare. That’s the first one I have seen in a year and a half so they aren’t a big problem mom…haha. But that’s really that’s been going on lately. We did find a really cool dad last week that has 5 daughters and no sons. And he accepted everything from the first lesson. And at the end in his prayer he recognized us servants of God. Which was really cool because that what president has been trying to help us do to be representatives of Jesus Christ. We don’t introduce ourselves as missionaries any more. Because Pres maynes says every church has missionaries but we are the only representatives of Jesus. So that was pretty cool. Sounds like everything is going well for yall. Hope you have a good week and I will write again next week. Love yall.Elder Cheesman

John 06-01-09

2009-06-01T15:24:00.000-07:00

Mom you have hiked up stone mountain before… we went when i was in fifth grade. It sounds like you had a good weekend full of parties and going to the temple. So when I get home the temple wont be open? That would be cool to see a family get sealed but I wont be able to see that here. The zone is mas o menos. We are having a few problems with some small disobedience and im not one to correct people a lot but I have got to learn. But this week will be better. Last week was kind of exciting. For our zone conference we traveled to Trinidad. Which is an hour in a plane. And we take the whole zone so elder cheesman with his companion gets everything ready and good for 10 missionaries traveling. And today we are leaving for santa cruz for 2 days. For a zone leader conference. President maynes is amazing. He knows so much. I loved a phrase he used last week… if you don’t like to serve…you probably wont like the celestial kingdom… it made a lot missionaries think. But he is happy with what we have done so far but there is a lot to get better still. The funny thing about last week was that we went to Trinidad and noone told us it was cold down there. The south winds came. So before we left it was about 118 degrees outside and when we were about the land they said it was about 55 degrees outside. So that wasn’t fun. Noone brought any jackets. So for 2 days we were kind of suffering from the cold. And today it got a little cold here in riberalta to cool stuff down. And I met another American who has a change more than me named elder schill. He is in Trinidad the only other American outside santa cruz. I got to work with him for the afternoon he is pretty cool guy. The monkey I played with is really friendly and playful. I played with him in church while my companion was teaching the teenagers. And at the end he fell asleep in my lap. I think he has finally gotten use to me. i always give him part of my food to get his trust in me. he eats about everything. And dad you are working with some big names so does that mean we have money now? Im getting use to working zone leader stuff still. It’s a little overbearing. I told president everything is out of order here and his answer was ..why do you think I sent you there? … so I got a lot of expectations from him. I thought the same thing as steven when you told me about his call. I wont be seeing him for a very long time. But hey there is always time after. Glad to hear the 50 mile hike was fun. Stinks that it rained the whole time. I bet that was pretty hard. I have eaten some pretty cool fruits here. Some are better than others haha. Lots just need to put sugar or make a juice out of it to make it good. Copuazu is a fruit from Brazil. It looks like a small coconut but not as hard. And its all white on the inside. The juice from that is probly my favorite here. But that’s really all that’s going on around here. Just keeping myself busy. I sleep and wake up thinking about who needs what in our zone. So that’s always fun. The days go by even faster now. I don’t think I dream anymore. I close my eyes and wake up. Im enjoying taking around these motorcycles(sorry mom) but here we use them a ton. Because there is not other option. Did you ever send off that package? Just need to know. Well glad everyone is doing well. And I hope yall have a good week. I will be in santa cruz till Wednesday morning. So im pretty excited about that. Well I love yall write again next wek. Elder Cheesman

2009-05-25T10:37:00.000-07:00

Well it sounds like everything is going well
 still at home. And I had no clue it
was memorial day. But now I have an excuse
to buy some more food. Everything is
pretty awesome in the jungle. Im getting use
to the life here. The heat will take
a little longer to get use to. The past week
was even hotter I think it got up to
about 125 degrees. Crazy huh? And I have to
walk around in that. We are also in a
time of small mosquitos. So the whole zone
 has a rule to use repellent the whole
day. There is a soccer stadium in my area
and the stadium lights at night have a
column of bugs. It was ridiculous the other day. It looked like the movies when the
plagues came in. literally over a million bugs from the light to the ground. Remember
stadium lights are pretty tall. But I will try and get a picture of it. And last
night because there are a lot of bugs. We were walking around last night and I
looked up and it seemed the stars were moving around. And we find out that they
were Bats. About 30 I counted. So that was pretty cool. Im starting to get to know
the members better here. It really helps now that my Spanish has progressed.
Especially when noooooone for a very long time speaks English. But im going to
be trying to call for some Americans. Especially to try and get my whole group
back in Bolivia. And about zone leader stuff is pretty crazy because this zone
has been so disorganized that we are trying to put everything together. I have
a couple missionaries that are problems but nothing too serious. My companion
is making me the financial guy because he cant handle it anymore. its ok with me.
Sounds like lebron is still playing well. Its down to the magic and cavaliers and
lakers now? I forgot who was the other team. But I don’t here anything about
basketball here. Movies a very very little bit. My branch president owns a
computer repair and dvd place. So I pass by to see what new movies he has.
That’s about it. I told him to put together heroes and 24 in some dvds when he
finds it. I hope he does. They cost 50 cents each I think. How was angels and
demons. When I was in peru I saw a billboard for that. But that’s about all I
think we have interviews this week so that’s always fun. Ummm there is nothing
really else happening. But im happy. We did have a baptism of a 9 year old this
past week. So that’s the first baptism in the jungle for me. The zone isn’t doing
too well with people with a date for baptism but I hope it gets better this week.
Anyway have a good week this week and I love yall. Thanks for writing.(lisa I
did enjoy the picture)

Elder Cheesman

John 05-18-09

2009-05-18T21:10:00.001-07:00

Well being a zone leader is really different. I do enjoy doing the different stuff and my companion needs a lot of help. Last change he was zone leader on his own. But the zone is doing alright right now and president is expecting a lot out of me to change the zone. He sent me some new stuff to make all the houses better to make sure every thing is in order. To see if the houses are clean( they don’t know me very well then.) no mom you would be surprised that im the one always cleaning up the house or trying to fix something. My companion said he will start helping so that will be nice. It did get cold this week finally! But for 3 days. It was worth it though. The south winds came in and it rained really hard and then stays cold for three days and yesterday it got hot again. But we are hoping for another set of south winds soon. That’s crazy that steven in going a month earlier. That’s so awesome. That mission has to be freezing cold. I was thinking the other day if I come back in December that’s going to be winter there and summer here… and thinking how interesting that’s going to be. But the offices will ask me in about 2 months when I want to come home. Then they buy the tickets. So we don’t have to worry about that right now. I like being zone leader because I actually have a word in what we do and what we need to do. So I feel a lot better. And my companion asks me a bunch of stuff now what we need to do. But I have a good time. I got a letter today from the fifes which was really nice of them. Tell them thank you please. And I noticed lately the blessing of having a temple close to you. The people here have to travel for a very long time and have to sacrifice a lot of money to go to cochabamba. In my branches there are about 2 return missionaries I think and about 14 people that have been through the temple. It’s a struggle out here. Next Saturday we are planning on marrying a couple so that they can get baptized so im pretty excited about that. Lisa I did get to read your blog this time and it looks like your having a good time with volleyball and parties and what not. Kristi I did get your pictures. And just baptize this kid John send the missionaries. References are always the best. Even just tell the missionaries where he lives and knock his door ¨playing dumb¨ and see if he excepts. If not …. Just wait a while longer. Or better is invite him to come to the house to watch a video with the missionaries. Sounds like you had a good stake conference. And where is bishop trying to move to? I don’t remember hearing about he wants to leave. I haven’t tried any weird food lately because the pension lady is a good cook. But I do eat soup(is that how its spelled?) now I have gotten use to soup when its 100 degrees outside. Ummm we went to that big river in my area its called. The river madre de Dios. Kind of a weird name but you see a lot of it here. It’s a big river with a jungle background is pretty cool. But that’s really all I have going on. Hope everything goes well this week. I love yall and everything is back to normal here in Bolivia as I have heard. I will be sending for Americans next change to come here… but will write again next week. chauElder Cheesman
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John 05-18-09

2009-05-18T21:10:00.000-07:00

John May 11, 2009

2009-05-17T06:55:00.000-07:00

Well it was really fun to talk to yall yesterday. Wont be too long till we can talk a little longer than an hour. Well some other cool facts about this place is some more weird stuff that they eat. I heard they do eat monkey here. They also eat crocodile tail, somewhere they eat cats but I don’t think im close to there. But ya its still pretty hot we are all waiting for the cold winds to come up from the south which makes it cold but… the joke is that the wind gets tired and gives up before it reaches here. But its all good. And as a zone leader we go back to santa cruz every month for a lecture from president. So I will be travelling as well pretty soon. I didn’t get a message from anyone but Kristi and I heard a lot more were going to write me yesterday… but o well I cant complain cause I talked to all of you yesterday. Sounds like everyone is having a good time. I really don’t have much to write either. I cant send pictures because the computer im at doesn’t have any USB ports. But I will send some next week. But I know its short but im going to write brooke as well. So thanks for everything and I love yall and have a good week. Elder Cheesman
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2009-05-04T10:21:00.000-07:00

Well it sounds like everyone had a good week. Even though the letters werent too long.
Next week we get to talk which is always fun. If things are turning out the way im
seeing it might be the last call to the house before i come home. So thats pretty
crazy. I will be calling i think on Saturday to plan everything for Sunday. I have
no clue where i will be when i call but we will see. They dont tell us anything
about where we are going until Wednesday. I want to send a photo of the babtism
last week but the computer wont read my camera so maybe next week. It was a batism
of 5 kids and it was very very dificult week to get them ready. Trying to get them

to pay attention and everything. We didnt have much patience sometimes. So that went
really well be we are worried about when will be the next one. That is so weird that
cade got married. Like half way through the day last week i stopped and told my
companion....my cousin just got married. It was pretty funny. Everyone is getting
married. But its alright i guess i will just have the search a little harder when
i go home. Who is all going to be in the house for the call? Or am i going to have
to call more than once? Im pretty sure actually that you guys call here but they
will give me more details this week. I have no clue what we will talk about
becuase i have enough time now to write everything i need. And i am still working
on my english again. Its even harder now that there are not a lot of americans
around. But i hear that 15 are coming this week. We hope more come very soon.
Its still a big toss up where i am going. I dont think i will be going to the
jungle but somewhere in the city. At least not secratary(becuase the time of
training for them just passed) and they didnt call me. So we are all good. And
wait a second. If i remember i did just fine getting up on time as well for
seminary. And got 100% attendance for all 4 years. I think your thinking of lisa
that slept in a little.... the temple is closing for 18months? Its takes that long
to fix everything? Thats pretty diferent to hear that the hawks are winning some
games. Who do we have now as our star players? Becuase i am really lost in all of
that right now. And in movies i havent heard anything in a very long time of what
has come out. And it took me by surprise to hear school is getting out in 2 weeks.
I remember the letter last year when yall told me that. Being here now getting use
to everything again. Seems like a vacation that i visited peru and came back. But
everything is going well and i will be talking to yall very soon. Probly Saturday
in the morning. And the new rule is you can make fun of my english. But thanks for
writing love you all and have a good week.
>>Elder Cheesman

John 4-27-09

2009-04-27T20:07:00.000-07:00

Well today we had interviews in the morning with president.
It went pretty well told me im doing good in changing the area around.
So that made me feel a little better. I feel i have more say in whats going on in
the mission now. I help out the other missionaries and they trust me a bunch in the
offices. Im very glad to be back here in bolivia. Its sooo calm at night its just
moon light to let us walk everywhere through tallgrass sometimes. Its pretty fun.
Yes guabira is really really small. The smallest area i think i have had in the
mission. The sugar factory as dad said is the most popular thing. The whole town
works there. And i hear when they have there 4 months of work all of guabira is smoke
and smells like sugar..but i wont be there for that thankfully. I live a street near
the school called juan sabala. Not the greatest  house. The chuch is near one of the
2 parks its a pretty big chapel. The ward is really good. We had ward conferance
and they did good with it. Had a lot of people show up. The members are getting to
know me better. My district is 10 missionaries. The only americans are me and
elder cope. The others are alll from peru. I heard that next change 15 americans
are coming. But none from my group! Wasnt too happy about that. There all the new
guys that havent seen santa cruz yet. But we will see how they do. At the end of
the year we are suppose to have 190 missonaries in the mission which is a ton.
So that will be good. That is crazy that steven is going to russia...i bet he has
been talking to jon rusch a lot. And glad to heasr that cory is heading out. Which
mission is he going to again? Always glad to hear that the old friends are asking
about me and dont forget. And that stacy talked to JD. He is a really cool guy.
Always liked that i kept a little better standards than the rest of the basketball
team. His family is really religious too. Mom as for the fall weather.... havent
seen much of that. But it did rain last week really hard all day which is always fun
to walk around in. And it got cold that day but that was it. The fall here really is
just more wind to keep you cool. But it gets more cold next month i think. Its still
probly 90 degrees outside. About the leather stuff. There is a guy here that custom
makes it for missionaries. And he is a friend of mine. I get some pretty cool stuff
for like 20 dolars. Its really not that expensive for how good a job he does. About
the peruvian sayings i have finally come out of them. All the missonaries made fun
of me but liked it at the same time because i can talk in there slang now. But im
back to normal. Im doing `pretty well lately. Had a babtism last week of a mom and
here son was going to but he backed out at the last minute. At the beginning he
wanted to go on a mission and everything but his uncles and people told him he
shouldnt. But we are still working with him. And this Saturday we will be babtising
5 kids. Ages...14 13 12 and 11 and 9. the 14 to 11 year old are brothers and
sisters. The 9 year old has a dad that isnt member. But they all want to get
babtised. So that was a blessing last week. I have had some alergies from all
these plants lately but im getting better finally. Sister maynes gave me some
perscription stuff to take which have helped. I really have no clue where im going
next change still. My guess would be financial secratary. Becuase he has to call
salt lake all the time in english. And he struggles with that. And he has 9 months
there. But who knows. I do know that i do have changes though. But thats really
thats been going on lately. Just wondering where im going to go next week. And i
need to do a lot of work before i leave as president told me this morning. So i
can leave something for the next missionary that comes. Anyway thanks for writing
everyone. I love you all. And i am reading the book of mormon in spanish all the way
throgh for the first time and im in the beginning of 3 nefi. Its a pretty amazing
story(im sure you all now that) but since the beginning of alma i have studied it
pretty hard and found some cool stuff. About the the past had sooo many changes of
peoples righteousness. I like to break down the stories everyone knows and pull
out stuff they havent heard of before and apply it to missionaries. For example
about success.... lots of people think success is numbers. But i share about ammon
who had a ton of good number and babtisms... and about abinadi who only had a
investigator progressing when he died. But he had success as well. I dont know
things like that. But thats all for now i will write next week to let you know
where i am going.
Elder Cheesman

John 4-20-09

2009-04-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

Well glad to hear you guys had a good time out there with brooke. O ya they just gave me my package. So thank you for that. Um here its pretty well off. As of right now i dont need anything at the moment. The shirts you sent me made me laugh. I want to send some clothes home because my suitcase is getting pretty heavy. I feel i have too much junk. O ya this week im might start doing some leather work stuff to bring or send home. Does everyone have the same size cuadruple? Let me know if you want one. And i might be getting a pretty sweet guitar strap made too with crocodile heads on it. But you dont need to send notebooks either... i already have some that are not very used. But thanks. The candy is always a plus. The past week went by pretty well. Our conference is tomorow with president and they asked me and my companion to teach the class about how to contact people in the street with the book of mormon. Its a new thing president started that we actually read them a scripture from the book. So we will see how that all goes. Im pretty excited. O the city im in is called Guabira, but the big city is called Montero. Its not in santa cruz its going by my old area like 20 or 30 minutes. But its pretty much the same. All the roads in our area are dirt. And this month starts the south winds which im pretty excited for. Because that means its going to get cold. Its been super hot lately. Its crazy. And speaking of bugs mom next week i will send you a picture a bug that comes out at like midnight i think. Its about the size of my hand and it looks like satan created it. Its pretty ugly. They say its a cockroach but i dont beleive it. I see them dead in the mornings sometimes. Never seen one alive. If you thought i looked dark in that picture that was in peru... here its even hotter. I got burned the first day. But those 2 big guys were my companions for a week till my visa was ready in peru. And the government does not like any church really. The president is an atheist and doesnt want any missionaries in the whole country. But here i am. About school i have been thinking more about that lately. Not really sure if i would stay in georgia or go out to utah. UVU is a pretty cool place to go and they have an alright basketball team( but i dont know how well of shape i will be in if i want to walk on) and maybe BYU im on the debate of that right now. But we will see. Dad thanks for telling me your experience. I have those all the time it seems like. We always use examples of faith in lessons. We put a book on a table and say like i have faith that i can move that book into my compaions hand. Only with my faith... then i try using the ‘force’ the people laugh and we ask why cant i do it? You need to do something to move it. That usually helps the people with there faith to get them going to church. Because here they are famous for saying i beleive in God and everything but i dont need to go to church im already set for salvation. So that gets interesting. But thats really all thats going on with me. I hope i answered everything. Thanks for the package. And hope everyone has a good week....Nos vemos. (see you later) love yallElder Cheesman

John 4-13-09

2009-04-18T19:24:00.000-07:00

John only sent one picture.

Well sounds like everyone had a good week. Im doing fine in my new area. i didnt really
do much for easter. but it is holy week this week for the people here so it was
\interesting. Im getting to know it a lot better and finding some new people.
Its a lot better understanding everything in lessons and such to actually try and
help everyone. Me and my companion are getting along pretty well. Havent got in too
much of a disagreement. But the area is getting better already because my companion
finally wanted to start working. But its all good. It sounds like mason is pretty
awesome and he will be huge when i get back. O ya i heard cade was getting married
but never heard when. Thats insaine in a month he will get married. To my ex prom date
as well. I am going to be losing a bunch of weight here pretty soon. So that will be
nice. We dont eat half as much as we were eating in Peru. I have not got my package
yet but i bet it will come in this week. O ya last week i went and did some papers
for my identfication of bolivia. And they told us that they think 50 missionaries
will be coming in next month. Thats a ton of americans. All the ones that were called
here that never came. My whole group. It will be a ton. It will be a nighmare and a
dream for president maynes. We have been talking and im worried that president will
put me in the offices next change. There is some guys that have a ton of time there.
So we will see about that. But everything is going fine the people here dont even
react at all when they see an american here. I havent seen any problems with that.
Really its about the church they dont like too much here. So we are hoping for a
temple here pretty soon. They are only missing like another stake to be aproved for
a temple. That would be pretty sweet. It is waaaaaay more hot here than in peru.
I have gotten a whole lot darker. It stays about at 100 degrees outside with
humidity. Or more sometimes. Then it will rain really hard for 20 minutes than stop
and get hot again. I love it. It makes the day more exciting. Well thats really
about it. The week flew by for me. I love you guys thanks for everything. I hope i
answered all your questions. The internet is kind of slow here. ....ha the pictures
just loaded. Everyone has changed a ton. Brooke even looks like a mom now(no offence)
i will try and send 2 pictures. One of me and my 2 fat companions and the other
with president perez.

