Elder Aaron

My Last Sunday...

2011-11-21T17:44:00.000-08:00

My last Sunday was really great! We had a district meeting, so we were all down in Senahú. It was really cool because we got to hear Elder Holland speak Spanish. I didn't know that he spoke Spanish? Did you? The talks were really good for the Guatemalans. They were all about going to the temple, not spending more money than you earn, and the importance of the family. Really nice and simple.

I guess I should say something about the entirety of my mission... which is really not possible.

I'm extremely grateful that I went on a mission. This has been nothing less than a life changing experience. It has been the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. Right now I feel like every emotion that I have ever experienced during my mission is hitting me all at the same time... so more than anything, I think I'm feeling confused, jaja. I'm really excited to see the family and my friends, and I am also sad to leave the people that have been my family for the last two years. I'll miss lots of things, but I am also looking forward to what's to come in my life. I know this is the true church. I have seen the hand of God played into my life more than ever during my mission. I'm thankful for all the prayers that have been answered unusually fast when I was thinking all was lost. I'm so happy I have been able to see how the gospel of Christ blesses families. These are all very real things. I'm grateful for my mission presidents,President Torres and President Watts. They put me where I needed to be and with the people I needed to be with. I love the Q'eqchi' people and the chance that I had to be with them for so much time. I'll miss living in the most beautiful part of the world with some of the coolest people I've met.

I'm so excited to see everyone, and how much taller everyone has grown.

I'll see you in two days.

Love, AARON DANIEL HOWARD

usan naq ink'a' tat'ane'q li solso' ch'iich' chiruuch inxikik jajaja wi ta tinkamq tqil qib' wi'chik

Tom Cruise is trapped IN DA CLOSET!

2011-11-16T06:29:00.000-08:00

This week was super great. I got permission to go to my old areas on two separate divisions so I could chaq'rab'ink wib', despedirme, say goodbye. It was cool. I went to Teleman with Elder Escelante, and was able to visit most all of my converts. Then I was able to do a division in the Tinta, and in the morning we caught a truck up to Actela Santo Domingo. I said goodbye to Hermana Rosalina and her family. It was super good for me. I'm really happy most of the people that I baptized still remember the things that my companions and I have taught them. I think there is a really good chance that 3 of the couples that I baptized will go to the temple. I talked to each of them about it, and they still know that they need to go. Um... other than that, it is really hard to find people to teach in my area because of big meetings or work etc...etc.. There are never men at home. It's terrible. We did find one guy who seems like he's been waiting for us, but he wasn't home yesterday when we went to pick him up. This week we have district conference so I only have 4 more days to be in my area. Please do me the favor of inviting everyone that I may have missed. Especially Peter and Laura (even though they might not be able to come). Thank you for registering me for my classes.. PRICIATE-IT. I can't wait for the snow! Have a super terrific WEEK!
Love, AARON

I will be sad to leave...

2011-11-07T13:51:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I did have a cavity, but it's fixed now.

Um.. well I ended up spending all week pretty much in the capital because my companion had to see a dermatologist. He has some crazy white spots on his face. Not much is going on in my area because we only were there for the afternoon on Saturday and then on Sunday, there was the election, so in Yalijux... 7 children showed up, and in San Francisco... 0. That was a really great week. I love my area though. I will be sad to leave it. My comp is doing a lot better with Q'eqchi'. It's cool to see his progress. Yesterday we sang again on the radio.. hey way are you in a movie but on T.V. MOKO NANTAW TA LI RU I don't really know what else to tell you. I think I might have found an opportunity to come back to Guatemala sooner than I think, and work for short periods of time with people... I don't really know though, but más de eso...

Yeah, Nikki congratulations!...I'm pretty sure I've met Justin Lake before, but I'm not sure.

I still got two weeks, Mom... but I can't wait to see you at the airport as well.

Have a great week !

Love, Aaron

We fly high, ain't no lie ballin'

2011-10-31T11:50:00.000-07:00

This week has been hard. We set a baptismal date with the dad of this family (the rest of the family are members), but he is leaving to go work until January. (Otherwise we would have baptized him this week, so I won't be able to see that.) Our investigators in San Francisco didn't show up to church yesterday, so that is sad. My comp and I did, however, get on the radio (I can't remember if I already told you). We talked about the churches around the mountains, and invited everyone to church on Sunday. We did a service project, and built a path to the church in San Francisco and fixed up the landslide damaged wall. My comp is cool! He's crazy and fun. He is always singing, and freaking out the Q'eqchi's. He's learning Q'eqchi' really fast. Happy BIRTHDAY, Dad. May all of your wildest dreams come true. hahah Hey, what is everyone doing for Halloween? Everyone is being boring today, so we aren't doing much. I'm going to the cap tomorrow to see if I have a cavity... 'cause I think I might haha. Have a great week!
Love, Aaron

Ya know what the Midwest is? Young and restless...

2011-10-24T17:39:00.000-07:00

Dear Family, Hey, this week was super awesome! I'm really tired though because the church has hired the truck that we usually take down into town. They are re-constructing the church in Se' Rit K'iche,' so we had to walk from 5 am to 9 am before we finally found a truck to take us into town. It's good though. This week we went to San Fransisco to church and it went really well (other than starting 45 minutes late), but it was cool. We couldn't get up to our area until Friday so we had little time to work, but luckily we have the branch president and the counselors working really well. We just buy them Pepsi each week if they go and visit the families that we assign them to. It works really well. Well that's great I get to talk in Sacrament Meeting as soon as I get home. (Aaron's mission report will be November 27th at 10:50 a.m. The church is located at 102 East 1400 South in Bountiful, Utah.) Um... as far as college goes, I really just want to have good teachers. So maybe Ben could look some people up on or something. I will do well if I have good teachers. Um, yeah, I don't want any more than 13 credit hours though. You should see if there is some Q'eqchi' thing I could do at the U. That would be sick. I haven't taken any of those classes, so don't worry. Um.. that's crazy I got my flight plans haha. If you could invite the Parsons that would be great and Cody's family. I would like Elder Jordan Smith's Mom to be there,... I've pretty much already invited all my former companions and most of my friends...oh if you could get a hold of da Pineae boyz (Joel, Morgan, Amilcar Jose Zelaya, Scott Wolff, the Golds etc...) Adam could probably do that for you. Ben's friends are invited as well (like Curtis, Big-Z, etc.. etc...)

Have a great week! IT IS FREEZING UP HERE RIGHT NOW!!!

Love, Aaron

Maybe I was the ocean, and you were the sandy beach; and every minute I was fallin' up at your feet

2011-10-17T11:51:00.000-07:00

Hey Mom, I e-mailed the registration office and I forwarded the e-mail that I sent them to you. Right now I'm in Coban, so it wasn't a problem to scan my license. Um, here are some pictures of my life. We have zone conference tomorrow and my companion and I took a little short cut to get here. It was... pretty, pretty good. hahaha. I'm really tired, but that's because my comp and I have done some serious walking this week. We have been working in branch called San Fransisco. All the members live really far away. 3 months ago there was a really big land slide so we went to all the members and invited them to come help us dig it out. Even a really less active guy showed up to help us. It was really cool to see, but there are a lot of problems there. We did a family home evening with a really nice couple there, and we cooked them pancakes (which they had never tried in their whole life). We had them sit down, and we washed the dishes. It was fun. Sorry, I don't really know what else to tell you... tomorrow I will have been away from home for 23 months... wow..So hopefully that e-mail works out. Let me know if they don't e-mail you back or something, but thanks for helping me with that. Have a great week!
Love, Aaron

Utah is getting ready for me...