Elder Cheesman

John in back in Bolivia 4-6-09

2009-04-06T11:23:00.000-07:00

Well i did write another lettter but i had to change Internet places so i will rewrite
everything.
Well lets start from Thursday. They tell us Thursday we can take all day to say
goodbye to all the converts and so elder stewart came to my area and he said bye to a
couple people and we went back to the house and figured out that we needed to be in
the offices as soon as possible. So we went to mcdonalds for the last time for the rest
of our mission. And they said our flight was that night. But then we were in the
offices for a couple hours and said our flight is not till tomorrow. So they take us
at like 830 at night to a really nice hotel where I think the church leaders stay when
they come. So that was fun. Well then Friday happened. We get up and go to the
airport at about 1030 we get there. Our flight is at 1240. so we check our bags and
everything and had to pay some overweight fees and stuff but we got our money back so
that’s fine. So we were waiting on this guy helping us out for a little bit.
After we had to run through security stuff and we went to imagration and it was
like 1225 we were almost through immigration and we asked a helper lady about our
flight and she called and told us it just left early. So we get kind of mad and
have to go back and do some more paper work. And call the leader guys that our
helping us.(they weren’t too happy this day)(it wasn’t our fault either) anyway they
come back president maynes chews these guys out through the phone. So they book us
on another airline for that night. So we waited in the airport alllll day till
about 1030 at night I think. Finally we get on the plane and get to Bolivia.
Sat next to some german guys which was pretty interesting.
Then we land and president maynes is waiting for us at 3 in the morning.
(he is amazing) he and his wife take us back to his house and we start talking
about what has been going on and where is everyone in the mission.
They invite us root beer floats. They told us they had the root bear in the
Beer section of the grocery store. We slept in his house and woke up and ate
german pancakes. Which were sooo good. After that we had interviews with president
he tells me that we need to be examples here. Because there has been a lot of
problems lately. He already made elder cope and stewart zone leaders and he tells
me im in this area in Montero for only 5 weeks then im getting changed.
It’s the worst zone in the mission right now. So he told me I have to make it
better in 5 weeks. So im with elder Rojas from peru. He is a pretty cool guy he
has the same time as me. He just kind of gotten lazy lately I guess.
But we will see what happens this change. Well lets take a break from me.
Brooke your baby is awesome. I enjoyed the pictures. And from the sound of it,
it sounds like a big baby. And I wonder who would have gave him the extra extra
white skin? Haha. I saw a baby the other day that was 9 months old and he was huge.
That’s how old your baby will be when I get home. So that was pretty weird. I do
complete 15 months this week. Which is pretty weird to think only 9 more months.
But im finishing in my first mission so its ok. Conference was really good.
Saturday I didn’t get too much out of it. The firste session I didn’t get to see
except the new apostle. And the later session we didn’t go. And the priesthood
session I was pretty tired because I was going on 4 hours of sleep and the meeting
finished at 10 o clock(we had permission to watch till that late) so I came home
and crashed. But im all good now. This week im going to start getting the area
better. President maynes has been really stressed out lately. He had to put some
really young guys as leaders. There are people who only have 3 months in the mission
being trainers or zone/district leaders. That’s why everyone is being disobedient.
I don’t know what he is going to do with me next change. O yaw hats funny about this
area is that it is about 10 minutes down the road from my other area. I always
wanted to see what it was like here and now I know. But I should be going out
somewhere in the jungle I think next change. There are only 100 or so missionaries
here so there are like 4 people in zones out in the jungle. So president is happy
to get some more. More missionaries are coming I think in about 3 weeks. A bunch
from the lima north mission I think. O ya you remember my old companion elder parra?
I was with him for 3 months before I left. He is in my zone. He is right next to me
actually. So it was really fun to talk to him. And im going to try and see my
trainer today. Elder walker in peru was teaching the mom of elder parra so its
cool to tell him what was going on. And the slang terms I learned over there.
So everything is going well. You notice that the letter is longer? Cause I
finally have my hour to write again haha. The only thing is the internet is
pretty slow. But I will get use to it. I think I might send some stuff home
next week so that I don’t have that much weight in my luggage anymore. Its
hard to get use to the money system again. But im happy cause now I get double
the exchange rate and everything is cheaper. And I get to eat all the old snacks
I liked. But anyway my wrist already hurts. But that’s all that’s going on. Next
week I will write more. And I think I answered your questions. But brooke
congratulations and I love you. Its kind of weird im an uncle now but im fine
with that. Im really happy to be back here again to be with this people.
They are way more humble. Ya I don’t have any nice house to go in now but the
people are nicer. It has down poured rain evey day since I have been here and
my area is pure dirt roads so that gets pretty interesting. Jumping around
puddles all day. Anyway thanks for writing. I love yall a ton. And hope
everything goes well this week.
Elder Cheesman

John's Email 03-30-09

2009-03-30T10:25:00.000-07:00

Well im not in Bolivia yet… i guess my visa hasnt gone through yet. But they should be talking about it soon. The comunication here isnt very well. But its all good. Im pretty happy. Im with 2 missionaries that are huge. They are the fattest in the mission i think and im the tallest. So we always gets some jokes about that in the street. And dad when you explained all that was happening to you i couldnt help but seeing you on a case of House. How did all that just happen? Thanks for giving me a lil scare though. Elder stewart and elder cope are probly going back with me in the same plane now to Bolivia. Where is the Villanova team from? Here it has been some big soccer games going on. Peru placed chile last night and lost. They are in a little war right now for land so i heard it was pure fouls during the match. Mom dont worry about the package i will take just about anything right now. One of the new companions i got is pretty annoying. He thinks he is the best missionary ever and so we try and teach him some things he needs to work on becuase he is still kinda of new but he wont accept a thing. The other elder is really cool. I get along with him really well. He is going home in 4 months. But i showed them around the area introducing my investigators. Hopefully they will do good here. i did babtize a teenager we have been working on for a while last week. So that was pretty awesome. All my converts have been assiting seminary every day so that makes me feel pretty special. Im hoping to go back to santa cruz and go straight to the jungle. Becuase i havent gone and everyone talks about it. Really thats all thats going on. Im running out of time but next week it will be an hour to write again. So that will be nice. Anyway i love yalll and thanks for writing. Brooke good luck with the baby. And dean i havent heard about any songs that have been wrote or house your band doing. But love yall have a good week.
>Elder Cheesman

John dating? 03-23-09

2009-03-24T04:59:00.000-07:00

Welll this week was pretty interesting. I get a call last Monday night of course after I have written you guys. The president calls and tells me that im going to start my papers to go back to Bolivia. And be one of the 4 missionaries to go back. Its me and elder stewart and elder cope and sister lucas. The things is elder stewart in cope are in the jungle so there papers will be even later than me. I will be the only one going back from this mission. I went today to the central of lima to do even more papers for visa. And heard we are going back Wednesday then by the end of the day they tell us probly next Monday. But whenevery the visa leaves I leave. Tomorrow im going back to the embassy of Bolivia to present myself to them to see if they want me back. Its been an interesting experience. What the problem is that in 2 days we have changes and they thought I was going to be gone so im not on the list for the whole mission so don’t know where im going. So all this is going to get interesting this week. But we have heard that they are working really hard to get us back going. But it will be a process of like 4 months to get everyone back. I did get to say goodbye in the meeting where the guys going home say bye. I did too with the sister missionary lucas. By the way lisa tell Lindsay wells that I have been on 3 dates with Jess Lucas they knew each other in BYU. Yes elder cheesman has gone on dates the past week. It was really funny and really weird. Me and sister lucas are the only ones going to these visa things. So they leave us together all the time. It was pretty funny. We were talking about it today how we are pretty much companions now and that doesn’t happen very often. But that’s pretty much everything that has been going on. Dad you need to stop getting hurt. How many times have you been injured since I have been gone? That isn’t allowed. I have been pretty sad saying goodbye to this ward. It’s a awesome area. I would have like one more change here but I will be fine. But I have been pretty happy lately. Me and my companion get along really well. We have found a lot of new investigators the only thing both of us are leaving and hope noone gets lost. Well that’s really all that is going on. I will write you guys o maybe even be able to call next week. But love yall. And hope yall have a good week. Elder Cheesman
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2009-03-16T12:55:00.000-07:00

Well last week was pretty normal. We did go to the temple last week though which is always fun. I bought a few things with the lima north misión name on it. Just in case we wont be going back to the temple. Brooke one activity i dont think i will ever forget was when we carved out things out of soap. Just give them a big bar up soap and dull knifes and tell them to carve somethin. I enjoyed it. But it is good to hear that you and justin are having a good time. I like the lips of your baby. It does look pretty funny. and i didnt recognize you with your huge belly. Its still pretty weird to me. But i can imagine because my pension is having her baby near the same time as you. Last week was better teaching whise. We found some new people to teach and have a batptism for the end of the month the only bad thing there are changes on the 25th. And i think i want to ask to go out to the jungle. I have a lot more trust with our new zone leader. And here you can ask to go to the jungle and there is a good chance they send you. And we have a million problems with people not getting married. I would have triple babtisms i think. Its really hard to find a place to do matrimonies cheap. Thanks for the basketball update. This time of year i kind of miss. But its weird to think last year i remeber you telling me the same stats. I have officially been in the field a year now. And next week we will have the same time here than when we did in Bolivia. Crazy how time goes by here. i sure miss rain like that. If it rains for more than 30 minutes here people think its the end of the World. And its not even rain it just sprinkling and people freak out. I think its funny. and the past 2 weeks have been the hottest weeks in like 5years. Its really hot. I go to bed sweating and wake up sweating. And i have a fan on me too. But we are going to be getting into fall here pretty soon. So im pretty excited about that. Im trying to drop this gut i have grown and i have been really good with food and staff lately. Except when our pension wants to give us pizza or KFC. Its awesome they like american food just as much as i do. They put in a new papa johns here and everyone loves it. How is roarke phillips doing with church staff? And how is allyn doing? Havent heard about them in a while. Ya go ahead and send a package to office either way i will get it. And sorry if some words are weird in this setter. Just saw that it changes some of my words on its own. But thats really thats going on over here. thanks for writing everyone. I love you all. And hope yall havea good week.
>Elder Cheesman

2009-03-09T19:44:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures and video from our Aflac trip to St. Maarten. We had a very relaxing weekend. We ate lots of food, played lots of tennis and just relaxed around the pool. The airport was next to the beach so people stand behind the jets when they take off. Below, you will see a video of me as I was blown away by a jet. I am still taking sand out of my ears!

John 03-09-09

2009-03-09T15:24:00.001-07:00

welll it sounds a very relaxing weekend for mom and dad. well last pday i got to see a movie of the world...good ol batman. yes the new one. i liked it a lot but it was in spanish so i can imagine how much better it would be in english. im doing pretty good. the weeks are going by pretty fast and nothing too special is happening. tomorrow we get to go to the temple again which is always fun. umm kristi i got an easy answer for you to stay alive.(keep playing basketball) i have missed it a ton lately. and i use some examples of basketball all the time teaching. our area right now is kind of dry not many investigators or people with baptism dates. but i think this week we are going to make it better. everyone is talking about going back to bolivia. maybe you should call brown or someone that can figure out some stuff... because we are kind of curious. that would be cool if we go back becuase i think president would send me straight out to the jungle. we would be the oldest americans in the mission if we went back. because all the other americans already went home that are older than us. so that could be pretty cool. o ya how is that new james bond movie. i see it getting sold in the streets and it looks cool. how is the aflac work going? we pulling in the dough? haha. my spanish is finally getting a lot better. not speaking english at all during the week now that i dont live with an american. they only thing here is that they yell at us if we say one word in english. but o well. the leaders are finally treating me a little better. i get a lil more respect for the work im doing in this area. i think they are taking away the guitar this week. but we will see. thats why i hope we go back to bolivia soon so i can just take the guitar back again. anyway thanks for writing me evyerone who wrote. havent heard from the future mom lately... how is brooke doing? well i love yall. hope yall have a good week. Elder Cheesman
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Johnboy 3-2-09

2009-03-02T15:00:00.000-08:00

Man thats crazy that it snowed in Georgia! I haven’t seen snow in a very long time it seems like. Especially right now when we are in the hottest times of the year. I wake up sweating, study sweating, eat sweating, and of course walking around sweating. But we are having a good time. Finding and talking to some crazy people every now and then to keep us interested. This past Saturday was pretty fun for me. We had 3 baptisms. And one was a lady that has been listening missionaries since November.(includes elder stewart) haha I baptized the 3 people. It was really fun. This ward is pretty helpful in the missionary work. Im starting to get some new friends in this ward. Mom that’s awesome about us maybe going back to Bolivia. I hope that goes through.(not to say I want to leave here or anything….) but that would be nice to go back. Im sure they wont tell us anything till like a week before its for sure. Everyone sounds like they are just traveling around on vacation. Dad in Utah stace to new York and then to Hawaii. I guess I will be too if I head back to Bolivia. So byu beat Utah in basketball? That’s pretty sweet. i did get to dribble a basketball last week for a little bit. But didn’t get to play anywhere but it was still fun. And stacy I did see the first 2 seasons of lost and they are very interesting. The only thing is that I hear it wont end for like another 4 seasons of confusion. I don’t think that show has an end. But im sure I will watch when I get back. Im sitting next to elder taylor and just said 10 more fast Sundays and we are going home already. Man that’s weird to think. Time is going by fast especially if we go to Bolivia or to the jungle. Time would go by faster. But we have been thinking about coming back the week of Christmas together(our whole group) I don’t know what yall think about that but I think that would be pretty sweet. and me and my new companion are still getting along really well. He is teaching me a couple things and I teach him. He has the energy still of a greenie so that’s gives me a kickstart every now and then. I will try to send some pictures next week I know I haven’t in a while. Im starting to lose some weight because of the heat so that’s a plus. But I do still kind of have a gut. I know it doesn’t seem possible but yes I do have a lil pot belly. Don’t worry im been working harder to get it to go down. Anyway thanks for writing again this week. Hope everything goes well for everyone. And I love yall. Elder Cheesman
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John 2-23-09

2009-02-23T09:20:00.000-08:00

well that kind of makes me mad that you didnt get my email last week. i wrote a good one too. o well. thats really sad to hear about jessica and her baby. and elder taylor did have an emergency change. that doesnt mean there was a disaster or something. that means you get a change when you arent expecting it. but he got changed and now he is in my district. so it is really fun to see him again. he is kind of mad because they are trying to form a rule where you cant have guitars but we will see. id rather be able to have a guitar than to watch a movie from the world. like last week for example. we started to watch the new hulk movie which looked pretty cool then the assistents called and said never mind i guess it has a bad part in it. i dont know why we have them in the first place. 0 ya dad about ancient america speaks. i think president wants to use it for the mission. and i dont know if i told you about the statue it shows in the movie about the guy that stole a bunch of gold from the natives. but i was at the statue before and have a picture of it. and im also going to try to talk to president about going to the ruins where that baptism font is. about tenis courts...they dont exist here mom. but kids do play in the street a lil bit. tieing a string across the road and playing. they play a ton of volleyball here though. i will try to play some basketball today. and my companion wants to start playing too. we are in a pretty funny holiday right now down here. its called carnivals and people through water from there windows and waterbaloons and you cant get mad. just keep walking. i got wet only once from a couple teenage girls in my other area. but i figured out we wont finish till march. dad that was an awesome picture you sent of the dunk. my companion liked it too. and all this about kristis last game.... i should not be hearing. .... she needs to play at least another year. cant give up that easy. and i have to come back and see some games. the first 2 years are the easiest but it gets harder and funner the last two years. and about working in the yard in stuff. dont worry i keep myself busy with plenty of stuff. like pushing cars down the street. and taking 40 pound bags up huge hills for old women. o ya there is a guy in our ward who is amazing. he is 80 years old! and he leaves with us to teach from 2 to 6 twice a week. and he knows the bible like the back of his hand. he was a convert from being a jehovas witness. he has some sweet testamonies. he walks just as fast as we do too so it doesnt slow us down. but we do have some baptisms this saturday which will be the firsts since december! which is pretty bad. but its all getting better now.(even though leaders alllllways think different) but its all good. anyways im having a good time still me and my companion have a good time. he is from the mountains of bolivia. he is twenty five years old as well. but he is still like a little kid. he says hello to everyone. he is a newbie also with 3 months. so that energy from being new he still has. but he still kind of works in a dream. its getting really hot here too. im sweating a lot more lately. and i hear its not half of whats going on in the jungle for elder stewart and a couple other of my friends. whats fun about this area is im baptizing a couple of elder stewarts old investigators. so it will be fun to talk to him about them. well i think thats about it. i think we will have more time to write soon.(i hope) but hope everything goes well this week. thanks for writing me and i love yall.Elder Cheesman

John 02-09-09 not moving far away

2009-02-09T14:28:00.000-08:00

Well we did hear about changes… im getting changed to an area inside the zone im already in. I guess im not famous for moving around much. My companion will be elder Montoya he is kind of new I think he has about 3 changes. He has been in the zone too so I have kind of got to know him. Well other than that last week for pday we went to the central of lima to look at a really really old catholic church and we got to see the part underground with the catacombs of all the bones of people from like a a few hundred years ago. That was pretty fun. Today isn’t pday because there are changes. But I am visiting a bunch of families to say good bye. Today ive been kind of sick. I think I ate something bad yesterday. I hear that my new area is pretty good but a lot of it is hills which are a little more difficult. That’s awesome that Justin went through the temple Saturday. It made me giggle to think that brooke is pregnant at the sealing. Hope people weren’t thinking bad about that. I did get my packages by the way thank you very much. We did get to watch my videos. Brought back a lot of memories. It was funny I was screaming at myself for the incorrect things I was doing. So thank you very much for that. O ya tell grandma thanks for the card she sent me. I got it like 2 weeks ago but I forgot to tell you. My companion knows a lil English but not a ton. And the rule of watching us is still kind of here. But they are getting more relaxed on it now. They are just making sure you aren’t looking at bad pictures because they caught some missionaries doing that. I do complete 13 months today which seems crazy. Only 11 months left now. It was sad to say bye to the people in my area a lot of them got emotional. I gave a 10 minute talk Sunday I pretty much said goodbye. But it was really fun. I ended with baptisms what more could I want? But that’s really all that is goin on. Im not toooo excited to only be changing in the zone but I will find the good in it. But anyway have a good week and hope everythin goes well. I will write again to tell you about my new area. Elder Cheesman
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John 02-02-09

2009-02-03T05:23:00.001-08:00

Well thats crazy that the super bowl has started. Well i had a really good week last week. We did have our two baptisms. The teenager Carlos is amazing. It was awesome to see him change ever since we walked up to his friends in NOVEMBER we have been passing every now and then but one Sunday he came i was teaching the class like usual and i challenged the three people in the room to baptism they all excepted. (but only 2 turned out) but this week we might have another baptism before i get changed. But im not thinking about changes dont worry. Im still getting the area ready for the next misionary. I also did some service last week in the area of some other missionaries. We had to cut out a flat plat of a mountain. We chizzled away at a mountain for like 4 hours and my hands were really blistered. Im still kind of recovering from that. We have walked like crazy the last week. I woke up 2 nights ago with a crazy cramp in my calf. And they have been sore ever since. Sounds like basketball never changes back home. I want to hear that grayson starts winning sometime soon... but thats cool that tennis is getting better. I showed ancient america speaks to our bishop and he said he remembers that from he was like 8 with the prjector slides or something. But he like it. And i know how i get fat down here....half a plate of rice....half a plate of mash potatoes or french fries....and a leg of a chicken...but maybe soup before that. With bread sometimes and gelatin after. Every meal. Haha but im getting a lil skinnier. I havent had a good lasagna in a while i had it about 3 months ago. Its crazy i complete 13 months next week. It actually sounds like i have a lot of time now when i tell that to people. It changed from....man you have a long time to go....too your on the down hill slope. It makes me feel special. But this change i feel like im doing a lot better at all the missionary business. My companion really doesnt help me at all. So this change i feel like senior comp. We are getting along better now. Im just worried because he doesnt know the area still if i leave so that might be a problem. Thats awesome that brooke and justin are getting sealed. That should be exciting. And brooke about your catholic class... i dont know how i have learned but i have scriptures in the bible for the catholics that shows them what the church of jesus christ should be. O ya kind of off the subject.. i found one of my favorite scriptures the other day. Its in filipenses 3;13 and 14 its pretty awesome. Umm but i think we are heading off to the zoo. But i love you guys and hope everything goes well this week. Thanks for writing. Elder Cheesman
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John's letter- 01/19/09

2009-01-19T07:56:00.001-08:00

>Well it sounds like you guys had a good week last week. Dad thats sweet that you had a good time with aflac and things are getting better. (that means that Money is coming in right?) and thank you brooke for correcting my english i had no clue it was attendance. Things like that i forget down here. The baptism went really well and Sunday was fun because we put a date with a guy with just one leg. So that was pretty cool he is really humble. It is getting really hot here. I have finally gotten use to it. Its usually 97 every day. That World be fun going to the vacation trip. That stinks that the girls lost and the boys too. We need to sometime beat south to keep them humble. Ya i just asked peterson about the christians and he said he knows them. Its really funny how he knows all my old buddies too. There isnt too much else going on. Everyone is telling me im going out to the jungle next change as a district leader but we will see what will happen. Man i really hate this new rule of no much time. Brooke thanks for the laugh of the day with that song. Im want to print it out and put guitar with that song. I think that would be pretty fun. Sorry this letter is so scattered out on topics. Im just typing what just comes to mind. And this computer is changing some of my words around too. But im doing fine i am finally more happy now. So thats always better. One of my companions from peru hurtado is done with his misión and is going to visit me one of theses day. So that will be pretty cool. Well i ran out of ideas. Thanks for writing everyone sorry if i didnt answer some of your questions. But thanks for writing and i love yall. O ya last week we climed a mountain to a mine. That was pretty fun but not at the same time being sunburned and tired for the rest of the week. But thats about it.
>Elder Cheesman

This is a short one 1-12-09

2009-01-12T16:07:00.000-08:00

well last week was pretty fun. hit my year mark. so that was pretty exciting i did burn my shirt. my new companion is named Elder Andrade he is from the southern part of lima. i cant send you a picture this week because they are trying to change up the rules on us lately. anyway i am having a good time. we have a baptism this saturday of a 9 year old. we also found a family yesturday who has a kid on the mission and 3 of the family arent members and now they are interested. our ward is getting better our assitence was really high at 145 last week, so that was exciting. well i wanted to know if dad sent that package of my basketball videos. umm just candy from valentines day. anything will be fine. dad thats cool that you are working with aflac and that you are the 2nd ranked salesman in the region. i miss playing basketball. i havent played in forever. i think my leg muscles of basketball are going to disapear. other than that there is only 4 weeks left in this change and it should go by fast. everyone tells me im going to be sent out to the jungle next change as a leader. so that would be pretty exciting. i have seen some pictures of the jungle and it looks like bolivia. so i would be pretty happy to go out there. umm well i dont know why but they are cutting our time short today for our internet. so i dont have much time. i think we are going to a cave today to look around and take some pictures(thats better than what we do other days.) anyway i love you guys and have a good week. hopefully this week will get a lil better. Elder Cheesman
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johnny 01-05-09

2009-01-05T15:19:00.000-08:00

Well it sounds like everyone had a good new years. I enjoyed it a lot actually. Me and elder ridge and his companion all went to the top of the roof of our house and watched the fireworks all over the city. (my companion was sleeping) the whole city just lights up with fireworks. It was pretty fun to watch. Well as for changes........ Elder Cheesman stays in the same area.. thats right i will have two areas at my year mark. I guess it was a prophecy of president maynes that i will only have 3 to 4 areas in my mission. But the other news is ... my companion is leaving. I dont know how that works cause he just got here and now he is leaving. Im getting a guy from the same zone that has like 9 months i think. He is a pretty cool guy i should be able to get along with him. He listened to some of the same music i did before the mission. And other good news is that Elder Ridge and I are still going to be living together. He wanted to leave so bad but his companion is leaving too. Which is really weird the two people that came in the past change are leaving. The next change will only be for 5 weeks. So it should go by fast til i leave. Dad i know how you feel about the asistance stuff. My ward starts at 8am as well. And we would have a ton more if it was a little later. But we are making it better. Its funnny the assitance that i get here is half what i got in my Branch in bolivia. And this is the ward of the stake we only get like 97 people every Sunday. And i probly willl have to catch up to you in guitar hero. But im learning some real guitar so im fine with that. i was also wondering did you already send the video of playing basketball? I want elder ridge to see it. O ya about me being sick...well i will not say if i went to the doctor or not but i am feeling better just the little depressed symptom. (the doctor wasnt there mom) i will go this week though. But i do hit my year mark Friday which is im pretty excited about. And the tradition is to burn a shirt there is one that is laying around the house that is noones that i might burn. But the year is going to fly by. At mothers day i wont even be decided where to go yet... thats too soon. Thats cool that chris got engaged. Its been a long time since i have heard about him. Thats good that he found someone. And mom thats ridiculous that you got a facebook. Its funny at the same time. Well there isnt too much else going on. Me and my companion are going or own ways and i think it will be better this change. He is happy to leave i think as well. Well i love you guys and have a good week. Elder Cheesman
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Late email from John 12-30-08

2008-12-30T19:19:00.000-08:00

Well it was very fun to talk to you guys last week. Nothing too special has happened since then. well i think ever since mom told me i had Mono i think i have it. So i might be seeing the doctor this week. A lot of the guys are getting a kick of saying i got mono on the misión. Alter the call we really just stayed in the house all day and built a ginger bread house. Played a lot of guitar too. We did have a zone conference with the president and everyone and i got to see elder Taylor and all the guys from our group. It was pretty fun. Its weird talking about we only have 8 changes left which isnt very much. I am kinda looking forward to changes but im not 24-7 thinking about them of course. We also went to the temple this morning again. That was pretty fun the let down is that we have to wake up at lik 515 in the morning to go. But its all good. The sessions are a little more interesting in spanish to do. Sounds like moms birthday went well. I didnt know a dominos game could last for 4 hours. I do miss that good ol cooking around chirstmas time. Stuffing sounds soo good right now. Thats pretty weird that krisiti went on a date already. Didnt htink she liked boys yet. But thats cool. As for my baptism it went really really well. It was a miracle that we got both baptized. With this teenager we show up to his house and we went to another church to get his interview and he didnt know that his baptism was in like an tour, but he went through with it and everything worked out fine. Then for the next baptism a lady named Tula(i liked saying her name) who i baptized she came with her daughter but we had to post spone it like an tour becuase we couldnt find any witness´. So that was pretty interesting. That stinks that kristi lost her game, thats coming from the guy who has more loses in the fam haha. Thats cool Bo and Eddie are still playing if you see them again tell them hi for me. And Dad i bet you missing that good ol yard work help from us youngins(cause we would help all the time) well new years is this week and its suppose to get pretty crazy here. So i think we will be going back early to the house. but thats really about all thats Going on. Have a good week and i love yall.

John 12-22-08

2008-12-22T17:47:00.000-08:00

O boy christmas is almost here. Thats insaine. Well i will be calling you guys sometime Thursday to set up everything to call me on christmas. So im pretty excited about that. Umm and good news i did get the two packages. And im enjoying them very much. Dont worry about me not enjoying it last week i bought my guitar for christmas. So i have been having fun with that. O and thanks for sending the pictures. All except the one of bradley this week was pretty funny. I saw that picture and read ballards talk in the ensign about a missionary coming home. Tried not to get too caught up into it. But then Sunday a guy spoke on that talk. Somebody is just trying to make me thinking about going home. Umm lately just last night i was feeling pretty sick i think i just ate something bad, but im feeling better today. Man that was really sad to hear about petes dad. That took me off guard. Glad he gets to go out there to see the funeral. This week should be pretty fun. We dont leave all day christmas and Saturday we have a couple baptisms. So im pretty pumped for that. Kristis team sounds like they are doing ok. At least they get close to winning everyonce and a while. But you need to beat south thats just a given. And thaks for bragging about those straight As i dont think i ever got. I am pretty excited for chirstmas they do some weird traditions here. They eat a big turkey at midnight christmas eve. And they think its rediculous that we still believe in santa clause. Me and my comp are doing better. Its not the perfect companionship but we are working on it. He kinda of got me mad again at the inventory but i took it like a man and made a few comentarys at him so he isnt just walking all over me. Umm i dont really have too much more to say but think of some good questions for Thursday. Well thanks for writing this week. And have a good christmas tell the whole family hi for me. I love yall and have a good week. Talk to ya Thursday!
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John 12-15-08

2008-12-15T19:48:00.000-08:00

Thank you all for being so good at writing John!! I knew I raised a good bunch!!
Love you,
Mom

Well things are gettting better. The past week we got along a lot better. I think we are starting to see things on the right page. Thats crazy im going to be talking to you next week. Umm i think how they do it here is that i call the day before than i call again on christmas im sure i will have more info next week. Well last week was pretty fun as well we went to a restaurant called amigos de la vaca( friends of the cow) and we each ate half a chicken. It was huge and got ice cream after. The president was there and everything so that was pretty fun. Well about bolivia we dont know how long it will be now cause they closed down the airport last week again. But elder nash is trying to get us back in. I am getting my identification next week too to be here. Cause i have been here for 3 months now. We do have some baptisms planned for this month that im pretty excited for. Yesturday for lunch it reminded me back of bolivia because i had cow intestine soup. This time is was a little more gross. Im not sure why but it was pretty ugly looking. She told me it came right from the cow yesturday and i dont think they cook it too well. So that was interesting. Well its starting to get hot finally. Not going to lie it almost gets as hot as bolivia. And im losing weight which i have been waiting on ever since ive been here. Dads thats cool that you won that award deal even though you didnt get more money. At least your getting noticed. Mom im glad your just ¨partied out¨haha i wish i could feel that again. Thanks for the basketball update, i do remember that big red head. Has he not gotten better at all? That stinks about brookes turtles always got to start off somewhere. But i bet she still ate them even if they were burned. And i did hear they are going to build a temple here in trujio or somewhere but its not in our mission so i dont think i will ever go. Yes we go to the lima temple every 6 weeks. I think we will be going either this week or next. But i think it might be closed for chirstmas. And figured out that changes are january 7th instead of the 31st because of the parties that will be going on. Which doesnt make since to me if we change at 2 in the afternoon anyway when nothings happening. So that means a little more time with elder laurente haha. But i will be fine. Me and elder ridge never pair up cause we cant. One of us has to be a leader or something but we are going to try and ask one day. But we do talk a lot every night. He got a package from his mom that we enjoyed. We aer going to be making a gingerbread house christmas morning wich i am excited about. But thats really about all that is going on. But thanks for everyone that wrote me. I dont have as much time as normal to write some of you individually but i love you all and i will try to write to yall more sepratley next week.
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John 12-08-08

2008-12-08T16:23:00.001-08:00

Man december is already here. im pretty excited i complete 11months tomorrow. That sounds like a fun activity you did with the reading thing i wish i was there to see that. That stinks to hear the football team lost indouble overtime they need to win state sometime. Glad to hear basketball is going better. Ya my name was finally called in the stake conferance thats cool. And 40 missionaries out for the stake is a lot isnt it? And about singing i did somethin cool last week. I taught the 10 and 11 year olds in primary howto sing the virst verse of Silent night for a program they are goin to do. They learned pretty fast and it didnt sound to bad either. I was proudof myself afterward. Also we had a baptism on Saturday and yesturday we got 3 dates for the 27th so are getting better. And kristi finally got her braces off she had them on for a lot longer than i did so bet she is a lil more happy than i was. Thanks for sending off the christmas package as well hopefully it gets here. Ya i think i decided to get a guitar instead of a mp3 to improve some. I proby would need like 100 dollars thats not too much for you americans up there is it??(i get that all the time) and about bolivia still no word. I think its because if they tell us then we might just stop working. But who knows. Things are getting better. The new companion could be better.not going to lie its probly the hardest change for me so far. He starting blowing up on me about some stuff Saturday that got me pretty steamed. But i kept my cool and i just listened. Just learned its better to keep quite and corect him during the week. Ya the language is better now with a latin comp. I can teach about anything i want really. Im pretty good at answering doubts. But other than that day im good. Just getting excited for christmas. They dont decarate very much at all here which might be good not to think about it all the time. My comp is a short guy yes but i think Parra was the shortest. Ya i got to see the conference thing last night in english so that was pretty cool. And i got the conference talks magazine finally. So i been reading that a bunch lately. I think of brooke when i read wirthlands talk about laughing at everything. So i have been trying to put that in affect. And i did hear wirthland past away. They dont tell us anything here. I was on an interchange with the zone leader. And he knew. But ya everything is good. I dont have much else planned for this week. But im still going strong. I love you guys. Thanks for all the letters there was a bunch this week. I felt special. Anyway have a good week!
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John 12-01-08

2008-12-01T17:56:00.000-08:00

Oops, I think one of these is a duplicate. Sorry. Mom

Well thanks for the pictures last week… i know i know elder cheesman looked dumb last email. Its all elder ridges fault that he kept on saying thanksgiving was that Thursday, and i didnt know any better. But we didnt celebrate it we just had a normal day. Umm anyway last week was pretty fun. I GOT MY STUFF! Ya they called one night and said i was going to the ccm again to pick up my bagage. So that was pretty fun to see a lot of the santa cruz guys again. And everyone so happy to see there stuff and also packages showed up for a lot of guys so that made them happy. I talked to elder taylor and elder hanks for a long time. Taylor has a new area thats just a hill and nothing else. So he just walks up and down stairs all day. also this past Sunday we had a baptism of this 8 year old girl. It was pretty fun. Her mom pretty much threw her a party after ward(catholic tradition) dont know how i felt about that but thats ok. So overall it was a pretty good week. Im getting use to my new companion finally. I think i have found to where we can get along. Its helping my spanish a lot i can tell you that. And we have a big plan for this month to get this 500 baptisms in december. Well here are some more pictures i forgot which ones i have sent but here are some more. One is of our door art me and taylor did with tape. Umm other of thanksgiving, and one of me elder walker stewart fiddler and rohton. I htink one of our baptism we had as well with my new comp. Umm so about questions... why would you send me a picture of brads come home thing haha just kidding. But thats pretty cool. Its almost a year away for me thats crazy. As for the weather we are in spring. Its starting to get a little hotter finally just in time for all my sweters to come from bolivia and not be able to use them. But it gets kinda cool at night cause we are kind of near the beach. Thats really cool about the football team i knew they would be getting better some time. And that the basketball team is improving. Tell that andrew kid cheese says hi. He was a funny kid we always messed around with him as a freshmen. I do miss being a handyman at home.... only some times not always. Everynow and then i get to use some of my abilities. We did do some service last week to use my height really. Putting some wood on top of a roof to keep it from flying off when the winds come. I get the 11 month mark next week which is pretty crazy. There some guys in our ward going out to the mission in january and it made me think i will be home for a year before they get back. So that was pretty crazy. O ya about the mp3 player is definatley gone because we had to clean out the rooms to put some new desks and new bunk bed in. And i searched everything and...nothing. umm i think i might buy one here that will be cheaper cause there is a really nice store next to our church. Or i just might have to get a guitar because the one from bolivia never showed up. So i might need some money this week.. actually more for shoes i think i might wait on the guitar. How was the new james bond? I have seen some signs for it and it looks pretty cool. There is some theater posters near our area we get to walk by and see sometimes. Well thats about it for the past week. Im finally getting use to the kind of work they do here and with my comp. The past week we have had some cool experiences finding new people to teach. And some old investigaters that are hard hearts. But they seem to trust me. A lot of times i catch myself teaching lot more smoothly than im use to. Its with the people that need a little more. Im starting to love the people of peru finally. They are not as humble in bolivia but im getting use to it now. Its weird because this is my 2nd area and its almost been a year. Crazy huh? But this church is true is really the only one that makes sense. The past week i started marking my scriptures a lot better to use more scriptures during lessons and im learning a lot. Like a lot of people dont know the story in Acts 8: at the end of the chapter talks about a guy reading the scriptures and gets baptized only because he had a testimony of Christ so it shows you dont need a perfect knowlege of the church to be baptized. But anyway i have run out of things to say. Hope everything goes well this week. And i will write again next week. love yall
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John 11-24-08