2011-10-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

Sorry I didn’t write you last week… I was in a car accident… nobody was hurt, and now I need a new car. Just kidding. Thank you for telling me about that. Well, if it’s even possible, you could get the Audi fixed and that could be the family car. I wouldn’t even mind. In the mean time, Grandpa is lookin’ fly in the Audi tt. We didn’t have changes btw. We are staying together. I’m excited to stay in my area even though right now we are dealing with some serious problems…with people not fulfilling their responsibilities etc. etc.. Anyways, General Conference was awesome! I watched it on a 32’’ flat screen TV in English, so I was happy. Right now it’s raining a lot everyday and it's insanely muddy. Pictures: This is a waterfall that I really want to baptize in!! And the other picture is me walking… a lot. Anyways, I’m happy to hear that it has snowed! That’s good news. Utah is getting ready for me. Anyways, do you have any other questions, or is there anything that you want me to get for people… like Guatemala stuff? I don’t really know what you want me to bring home for everyone, so just let me know so I can get it. Oh, sorry I didn’t write you last week. The internet was insanely slow, and then my letter got deleted, so sorry.
Love, Aaron

Smilin' next to Opra and the Queen

2011-09-26T21:15:00.000-07:00

Yeah, our baptism was really cool. I really like doing them in the river. This week was too short because we had a meeting in Se'Nauq' with President Watts. It was a great week though. We are just looking for families to teach, but its been a little hard 'cause the men are harvesting crops right now. So yesterday, I wish I was filming because we were walking, and there were kids shooting their sling-shoots across a gorge at a Pepsi bottle. I just walked up to them and asked to see their sling-shot. A kid handed it to me and I nailed the Pepsi bottle on the first shot, said good bye and walked away. These kids were shocked. It was hilarious. Yesterday was super muddy and rainy. It is the rainy season, but I don't mind. I love getting dirty. I slept in a hammock in San Fransisco (our other ghost branch) last night. It was a little cold. I'm excited for General Conference this week. It will be good. That's cool Taylor ate dinner with you guys, Sorry, I was trying to send more pictures but they aren't going through.... oh well..
Have a great week!
Love, AaRoN

Baptisms!

2011-09-23T08:53:00.000-07:00

Yes, I did have my baptisms, thank you. They went super well! Everyone showed up like two hours late (which is totally fine). I gave a little talk about the Holy Ghost and my Branch President spoke as well. Then we went down to the river, because there is no baptismal font in the church. It was sick. I baptized the father -Victor Manuel Caal and my comp baptized the mom -Matilde Ical Ical. The three daughters wanted Elder Gutierres (who was there before us) to baptize them. It was sick. It was my comp's first time baptizing, and he did great. I'm glad everyone is staying busy with school and work and stuff. Um.. I don't really know what else is new... Yesterday I hit my 22 month mark... Today for p-day we didn't do anything 'cause there wasn't any power until just barely, but we just ate food and played cards... I love this place, it is incredible. I'm glad we still have a pink oven, haha. Thanks for the pictures. The pictures I'm sending you are of the family we baptized, Elder Smith, Elder Gutierres, and I in the river, the pond that is right next to the church and what I wake up to every morning, and a hike I went on last week early in the morning.
Enjoy. Have a great week!
Love, Aaron

And a walking soul

2011-09-12T12:41:00.000-07:00

How's da hood mom? Sorry, I would add a question mark after that but the entire row of numbers isn't working, so just periods and commas today. So... I forgot to tell you what we did last week. We went spelunking, or cave diving. We went in Se Amay where there is this super huge cave that is supposedly like fifty miles long, but we just went into it as far as the elders knew. It was pretty cool, unlike other caves where you have to stick to a trail and you can't touch anything, but here no. We just went all over the place and caught huge crabs which we later cooked and ate. We found like a natural xylophone, (I'm sorry I have no idea how to spell that,) but that was really cool. We could just bang on it. I'm sorry, this is probably sounding all very dangerous but let me assure you that it wasn't. So don't worry, we are careful. Anyways, the crabs were good. My comp's mom wants to call you or something. I don't know if you're down with that, but maybe I'll just give here your e-mail. Ummm... we are lucky the pictures I'm loading will work. The first picture is me next to a huge bull that wanted to drink my dough water. The next is my area, (an amazing mystical land that I love,) and the last is my comp and I right after crawling out of some really tight dirty caves or guecos haha. I would like to acknowledge that yesterday was a very sad day for many due to what happened ten years ago, however for the Guatemalans it was a weird day because of the elections. We were not allowed to work "cause sometimes there are riots during elections, but nothing happened here. I think a guy named Otto Perrez won, but I actually still don't know. We had to walk really far 'cause there were no trucks to get around, but it was o.k... minus the rain, haha. There were only nine people in church and they were all kids 'cause all the adults went to vote, so we just did Sacrament Meeting and I talked about the Word of Wisdom, and the Branch President's daughter bore her testimony. After that we just colored for Sunday School. It was fine. This is going to be a really good week! We have a family that is going to get baptized, and so I get to do a division with Elder Dilworth till Friday, 'cause that's the only day that there are trucks. It's going to be really fun. Today we just played some soccer and hiked up a mountain to watch the sunrise but it was cloudy. Thank you for buying my ski pass. I am stoked Dad and Adam got a pass, exclamation point. I can't wait to go skiing. I am going to be taking tons of pictures in my new area, don't worry. I will be taking pictures of all the normal stuff as well as the beautiful stuff. Right now I am making a verb chart in Qeqchi and English and Qeqchi and Spanish for the mission... it's going to be big. Anyways, have a super great fantastic week. kk. love Aaron

Come a room, boy; Boy do you hear?

2011-09-06T09:10:00.000-07:00

Dear family, I am doing GREAT! My new area is XYA'AL LI HUX (shtee AL lee hoosh). That means the juice of a sharpening stone in Q'eqchi'. I am so Stoked. I'm in the sickest area in the whole mission. It is so far away from everything. It takes three and a half hours to get to the nearest town (Se'Nauq') by truck. It is nothing less than a journey every week to get to district meeting and a place that we can use internet. There is not power in XYA'AL LI HUX, except a school and our house. We live next to the church in a missionary house built by the church, so we have a solar panel (It got finished like a week ago), so basically I live in the nicest house I have lived in during my entire mission. My companion is awesome! He's Elder Dallin Smith. He is really funny. He's really new in the mission, and he is from Virginia so he speaks with an awesome accent. He kind of looks like JOEL MORGAN, like his face. My area is awesome though. The people are so awesome! They always invite us to eat with them, and our fast and testimony meeting was awesome. Tons of people bore their testimonies. A lady asked for some money for medicine during church, and I was amazed to see that everyone gave her at least like a quet and then everyone went running to the branch president's office to pay their tithing. Its really different up here. The people are really nice and don't say terrible things to us. The only thing that they do differently is all the little kids ask our names like a billion times a day. It doesn't bother me at all compared to what I was being asked before in all my other areas. I really hope I get to finish my mission in this area. That is too bad about Bob, I remember him, but like you said he's with his parents and Grandpa Adams. Peter and Laura's house is four times older than I am. Sounds like it was built well. I'll have to go visit them and their dog. Well, I'm trying to send you some pictures but... the internet here is just terrible. It isn't loading anything, and it takes forever to do anything, so sorry. That's just how it's going to be for a while. Have a good week, and make sure you have got my ski pass for me. K, thanks <3
-AARON