2008-11-25T06:09:00.000-08:00

Well it sounds like everything is going well at home. How come I didn’t hear anything about thanksgiving? I thought it was last week? I have some funny pictures of our thanksgiving dinner with elder ridge. It was some crackers, cookies and a soda. But it was pretty fun. Well when elder taylor left he bought the rest of it from me. But elder ridge just got a really nice new one. He payed a member to go out and find one. So that’s pretty fun. Im thinking about it cause it was a really good buy for what he got. But im waiting to hear if we are getting our stuff. Now other news…I heard from a better source that we might be going back to Bolivia the 31st of December. They are starting to call missionaries back to santa cruz right now to go to the ccm. So im not too sure whats going on with that. Well my new companion is Elder Laurente… he is from Arequipa, Peru. He has a year and a month in the mission. He is an interesting character… he works really hard don’t get me wrong, I just think in the wrong parts. Sometimes it’s a little hard to get along with him but man I did learn patience the first few weeks here so that is helping a lot. And like dad said there is always good things you can search for to take from them. So I mean I will be able to get a long with him. He has a really really dry humor and same tone voice. So I try to make the best of it by making jokes and stuff. Most of the time I just entertain myself which isn’t too bad. I don’t know if I told you but I think my mp3 player got stolen the other week. And I feel bad to say this but I think it was another missionary because they were all in our room one P-day. So I wasn’t too happy about that. We do have some new investigators going to church a couple just accepted to be baptized with a lil more time. I did baptize an 8 year old yesterday. Yes Sunday after church. I know it doesn’t count for the mission but me and elder taylor thought we would help her out cause she didn’t have a dad or any other priesthood in the house. So we taught her everything and planned her baptism. So I really enjoyed it not sure how my comp felt about how we did one that doesn’t count for the mission. but its all good. I laughed pretty hard when I saw that picture of brooke. I didn’t think I would ever see her with a gut. (Haha when I tried to write gut I wrote guy on accident) that would have made a funny sentence. Umm Kristi needs to start acting on her charges then if she wants to live up to the brother. That was a big key to getting all of those. Glad to hear the guys are actually winning some for a change. Is the coach actually doing better now? Dad it was good to hear you have some baptisms planned for this week. And those activities with food do help a lot. Our problem is just getting money to do it. Sad that byu lost to Utah I thought they were doing better this year. And how much genealogy did you find in moms line? Umm really that’s about all from the past week. Just teaching who all is in our area to my new companion. He just came from the jungle of the mission where everyone wants to go here. So he was pretty sad the first few days to be here but it is getting better. But ya im staying happy don’t think from all this complaining ive done doesn’t mean im not keeping myself happy. Lets see if I will send some pictures to you guys. But ya thanks for writing. I love yall. And hope you have a good week.
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John 11/17/08 New comp

2008-11-17T15:13:00.000-08:00

Well this was an interesting week. We know changes now and we werent too happy about them. My comp is leaving and im staying in our area. We are pretty sad actually, the guy im getting is aparently a reflector worker. That he does whatever his comp does. So we will see how this goes. I think im still senior comp which is weird cause i think the guy im getting has a whole lot more time than me. So that will be interesting. Not going to lie its going to be pretty hard to change comps but i think i will be able to do it. We still have this one zone leader here.. kinda surprised because there has been a million complaints against him the last change to president. But o well. Sounds like everything is going well at home. Thats cool that dean came. I knew he was coming i can imagine moms face as he walks in the door that would be funny. The picture of him looks rediculous. Like the beard as always not too sure about the hair i liked it better before. But it sounds like you guys had a good time. And tell Casey and Kayla hello for me as well next time you see them. Casey ya has been going to church for a while i think its her parents who have the problem with her going. They were pretty mean not going to lie. Dad i didnt get to see that temple thing didnt hear about it. And it seems like yesturday that i was doing those services for sister bean. Thats crazy that she is turning 100 in feb. As for your questions mom... Dogs, we have problems with a couple of them running after us, but usually we dont have too much a problem. But they control rabies a lil better than you think. They have a deal where you bring your dogs to get shots for free. I forgot what company does it. About Bolivia i heard its getting better. But i just heard that they have our stuff here in the CCM so i have no clue whats going on. I did go to the temple last week which was pretty fun. It was my 2nd time doing it in spanish so that was interesting. Went pretty well though. Ya someone mentioned brad was coming home soon. Thats crazy it felt like yesturday he left. But im doing good, just hope me and my new comp get along. Im sure i will be fine. But it will just be weird going beack to a latin comp. But i love all of you guys. Hope everything goes well for this week. I will keep you updated on the new comp.
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Johnboy 11/10/08

2008-11-10T15:22:00.000-08:00

Well last week was an eventfull week. It went by a lot faster than normal. Changes are next Wednesday, and we are not very excited about that because we are feeling one of us are going to get changed. And about going to the jungle i dont think that will happen anytime soon. As long as we dont have our stuff i dont think they will send us. Because the things in bolivia are getting a little better. But who knows. And man did i know Obama won. Everyone down here was cheering for him the whole time. And every contact we do asks about him. I dont enjoy it too much for what i have heard he is trying to do like a communist kind of government? I dont know. Last week we found a new investigator that was an answer to my companions prayer. We go up to this guys room and he has some huge guitar amps a drumset and a Jackson Rhoads which is one of those guitars that looks kinda like a V. But its a nice guitar costs like $1000 and my companion got to play a little. But we soon figure out that this 17 year old was better than him. Sounded like he belonged in a music video he could do some amazing solos so that was pretty fun. Hopefully he will be able to progress some. This past Sunday was also fun because we had 4 investigators at church. I guess your missionaries are doing better but for our area thats pretty good. A guy that we told to go was actually there before us waiting. So that was pretty fun. Found a awesome family that has like 7 people that are interested. I also completed 10 months yesturday. So that was pretty fun. Me and elder taylor have been talking about if we are going home before christmas next year. And i think we might do it because it just works out right. But the year mark is getting really close and i think that is crazy. Its about a change and another week away. But ya im having a good time keeping ourselves happy, even when a lot of days some certain leaders are being kinda crazy. Finally we are kinda of getting along with them. Umm there hasnt been too much more happening other than that. O ya wait grandma sent me a letter deal. And can you tell her thank you very much for what she sent me. I had some cool experiences last week. She sent me grandpas ancient america speaks in spanish. And it was at the perfect time too. We have this guy that is getting closer to baptism and i showed him that video and he really liked it. I have watched it a couple times already. Because a lot of stuff is in peru and the people enjoy that a lot. Had some really good talks after it. I love to talk that Joesph Smith had no clue about these things 200 years ago and there is nothing that contradicts his words. So ya tell her thanks for me please. About the batman movie.. we didnt get to watch it actually.. there were a couple missionaries that werent very happy. A leader said that we didnt have good enough numbers, they do a weird reward system here. If you have good numbers you can watch aproved movies. And yes mom it was the black knight movie and it was aproved by the president and we cant watch anything aproved by him. I didnt want to and as you said it was hard to find someone elese who didnt want to watch it. But its ok we ended up watchin the Best 2 years. It was funny our other choice other than batman was indiana jones the new one. So i think its pretty weird they do that kind of stuff. As for the christmas package i dont want shoes sent to me. I can just get them made for cheaper. Maybe just some money to buy more made shoes. There isnt too much i need really, we have a pretty sweet mall in our area. But if i get changed i might want some more stuff. Send me some more family pictures or somethin. I know that sounds like i will get trunkie but it would just be nice to have some in hand that our different i can show to people. My comp just told me there is a church hymns guitar tab book that you can buy. I hear its pretty cool there are like children songs and stuff to learn. So thats just an idea im not sure where you can find that. Maybe brooke can . but im sorry i havent thought of anything else. I will think about it this week and will write if i have changes or not next Monday. Dad that was a really cool story about the apostles. It is pretty awesome hearing them talk. They know so much and bring a different kind of feeling to the room. O ya we get to go to the temple this week finally, so that is going to be pretty fun. The only down side we have to be ready and at a church at 630 in the morning. So thats going to be fun. Well thank yall for writing this week. Hope you guys have a good week and i love you all and the church is true.
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Pine's email

2008-11-09T04:36:00.000-08:00

Because you all tell me that I never let you know what is happening with your cousins and extended family, I thought I'd post this email from Pine to keep you informed.
love,
mom

Just wanted to let everyone know that Nick is home from his mission in California, and is engaged to be married on the 27th of December, here at the Columbia River Temple. I mean he has already been home a whole 3 weeks, I don't know what took him so long. We are actually excited for them. He and Cassidy dated for about a year before his mission and have been writing back and forth the last 2 years. She has been on vacations with us and spent a lot of time with us while Nick was gone, so she already seems like family. Stephen also has some exciting news. He received his mission call yesterday. He is going to Curitiba, Brazil. He is excited about his call and will be leaving on March 25. Now I guess he and Daniel will be able to speak back and forth in Portuguese when they don't want us to know what they are saying. Speaking of Daniel we are still looking for him a wife. He needs someone to tell him "no" once in a while when he wants to climb another mountain or crawl through a cave or jump out of an airplane. He has been enjoying life for sure and is going to start his masters program in January at BYU. Oh yeah, Adam and Ashley are expecting again. She is due on May 26th. The doctor says it is only one baby this time, but thats what they said before, so we will see what happens. Well just wanted to let everyone know that we would be glad to have you here for the wedding if you don't already have Holiday plans. I hope you all all doing well.Love, Pine

Johnboy 11-03-08

2008-11-03T15:09:00.001-08:00

Well it sounds like last week was an eventful week. I wish a happy birthday to both lisa and Kristi. You guys are getting way to old. Im old now. Man my companion talks about college stuff he did before the mission and it makes me want to go even more. Its good to hear about college football. I knew it started just didn’t have any updates. I liked the pictures that dad sent me. Even though I barely recognize those kids anymore. They are all like 12 years old to me. Well Halloween was last week. Didn’t really do much. Me and my comp drew on our faces this guy we had drawn on our board from a while ago(kind of weird I know it’s a long story) but I will send that picture later. Apparently here they are against that holiday and some aren’t. so some kids go to stores to get candy and teenagers run around in the street with drums yelling there is no Halloween! Its pretty weird. And this week I think there is a big catholic deal happening. Well I did hear that a new hulk came out, some of the new guys were telling me. I heard it was better than the last one. And what is this that Kristi gets the high tech phone? That’s crazy stuff like that doesn’t exist here. Well they do have iphone advertisements but noone ever has one. And its good to hear from Marvic, I forgot he is still there in highschool. He was a really good guy.(that’s one you can send the missionaries to) he is pretty humble. Tell him hello for me and to take over this year. Mom glad to hear you got that 84 on your brokers test but it made me think… now when I got that grade on anything you told me I should have done better… now how long have you studied for test?? That’s a joke mom don’t get mad at me. But that’s good. Good luck on your state test. Well to answer some questions I did get my shoes. They came out different than I wanted them. I told the guy to make them for a lot of walking and he decided to put that wood bottoms on it. So they aren’t the best walking shoes ever but they work and I like them. They are the slip on kind of shoes without laces. About the stuff in Bolivia. Don’t push for us getting the stuff. Im pretty sure president maynes is keeping it till we go back in January I think. So it will be less expensive to come back with one bag. And the stuff is in the assistants house in Bolivia. We are finding a couple people to teach. But its really hard here. I don’t want to complain at all cause im sure brooke and dean had it a lot harder. We are being obedient don’t have much problems with that. The economy is doing fine so far. Not many affects down here. But everyone has heard whats happening up there. And with elections this week everyone always asks us who is going to win. Other than that I have had a good week. O ya I felt another earth quake the other day. It was actually just a temblor which is just a shake. But they shake hard like twice and its done. It was a really cool feeling. Don’t worry I was in a place I jumped outside in like 3 seconds. Haha elder ridge was like running downs stairs as it was shaking and he said he couldn’t walk right. And I had a cool lesson the other day with this evangelist. They know there bible pretty well. It was this lady that had crazy thoughts about adam and eve. And wanted pure proof from the bible what I was saying. And so that was a test of my knowledge cause I don’t know the bible that great. I kind of studied up before I went over there. But man we went for an hour and I was scared she was going to tear me apart but luckily I had a lot of help from the promise in doctrine and covenants where I will have the words when I need it. And surprisingly I changed some of her beliefs and made her double think and studied up on it. She told me noone has ever seen God and I showed where like 5 people have seen him face to face and talked to him as a friend would. So ya that was pretty fun for me. Umm other than that im good. Im staying healthy. O ya we are going to be watching a movie today as a zone…. Batman and not the old one we are watching the new one. My opinion I really don’t want to and I don’t like how they can do that here but ya it’s a zone activity. There will also be ping pong where we are going so I will be able to play around again. It has been awhile. I did get to play a lil basketball after a service activity. I just had to keep the ball away from like 5 little kids. So it made me work on my dribbling skills. But I still have my shot luckily. I made like 3, 3 pointers so not everything has left me. But ya thanks for the letters this week. The pictures were really funny of jack. He looks like an old dog now. He needs a hair cut or something. But ya I love you guys and I have having a good time here. Hope yall have a good week.
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John's latest 10/27/09

2008-10-27T17:24:00.000-07:00

Well this year is going by kinda fase... halloween is already like next week. Thats crazy. Sounds like kristi had a good season but didnt finish it out how she wanted... i know how that goes. But ya got to make the best of it. I miss that good ol georgia fall the weather here actually reminds me of it. But i dont like the fact that the sky is always grey. But the sun actually did come out the other day and got a little hot. But yes my other shoes did die. My foot blew through them. That happend in Bolivia i wrote you that. I still have my timberlands. And they are the only shoes i have hear. So i looked for shoes but i had to get them custom made. I will be picking them up today. My companion might be more happy than i am because i think he is sick of the smell. As for knowing who is this Joseph Paul but i think i have an idea of who it is. Ya people are talking about this great depression deal happening up there i didnt know how serious it is or anything. But everyone is praying that obama wins the election here. So that they can all just jump in and out of the united states. Umm o ya the conference last week was cool. We went to the ccm again and so did all the missions that are in the city of lima. So it was pretty packed. I liked the fact that in that room were... 1 apostle, 4 elders from the 70 (one which was a president of the 70 Elder Costa) and all the mission presidents of Peru and Bolivia. So yes we did get to see President Maynes again. We got to give him a hug but didnt get any time to talk with him. They spoke about missionary work of course and it was really good. Christofferson talked about how we are chosen to our missions. It was pretty cool. I enjoyed it a lot. There is a rumor we are going back in January but i dont believe any rumors anymore until they happen. But we still have no word on our stuff so thats a mystery. Ummm we are teaching people here. We have a couple investigators but we need a lot more. Our area is really hard and full of money. Thats awesome that brooke is having a boy. I she getting big yet? Cause imagining brooke fat just cant get a good picture in my mind. Well there isnt too much else going on just a normal week. But it was good to hear from yall. Hope you guys have a good week i love all of you. The church is true.

Oct 20, 2008

2008-10-20T15:05:00.000-07:00

John's companion's mom sent this picture.

John 10-20-08

2008-10-20T14:59:00.001-07:00

Well it sounds like everyone had a good time at the play last week. I have never heard of that play. I am better from the sickness i had the other week so everything is getting better. Just that the flea thing here actually is real. Mom dont freak out but i did get some flea bites the past week because i think they were in my socks. But now i know for next time. Glad to hear that kristi beat brookwood, whenever they lose its always a better feeling for some reason. Well the past week was pretty good. Kinda a normal week except for we did have our first Baptism in Peru. It was really fun because she is the only one in her family that would listen to us and get baptized. She knew it was true and it really helped her to see young men around her age leave there houses only to serve. So that helped her testimony a lot. Im not sure what advice i could give to the missionaries at home because i have no clue what it would be like working around up there. But 7 baptisms is very possible. Just the references have to happen. Elder Nash from the 70 said that for references dont just ask if they know anyone. Ask if they know anyone who was just married or just had a baby or had a death in the family. Stuff like that and then take there names and visit those people. Just an idea. Well as for the answers to what we do on P-days, usually we come to internet go back to our areas maybe walk around the big mall we have or go eat at mcdonalds with other americans. O ya i might be taking money out this week. I found a guy to make me custom shoes(good quality dont worry) for like $60. they should be done later this week. So i am kinda excited about that. Well as for today we are going to the Lima Zoo. Which i hear is kinda of cool. I dont know what to expect. We are allowed to go because our zone has 20 people with baptism dates. So thats pretty cool. This mission is pretty weird im not going to lie. If a zone gets enough baptisms they get to watch a movie approved by the president. Its kinda weird im not sure how i could watch anything becuase that will just click me back and make me want to watch more. Elder taylor has really seen every movie i have so when we get down we just start quoting movies(like old times) and it gets us happier. On p-days i also play some guitar to get better. I dont know many songs yet becuase my comp just wants me to get down more of the basics before anything. Well i am having a good time here. The liders are better know and me and my comp are finding some more people. Our area is actually really hard becuase there is a lot of rich people in our area. So we are thinking to start working in the hills where the people are a little more humble. And mom we are taking care of the Greenie still. Elder ridge is learning a lot with us. He might be suffering with his comp right now but it is making him better. Next week im going to try and send a video home if i can. Im going to see about it. Of our house and stuff. Umm there isnt really much else going on i think. I still feel like a zoo animal walking around the streets the way people look at me. We get a good laugh about it every now and then. O ya thats crazy that whitney is leaving already. I love how i just now heard about it from yall. I had to hear it from Elder Thompson when she got her call. But thats really cool shes leaving. I already feel old in the mission when this change is over we only have one more change till we have a year. Thats really crazy for me. Its flying by. But i am having a good time finally and o ya almost forgot we have a conference this week with Elder Christoferson at the CCM on Wednesday and i think President maynes from bolivia might be coming. So im kinda excited about that. Well thats all for this week. It was good to hear from all of you again. I love you all and hope everyone has a good time this week. And i want to hear about college football and who is winning. I havent heard that much. And also how basketball is going to go this year. Tryouts should be in like 2 weeks i think. But i lov eyou all and i will write again next week.

Johnboy 10-12-08

2008-10-13T14:28:00.001-07:00

Well this past week was an interesting one. Well of course the cool stuff happends a day after internet and we almost forget about it. But i experienced my first earthquake last week! It was awesome. We were watching a church video with a family and we heard like a big truck going by or something but it kept on getting closer. Then the floor just started shaking. We look at the family and they yelled earthquake run for the doors! Me and my companion look at each other and just run for outside. And the whole street was outside. Everyone is paranoid here about earthquakes one happend like 5 years ago that killed i think like a thousand people or more. So that was pretty exciting. What was not fun last week i got kind of sick. Im fine now mom dont worry about me. But i think i got a lil food poisoning. No clue what i ate but i did not feel good that night. I couldnt sleep too well and had to run to the bathroom many times in 48 hours. I forced a throw up to make me feel better which it did. The next day was just kinda of hard for me because i had a fever and i was weak. But everything turned out fine. Umm about my stuff in Bolivia i have no clue when we are going to see it again we actually dont hear anything about over there. I did here its getting kinda of worse and all the missionaries from outside bolivia might have to leave. But that was a rumor who knows. Yes mom there are no trees in my area... its a desert here with big hills. Im in an area called independencia. But i live near a huge red electric store near my house so you can look for that in google. So ya we kinda of miss santa cruz for the green. And the fact that the sun comes out. O and Elder Ridge is a funny guy. He was struggling at times but we usuallyt make him feel better. He is learning so much faster than we did cause we are there to help him in every little thing. So he getting use to the life here fast. I am just remembering alot of stuff with him. But he will be fine. The leaders here are getting more use to us.. im not sure if i said but they didnt like us too much when we got here. But they have apologized and its getting better. Dad i think i saw that corn stuff before i never ate it though. O ya our pension is from Colombia so they love to hear that you served there. They said they love it over there and its way better than here. And i hope as well the gas prices go down. So by the time i get home it will be at like 1 dollar again right? Thats what we are all hoping. O ya me and Taylor make fun of yall about how you are talking to his mom and everything. We feel like little kids still. Its funny i dont mind. And that you just found ridges mom out of nowhere made us laugh again. Taylor is teaching me a lot on guitar so i am getting better at that. We are in progress of writing a song. O ya funny story. So i was looking for shoes and this is where i feel like im a freak. I go around asking people for my shoe size which is like 46. and it exists but they said in my whole area nobody has it in any popular store in the super mall. So that made me feel kinda like a circus animal. But i have heard that they do have my size in one place aparently i can get my custom shoe made. So im looking more into that. Dont worry about sending shoes i will find some. Man thats crazy that TJ came back i hope he gets back into the field. And its hard to think all the friends i had that are younger than me are in college. That blows my mind. The wall i tore down was a big brick wall and i had to make a door passage for them. So it was destroying with carefullness(i know thats not the right word) but you get the point. But ya me and taylor are still getting along really well. We did make it past the change and we are still together. We thoght they were goin to separate us. But we are fine for 6 more weeks. I dont think there is much else going on. Thats not fair that stacy lives on the beach now. I saw a beach the other day for the first time in a long time. We climed one of the big hills and we could actually see pretty far this time and we saw the coast so that was pretty cool. But im fine and having a good time getting use to the area and meeting knew friends. Some new northamericans just got in our zone so there are a lot of americans right now so it should be fun. Well thats about all, i will write you guys again next week. But thanks for all the letters and i love you all. Hope you all have a good week.

Birthday cake in the face 10/6/08

2008-10-06T14:56:00.000-07:00

Well sounds like everyone had a good conference weekend. I didnt get to hear thefirst session on Saturday because i was tearing down a wall for service. But we got to watch all the sessions in english which is way better. It was really coolfor us because... i knew 3 people that were in it. The 2 guys in the 2nd sessionon Sunday who had really strong accents. One from peru and one from brazil. Ya iwas with them like 2 weeks ago and shook there hand, and as well the guy who gavethe last prayer was Elder Nash who i have heard many times when this whole changewas going on. He does this lie detector test. He always wants to shake every missionarieshand then puts his hands on your shoulders and looks into your soul. Not even lieingafter he did it he told us that he was looking of how worthy we look. When he staresinto your eyes you feel like a little kid and think of any little thing you havedone wrong in your life. He is an amazing speaker. And im not sure you noticed butin his prayer that he asked for the governments in the world to permit the missionwork in(i think he was referring to us) so that was really cool to hear. But as for me i am having a better time. We are getting a lil more use to the rules andstuff here. Its still the polution fog every day and it is actually cold 6 days out of the week. But we dont have sweaters or anything and we have survived so far.Um we have no clue when our stuff is going to get here. I have heard more of we might go back soon. But the people here are interesting. The area we are in is oneof the riches areas in the mission of course. We have super mall just outside ourarea. And as well a MCDONALDS man we ate there with a bunch of americans from boliviaand we were loving it. It had been sooo long. So that was pretty fun. For my birthdayi really didnt do too much. I just bought a huge cake and at night i played a lilguitar and got my face smashed in a cake. Umm dad thanks for the quote of the day.That was from the sisters talk in conference i think that stuck out in my mind too.I also thought of you when the profet talked about the Music Man and i laughed andnobody else knew what i was talking about. Me and elder taylor are still workinghard. We have recently figured out that noone believes us that we do our numbersand thats why they dont like us. But the district leader went on changes with mycomp and got to work really hard with him. So i think that has helped us a littlehere. Because ever since we got here they said they uped there contact goals to what we had in Bolivia. It was 105 but we said we were doing 140 every week so thepresident changed it for them too. I think me and taylor work together well he cantalk really good spanish now, its funny to see him talk because in the ccm he wantedto quit so many times. I really enjoyed what the prophet said about the kid thatwanted to quit spanish and went to the japonese class. O ya in the mtc choir.. robbyjenkins was in it. I saw him for a few seconds and yelled i know him! But im notsure if it was him or not. But it really looked like him. Glad to hear that BYU is doing good its about time that we shine out a lil better. And thats crazy whatthe government did to help AIG. But hey i think its better than goin into a depression. when you dad talked about the gas shortage it reminded me of bolivia because randomdays it would just cut off for the whole city and everyone would be in lines allday. Hey im going to try to send some pictures in another email of me and elder taylor. And the new guy we got took the place of the columbian but we are learningto get along with the other one now.(because we changed rooms to have our own) hahai also had to build a bunk bed for me and elder taylor. It almost fell one nightbut now its fine. Umm but it was glad to hear from all of you. Im doing fine dontworry about me. And hope you all have a good week. I love you all and hope all arebeing safe. Dad good luck in your business stuff. Just got to use that ol missionaryteaching skills. And ya write yall next week.

John's companion's email

2008-09-29T19:10:00.000-07:00

what up my fam. so im in an apartment with cheesman and two other missionarys. but we are gonna move to another room soon. so yeah we know our area pretty good now. it is better here cuz the peruanos use the grid system and the number system. cheesman is still a clown as always.. we get along really well. he is like mike anderson. we always talk about crazy random things. oh so the work is going along fine, the peruanos are more hard to teach they are ruder but oh well.. there are choosen people every where. so chad is dating now? wow is she practically deformed? ha ha no just kidding hey you got to email me pics of the date and other random photos yeah? just do it in a different email. im glad that dad is finding work. i still cant send the package. darn it all. so the missionarys dont get hardly any money to live on. so ill be taking out some money occaisionally..... mainly cuz i have a gringo comp and hes down with eating mcdonalds and burger king oh by the way i ate those crazy seed things on the burger king buns....didnt even get sick. i have a stomach like steel. ha ha but yeah oh yesterday i had to eat a fried fish. just imagine a fish out of the ocean.... fried...with skin and all. and the lady said the eyes are good...so bieng the cool american that i am took my knife and popped out the eye and ate it..... wow eyes from fish are not soft, they have a hard center that tasted like crap. but i said it was good so cheesman did it..... ha ha gross. it tasted like fermaldihide. oh well. ha ha it is so funny to have a gringo for a comp. well that is about all for this week. talk to you guys later. and chad i know how you feel....my first talk in the sacrament meeting in spanish was like two minutes... i was just making noises and such. well peace out. les amo con todo mi corazon. yeah. chau elder AUSTIN TAYLOR

John 9/29/08

2008-09-29T17:40:00.000-07:00

well thanks everyone for the birthday wishes... i did have a good one. i ended up buying a huge chocolate cake for myself that lasted for almost a week. but the guys in my room sang me happy birthday and made me take the cherry off the top of the cake with my mouth and of course i got shoved into my cake. so got some good pictures of that. i havent sent many pictures lately because i kinda dont like bringing my camera around here. its famous for the robbers here. but me and my companion are huge so we dont have many problems. there is a new american in our room now. Elder ridge from utah we are helping him a lot with his spanish. he is so lucky because anything he doesnt understand he just asks us. but dont worry we dont make it too easy on him. haha its fun to live the flashbacks through him with the food and worried about bugs and stuff. umm well my area is callled ..lets see if i can spell this right...Tahuantinsuyo i think thats how its spelt. everything is named here after inca names so it makes it a little harder. ya i have heard that this mission was praying for more missionaries and even though we really didnt want to leave we are making the best of it. me and elder taylor are leading the area in street contacts we are doing so many. we talk with every person that walks by and knock every door. so its really challenging our spanish but we are doing fine so far. ummm i have no clue when we will get our stuff from santa cruz. because they havent gave us any update on over there so we really dont know. we dont receive a lot of communication from missionaries that think we already know what to do but there are a lot of new rules here that we had no clue about. haha elder taylor just told me his mom is talking with you. but we are doing fine a lot of times it gets really hard on us when we knock doors alllllll day and we dont have like any success at the end of the day but we wake up and do it again the next day. we bought a guitar last week as well. you know why? cause elder taylor can play really really well. so he is teaching me a couple things here and there. he was a hardcore rocker before the mission so he can play some pretty cool stuff. we are writing a song actually in spanish that we are almost done with. it talks about the girls that bother us in the street. its pretty funny. umm nothing much is really going on here. o ya the polution here is discussing. we went exploring in the huge hills in our area to look at all of lima-.which is huge has like 10 million people. and it was just a smoke fog over the whole city. but we could also see the beach from some of the hills. but the air is discusting and it never rains here it drizzles a while and thats what they call there rain. its also really cold here every night. im not use to that going from like 130 degrees to about 70. but its all good. umm the pictures of spencer were really cool. he looks really different i want to hear some more experiences that he had there. he looks like he is back in really good shape... even though i didnt think he ever left his really good shape. umm but i dont have much time left... they kind of cut us short here on our time(which they cant do) but we obey with a smile. anyways i love you guys and thanks for everything and i will be fine here for a while i think.

Email from John's companion (his mom sent it)

2008-09-24T16:56:00.000-07:00

hey fam. whats up im just in perù working like a mad man!!!! yeah im with cheesman in one room with two other misioneros in the same room. but we have a seprate area with cooler investigators. ha ha it is a blast having a gringo comp, cuz they acually have a sense of humor. ha ha the missionarys here think we are all new until they hear us talk.... yes we understand you too!!!!! so the mission here in perù is different .....way different. but oh well. hey you guys need to pray for bolivia and the people in bolivia. i miss bolivia so much i just want to go back everyday. man yes i got a suit coat and pants and it is good looking, it is blue and it fits me fine. man the mission here in perù gets less money and the things here are more expensive so i might be taking out some money later if i need it. sorry. i left all my carry ons in santa cruz. my back pack and guitar, and my other luggage. man so i dont have my real scriptures. or my bible. all i do is carry a bom and pamphets. that is it!!! oh well im gonna email the prez Maynes about sending my bags here. you guys should pray for me and my patience. i think that is why im here.... to learn patience.....man i want to learn it NOW!! ha ha oh well what can i do? this is not my work and when ever im down i just think of the hymn "ill go where you want me to go" that is all i can do. no clothes no books and no guitar.....just a message. wish me luck. tengo muchisimo amor para vosotros, hay que recordar eso. soy misionero y a donde me mande.....irè Señor. chau chau, Elder Austin Taylor. oh man i forgot the funny story time. so cheesman and i were buying shoe laces for like thirty cents for two. and he accidently did the math wrong and gave her a little less than i cost but thought he should get change. so he was like "give me my change woman!" and she was like "No" you owe me money. and his wallet was out and he bent over and spilled all his change on her and her little store (cuz it was on the side walk and she was sitting down) then he pick up his changed and still demanded his money but he finally gave in and gave her the money. then after he said to me ha ha did you see that? i just poured money on a poor person!

Happy Birthday John! (tomorrow)

2008-09-22T14:34:00.001-07:00

O peru… it is an interesting country. Its actually really weird because they are a little better off here money wise. I thought that here was way poor but getting use to Bolivia this is like an upgrade. I do not like the pollution because you never get to see the sun during the day its just a big cloud over the day alllll day. Its kinda like a foggy day back in the states. It also gets cold here and I left all my winter stuff back in santa cruz so I will have to buy some here. But I have been fine so far. Me and Elder Taylor are kind of starting over an area so we have been doing a ton of contacts and door knocking. We have learned that the people here are actually really hard to talk to. But the members are amazing a lot are return missionaries and they like to help us out. Im not going to lie but some points in my patriarch blessing are coming true. I have been learning a lot of pacience with a guy we live with. But we are adapting and figuring out how to get along with him. He just didn’t like the fact that we had to storm in and live with them. But I will be fine. Me and elder taylor have a good time but we also have a lot of success. I even sat down to tie my shoe for a second and someone came up to us just to talk about the church.(that was cool) we both stick out like sore thumbs as well. He is about 6´3 red head, white as a ghost and me a goliath walking down the street. So everyone just has to stair at us. My Spanish isn’t going to get worse I think its gotten better here. Because there is full concentration for the both of us when we are teaching. Because we have to understand everything they say there is no back up latin anymore. And so far….we have been almost fine with everyone nothing that we have been confused. I lead out the conversations and they can finally understand me! Haha And if I thought the girls annoyed us in Bolivia here it’s a lil worse with an American companion. Its kinda crazy that my birthday is tomorrow… I did get to cook some of the cookies just the bad news that the lady that did them burnt them because she didn’t know they hardened after you take them out. But I still ate a couple. Speaking of which im going to get fat here. We have a meal planned every breakfast lunch and dinner every day. We have a pension for breakfast and dinner and the members have to feed us for lunch. So ya we eat quite a bit. Ummm what else there are a ton of new rules that we are getting use to. But I think we will be fine. We are in a room with 2 other missionaries… Elder Rojas from Columbia and Elder Lima from Lima Peru. But I really like talking to the Columbian because he is new and always excited. But we got stuck on sleeping on bunk beds that they just stuck in this room. So its kinda crouded with 4 missionaries and 1 bathroom. O ya funny story…I AM TALLER THAN THE SHOWER. Its ridiculously small. My neck is about where the water comes out. So that’s been an experience.. also about the bathroom…. You always gotta keep on your toes. Apparently everything is on one breaker and so when there is someone showering and a light is on in the other room the power randomly cuts off and you cant see anything and it turns to cold water. So that was an experience. It would happen like 3 or 4 times every shower. And its really fun to see the lights go out and elder taylor yell O MAaaaN! But other than that lifes pretty normal. im starting to feel older and older. Im in a district with a guy from santa cruz who I saw when he had 5 months and now he has 14! Time is flying by. The number of Americans that came from santa cruz were like 60 I think. Pretty much doubled the number of Americans that were here I think. Also about going back to Bolivia we are not sure of anything yet but I did say 3 weeks cause I heard that but it can also could be like a year or till I finish my mission no one knows. But someone said the things are starting to calm down a little so that’s good. Dad that sounds like a good idea for your book. I might want a copy of that. And that you are still working with aflac…so does this mean we have money now? And I want to hear how spencer did in all of his training. Umm I don’t think there is really much goin on I think we are going to be having a good time tomorrow for my birthday and everything. We have a supermall in our area that has mcdonalds and pizza hut and a bunch of nice stuff. So im happy still just at times it gets kinda hard. But I can handle it I think. But it was nice to hear from all of you and I hope you all have a good week. Just pray a lot for me and I love you all.
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John's email from Peru

2008-09-18T12:59:00.001-07:00

thats cool that we were in the church news. well i am in peru now... its sooo much different. but i am in the Lima- North Mission with Elder Taylor! he is the big red head im not sure i havent sent a picture of him but he is one of my best friends in the mission. and they gave us an area to start working. we live with 2 other latins this time and they are going to kind of teach usthe area for today and tommorrow we are on our own. but the past week has been full of crazy stuff. a bunch of missionaries didnt have passports and the american embassy was with us getting passports ready from la paz in like 3 days. thats really fast. then we stayed in the CCM again(the prison) actually i got to sleep in a hotel one night. but it was really fun to see the old teachers i had and i could have fun conversations with them and understand everything they say. so i really enjoyed that. i also went to the temple again which i havent done in a while but i heard that we get to go every six weeks now if we are here for that long. but i am thinking we are going back in 3 weeks. they are saying things are already calming down over there. the culture here is so much different its actually a little better. just that i dont like the fact the sky is always smoke. sometimes you cant even see the sun throughout the day. but i will make it fun and we will work hard. me and elder taylor have alot of goals to work hard here to see what we got together. i hear also that they baptize a ton here even more than back in santa cruz. also whats different is they way they talk. so there is a whole new vocabulary that i am learning but it wont be that hard. but the thing is we are suppose to write you and tell you how to write us and everything but they didnt give us any directions yet so i might have to write that monday. Our mission president is from uraguay President Perez and he looks american but he doesnt know much engish. i thought he was for a while then he tried saying somethin in english and it was a strong accent. but i will be fine now that i can understand him. if i didnt know spanish at this point i dont know how i would live. but anyway i am just fine and i am excited to be here and to have my first american companion we both have the same time and i think im still senior comp but it doesnt really matter to me. umm but if you guys have any questions ask away. and i hope all of your are fine. i think i am going to have a good time here.