Feels So Good On Da Top

2011-09-02T13:06:00.000-07:00

I'm glad you had fun with Rozzi. This week was awesome! Our baptism just went great, and the best part is that everyone contributed. Even this investigator lady was there helping out with the food. The branch bought two huge cakes, I bought some toastadas, and my comp bought the drinks. The members came through on their talks, and there was all the baptismal clothing and everything. The marriage went well also, other than there was a car accident so there was a little delay. Luckily, I told everyone to be ready three hours early. Church was good. It was my last time there because I HAVE A CHANGE!!! Yes, I am super excited. I'm staying in Polochik so I am super stoked. Everything is good! Today we played some soccer against some kids and they just owned us, so we had to pay ("cause we rented a synthetic field) anyways. I think I'm going to finish my mission in the mountains. There are a lot of Elders that have changes in the mountains, so I might go in one of their places. I can't think of any other specific events this week, other than a lot of people were mocking us but that's o. k... These people are mostly in the valley so.. adios wates. Q' Love you all. N-Joy the pics... and school Adam, hahaha - Aaron

PS me llegás vos Adan nice PLUSEER (bracelet)

What Pump It Up

2011-09-02T12:12:00.000-07:00

This was hands down the craziest week of my life... first off: on Monday we went to ELESTOR to do divisions with Elder Ch'ulak because we're going to have to do baptisms Saturday. I stayed in Teleman with Elder Chanchavac. In the night, I woke up at like 3 AM, and he was suffocating. Earlier that night,I got down on my knees to pray when I remembered... I need to fill up my water bottle. I went to the other end of the house to fill up my water bottle, then went back to put my bottle in the fridge (which is close to my bed). So I turned on the light and I see Elder Chanchavac on his knees grabbing at my bed and he couldn't say anything. I just saw bile, or a lot of spit, on the floor and then I heard him cough ''agua!'' I grabbed my bottle and threw it to him. He drank it, then whatever was blocking his breathing went away. I have never seen anyone suffocate like that in my life. It took me a while to wake up, and I had no idea what was going on. It was a serious miracle. The next day... my companion couldn't get back from Ch'ulak because the people that were going to get interviewed weren't there... so I called some other missionaries (Elder Dilworth and Elder Asencio), and they came, because on Wednesday we had to take papers out of Panzos and out of Actela (in Santo Domingo) so we had to be two places at once. They came, and we did divisions again and I went to Santo Domiink with E. Dillywacker. When we got to the Tinta (which is in the valley), the people said there were no trucks because the roads were destroyed. So I took my plastic, that I use when it rains ,to cover like the 25 pounds of books that I was going to take to Rosalina and her daughters so my sweat wouldn't destroy them. Then we started to walk... like fifteen minutes into walking, of course it starts to rain... so we walked in the rain up the mountain. When we got to the place where you take legal papers out (kind of like the DMV) nobody was there. We asked where the people were, and some people said that the workers just went to eat. So we went and visited a few people that I knew, and we came back an hour later.. Nobody.. so we are sitting there waiting, and the people around us just told us, ''Oh you can just come back tomorrow..(this was Wednesday, and on Thursday we had interviews in Senahu and zone conference on Friday) I could not wait. I asked some kid if he knew where the person who worked there was. He did, so I asked him if he could show us. We went to a lady's house and I knocked on the door. I asked the lady if she wouldn't mind printing off a paper for me, and told her that we had hiked four hours in the rain to get this paper. She obliged, and we got her paper. We went and talked to Rosalina (the grandma that I baptized in Sacsuha) and Arturo's sister (our investigator, who I also baptized in Sacsuha) and I just unloaded books and pictures. I gave them one of those memory games that you bought me because we always used to play that with them. I also gave them a little money so that they could come to the marriage and baptism this week. Then we visited a few other people and slept on the floor in the church. At 4:30 in the morning, we woke up and hiked down to the Tinta , 6 miles soaked and muddy in the same clothes. But we got the paper, and when we got to Teleman, there was no water, so we couldn't bathe, haha. Then we went to Senahu and we had our interviews. My mission president is awesome! He is so nice and considerate. His wife is also just awesome! She gave the coolest talk in zone conference. Yesterday, our investigators came to church and everything was all set up for the marriage and baptism. What happened today was just another story in and of itself, but basically we had to take the papers of our investigator and his girlfriend to Panzos to set up the wedding, and the mayor's secretary would not do it. He absolutely hates missionaries and told us that he was too busy, and that he wouldn't be able to get married for a month. I was ready to cry because there was no reason that they couldn't do it for us. But then I called a member that was working there, and basically he convinced him to do it for us with a price. I had to buy this obstinate guy a Gatorade and something to eat, so that he would do me the favor!! Some things in this country are so messed up. Anyways, that's all. I don't have any more time, but there are some pictures of my investigator family. The one that is getting baptized this week.. God hears our prayers.
Love, Aaron

My life is just awesome

2011-08-15T12:50:00.000-07:00

My life is just awesome. I am going on divisions today with Elder Chanchavac again. I really like him. Cute is the only words to describe him. We finally set baptismal dates with some people. The son of Rosalina and his girlfriend decided to get married. I called Arturo and was talking to him last night and I told him that I really want to see them get baptized before I leave. (They had already told us at this point that they wanted to get baptized). He said that he would talk about it with his girlfriend, Maria, and now we are going to get them married on the 25th of August. They talked about it, and everything is going really smoothly right now. We taught them the word of wisdom... and he told us that other than his cocaine crops and his wife being an alcoholic, they don't have any problems with it. hahah No but really they don't have any word of wisdom problems, not even coffee which is usually a problem. We got super lucky yesterday 'cause we went to get them to come to church, but only the dad could come because the mom was having some problems with LIX Q'EHIL LI PUCHUK LI NACHAL RAJLAL PO haha. The district president was driving by and gave us a ride. It was nice. This guy is super funny and I love talking to him. I'm going to St. DOMIINK and then to Actela on Wednesday to get his birth certificate and another paper so that he can get married. I'm going to give his mom and sister some money so they can travel and see the baptism. It's going to be cool to see my converts from way back when. This week we have zone conference and interviews. My life is really busy. Hey, do me a favor and see if you can't get me signed up with UTAH FREESKIER SOCIETY because I'm almost positive that they do a student club discount for SNOWBIRD. If Cody is getting his season pass there then I definitely am going to as well. If Cody jumps off a cliff I am definitely going to do it as well. That sounds like a fun birthday for Adam... he should look into getting a pass to Snowbird as well. Everyone is traveling like crazy. That's insane that Adam is already starting school.. too bad, hahaha I hope you have fun in California and Europe... China etc... be sure to take tons of pictures and send them to me. The pictures I sent you are of the temple, the concilio, Elder Smith ,my dear Yumo, Elder Gutierres and me when we harvested some corn with Arturo. He and I also made some awesome cookies in the church for his 18th month mark and other stuff..