John's email from last week, before leaving Bolivia

2008-09-18T12:59:00.000-07:00

O family… what a crazy week it has been. But its all not that bad. The news update… Today all the Americans are packed up and heading for peru tonight. And then we are going to be called to a mission over there. Which was kinda hard for me to hear yesterday at the last minute but I did see it coming. We haven’t left the house since Friday(but we still did have a baptism Sunday that was really important to me) but I am just fine. I heard a RUMOR that we are going to Peru for only about 3 or 4 weeks and might be coming back here. But whatever happends happends. Its just going to be a big change because it never gets that cold there and it rarely rains hard either. But on a lighter note we did have a talent show the other day put together by me and my companion that we acted in. it was pretty funny im not going to lie. Im going to try to get one of my buddies here to put it on youtube one day so you can see. One act was like the whose line is it anyway? With my arms are the arms of another person doing stuff to get ready for a missionary day. But my favorite was when we did David and Goliath. And my comp was david and I was goliath.. but I had a lil kid on my shoulders with my big jacket so I was even taller. Then we fought like a wrestling match. I thought it was pretty funny if you ask me. That’s good to hear that BYU is actually picking it up. I hope they keep getting better and better. And Brooke for some practice- Estoy feliz que un otra persona va a empezar aprendiendo este idioma. Pero de verdad no es tan difícil solo necesita orar muchísimo pero es posible. Muchas palabras son mas divertido y rápido para decir. Entonces buenas suerte con sus practicas y ¿como estas tu bebe? And lisa thanks for writing me again.. you write a ton and i like it. But just work on those missionary experiences the secret is not to be ashamed of anything in 2nd timothy 1 verse 7 I think talks about God did not give us a power to fear but power of love. So if you love the people share what you love. But I have a lot of missionary experiences its really amazing a lot of times I am confused why something bad happends at the beginning of the day but near the end it turns out to be something awesome. Like I was kinda mad I have to leave here but I think everything has a purpose. I baptized a lot in my area and I guess its time to share the same thing with an other culture. I think I will be fine. It’s a lot easier when you can communicate with the people. Stacy that’s awesome your getting a beach house. Just keep it long enough until I get home sounds good? And about the photo shop im not sure where the cd is but you can always get the free 6 month trial on adobe.com and look for cs3 and somewhere it should have a trial. Umm but besides all that im really happy now I have made a lot of friends that I have been able to spend a lot of time with and even though we might be separated im sure I will be able to find new friends in Peru. And I get to go to cochabama tonight so that will be fun we are taking all the missionaries out of that mission too. Its about 80 americans! That’s a lot of gringos. Umm but hopefully I will get to call you when I get to peru I heard I can. But ya I will let you know whats happening when I know. But I love you all and I hope you guys have a good week. Just don’t worry about me im not heading off to some civil war….yet but be safe and be smart.

latest from Bolivia

2008-09-08T18:24:00.000-07:00

Well i didnt think i cut the last setter short.. I don’t remember if I was running out of time or not. Sometimes it does happen. But as for political stuff the districts in our mission are blocking off all the entrances to leave or enter the country. They also said they aren’t going to send meat and stuff to la paz. So that’s really all that’s been goin on the president has gotten pretty mad with all this and might take it to a civil war. But who knows president is always ready to call everyone out of here. And mom don’t worry because if something really bad happens I have the international airport we come in and leave on about 15 minutes away from my area. So I will be the first to leave of everyone. But it is true the 16 American missionaries that needed to come last change didn’t come. They are going to stay in Peru for 6 more weeks. But if they don’t come in October that might be problems. But in my area there is nothing going on at all with all that. The people there are really laid back where I am. But I complete 8 months tomorrow which is crazy. Its going by really fast and I will be leaving my area in a month. So I have completed my 3rd month until my 9th month in my area. Everybody laughs when I tell them that. Dad I did have a similar experience to what you had. We were walking in santa cruz and a security guy stopped and asked who we were. Explained we were missionaries and he asked why we are called elders. And explained it’s a title for missionary and after said he was called Elder. So I bet his parents or something are less actives or something. Mom about your questions, I think the list is just fine. Actually it might have been a lil too much haha because if you need something down here you can find it pretty easy. Maybe chap stick I haven’t seen too much but that’s about it. The apartments aren’t tooo bad…. I know one of the sisters here has air conditioning in one apartment(lucky) and there is someone to wash your clothes and feed you lunch every day. The money for the person that cooks for you is paid for by the mission. The clothes are paid for through your monthly payment. And they are called your Pension Mosquitos are not a problem in the house I haven’t heard too many with that but when we teach sometimes they get pretty annoying. But a couple houses had some fleas I think but that’s about it. And about the robbers, ya I have heard some stories of missionaries getting robbed but a lot of them turn into a street contact which is really funny. Just explain we don’t have very much because we are missionaries and this is our church. Then we can share a pamphlet and keep walking. But in my area there isn’t a problem with that at all. We are in the middle of nowhere a lot at night and we don’t see too many people around. That’s not good to hear about the volleyball. How can the cheesmans lose to the cash. I think we lost to them the last time too. But that family is really awesome me and mr cash talked a lot before I came out here. I think he wanted to see some pictures so maybe you can email those and also mr moon can see them too. I heard about the woman being called to vice president that would be cool. I really don’t know because I don’t hear anything about what they want for the country but I hear the general stuff. And o ya… Happy early Birthday to Elder Cheesman! Haha I did get the packages last week. They got here in about 3 weeks I think. The offices might have had them a lil bit. But it was really fast. Thanks for everything. The guitar tuner helped out a bunch. So now I am progressing a lot more with my guitar skills. Im really surprising myself actually. And the cookies we will be cooking for my birthday. But thanks a lot im pretty sure everything was in there that you sent. But next time put the stickers of holy stuff on the seals. That’s a lil better I hear. Umm but there isn’t really too much else going on but I will keep you updated on the political stuff. Im sure its on the internet somewhere. But I love you all and thanks for writing me. Lisa I loved your letter I haven’t heard from you in a while. But I know whats its like to write missionaries… haha anyway hope you guys have a good week im doing great we have baptisms planned for every Saturday this month. A teenager was finally baptized last week that I have been working on for the whole time I have been here. Anyway have a good week and I will write again next week. (the picture is of elder parra my companion and elder gates elder ryan and yo) elder gates is the most white of all of us.
No virus found in this incoming message.Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com/ Version: 8.0.169 / Virus Database: 270.6.18/1658 - Release Date: 9/7/2008 3:30 PM

Bolivia Craziness

2008-09-01T12:46:00.000-07:00

I got an email from another Missionary Mom that I will post on here so you get an idea of what's going on. When I read John's he put in his subject "O Bolivia" like he was going to talk about what was happening and then his email was just cut off at the end like he ran out of time so he never mentioned anything. Say some extra prayers for him. Did any of you hear from him?
Mom

Hi Carol,
I just got my email from my son and he said he was setting just 3 feet away from your son, so I know you've got your email for today. What has your son told you about what is going on over there? My son, Elder Gates, just says that the government is so crooked and that he'll tell us all about it when he gets home (the next change he comes home). All the missionaries that were supposed to come last week can't come and none of the missionaries can change areas because they can't travel because of protestors blocking everything. Jason said he has never seen or heard so much violence in his life, the hatred between the collas and cambas is so bad. He said the president of Bolivia is in Iran right now and has already visited with Libya. What kind of info has your son told you? Thanks for any information you have to share with me, I know our sons will have alot more to tell us when they get home than they are sharing in thei r emails.

Deniece Gates

Well it sounds like everyone is doing well at home. That’s crazy that the hurricaneis going to hit new Orleans again. Somebody was talking about it the other day andI asked if it was goin east or west and they said more west than anything. Also I did hear that we might have that woman vice president. Everyone down here is sayingobama will win without question but I have no clue im cut off from the media worldand im fine with that. Mom glad to hear you will get addicted to fantasy footballas well, I was never really good at it I just chose random people and hoped for the best. Dad its good to hear about goin to talk with aflac a lot. That does soundexciting hope that meeting in florida goes well for you. Wow labor day already huh?I had no clue cause there is nothing like that here but there is always some viriginmary march in the streets that looks like a holiday all the time. Its interesting.and yes I am lucky to be having the health I have had. This past companion has beenway more sick from the food than I have. Which is surprising cause we eat some stuffthat is really interesting and I don’t question what it is which is better. The other day I think I had cow intestine.. it looked like a bunch of wrapped up macaronisand I asked my comp what was it… and he said he would tell me after. But I was guessingwhat it was which made it worse. But it was interesting just really chewy is all.I always like to hear that Loganville loses and that Kristi is getting better. Iwent out and shot some the other day I still have my shot but it took a while toget it back my shoulder kept on hurting because I haven’t used my shoulder like that in about 4 months. But I sure cant jump like I use to. I now do a bunch of jumping excercises to get it back. But I hope that my new calf muscels will helpbecause I was looking at them the other day and all my life I haven’t been able to get them to like they are right now.

Hochstein Blog!

2008-08-25T19:34:00.000-07:00

Who knows how well we will keep this up, but maybe we will be able to keep baby updates on here.
http://tidy-chaos.blogspot.com/

repent, and write your brother! at least occasionally.

2008-08-25T16:06:00.000-07:00

Well sounds like everything is still exciting at home. Hope this hurricane stuff doesnt get too serious. Thats awesome that Ashley got baptized, she was going to church for a long time. Im glad her parents are going along with it. Thats what we have been doing is been taing to a lot of parents to get there perision to baptize there children. But everything goes well. The people are worried at the first impression of us then learn to trust us and everything goes fine after that. The only thing i dont like when there is a teenage girl in the family that trusts us a lil too much…. We had a problem with one the past week that wanted to be my wife already. Her mom told her to give me a promise ring and everything. Then took a picture of me with her cell phone without me knowing. So i dont think we are going back there anytime soon. Well we do have changes this week, but i still dont think im leaving which im kinda glad for right now because there are some families that are progressing really well that i want to see a little longer. Dont worry im not getting to attached to where i wont want to leave me area. I have accepted the fact im going to be leaving one day better to accept it earlier. Thats good to hear that krisiti is playing well. But i think she should be treated like a tenth grader…its tradition everybody needs to feel that. And that the fruit pizza legend is still going. About workouts, ya i get a chance to. I play soccer at mutual every week now which is realy good for me. But i think we are going to play basketball this week. And i have thought about playing college ball but i really dont know where i would want to play. President has told me to go out to like snow college and do a trial triout, and if they dont want me ask where i should go. So i might do somethin along those lines or try for a place closer to home. And i got to watch a lil of the final game of basketball of the us and spain. I only saw the third quarter but the us plays amazing and surprisingly spain was keeping up. I was just glad to see we actually had some good players go this year. As for p-days we dont do very much. We had planned today to go out to kinda a lagoon place like the last one but our driver fell through and we will go another week. But we go to downtown santa cruz where a lot of other missinaries go every week. So i get to see a lot of my friends. i have been thinking as well of ¨creative ways of teaching¨ and i have a feeling i am going to the boarder to learn portugeues, and as well in my lessons i use a lot of examples and expierences, i think its easier to understand. Man how is brooke going to have a baby? Thats still crazy to me. April isnt too bad i will be coming home in about 8 months after that. Not too bad. But i am good. I really have lost all of my nervousness that i felt the first two months and i have got use to working like this every day. Especially in our area we have like 5 different cities that we take turns on every day. So every day is different which makes it a lil easier i think. The teenagers only bother us by whistleing or shouting something, like take me to the US. Or some are more direct and ask how are you right to our faces. But im getting more and more famous in my area. Its funny me and my companinon hear someone new everyday shout my name. No clue how they know it. But i have gotten use to it so it isnt too bad. The kids here are awesome, as dad said a lot earlier. I get along with the kids more than anyone and they like me back as well. They always play with me and cry when my companion wants to. So i realy enjoy doing that kind of stuff as well. As for the weather it is getting pretty hot. The humidity is kicking in, i hear it gets to about 103 degrees. But a lot of americans dont think thats a lot but its like 103 in georgia for a week straight, so its way worse. I actually have been a lil sick the past week with a cold i guess it was. But my companion got it first from a teenager in our branch and of course i would have to get it because we are together every day. Umm nothing realy else is happening only getting excited for my birthday. But the year is flying by i dont know how its already september… its almost been a year since i got my call. And that feels like yesturday. Anyway i know this is long because nobody else wrote me haha. Its alright but hope everything goes well for yall this week and im being safe and smart of course. I love you guys and hope you enjoy your cold weather!No virus found in this incoming message.Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com Version: 8.0.138 / Virus Database: 270.6.9/1634 - Release Date: 8/25/2008 8:48 PM

Uncle John

2008-08-18T14:24:00.000-07:00

John's email had the subject title, "Uncle John, I like the sound of that!"
He is mostly answering a lot of questions that I asked. I was mean and told him that I looked forward to Monday just so I can hear from him, that is until Heros starts back in Sept. Of course I told him I was teasing. Scott Kaiser had to come home again from his mission, because he is so sick. He came home once and figured he could serve feeling bad just as easy as he could be home, but I guess he is really sick. They thought it was crones, but now they are not sure. You would never believe he was in Wyoming on his mission. Any way this email made me laugh out loud a couple of times, because it is so John!
Love you all!
Mom

O man i thought the day would never come to where i would be an uncle. But that’s really exciting, I just want to see pictures of brooke getting fatter…haha but I will be home not too much longer after the baby so that’s ok. Or maybe brooke can just wait till next Christmas to have the baby? but as for the elections mom the president they have now will stay president and everything is back to normal as I thought it would be. Everyone is all talk down here with the government, they go on strikes and what not for about a day and quit cause they cant afford to miss more time off work or something. I got to see a lil of the Olympics they only show about 2 hours of it everyday here so they just do highlights really. I saw phelps get a couple of his gold that was awesome. He is an amazing athlete, playing around with the best in the world and winning by 4 seconds sometimes. And I saw a lil of basketball of china and spain. When spain won in overtime they looked pretty good. But I hear our united states blows everyone out of the water at last. I saw who all we have on the team and finally we have some good players. Who just play around with the competition. That’s sad about scott coming home again, no offense but I don’t think I would be able to leave. And I am getting attached to my area, we were talking yesterday about how I am famous in my area. Some teenagers that like to give us a hard time learned my name I guess. They yelled out cheesman! And I have never talked to them before word gets around I guess.(the worst are the teenage girls that are around at night) they bother us the most. Well we don’t know if we will get more elders this next change or not I haven’t heard anything. But I think I will be here another change unless president changes his mind from a few weeks ago. This week I finish HALF A YEAR in my area. That’s so crazy I just have to do my area three times over again and im at home. But I am focused on my work don’t worry haha. Um the converts here do stay active, a couple of them fall because they are little kids whose parents aren’t members, which is always pretty hard. Why would you ever say the word Heroes to me.. I have forgotten about that till now. But no its all right just don’t tell me what happens. I did get a couple of baptisms this week and hoping for one more this Saturday. So not all the people that I wanted but a lot of good stuff has been happening so im happy. O ya dad apparently this guy in my ward served in…Palmira I think and how the shower there was just water shooting out of a wall? And if you remember any names from that area he said he knows a lot of old members. Y para el español.. esta bien por ahora solo necesito practicar la pronunciación de todos las palabras porque todavía hay personas que no me comprenden. But i am happy and having a good time here. I hope everything goes well for yall this week. And tell everyone there hello for me. Love you guys and thanks for everything.

John's smiling face! 8-11-08

2008-08-12T14:04:00.001-07:00

Man it sounds like everything at home is going well. Man I cant believe Nathan isin his house already. That’s crazy. Well I can believe it because im done with 7months and the time has flown by. I know the Olympics have started…man I didn’t think it would be this hard not to watch them. Everyone down here is talking aboutit. I only heard about the opening ceremonies, im sure they will be on dvd here in a week or so so I might get a chance to watch it. But I heard no Bolivianos aregoing to be doing that well in the Olympics it made me laugh but that’s good thatthe guy in the bicycles made himself stand out. I heard Michael phelps beat his own record from the last Olympics so I was excited to here that. But I think I canmanage not watching as long as I get stats or see highlights after the mission. Another thing is everyone is buying the Batman movie already. And to buy one is like a dollar I think. Pretty hard not to buy but we cant so I think I will be fine.Who all is in the American basketball? We actually have some good people this year?And I hope I get those packages too. O ya yesterday we were in our house the wholeday again. President was worried because there was another voting. This time it was to see if the president they have now will be president till in 2 years. Andthink might get a little out of control. But yes we have an evacuation plan. We will either leave here to peru or argentina or the US. But I am about 95% sure thatnothing will happen. In my area its really relaxed because im outside the city. That’s sad that the odels left. They were a good part of our ward. As for me I amdoing great, im use to living here. The other day it was really funny because wehad an interchange where I swapped with another missionary, and I went to there area to help for a day. But at night I was trying to sleep but I couldn’t, becauseI didn’t feel at home I missed my house in Wanes. It was really funny. I couldn’tfall asleep without seeing my stick ceiling before I closed my eyes I guess. Ummwe did have a baptism of 2 this past week that was really fun. And I hope to havemany more this month to complete my personal goal for this month. And wow Nathandid get skinny! The picture just now loaded. Man and he looks Mexican too! Haha man I miss them . they look really good though. Ask them I they could write me sometime I want to hear from them. But anyway I think that’s all that has been happeingwith me. Thanks for everything and I hope I got to answer all the questions(the internet is really slow today for some reason.) but im fine and I love you guys.Talk to ya next week

johnboy 8-04-08

2008-08-04T10:06:00.000-07:00

Well thanks everyone for the letters this week. That’s crazy that you guys have
been married for 29 years. That’s awesome. Glad to hear Kristi is doing well in
volleyball, I got to play some volleyball the other day and I have lost a bit. The
way I get fat is eating about 6 times a day. And these people don’t hold back. They
keep offering and you cant reject it. But I have started working out harder to get
rid of it. So I think I will be find. But I do want to hear Kristi making varsity
this year. Just need to go out and shoot more. Hey I went out and practiced a lot
outside. A lot of times you guys didn’t even know it… but I could have done more.
And that’s exciting that school starts next week. I was thinking about that the
other day. And how can Nathan and Fernando be coming home? They just left…man I
want to see them. Tell them to write me with a picture. And I want to hear how there
Spanish is. O ya I had my interview with president and I think I will finish my
mission in the same area. Haha no but he said I will have a lil more time here maybe
because this area is the Best in the Mission so he told me to stay there keeping
it successful. He also might put in two more missionaries so that means I might
be training soon. Pretty funny I can be training where I was trained. But I love
my area. Its huge and I am getting to know everyone. Just will be harder when I
leave. Umm Guitar is more or less. I have very little time to practice but every
now and again I pick it up and practice the stuff dean sent me. But I think I have
improved a lot. I think its way out of tune too and I don’t know too well how to
fix it. Hey maybe you can send an guitar tuner deal. That would be nice. I did
send an email to Trevor and I will do my best to help him. Man what are all these
new movies coming out…that’s satan really trying at me I guess. Haha no but im fine
now I am really use to living here now. And I can deal with all the rules. But I
am having a good time and working hard. I love you all and thanks for writing. Hope
everything goes well this week, and give refrences to the missionaries! Refrences
are the best way to go. O ya dad what areas did you serve in Columbia there are
a lot of guys in my branch that just came from there. Anyway have a good week, pray
that I can get some good amount of baptisms this month please.

Johnboy's latest 7/28/08

2008-07-28T13:17:00.000-07:00

Man how is Phil already home from his mission thats crazy. I cant wait to hear thatgood ol spain accent he must have. Everyone here in Bolivia makes fun of there accenteven though its more proper. I cant see phil eating cow tongue either. Or the drinksthat they serve down here. I struggle with this drink called Chicha. Chicha is ajuice made from corn.. ya interesting and then the mix with a a bunch of stuff.Like chicha de mani is the corn mixed with juice from peanuts. Or chichi de cerveca(whichactually means that juice of beer) but its really just mixed with grapes. I struggleat times drinking that down. But other than that im loving it. Im getting prettyfat im not going to lie. I have never eaten as many oranges or mandarins in my life.And im pumped for mango season coming up. Its in like 2 months and everyone herehas huge trees of mangos. Don’t be jealous Dad. But this month if everyone couldpray for a bunch of Baptisms. We didn’t have too much the past month but we havea bunch for august. I think we can pull out maybe 9! That would be awesome. Updateon Spanish is going well. I completed one of my goals I set in Peru when I wantedto correct a latin in there Spanish. And a teenager in our ward the other day wason the computer chatting. And was writing a bunch of word spelled incorrectly. Soa couple times I told him the right one and my companion just laughed on how I canspell better than him. But not saying I know this language yet. I also can understandthe little kids better than my companion. I think its because we have the same amountof vocabulary. Glad to hear that Kristi is doing well in Volleyball. But is she improving at all in Basket? Because that season is coming up soon as well… its crazyto think school is starting again there. The summer flew by for me. Well it was winter here haha. But I hear the summer is death in a couple months. And Decemberis when the storms start. Not too excited about that because the next change im going to the very north of the mission where it floods like crazy. But that shouldbe an experience. And this Batman stuff is killing me. Everyone talks about theyare goin to go see it down here and there are posters and previews everywhere. That’sthe hardest one for me to not watch. But I can wait. Heath ledger looks like he did a really good job as joker. Its not too cold anymore mom but when it is I haveenough to make myself warm so don’t worry too much about that. Umm I don’t thinkI need anything else in the package. But I will think this week and let you know.Just don’t make it too expensive. That’s cool that your having a soccer tournamentDad. I want to play im getting pretty decent at soccer now we play every mutual.And I get a goal every now and then. But I did play some basketball last week. AndI still got a lil something in me but I lost a lot. I don’t feel the same when Iplay. Anyway I love you guys and I hope everything goes well this week. And thiswork just keeps getting better, I have learned to love the people here and how strongthey are in the church. My first baptism(she is awesome) travels for about 40 minutesjust to get to church every Sunday. And half that time is on foot. And she givesus food every time we go there. But love all of you and be safe. Have a good week.

2008-07-21T15:48:00.001-07:00

Wow all those messages you guys sent me were awesome. Not all the news was great. Not too happy that the Odells are leaving. Well i am in Warnes 6 weeks more! You know what that means i will have HALF A YEAR in my area. Pretty awesome and crazy because time is flying by here. Im not too sad about staying i have a lot of friends here and people i need to baptize before i go. But me and my companion get along really well which makes the days easier for me. But mom dont worry about me changing to the middle of nowhere…they have internet everywhere here. Everyone has said that they have had internet in every area just some are slower than others. But i want to go out there from all that i have heard. Your area can be an hour away from the next missionaries. And a plane ride away from the offices. But latly my companion has been trying to teach me a lil portuguese(i dont know how to spell that) because he just came from the area that speaks only that near Brazil in Corumba. O ya i forgot to tell you guys last week but I milked a cow! So that was an experience i think i got about umm two squirts wirth but at least i got it. My companion got a lil more than me but thats not important. I think i have had every part of a cow now. Had kidney and stomach again of a cow last week. The stomach was not bad at all it tasted really good but the kidney that was a lil difficult. Well i think it was a kidney. Somethin near the stomach. Thats sooo crazy about Phil and nathan coming home so soon. I always talk about when we are all home us 3 will have way different spanish accents. So im looking forward to that(the bolivian accent is the best) anyway. I will send some photos of the zone of the last change. Nobody left so it will be the same this 6 weeks as well. Dont think that im trunkie or anything but after this change and 2 more changes i have a year done with. Me and my companion were thinkin that yesturday becuase we have the same time here. Its goin by way too fast. But i have having a good time now at last that i have learned the language. Things are a ton better when you know whats goin on. But i still have a lot to improve in my teaching skills. I think thats about it but i love you guys and hope everything goes well this week.

John 7-14-08

2008-07-14T14:14:00.000-07:00

Well it sounds like everything is goin well at home. I am glad to hear that you guys enjoyed the picture of me and my companion.(he hates that picture) well I don’t know if I have changes or not. Im getting way to nervous. I don’t want to leave my area just yet. We found a whole city that doesn’t have any churches. But I wont know till this Tuesday if I have changes or not. But I am having a good time with my new companion he is the first one I get along with really well. We work hard and we joke a lot as well. Well the stories from the past week…haha o ya Kristi cant complain about any kind of food. This past week was my second time with good ol cow tongue. I have had it in two different ways. The first time I had no clue what it was I was just eating what the pension at lunch gave us. Half way through I was thinking what kind of meat it is. So I asked my companion and he just stuck out his tongue. Then I realized because the bumps and everything were still on the meat. It was just straight up cut up tongue. And the past week I knew before hand it was tongue. Which made it a little weirder I think. This time it was long slices of tongue. And ya it just feels like biting your own tongue but actually going through..ya yummy. But its not bad tasting only the thought. And who knows what else I have been eating I just know I would not have ate it before the mission. And I might b e coming back home a lil chubby. Surprisingly I am getting a lil weight on me now. We eat so much, every person that we go to invites us something. We had 3 lunches yesterday for example all in 4 hours. But cant complain its better than being hungry. Funny about that spider when my new companion saw the picture said he had a bigger one in his bed with him way up there in the north of Bolivia. But ya lil creepy at times, I just try and think of other things. Um nothing really yet is happening with the whole peru deal but I think us Americans are fine. Most people like us. I mean they all have at least 2 shirts that have the US flag or a mark from the states. About the package umm just kinda the same stuff you sent last time. O ya one thing I might want is the power tester I use to have. The pen one that would light up to any electricity. They don’t have any good ones down here. But I think that is the best address to send it I can ask president this week about it(we are pretty good friends now president and i) and I haven’t got any letters since the one of the Guatemala and the one lisa sent me with some stickers and stuff. But I don’t know whats going on. And about the money at times we run out of mission money and have nothing and so that’s our back up so that’s the really the reason I need money know. Im using it more wisely now. Because I am understanding whats goin on. But I think that’s really all. I am doing fine getting a lil nervous for the changes and Spanish is still progressing. Hope everything is going well at home and I love you guys.

John's email and pics from July 7,2008

2008-07-07T18:56:00.000-07:00

Well it sounds like everything went really well at the reunion. Everyone inthat picture looks so much older than I remember. But that's good that manypeople went. The garden I saw I was also impressed with. You would thinkmore people down here would do something like that to live better but theydon't. a lot just have fruit trees and yucca plants. I have grown to likeyucca I don't know if dad knows it but it's a root of a plant they eat herein a lot of different ways. Kinda taste like French fries at times. Umm imnot sure if the house we built is standing still because its in anotherarea. But with me this week I have just been training my new companion elderparra the area. Because maybe in a week I will get changed. But if not itscrazy to think at the end of the next change I will have half a year just inmy area. Crazy huh? But mom this week is when I do complete my 6 months mantime has flown by. Whats cool is I complete my 6 months a day before mycompanion does. So that should be pretty fun. Nothing really too big hashappened here, just in the future there might be a problem with peru herethat we were kinda worried about but I don't think anything will happen. UmSpanish is improving a lot. One girl in the ward of our zone leaders(2americans) told me that I have a better accent than them and they are goinhome in two months. So that made me feel a little better. O ya one of myzone leaders wants to know what mike had to do to work for the government,he wants to do the same stuff after the mission. Thanks Dad for thebasketball update I was wondering the other day who won. Hows Graysonbasketball goin to do this year? Are we improving at all? Umm and who isgoing to be president it seems like some people down here know more aboutthat than I do. But ya that's all that's been happening with me. Hopeeverything goes well this week. Love you guys.

For Stacy and Spencer

2008-07-01T14:48:00.001-07:00

Happy Anniversary Stacy and Spencer!!
Love you both!

John's email 6/30/08

2008-07-01T14:43:00.000-07:00

So if you are looking at this for the second time, then you'll notice I changed John's email to the one he sent this week instead of the one from 2 weeks ago. Sorry.
I added my email on the bottom so you would know what he is responding to.
Love,
mom

Dad i got a couple of your emails. Just not any letters yet, im going to be asking more about this letter business I don’t know whats goin on. But I got a new companion this week his name is Elder Parra (yes if you look at his name he has a double r… which means I have to learn to roll my tongue perfect now. He doesn’t like it when people pronounce it wrong. He is from Lima, Peru and he has the exact same amount in the mission as me. We are going to be leaving the mission at the same time. And I don’t know getting him means I stay in my area or not. I wouldn’t mind it we are having baptisms like crazy. O ya this past Sunday we had branch conference and we had a goal of getting 200 people there to show the stake president we are ready to become a ward. Well we had 235 people show up! It was really awesome the… capilla?(dad translate) was filled. so that was a lot of fun. Im pretty much a pro at the area now people come to me for refrences and I have a good idea where they are each on they tell me. . Sounds like Kristi had a good time at camp. Those were always some of the most fun times with the team. Because other than practice in the summer you never get to see them. And I in stacy´s letter man if spencer can only do 18 push ups in two minutes why don’t I look as big as him? But that stinks he has to stay in that holding class so long. Dad the name of my president is President Maynes from Idaho. He is really really smart and strict on everything. He has a brother in the first quorum of the 70 that’s apparently the one in charge of the missions in this hemisphere. But I really like him a lot. Spanish is coming a long really well right now. I lead a bunch of lessons the other day because I had an interchange. So that was pretty interesting. I laughed about the murder and mike. Maybe the murder just felt bad and would turn himself in? o I did some fun stuff on Friday. Well Thursday we had our district meeting and the zone leaders asked if we wanted to this service activity of help building a house. So of course I volunteered because I like doing that kind of stuff. They said it would take about 2 hours not a big deal. So Friday morning at like 10 we went to this ladys house and she wanted to take apart the house she has now and move it about 15feet away. It was one of the most pointless reasons but he we do what we are told. Well I was lucky I brought my leather man because that leatherman built the house. We started from the roof down. Haven’t heard of that before have ya? But if was fun but now fun. kinda stressful actually because they said I was the one who knew most about this stuff so I had to plan it and design how we were goin to do it. She wanted the house a lot taller to. So after about 3 hours of planning in testing we actually got some where. It was interesting. To make a long story short we worked till 6pm but the house was taller she was happy and everyone was tired and we didn’t eat anything alllll day. But ya that was a lot of fun. didn’t think I would be building a house from scrap metal, tarp, and with a leatherman. You should tell mike Hansen this story. But we rigged it so bad because we had lack of supplies. So a lot of the corners and stuff are just wired together. So we are crossing our fingers that goes well. But that’s really all I got. I love you guys, and I will let you know what happends next week. The pictures didn’t go through last week so I will try again this week…

Hey There,
This was a fun week for us and I hope you had a good one too! I'm hoping the news we hear about places in Bolivia declaring independance from the rest of the country is not going to affect your safety! How is your new companion? I guess you are going to be there for a while if you got another new companion. Are you getting Dad's emails? He said he asked you some questions that didn't get answered and so he was wondering.
On Thursday we had Brenda, Eric, Mike Day and his family came in town and they are always fun to have around. Mike is working for the FBI in California and was telling us about some of his experiences. He told us one time that I guy had murdered someone that day and the FBI found out where the murderer was so they had the house and area surrounded by all of these FBI people and Mike and his partner were parked out front of the house. The murder and someone else came walking out of the house and Mike gets on his radio and tells everyone. He sees the two guys split up and walk pass his car on both sides. He was waiting for them to walk past and was going to get out and get them from behind. The next thing he knows he hears someone trying to get into the back seat of his car so he jumps out, buts a gun to the guys head and and tells he had better not move! When another car arrives a little while later they realize the murderer thought Mike was his ride! All the other FBI agent could not understand what happened. All they know is Mike radioed that he was coming out of his house and they the next thing they know is he had single handedly (I guess he and his partner) took down this dangerous murderer! So now when they have someone like that to arrest they say "Let's just put Mike Day out front and maybe they will come get in his car!"
We played some cards and some Wii. Lisa and Pete just got back from California and bought the Dr. Mario and a new tennis game for it.
I've been working on our reunion for this week at Ft Yargo. And working in the gardern and working at work!
Briana was my only Laurel that was going to be at Mutual this week so she came over and we played "Are you Smarter than a Fith Grader" and I guess I'm not, but it was still fun. Then we watched a movie.
It sounds like all of my siblings are going to be here for the reunion this week so I'm really excited about that.

Yesterday was a great day. Megan Waisath and her husband Lee were sealed in the temple. We went to an endowment session and then the sealing and then out to California Pizza. The Cersey's and Waisaths and their family were there and Harold Galvez. It was like old times. We had fun. It's hard to believe that all of these kids that you all grew up with are so old! They are friends that are more like family.
So church today and that is about it. Hope you have a good day week! I'm going to try to send a birthday package soon, with the hopes that it will get to you on time or that it will get to you at all. Is there anything you need or want in particular?

Love,
Mom

John's letter from 6/16/08

2008-06-23T15:34:00.000-07:00

Our email was down for a while so I didn't get John's letter up last week. Here it is with this week's following.
love to all!

Hah you dont know how many times i have had that meal of rice and chicken. Its really funny now when its not chicken and rice im kinda disapointed. Our pensionista kinda went through a beans with everything stage. I kinda struggled with some of it but ya finished every day. Because if i dont i will wither away to nothing. Ya we dont eat salad because of the lettuce but i eat all different sorts of salads. I dont think i have gone a day without a half a plate of rice, pretty weird huh? My week went pretty well really fast. Every week seems to go by faster and faster. I had my interview with president for this change and we had a good conversation. First i talked about his lesson he gave in our zone conference, cause he kept referring to basketball and asking me if it was true everytime. He talked about giving excuses and asked me in front of everyone ¨how did you feel everytime someone gave an excuse on your team¨ i just said we ran. Which was cool cause i was talking about the same things with my companion the week before about basketball and how much we ran all the time. Then we got on the subject of what i should do after the mission. I was sayin i wasnt sure if i could make it anywhere for basketball but he told me to send out some letters or somethin and ask for an oppurtunity and if the people that watched me didnt want me, ask for where they think i could go. All this is not for sure yet we just talked about i shouldnt end on the season i ended on… but anyway other than that i have been healthy me and my companion get along pretty well. And we have some baptisms lined up for the next 2 Saturdays which is always exciting. O ya we taught this girl that is studying english and she knows it pretty well. Whe wanted me to teach in english. So i tried to talk about the pamphlet we give and every other word was spanish. They kept laughing at me that i couldnt do it. But i made it entertaing haha i think im goin to be giving her some english stuff cause she says she has none. Thats cool that brother watson came back thats good to hear about them. And the weather has been crazy here too. The south winds really through everything off. Yeseturday it was really hot up until 6 o clock then it dropped about 50 degrees and now its really cold. You just never know. But thats really all i got this week i think. Just spanish is still coming along and ya i love you guys and hope everything goes well this week.

John's letter from 6/23/08

2008-06-23T15:32:00.000-07:00

Your son is doin fine. The president was only talking about bball and asked if i knew where i was going. Ya I went to Georgia state for like 3 days I think. I really enjoyed it up there. Glad to hear that south lost, not glad to hear that lesniak actually left. And why wouldn’t the new coach want him? Well I got a story for this week… the week turned upside down as of Friday. Everything was goin fine normal week teaching. Then we came back to plan Friday night and we got a phone call my companion answered. It was the people in the offices. They told my companion to pack up his things right now because in the morning there was an emergency change. We were kinda expecting it because earlier in the week we went up to the offices and another companionship was havin a problem but that day went by fine after the president talked to them. So we went up Saturday morning and my companion with with another and I got the secretary of the office. I didn’t mind that he was a pretty cool guy. It was a crazy day with that then we had to get back really fast to get ready for a baptism then. And my area is about an hour away from the office so it was pretty annoying to go to the offices every other day. But after the baptism we went back to work in my area then he got a call that he needed to be up there back at the offices that night. So we weren’t too happy o went back up there at 9 o clock at night and I came back with an interchange after. Then I was with an interchange for church and a lil after church. Then I went back to the city to go live with the zone leaders. I didn’t mind that at all because they are the two Americans that I get along with really well. And now after im done writing today im goin up to the offices and picking up my new companion. So ya that was pretty awesome. Im goin to send some pictures. One is of a baptism we had this past Saturday. Another two is a cd case that I had made by this member in another area and it cost me like 20 bucks I think. But its all pure crockodile, anaconda, lizard and cow leather. The symbols are bull fur. So ya im pretty happy about that. Another one I a friendly visit we had in our bathroom the other night. Ya it was a huge spider. Kinda scary because it was venomous too.but ya my comp walked in there to use the bathroom, and he screamed. And I saw it and I freaked out. Then we killed it and it was a mess I have a picture of that but I don’t think I will send it. But that was pretty exciting. But ya everything is going well now. Once I get my new companion I should be better. Umm but ya I know I keep saying this but I will try to send some stuff back soon. Anyway that’s what happened this week. Well I love you guys and hope everything goes well. And I will hear from yall next week.

Dear Dad,

2008-06-15T18:49:00.000-07:00

Happy Father's Day! Just wanted to thank you for everything you've done for me and the rest of the family over the years. You are the ideal dad that every child deserves to have. The one who can do anything and everything. The one who always shows his full support with everything we do. The one who is positive. The one who pushes us to achieve greatness. The one who lives what he teaches, setting a perfect example. The one who loves his family, unconditionally and always.

Dad, I love you. Happy Father's Day.

Love,
Stacy

John 6/6/08

2008-06-09T16:09:00.001-07:00

Well it sounds like everything is going good at home. I have not beentransferred. it was pretty crazy almost nobody in our zone got changed and alot were thinking they were leaving. Im still with my same companion aswell. Its o.k I want to stay there are some people we have right now that Iwant to babtize. And mom well I haven't completed my 6 months just yet don'tjump the gun haha. Today I hit my 5 month mark. But one more month. Time isflying by though every Sunday comes around really fast it feels like. Dadchalinga is Bacano in Columbia I hear. Girls camp sounds like it's a lot offun. And it doesn't matter that they slept in tents they are still spoiled.Going to water parks and what not while I was doin wilderness survivalbuilding my house out of sticks in scout camp. Well I miss those hot summerdays in Georgia its got a little hotter lately but today its goin to raincold, so im not too excited for that. O man dad I hope I give a talk in yourbranch instead of the home ward when I get back, I tried to teach a lessonin English in one of our practices. It was impossible my companion wanted tosee how much he could understand but I was speaking Spanish words half thetime. But I am understanding a ton more, and I completed one of my goals tohave a kid understand me. Not saying every one can understand me all thetime but he answered a question. That's good to hear about how the stake isstepping it up in missionary work there. I think all the time about how Ihave had opportunities to talk about the church but I didn't know what tosay back then. You learn so much out here. O and I don't know if I alreadytold you but my companion is amazing. He was converted only about 9 monthsbefore he left for a mission. And he goes strong every day, its amazing. Andhow now he knows more than I do about the church, well almost. But at timeshe talks about his conversion to people when they say that they have alreadybeen babtized and then he says well I was a 2nd time.. and this is why. Soya that's pretty cool. Alright now time to answer questions de moms letter.Taking out the trash, I still do that down here. But all I have to do iswalk outside and put it in this metal basket. And bugs I have seen someinteresting bugs. Some really really big ones that don't look they are fromthis earth and some really annoying small ones. Spiders are normal now wekeep them around to kill all the mosquitoes but if they get near my stuff yathey are dead. But I try and learn about all I can that are dangerous ornot. O ya how is the rain situation going still have restrictions and whatnot? And the gas prices how are they looking? Well we did have anotherbaptism this week of 2 people a woman and a kid. It was good to finally getthem. I have started to make friends in the ward now that I can haveconversations with them haha. So that's why it might get a little hard toleave here. Umm I really don't have too much else going on. Still workinghard and learning a lot. O ya Dad I am a lil past half way through Jesus theChrist and its an amazing book. I like it a lot. Also about to finishreading the book of Mormon again (cant do that enough right). And brooke Iwant to see a picture of this new house you are going into. Stacy I want tosee some of your work of these photos(is that spelt right?) anyway Kristigood luck with bball and the new coach. And who is she by the way. And mrdollar was awesome glad he remembers me. O ya who else is in Grayson still?Ok that's all I got but I love you guys and I hope everything goes well thisweek.