K, I love you! Have a great week -Aaron

Dolla Dolla Bill Ya

2011-08-11T08:38:00.000-07:00

My week was just fine. Thank you. Hey! IDK could you ask Cody and Taybay and BraidDog where they are going to get their season passes,'cause I need to know? Cody can have my Pass Out Game if he can find it. I don't even remember where it's at. I thought I lost that. Speaking of drinking, yesterday my neighbor (the one who gets drunk all the time and threw a vodka bottle at our front door) was smashed in the street and had crashed his motorcycle. I grabbed it, and helped him bring it to his house and park it. He then told us he wanted to talk the Bible. We helped him into his house, read, 1 Corinthians 3 :16-17, and prayed. Poor guy ... oh I also took his vodka and dumped it out when he went to the bathroom.. sin? q' me importa pues. Hey, also this morning we were going to the Tinta se' CHIINT and we were in the back of this truck and we totally destroyed this little puppy. I felt it lift the truck up, and then I saw it flip up behind the truck. It was so sad! All the Q'eqchi's were going nuts. Hey HAPPY BURF DAY ADAM!! I'm a bring you something home for your birthday. Prolific flowers? WAS BEN ABLE TO GET TO WORK ON TIME!?!? JK I mean is he OK? No brain damage? Sorry. I had to write a really long letter to my Mission President today, so this is short and not too great. Sorry. I love you all. -Aaron

Razorblade Salvation

2011-08-01T09:58:00.000-07:00

That's a lot of events... well, first of all I have to say that I am proud of Orion leaving on his mission, and for Taylor returning home. However, I maybe even more proud of how much of a man Cody has become since I last saw him, haha. That's really cool Michael and Lisa are going back to Turkey.

Thank you for the PICTURES!!! They are awesome. That's really crazy to see all my fiends all together. It's really good to see all of them as well as you guys. Rozzi is looking like she should be a baby model. Liza and Jeff's trip looks super sick. I want to go.

Why is Ben in an Audi? Who's is that?

Here are some pictures. The road I'm sitting on is my enemy. My comp and I run this thing often.
There's a picture of some hands. This is how riding in the back of a truck is.
There is me trying to kiss elder Chanchavac/the coolest tie I own.
There is a staircase that just murders me every other day that we have to walk up 'cause one of our awesome investigator families lives up there. They came to church this week.
There's some cows etc etc...

This week was good. We had a ton of investigators in church. We are teaching the son of Rosalina, the lady that I baptized in Saqsuha'. He and his family are really cool. We are going to go work in their corn field this week, and then pick some avocados off their avocado tree and make guacamole. It's going to be good. I'm going to the capital right now. I love doing this trip.;ldkajflsjLJSDUF=)S(DF&/#$#)/")(%/)"# right? Umm... I don't really know what else is new. Nothing...

I don't know that kid that got home. Different mission.

I do need to get my handwriting analyzed, don't I... 'cause it has changed a LOT!

K love you have a GR8 XAMAN

LAJ AARON VICIOUS HOWARD

There's a steel knife in my wind pipe

2011-07-26T08:32:00.000-07:00

In the last picture the children are watching Aaron do Yo-Yo tricks.

One year older... another year closer to death.

So today I'm in Coban, which is good but goes too fast. I got to eat some McD's today so that's all I could ever ask for. I'm super tired, but it's been a pretty good day. I'm going to get some snacks for myself. Elder Chanchavac and Elder Xocop woke me up at 1 am to say Happy Birthday. My companion, Elder Hexem also told me Happy Birthday.

This week was kind of hard. None of our really good investigators came to church. I did the best division in my life with Elder Chanchavac in Ch'ulak. We went to all five areas, and went to all the branch president's houses... it was not a short hike. I went to Isabal to do a baptism for the sister missionaries. I have never hiked so much, so fast in my life! It was rough on my little K'iche' friend. He got a bunch of blisters on his feet that later exploded when we were running to get onto the last truck passing through this little village. We were stuck at (Chichipate) at night. It was really quite an adventure. N-E-wayz, I don't know what else to tell you.... did I already tell you that I was trying to catch a crab? It caught me, first on the finger (hard) ((blood)) and then I ate it... well most of it. IDK, I'm too tired.

Thank you for that little history of my baby birth. These are the types of things I can't remember. I was watching "Hunt for Red October" 21 years ago.

k, have a great week!

love, Aaron

Then I watch it leave through the wind. I guess that's why they call it pane.

2011-07-19T10:33:00.000-07:00

This week was crazy. We had too many people to handle! We had 12 investigators in church, and it was so crazy! It's like a one man band, even though there are three of us (my comp, me, and my branch president). We are getting a lot more people to come to church now. We just need to teach a lot before these people can get baptized. I didn't have a change. I don't think it's really hit me yet fully, but I'm not going to lie... I was pretty ready to leave. It's just hard to be in an area for 7.5 months in a row. My companion didn't have a change either. Um, for P-day yesterday, we went up to this tiny village that is 3 hours away, and handed out a million pamphlets to all these Q'eqchi's, in this place called San Vicente way up in the mountains. It was really cool 'cause missionaries never had gone up there really, and the people were really cool. They were way outgoing and nice (very unusual). We just contacted a ton of people, took some pictures and ate a little bit. I bought this Yo-yo up there and was doing some tricks. All the kids were just amazed. It was awesome! Life is good. I'm running out of money 'cause the office elders never re-imburse me or anyone in my zone. I'll be fine though. That's super cool Peter and Laura are going to be neighbors with Richy Rich. I'm already excited to go visit them! I am also excited to go on this cruise!! I guess I didn't realize how awesome cruises are because as soon as I mentioned to my comp that I was going on a cruise, he started freaking out and telling me how good my life will be, as well as Elder Snow. They just told me about sitting in front of a pool on the top deck when some girl would come by with a cart full of fresh home-made cookies and brownies with cold glasses of milk, and you can just grab what ever you want. I'm very excited to go. I'm good; I'm just still in this area. Have a good week.
Love, Aaron

I wanna live good ...

2011-07-12T10:05:00.000-07:00

Wow. Um...well let me just tell you about what we did this week first, and then I'll get to the other casacas. This week was really cool! I got to meet President Watts in person, and his wife. They are really nice, and they gave me a 3 Musketeers for my birthday. We had a meeting in the capital, and it got me super inspired. One of the principles of the gospel is persevering to the end, and I don't think a lot of people grasp this concept because there are like a million less active members everywhere I go. I also think this can be applied to peoples' callings in the church. Once people do something big, they just stop. Just 'cause my companion and I baptized a huge family two weeks ago doesn't mean we are going to stop. All this kind of popped in my head at this meeting, and I started to think about my area. I figured out the people that we were going to get baptized, and we went to visit them, taught them, and set baptismal dates. Our (best) current investigators live so high up on the mountain. We went up there four times in three days. We also got this huge family to come to church with us for the first time. It was a total of like 10 people. Super cool! If everything works out, whoever is here next change should have a lot of baptisms. Teaching Primary was tough. The Spanish kids just won't behave, and the Q'eqchi' kids are so nice and quiet. They sit there and color and play (Choose the Right) memory cards and the Spanish kids just fight. I have to sit and hold these crazy kids for the majority of church. Next week are changes. I'm pretty sure I'll have a change. I think I'm ready for one. I have now been in my area for a fourth of my mission. Whoever comes in my place is going to have like 9 baptisms on the 6th of August. We finally have some really good investigators that come to church. Um....today we played pool. My comp and I went on a super cool run this morning along the River Polochik.

K, let's talk about life at home. I think that is an EXCELLENT idea to go on a cruise in JUNE!!! I've wanted to go on a cruise my whole life. As far as my car goes... I really don't care about it anymore. You can do whatever you want with it. Maybe it's worth... something.. parts.? IDK. I was planning on saving for a new one anyways. I really want my scooter still, and anything you have to replace or fix, registration, insurance, etc... just put it on my bill or take it out of my account. I love that thing. I want to go to BYU Jerusalem and study Hebrew, and then go to Egypt to study the bible for 5 years. Maybe I'll marry an Egyptian princess and live by the Nile...jk I want to go to the U of U in the spring on January 9th. I do not want to take a ton of classes, like some math class, physics, something interesting like history of rock, or some architecture thing, and maybe like Spanish or something, but... I don't know. I want to take few classes so that I can actually focus on them and get good grades.... (and ski!) but like 12-13 credits MAX juno... K, yeah I really am going to want a ski pass. That is a NEED!!! That is a need in my life.. so I would like you to buy me one. You should be able to get me a College discount one..It should be cheaper than the Young Adult one. I think they are only like 4-5 hundred dollars hahaha <----wow. Um... I'm really not that worried though. I think you should talk to Hno. Mike Mason about my mutual fund and see when the opportune time would be to sell some stock or what ever... I will definitely be needing that money when I get home, with skiing and ohh college.. You should also see if there is any way to get me some scholarships or grants of any type, O. K.? That is something we should be thinking about. Anyways, if you have any more questions just ask. Thanks for whatever you sent me in advance. I'm sure it's great.

I did live with Elder McPhee. I love that kid. He is awesome! That's cool you were able to meet President and Sister Torres. They are very nice people, and have helped me a lot through my mission. I asked for permission to open up a new area, but we'll see what happens. I don't really know what language I'm going to be speaking next change... hopefully not LI KASTIIY (Spanish), but whatever. Sorry, this letter is crazy. I don't know what else to say. Have a good trip to Colorado. I am super jealous that you are going to watch Harry Potter 7 p2!!! Les quiero mucho y espero q' tengan una semana super chilera

-AArON

Ella Ella Ella

2011-07-07T08:49:00.000-07:00

Happy fourth of July. I have eaten so much it's crazy. We went to the capital this week, and I met President Watts. He's a super nice man. I really like him! His wife is really cool too, and she cooks some awesome chicken cordon bleu. Getting to the capital was crazy 'cause we got stuck in traffic/construction, so when we got to a place to switch buses there weren't any more. We got on the back of this cattle truck, and it was raining like crazy the whole time. I'm good. It was just super annoying. We have an investigator that lives so far away it's insane. I can't believe he has come to church twice now. He's awesome! It's the guy that brought me my hymn book when I left it at his house. Last Friday we were teaching this guy (Marvin, who I met in La Laguna), and we were trying to help him with some drinking/fighting problems he's having. He says to us, "I need to find a better outlet for my energy 'cause every time I play soccer I get mad...and then into a fight. I've seen you guys running in the morning though. Do you think I could go with you guys?" We told him, "Sure, that would be fine." Then he's like, "So what time?" We told him like 6ish... "How about 5?"..."Um...no .. 5:30"... "Fine, we'll go." We left after talking to him a little more, and after he showed us where a guy BIT him and left teeth marks in his armpit from the last fight he got into. The next day we ran for 13 kilometers... and I almost died. Then we went to visit some investigators up this huge mountain that night, then the next morning we went to pick up these same people for church, and I had to go change my shirt because I sweat through it. I was pretty much dying. Going to the capital was a nice break. I don't really know what else is going on in my life. I got some new shoes. They are so sick. They are gortex Ecco high tops, and they are super fly. Elder Jennings gave them to me. Brand new. I went to some sweet used clothing stores in Coban and found a North Face jacket for like 3 dollars. I bought a ton of snacks in Coban to take back here to Polochik, and stuff for everyone else. Capital trips are nice. This internet place has a huge picture of Jesus creating the world. I'm not really that tall, everyone is just really short.
K, that's all I got.
Love, Aaron

Soups up dat oooh

2011-06-27T14:46:00.000-07:00

Mom! If you are going to send me something for my birthday... let it be a FREESKIER Magazine, and then I'll circle anything that I want from it and send it back. President Watts gets here tonight. President Torres is leaving the 29th. That's crazy. I'm going to meet President Watts next week. Why is Adam getting a passport? Where is he going? So, I was living with Elder Hale and Elder McPhee and working with them a lot until they both got a change. We didn't have anyone to do the baptismal interview so we had to go to Se'nauq' and grab Elder Fadel, and then go back to Teleman super fast. Elder Fadel did the interviews for the family we baptized, and we went home in a crazy huge rainstorm. It was fun. The next day we had the baptisms, and of course there was no water. I swear every time there is a baptism, Satan just shuts off the water. How can something as simple as turning on the faucet become such a big problem? Whatever. We figured it out and everyone showed up late anyway. It went really well. Manuel Jorge (the dad) got the priesthood yesterday. I'm going to get him a white shirt so he can pass the sacrament this Sunday. This is the greatest family ever. I'm stoked for them. We also taught another guy on Saturday, and it was a really cool lession. We left his house, and then when we got to the next house, I realized I didn't have my hymn book. The next day that man came and sat down next to me in church and then handed me my hymn book. This is not normal for Q'eqchi's!!! He'll be a really good possibility for us. Um... oh, I lost my cell phone this week!! It fell out of my pocket when we got in the back of a political truck, and I didn't hear it fall out 'cause there were two megaphones blasting crazy music. That was stupid of me.
K I love you
-*Aaron

enjoy da pics

I be we swimmin' in the ocean with pidgeons

2011-06-20T15:41:00.000-07:00

I am fine. Happy Father's Day, Dad. Hope it was a good one. Lemonade pie sounds good. The division was really good. We had to go on a four hour hike to get some identification for the baptism that they had. It was fun, and I was also there for the Father's Day activity. We were able to get the father of this family to come. We were later able to teach him, and he and his family came to church. They are going to get baptized next month so that will be cool. That area is super sick! I'm trying to send you some pictures, but I don't know if they are going to send. This computer is being really slow. We have the elders from Ch'ulak living with us because their house is under construction (the church), so we are now working with them a lot (which is super nice). They are Elder Hale and Elder McPhee. We got our family in church yesterday, and they are going to get baptized this Saturday!!! YES!!! So it will be really cool! We are going to go teach them tonight. I have never met a more GOLDEN FAMILY in my life. These people are ready. I'm stoked. Sorry, I don't have a ton to say ever, but I'm good. I'm just goin'. Have a really great week, o. k.?
love, Aaron

The Correct Story is on Elder Norton's Blog

2011-06-14T12:27:00.000-07:00

Aaron's letter this week is full of concern for his friend Elder Norton. I think he heard a different version of Elder Norton's experience than what is posted on Elder Norton's blog. I am glad that Elder Norton is O. K., although I am sure it was very hard to lose so many important things in the water as he fell. Please check Elder Norton's blog for the correct details. Gina

Surly da' n from.. so we livin' life like a video

2011-06-13T11:58:00.000-07:00

This last week was pretty crazy. Not for me. For Elder Norton. He should be dead, but he's not 'cause he's an obedient missionary. He was walking in the rain back to the church that he was living in when the road collapsed or something, and he fell into a drain pipe. His companion caught him and was holding on to him, but the water was super strong so he couldn't pull him out. The water was beating him in the drain pipe and he was dying. Then the Holy Ghost told him to just let go. His companion was screaming at him, telling him he wasn't going to let go. Then he yelled at him and told him to trust him and he let go. He fell through the pipe (which only he could have fit through), then came out the other end and fell a rather large drop into a river and then he was washed up onto a rock unconscious. His companion got him and they took a truck down to Senahu (for 600 quetzales) and stayed with the ZLs there. He got an emergency change (tear). It's seriously a miracle he's alive. You'll have to look up his story though. It was like a story right out of the movies or something. If he wouldn't have been washed up on that rock (unconsciously) 20 feet down the river, he would have fallen down a huge waterfall and died.