Johnboy

2008-06-02T08:04:00.000-07:00

He also sent a oneline saying the wedding pictures were "sweet".

Well im glad iron man was a good movie. I am already getting tortured enough out here because i can buy iron man right now if i wanted for like 25 cents. Ya once it comes out in the states they have it on sale here the next day. Its halarious but we arent allowed to buy them only originals. And kristi should love drivers ed i learned a ton from that. And if you wreck its not your car anyway… haha but it did help a ton. Thats good that you are running her because always at the beginning of the season is the hardest running in your life. I think about some of the conditioning i did and still cant figure out how i did it. But i need to be doing some more excercises cause my arms are getting way too skinny so hopefully that will change. But surprise surprise that it gets cold here. Like really really cold. Its about the same as the winters we have. I sleep with a hoody my sweat pants 2 pairs of socks and the trench coat as a blanket with another blanket on that. But ya we have been really cold walking around latly. It aparently all blows up from the south. But i love it the only thing is that a bunch of memories fly back from like football games and what not when i was just as cold. But its all good. Spanish is coming along really well i can understand sooo much more and that helps a lot. My speaking is getting better my goal is for kids to understand me. When i can do that i know spanish haha they are the more difficult. O.k for your questions… i wont know if i am transfered till tonight. But i think im leaving and yes it is possible they put me on a 12 hour flight to the north. But i hear those are the best areas. I am good health wise this week just the random feel sick after food but nothin really happends. Umm we are getting a couple married next week to be babtized and we have been working on that one ever since i got here. So thats exciting. Its weird i really dont want to change now that i understand these people beacause they are amazing in my area. Umm but ya i will write you guys next week and i love you and have a good week.

John's letter 5/26/08

2008-05-26T09:43:00.000-07:00

Well the wedding sounds like it was a blast. O the beach that does sound like fun haha. But its still there when I get back right? Anyway this week flew by. We worked pretty hard because I only have a week left in my area. We had a babtism of 2 kids saturday just kids of members that weren’t babtised at 8 years. Nothing really else happened I got sick for 2 days but it wasn’t so bad I didn’t leave the house. Just woke up in the middle of the night feeling ¨chopi¨ (not good) but ya other than that the week went by really well. Sunday was really funny because we had a surprise visit from the 70 in our area and he is awesome. I taught a lesson with him the first change for like 2 hours. He has an answer for anything I cant imagine what it would be like with a prophet or apostle. He gave a bunch of ¨wasca¨(giving stick) at our branch because noone is ever on time and not many less actives members are coming. So it was good to see that. His name is elder campero and he is in the first quorum of the 70. my Spanish is progressing its just hard for people to understand me at times. My companion says its not my fault because the people just zone out. But who knows. I wish I could have seen everyone playing rock band that would be interesting. And that’s a shame about Indiana jones I saw a preview of it the other day and thought it looked cool. But o well. I bought my sweater down here for like 14 bucks cause I didn’t like wearing my hoody with a tie. So we went to this place where most missionaries go for ties and sweaters and such. So ya I liked that one the most might go get another one today not too sure yet. O ya! Haha I got your package finally. It was really funny. Zone leaders told me they had a surprise and it was this beat up box. Apparently the box got wet or something that’s probly why they kept it longer so it didn’t fall it apart while sending it. But ya I got everythin inside I think. We think they took a peek inside too. But the candy is heaven im savin the twizzelers for a bad day. But the girl scout cookies were chalinga. We have a new guy we have been talking to at this church called Cristo viene and yeah its pretty weird. We walk by all the time and take a peek cause they watch these animated videos and have this preist they always watch. Ya so we stopped one day and talked to the main guy. They apparently know the end of the world is in april 14 of 2024 at 4 in the morning. We thought wow that’s pretty good. They know there scriptures really well but the one thing that’s kinda out there. Is that Bill Gates is satan. Seriously they have a book about it they gave us all about how he is antichrist because he wants to put this computer chip in everyone that can make us read minds or something. Ya its pretty weird we have another meeting with him to clear up some questions. We just gave him a pamphlet of plan of salvation and see how that goes. Well I love you guys im doin fine. Hope everything still goes well at home.

John's letter from 5/19/08

2008-05-21T23:06:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the 3 comments on Brooke's post. What can I say it is 2:00 in the morning and I must have hit the enter button 3 times. You all know I'm such computer wiz.
Anyway here is John's letter. He is answering a list of questions that I asked. Mom

Thanks for the email mother. I forgot about that picture with president that’s funny. Ok the package I got was from lisa with some candy. The letter was from you and dad with pictures of Guatemala, which were really cool by the way. Good news im able to send some picture today. For p-day today.. it was an interesting one. We went out to a lagoon out in the middle of nowhere. It was a jungle/desert, the wind did not stop blowing hard for about the 2 or 3 hours we were there. We played some football and at times I threw the ball a little in front of me and it could come back for me to catch it without movin. We went in the back of this big truck. 12 missionaries goin down roads standing up in the back of a truck is a pretty funny site. Well on the way to this lagoon we hit all sorts of fun obstacles. First was a huge sand dune we had to get over. Well we already saw two other trucks like ours that were stuck so that wasn’t good. So we did some service there spending about an hour to get people out of the sand. All this is happening with sand blowing in our eye at 100mph by the way. That wasn’t too fun. But ya we kept goin to nowhere got a lil lost but eventually found it. While we were there got to throw a lil football back in forth. It was awesome throwing with the wind I threw it like 100 yards. Then there was the big hill of sand. And we had races running down it and at a line start to role to another line to win. Soo that was pretty fun. But I did get a lil sunburn because that’s the most direct sun I have gotten since I have been here. So that was all fun and on the way back we took a “short cut” according to the driver. Ya we eventually got to a dried out river that was all soft sand again. So got stuck a couple times but then at the end was a river to cross. That was pretty cool I walked across with 2 other elders for the weight to be lighter. So all that was an experience I have a couple pictures I can send today. I wont know if im being transferred till the first week in june. Which I probly will be transferred. The weather is always changing the day after it was cold it was scorging hot again. So we never know. But I love the weather. O ya I gave a talk in church about ummmm dìa de reposo get dad to translate. But ya it went fine wasn’t too nervous surprisingly talked about 10 minutes. I was impressed I could do that. I got a couple compliments but i think the others didn’t understand. I chose that topic because a lot of the people here don’t do the right things on Sunday so I gave a little waska(giving stick) to them. Im doin pretty well with the obedience, my companion keeps me in line. We don’t bend really any rules so all that’s pretty good. Money in my account every now and then I don’t think im goin to make any big buys anytime soon. Just check it every once in a while. And of course I love my mother. That’s an easy one. Ya when jacked barked a whole bunch of memories flew back in. but ya at times its weird what things we have in America that don’t seem to big that we need here. For example public bathrooms in our area I think there is one place with it. Or police haha. Ya the police system is really non existent here. If you aren’t goin 100 on the roads you get honked at. Well I guess no matter what you get honked at here. Ummm but ya I love you guys and I hope everything is goin well for the wedding this Tuesday I cant wait to see some pictures. But ya love you and I will hear from you next week.

The New Hochstein Residence

2008-05-14T18:35:00.000-07:00

We just signed the papers today and we can start moving in on May 29th! Woohooo! We probably won't live there for a while after that since Justin's apartment contract is up at the end of June and we will be a bit busy right after the wedding. I'm glad I saw this house after the first adventure house we looked at. The first house smelled like bad beach motel and when we walked in the basement we found that it came with its own beach! The floor of standing water (who knows how long it's been flooded, the house has been vacant for a year) was a little discouraginig, and I didn't think I would be happy with any house on base after that. The house we are going to live in is old on the outside (built in either the 60s or 70s, don't lick the paint) and new on the inside. And we don't pay for anything but phone, internet, and cable. Yay. Details: Duplex, 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom (small ones), big living/dining room, Front yard, back yard, no basement, storage shed (out front, kind of ugly), fridge, oven, and dishwasher included. We will live here for a year and then move into the REALLY nice, new housing on base. Wooohooooo! Come visit us!

John's after Mother's day email

2008-05-12T07:53:00.000-07:00

It was great to talk to all of my children! Thanks for the great Mother's Day. By-the-way, I just booked Dad a flight to SLC for Brooke and Justin's open house as a Father's Day present. I figured with all of his family and friends there, he should be there! Love you all! mom

Well family it was amazing to get to talk to yall last night. Haven’t spoke that much English since I have been here. I hope everything goes well with brookes wedding I am not goin to lie I do not miss setting up for that kind of stuff. But actually right now I could probly go for it. Kristi´s woody doll was pretty cool I know I could never do something like that. I didn’t tell you guys but I have started drawing as well surprising I know. I just start doodling or draw what I see on my desk. Still not very good at it but its something I could get better at. There wasn’t too much I missed talked about last night. You know that the next time we talk I will be a week away from completing my year. I thought that right as I hung up last night. That’s insaine, there really isn’t that much time in the mission but at the same time, there is. But I can survive its really not all that bad here. At times u get the culture shock but not too much because the people are so awesome here. They are nice to anyone even a tall gringo like me. And they are kinda nice for my Spanish they are not shy down here for telling you something your doing wrong. Its funny how the rudeness factor is messed up here. Its not rude to call someone fat to there face or to explain someone to another person. But if we don’t eat the food they cry. I don’t get it. Um o ya my zone leader just said he has a package and 3 or 4 letters for me at his house but they cant give them to me till thursday so at least they are here. And about the sugar thing ya I recognized this week I need to slow down on the sweets, that’s why I bought the 20 oranges. And I have been improving and I even worked out this morning too. My arms are getting too skinny. But ya if u guys want anything from down here just ask and I can see if I can get it. And it would help to get some money to send that stuff. Not too much but anything will help. Ya im making this letter a lil longer cause the one last week didn’t go through. And mom I still don’t know what you were doing for a job I in the office or something. And also hows the flu stuff coming along? Or was the logo not professional enough to make it to the big companies? But ya this week is goin to be pretty normal and we have another babtism the saturday after this one so that is always exciting. Anyway I love you guys and glad to hear you had a good mothers day.

today's note from John

2008-05-05T09:39:00.000-07:00

I guess it is a good thing I saved John's last two weeks emails, because we didn't get much today! The picture of his district in front of the stage below really made me miss him. It is such a John picture!! We get a call from him on Sunday!!
Mom

hey im safe i tried to senf my last looong messagebut the site messed it up but ya i will write more later im good everythinng is fine here mom i love u guys and i will call next week maybe a collect number that is suppose to be cheaper. not really sure on what time im goin to cal but i will let u know sorry its short i had a real lng mesage but nwo no

John's last 2 letters

2008-05-04T19:05:00.000-07:00

Sorry I didn't put these up sooner. I guess we will also get more tomorrow.

Mom

I actually did not get transfered.... im the man of the area for a week training my new companion..nothing has been harder than that haha. but i am surviveing just a lil hard where people live in 2 huge areas and remember names and what we have taught. its crazy. but i got a new companion Elder Hurtado he is from peru and he has 15 months in the mission. its crazy and he keeps saying its not that much time in the mission and makes me mad haha. but he is a straight forward hard worker. which is good for me i guess but he likes to joke around sometimes. i cant send a picture this week cause we are at a different place buuut i will send one next week. and i couldnt open any pictures either so i have to wait till next week. anyway sounds like it has been crazy at home. i dont think i could have handled dad having a spike in his foot that would have been crazy. And these girls your talking about arent in my mind anymore for 2 years so dont try to explain to many of them. i havent given a talk yet annnd español is coming along still. i can pretty much understand what everyone is saying. and i can teach for longer periods of time giving examples and experiences and what not. so not too woried about that.we actually had some new americans come in our district this week. its fun to see how far i have come i gave one a call after the first day to check up on him and talk a little english so he doesnt freak out. i know when an elder called me at the beginning it helped me a lot cause i didnt know what was goin on and he gave me some tips and gave some assurance so i thought i would do the same. haha mom i really just wanted my card to work if i wanted to buy somethin down here for you guys or for me when i dont have any other money. cause we dont get much for every month. just enough. but i can buy anything i need here really. i mean i have starbursts and skittles in our house. bought oreos the other day and mac and cheese. so its not too bad cause we are close to santa cruz. well im glad u think of me fixing fun stuff like the garbage disposal. i keep looking for oppurtunities to fix stuff down here. i fixed our shower for hot water and the whole time i had flash backs to work. that was a lot of fun took it apart saw how it worked and went bought the part and replaced it done. ya anyway i am doin just fine we have some babtisms lined up for this month so we are pretty excited about that. hope everything is goin well at home and dad just needs to stay inside and watch tv. but ya i dont think we are leavin the house next sunday cause 4 de mayo its pretty crazy here i hear. but its all good. we fasted to hope everyone is safe and smart. but love you guys and hope to hear from ya next week.----

From 2 weeks ago.

Um i think i only got one of those emails last week. but i got the ones u sent this week. Ya i was kinda wondering why u only wanted to talk about basketball. its all good. Im doin just fine, i am now getting use to the every day stuff and liking it. its only hard when im talking or teaching and the people are confused about what i was sayin ya but other than that im good. Transfers are this week and i wont know if i stay or go untill tonight i think im leaving. which is sad cause this place is about to explode with babtisms but o well. this is a perfect place for new guys to start anyway. BUt i am an expert on the area now too...kinda cause we have the biggest and most difficult area around here. yesturday we walked probly like 6 miles just in the afternoon. on one road haha. but its all good lots of street contacts. The president is president maynes. he isnt too strict he is really funny and everyone says he is good at bball i think he played in college or somethin. but he likes to joke around but he can teach very very well. every lesson he has is amazing. The painting looked really cool, i have started doodling more and more now. trying different things while i am out here. ya my tan is coming along but everyone here still knows im a gringo. i dont know if u saw in the picture my awesome watch tan line. thats the color i had leaving the mtc and man was it white. i still feel like i dont have a tan really being around people that are almost black. well it doesnt really matter cause my height gives it away anyway that im from the states. i dont need sunscreen i havent gotten burned yet only in peru a lil. we do pretty well stayin out of the sun. o ya i know its probly a good thing but i cant take money out from my bank card here i can buy groceries and what not but i cant withdraw dont know why. just thought i would let you know. and u dont have to really send me too much here cause i can buy pretty much whatever i need. we go into the city every pday and its really modern there. umm but ya im still learning a lot every day and im stayin healthy as well. hope every thing goes well with the wedding. im goin to try to send home some stuff the next change nothin big just a few cool small things. but ya love you guys and thanks for writing. these pictures are of our district and zone.

Grandma and Grandpa Cheesman

2008-05-01T07:39:00.000-07:00

These photos were taken by Sister Clayton, a senior missionary here at the library. She was a senior missionary at the time of the pictures in Gma & Gpa's mission! The crazy part is these were taken the month before I was born. . .

My painting

2008-04-20T06:21:00.000-07:00

This is the painting I have been working on for the "Asian room". It has a ways to go. I've never worked with oils and I'm not very good at it. I'll finish the middle next.

John's letter from 4/14/08

2008-04-14T08:33:00.000-07:00

I sent John two emails this week. One with information about what the family has been doing and asking him questions and one with a basketball update from the NCAA. Obviously he only got the one email when he responded. Hopefully he got the other one too and just didn't respond yet. Enjoy. Love you all!

Well that sounds like its a lot of fun. i do kinda miss march madness but its not somethin i would think about all day dont have to worry about that. president didnt get to play last week but we played still and man i have a vertical leap of a catipillar(one of the quotes a guy at the ccm always said.) but it wasnt too bad but i have lost a lot. im trying to lose a lil weight in my stomach area, all the muscle i did have is now flab my legs and arms are fine but im looking pretty chubby in the stomach. o well. umm ya so i had a babtism yesturday and it was amazing. babtized 4 kids and a grandmother. was goin to be 2 more but they had some wedding paper work problems right before it. so i think we are babtizing them next week. and maybe 2 or 3 more as well. so ya its a gold mine in my area right now as president says. and our changes are next week i think my comp is goin to be zone leader in one of the new areas next week soooo i get a new comp and i am directing the area. not senior companion just that i know the area. haha well i know half of it because its huge. i dont see why we dont have bikes in my area we sure could use them. we walk over like 12 miles a day i bet sometimes. the weather is so weird here, yesturday it was crazy hot and couldnt be out side too long. now this morning is freezing! everyone has coats and what not. now its not really cold because im use to it but the change is what gets everyone. O ya we found our first rat yesturday, it cralled away outside our door last night i didnt see but my companion screamed it was funnny. ummm its hard when u dont ask many questions cause the same things seem to happen every day and i dont know what to write haha. the weeks are starting to go by a lot faster and i hope i know spanish pretty soon cause its pretty hard sometimes looking dumb when a fam or somethin is talking about a problem but i have no clue what goin on. but there are other times, like in the Best two years, when he starts speaking dutch at the end and doesnt realize it happend to me the other day. it was funny i was with this fam and my companion went and talked to a kid for sec, then the fam kept talking to me asking me questions. i was scared cause i didnt have my companion to help but i kept responding and they kept asking for a while and at the end i kinda stopped and realized i was talking to a native family on my own. it was crazy didnt think it was posible. buut yeah im staying healthy luckily. its funny cause my companion is lack tose and tolerant i dont know how to spell that but anything with milk he gets sick and makes me feel a lil better. ya i love you guys and thanks for the update. hope you guys have a good week what are yall doin for spring break?