Um... what else... one of my favorite people got a change out of Polochik. Elder Fast... but it was for the better. He had a special medical problem... INK'A NIKINRU CHIXYEEB'AL K'A'RU XK'ULMAN RIK'IN LIX KUN CHI US AB'ANAN EB' LAJ B'ANONEL INK'A KE'XSET' XTZ'UUMAL LIX TZEJWALEJ CHI US YIB'I RU XNA'LEB'EB'!!!!!

UM... so our whole family came to church with us again. It was pretty exciting. This is going to be a huge baptism. I'm really excited. It's in 2 weeksish. We went and taught them the Word of Wisdom with our Branch President and Elder Fernadez, and they were super willing to stop drinking coffee (everyone drinks coffee here). Their kids are the best behaved kids in the Primary, and they are super fun. We just color and play hangman, and try to sing but the kids only know how to sing "I am a Child of God," so it's kind of hard.

This week I'm going on a really long division to Yalijux ... (TEA- ALLY-HOOSH) hahah, but it will be so cool! I'm really excited. This is the area where Elder Norton fell into the drain pipe, so I'll be really careful, don't worry. I'm super stoked though. This is the area that I've been wanting to see my entire mission. They live in thee most ghetto circumstances. One of the churches that they sleep in has a dirt floor, no beds, no water and the bathroom is just a hole outside, haha.

Sounds like you had a really nice weekend. I hope you think of me when you read about your son sleeping on the floor and not having a bathroom, right after staying in the Sheraton and swimming in pools/hot tubs and eating nice food. hahaha! Jk, Mom. You take it easy. That is fine. Anyways, I think I have to go, but tell Ben and Chip Chip to write me or something.

K, thanks,

Love Aaron

enjoy the pictures

More pictures from last week's letter

2011-06-12T15:48:00.001-07:00

Wanna tell you something that you prolly should know this that Slumdog Millionaire Bollywood flow

2011-06-12T13:13:00.000-07:00

No I haven't baptized the family yet, but they did come to church with us. I got to teach some of their kids because we teach primary in church... which is fun... and really tiring. Candy helps everyone behave. We are going to have the baptism on the 25th, so a few weeks. It will be good. I am still in Polochik which is good. I'm healthy.. I think you can look at my pictures and decide for yourself if I'm staying healthy. I did divisions with Elder Fast and it was really fun! I went to the capital as well, for a meeting. I did divisions while I was there and it was incredible. We taught this guy who was super nice and straightforward. He let us in and told us that he always saw the missionaries knocking on doors and everyone always lies to them and slams the door on them. He asked me why I was here in Guatemala, and I told him 'cause I'm here to build the kingdom of God and I've been in the church my whole life and I know it's true. He told us that he was going to go to church, and I think he did. Then the next lession we set a baptismal date with this older guy and it was really cool. Um... IDK... they are going to combine Polochik and Senahu' so that will be cool. I will get to go there a lot more. I'm still with Elder Hexem, which is fine.... That's weird it's already summer.. It feels too early, but whatever. Tell Adam to not work too hard. My life is good. I'm just kickin' it here still for six more weeks, 'cause I didn't have a change. Have a great week. I think you should go hear President Torres. He's an awesome man. I think he is really ready to get out of this country, haha.
k. much love -Aaron

Genuine brilliance or innate madness- Yeah, we all spin on the same axis

2011-05-31T07:46:00.000-07:00

How am I? Great. I am great. I broke the house record. 1278 consecutive jumps w/the jump-rope. Elder Snow, Elder Hexem, and I had a jump off, and I won....2 quetzs. Awesome, right? I've been feeling a little sick, but nothing really serious. We had district conference yesterday.. It was good. I did divisions in Ch'ulak again and I skinned a pig. It was DISGUSTING. I have a video of it, a little bit. My companion went on a division to Canlun and I stayed in Teleman w/Elder SNOWdawg. It was awesome 'cause we found this guy's house that just came to church last week, and we taught him lession 1. We asked him if he liked the church and everything, and he told us how he had been going to all these other churches, (his wife was going to the Grace Rain Church, some evangelical church), and then his heart just told him he needed to go to the Mormon church. We set a baptismal date with him, his wife and his kids. AWESOME. He has 5 kids but only three of them are getting baptized 'cause the others are too chiquitos. Soo that was awesome. I can't believe there is another Pirates of the Caribbean movie! That's so weird... as well as Esther getting married to someone that lived in that house. K, thanks for writing me. Appreciate it.
Love Aaron

My furs a Mongolian, I let all the goalies in

2011-05-24T14:29:00.000-07:00

I'm tired! I seriously go to bed, then wake up the next day not feeling anymore rested than when I fell asleep. I don't know if I'll survive much longer! Especially with chainsaw-murder drug lords on the loose!! Right . 27 people dead. I wouldn't worry about that here though. This place is super, super laid back. There is nobody rich enough to even own a chainsaw. I'm glad you got that package. That's so nice of that Ryan! I just threw in tons of random stuff that I wasn't ever going to use here. So.. yeah... Um this last week was zone conference and interviews. It was super good. I did a division in CH'ULAK and set two baptismal dates. I committed a guy to baptism on the phone oh... and to marriage. AND HE ACCEPTED. This guy is just gold. Never having talked to the missionaries there in CH'ULAK until yesterday, where they taught him lessions 1,2 and 3. I'm going up there to meet him and do his baptismal interview on Wednesday, then he's getting married to his girlfriend on Thursday, baptized on Saturday, and confirmed on Sunday. Super nuts. I also ate at this mine camp up there (Canadian owned). It was delicious!. So, we hired a truck and went up to ch'ulak for a zone activity today and ate some amazing chicken and patatos and rice with like plates of fruit and really good rolls etc... buffet. Super good. It was really fun, and I would send you some pictures but this computer is so bad. So, Rozzi likes the leopard... must be DA SPOTS! right.. Yeah we really need to update those wall pictures! Adam is like 6 in his picture hahaaha. The zoo sounds really cool. That's one of my favorite places to go. I'm glad you didn't have to talk about me in church. Sounds like there are some youth with somethin' to say. I'm always careful, FYI. Um... I don't know what else to say... I'm sad 'cause FOUR of my companions are leaving soon. Elder Legua, Elder Turek, Elder Gonzalez, and Elder Lara. Some of my best friends in the mission are leaving. I hardly know anyone in this mission... so yeah that will be weird.
Anyways, have a GR8 XAMAN (week)!
kkk<3HAOAWRAORND

Oh ** I'm trapped in da closet

2011-05-24T14:27:00.000-07:00

K, so this is what is up. My companion and I went to Elestor last week and on the way back we were hitch-hiking, and we got dropped off by a bridge, We crossed a river over a metal pipe (it was scary) haha. Hey, and then later we got a hitch-hike from a guy named Ryan Allred. He served his mission in Polochic like ten years ago and was just visiting. He offered to take some stuff home for me, so he should be coming by the house any time this week or next with the following items: My blue Nike kicks, my nasty H &M hoody, a Book of Mormon that I read and marked, a brand new EB' LI XB'EENIL RE NA'LEB' LI EVANGELIO, um..my RVCA pants that I've never worn my whole mission, a hand made bag (that's black), an orange paper wallet, three mission plaques of mine, some pictures of my companions and some other random missionaries (go ahead and look through it). There is an additional picture that you are to give away to some girl and have her write me, and set me up with OK? But only if she's cute (the one that is not in the photo album) .... Um, oh yeah, there are some brand new true religion jeans in there for Eliza, if they fit her, if she wants them... and then the ties are for the boys. There are a lot of corte ties (really sweet cloth, and the only expensive thing that people have around here). So keep your eyes open for this guy. He's super nice! Thank him for me! buena onda, So I almost died trying to cross a river, but everything is good, don't worry. My entire backpack fell in the river and I got soaked getting it back!!!! MY SCRIPTURES!!! freak!!! Crazy day 'cause I had to go clean a house with Elder Dilworth...of some dirty things... I did a division with him.. I love that kid.. I'll send you a picture of him. Oh I was going to ask you if you ever had your Mom pow-wow, and if so how did it go? We had conference today.. It was good. President Torres said some funny stuff... he pretty much talked about getting married and having a billion kids 'cause ''if you don't have more than four childeren you are not replenishing the earth.'' He also talked about how the women have to nourish children. ''If my wife ever said I dont feel like cooking, that would be exactly the same as a man saying I don't feel like going to work,'' he said. Hahaha oohh man, President Torres cracks me up some times.. I don't know if my mission would be very fun without him 'cause he's just a character. I guess I'll see though. He's ready to go though.. he's let us know like a billion times..we sang that song '' We are as the army of Heleman, we have been taught in our youth'' (in q'eqchi'). That was what I organized for the conference, way better than talking!! It was cool. anyways yeah, give Eliza those jeans if she wants them...I'm going to bring you some more bags and stuff, and if you, or anyone, even want they can tell me the colors they want on a bag and I'll get them one made... they're super cool.
Check it out.

k, love Aaron

More Pictures from the Mission

2011-05-10T10:15:00.000-07:00

What's up? The wedding looks amazing. Be sure to tell Curtis congratulations for me! It was really good to hear all of your voices as well. I'm sending some pictures 'cause I'm in a place with really fast internet right now. We didn't really get to do a lot this week 'cause we went to the capital, and didn't get back till Thursday. Our family that we were going to baptize... um hasn't been truthful, and didn't come to church so we're going to take a break with them 'cause they aren't doing their part. We went up to Ch'ulak to do an interview, and I had to haul up a box of LIX HU LAJ MORMON (copies of the Book of Mormon). I don't know if you know this, but the Lix Hu Laj Mormon is like three times bigger than the Spanish Book of Mormon (which is an inch bigger than the English Book of Mormon. Basically what I'm trying to say is I carried a 40 pound box up a giant mountain, and the box almost broke because I was sweating so much it was destroying the cardboard box. Church was good yesterday. We had a lot more people come. I already told you that we had a really cool lession with our branch presidency...um .. what else? IDK, it was really good to talk to everyone. Tell Peter, Laura, and Matthew hello since I didn't get to talk to them, but none of them are mothers yet... and some of them never will be.
k check it.
Love lil A'ron

More Pictures from Guatemala

2011-05-02T15:48:00.001-07:00

Takin’ my inner child, I’m fighting for it, custody With these responsibilities that they entrusted me

2011-05-02T15:11:00.000-07:00

This week was crazy with changes 'cause somebody changed the system and messed everything up (a lot of time lost). Um, YES I want to call you this Sunday. I was thinking I could call you in the morning first.... like 7:30-8:00 and then we'll set up a time...to talk ... like maybe 7 at night.. you know..? Yeah, my comp is Elder Hexem. He's a nice boy. My change won't be as crazy as it was with Elder Legua, but it'll still be good. Elder Hexem is from Rexburg ID, and he's a machine. He ran a mile in 4 min 36 seconds!!! We've been running every day so far, and I'm dying, but it's good, I think I'm going to get some protein in Coban tomorrow at GNC, 'cause we're trying to get ripped. Our family didn't show up to church!! again... so ... we'll just pray and keep working with them.. I'm running out of ideas. What are you going to do with Liza, Rozzi and Matt? Is King William's wife cute? Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. Some member texted us at like 5 AM (Elders please come to my house it's urgent!) so we ran over there and her ex-boyfriend was there DRUNK. He had his tuktuk (three wheel motor taxi) so we just got his keys and drove him home. It was pretty funny. My companion and I found a pretty cool cave in our area and some iguanas. IDK what else... not much tranquilo.. juno? Hey that's super cool that Jeff is surfing in El Salvador. I feel good though, Mom. Don't worry about me. I'm eating my broccoli and tomatoes etc.. I'm getting continually more tired, but whatever... I'll live... I have no time these days for myself, but it's better like that.
You kids have a good week, k?
Osama Bin ladin was killed
God bless the USA.

love, AV Howard

Go n' brush yo shoudas off

2011-04-26T09:09:00.000-07:00

Sounds like Easter was pretty fun. My Easter was kind of rough. I don't really want to go into details about it, but let's just say a lot of people let me down. Ummm. so then we got depressed, and ate a lot of cookie dough (3 dozen worth). We did divisions yesterday. and I went to meet some less active members with my Branch President, WAY up in the mountains! It was cool. Oh, last night I was cleaning out my house, and I found some crazy Christmas lights that I started playing with in the dark like astro jax, and my comp and I had an Easter dance party. So I guess it was a pretty good Easter for me. An insane amount of cookie dough.... Christmas lights... oh, and I tried this fruit that I had never tried before (it looked like a crazy giant huge pepper and was super bitter). Good day. OH, I forgot to tell you... I don't have a change, but CRAZY LEGGS does... tear. He was the best companion ever! I'm praying I get someone fun 'cause... you know ... I really need that right now. I'm kind of sad though, but I might be comps with E. Fadel (he's from Bountiful). That would be good. He's like a prodigy Q'eqchi speaker. Today we helped Saqsuha' move to a super awesome big house 'cause they are going to put more missionaries there. I also went to Tukuru' to look at the new house there. There are like a billion people moving simultaneously. It's really organized. THANx for the pictures. 'PRICIATE IT... The spiral jetty is cool. I want to go there, oh and to the golden spike place too. That's super exciting that Orion is going to Argentina! We'll speak some Spanishishshssihsishss, 'cause I SPEAK IT right? Bryan too, he's a fine boy. K well g2g I'm bored (xintitz) k

LOVE you

Aaron

P.S. Did you grab me something from Grandma and Grandpa's garage, or what?

Swallow these words. Taste my thoughts. If it's too nasty, you can spit it back out.

2011-04-19T09:30:00.000-07:00

Well today was nothing super special. We went up to Senahu to play football. It was a good time. I got some awesome cinnamon rolls for super cheap up there. Yeah, so we went to Sajomte to go on divisions, and to confiscate a ton of dvds and a Portable dvd player from someone up there. My companion and I are checking on the missionaries, because they are going to close a lot of the areas. So that's whats up. Ummm, church was awful this week. Nobody showed. It was ridiculous. My branch president had a talk with us, and he kind of just broke down and told us about all the problems that are happening. It kind of makes me sad and depressed. Like he got up in church and was like well... Elder Legua will lead the music... and since all the people that I assigned to give talks today didn't show up... my counselor will get up and speak a little. Then after he finished, my branch president just got up and talked about how people just don't understand that they have to be willing to follow Christ for themselves and for their own salvation. We have to follow God's will and not our own, and all the people that came to church came because they are concerned about their own salvation. It's so sad 'cause this guys whole family is like falling away from the church and his wife is the Relief Society pres. and his dad was the branch president. etc ... etc.. our investigators made up 10 percent of the congregation. Um .. its super hot and not flooding here.. Changes are next week. I DON'T WANT TO LEAVE MY AREA. nor my comp. We are kind of running out of ideas of thing to do though. Thanks for sending me those pictures and the package. Yeah I love my perfect push ups. Yeah you should learn Spanish, Mom. We can talk to each other when I get home. I feel like I will be speaking Spanish soon... but idk. For sure you will go on a Spanish speaking mission. ... well hey I get to call you soon! huh...Mother's Day is coming up.
Neeways
love you
Aadanard

Tag Team Back Again

2011-04-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

So this last week was awesome! We did have our baptism, and the whole family came so it was super good. Even Dasty's big mama hiked down the mountain to go with her three super loud screaming biting kids. It went really well. French toast sounds good. HEY, I got my package. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. Super good! My comp and I are still working on the food. I use my perfect pushups every day. Yeah, you need to tell me about Colorado. Tell me about picking up hitchhikers, and send me some pictures. This last week was seriously good though. We got five people to accept a baptismal date. This week we had interviews on Monday and then zone conference yesterday so today is p-day. Something seriously crazy is going to happen in Polochic. Elder Smith told President Torres what was happening in Santo Domingo, and now he is going to take missionaries out of the mountains and put more sets of missionaries in the cities. He's going to close a lot of areas 'cause the missionaries don't have time to work for how much traveling they have to do and how little success there is. It's crazy. We are looking for houses for more missionaries in the valleys. The baptism E. Smith and I had was one of two in the last 2 years. There will be some crazy huge changes. Anyways, we have two baptisms of a divorced mom and her daughter not this Saturday but the next. I gave a talk in zone conference. I was super nervous... cause I had to speak in Spanish, but it went fine. I talked about D. & C.: 4 and Christ- like attributes, having an eye single to the glory of God. Anyways, I am out of things today. Thanks for the package again; it was really good!!

love, a a r o n d a n i e l h o w a r d

You couldn't hold me unless your last name was hand. The only way you'd wear me out is to stitch my name on your pants...

2011-04-05T08:40:00.000-07:00

I'm like Sprint or Motorola, no service out of your range... I am number one

K, so... this week was fine. I saw most of conference, but the signal was kind of bad. I really liked Saturday's sessions though, especially "cause I could hear them. I slept in the church on Saturday night on 7 chairs... comfy? We woke up early to go pick up people. We went by like 10 of our investigators houses... and one came. So we're just going to be having one baptism this week. It's O. K. though, we're trying. I probably already told you this, but I just ordered a sweet two button suit. It's going to be quality. Hitchhiking is like the only way to get around here other than a micro bus and they aren't too safe either, but I'll be careful. I'm almost positive I got a package from Liza today.. It's probably the one you sent me? Hey, that's cool that Liza is running a half marathon! I really want to do one too. I don't really go running very much in the mornings "cause I have to hike up giant mountains everyday, so I usually just jump rope, bench, perfect pull ups and push ups. Exercising is sick. I can't wait till I can actually get proper nourishment, haha, but I do take Mens ''1-a-day''. I'll be looking forward to eating better after my mission.. or at least when I get out of Polochik q' no me pase. K, sorry, boring week. I don't really know what else. Send me those pictures, Ben. Haven't got them. Kaxlan means chicken (pronounced cash lan). Ummm... thanks for writing me as usual. I hope you get the pictures I spent like 25 min on sending, haha.
k love,
KID A....aron

Cintura sola, la misma vuelta

2011-03-30T11:38:00.000-07:00

I had a crazy nightmare last night. I won't tell you about it. That festival of colors sounds really cool. You should send me some pictures. Happy birthday Grandpa Howard. Yesterday was a hard day. Nobody was home, and the one house we got into the guy was a hater; he just wanted to fight. My area is super diverse because there are people with money who speak Q'eqchi and Spanish or just one or the other, and then there are the exact opposite. Poor. I like working in the ghetto areas more with people who aren't so proud. A good amount of people came to church yesterday, but only two investigators came (the two that are getting baptized on the 9th:Elda and Lusty). Elda didn't come to church last week 'cause her mom is super sick. We went to visit them on Saturday and she told us she hadn't eaten in a week! You could tell.. so on Sunday my comp and I woke up early and brought her some oatmeal and medicine, and we brought Elda to church with us... Um what else happened? Some guy driving a motorcycle almost killed us we think.. 'cause I may have accidentally sprayed him with water as he was driving by. He turned around to come after us, but my comp and I ran into a house. OH ,we also did service and it was the worst! We helped this guy move these giant planks from the top of the mountain to his new house by the road (there is like one road that goes through Polochic). It was super crazy and hard.. I still hurt from it 'cause we woke up at like 5: 45 and seriously ran to get there buy 7:00, up this giant mountain then we helped him move stuff into his house. I killed a scorpion with a machete. And we hauled these planks on our heads. The guy is a super good member so.. it's alright. I helped baptize three people in the Tinta (the sister's area) on Saturday. Oh one other thing, my comp and I got a hitch-hike from this guy who was out of control when we were coming back from the Tinta. He was like peeling out when I stuck my thumb out and then he slammed on his breaks, then we got in the back and we were going like 45 mph when I was like ''there's a speed bump!'' He just powered into it then 4 minutes later he slams his breaks, gets out of the truck to light his cigarette and he asked us, ''Where you guys going?'' .. Teleman.. ''ya llagamos (we're already there)'' then he gets back in his truck and floors it then I yell ('cause its windy when you're driving like 75 mph) to E. Legua ¡YA LLAGAMOS!!! WE'RE LIKE 45 MINUTES AWAY!!! It was super scary. I'm pretty sure that guy was drunk. I said a prayer so that we wouldn't die. Nyways, I'm going to Coban today.. I need to buy a new suit so if there is movement in my account you know why... Ya'll have a great week now kkk.
love
aaron

I hope you don't get mad at me, but I told Nate he was a freak said he wants a..

2011-03-23T19:11:00.000-07:00

K, sorry... that is too bad I sent you like 12 pictures but.... only one of them got through,(the worst one). Hey, I was trying to send you new pictures today but nothing was working for me, and so I need to change out my memory card. Today we had a zone activity. We went to Rio Dulce and saw a bridge and a castle. It was cool. Just imagine in your minds 'cause no computer wants to read my memory card. Now we are working a lot with some less active members, and finding their kids (unbaptized), so we will have a few more baptisms in 2 or three weeks. My comp is Marcos Legua. This is going to be the fastest change of my life. There is seriously not one second that we are not laughing ,hahaha! It's almost embarrassing. We seriously cannot finish a song with out cracking up. I haven't laughed as much in my whole mission than I have in the last three days. Today was my comp's birthday so I bought him some ice-cream. These days I'm eating banana bread that's super good... this lady that lives by us is going to buy us peanut butter and mac n' cheese from the capital. Life's good. My comp and I are working super hard. I'm super tired and want to sleep. My comp is from Utah (Brigham -- he's like half Paraguano... but deep down he's really just a Mexican). Um what else... I still haven't got that package from you....

K, so story...my comp and I are asking where this reference lives/contacting...(Q'eqchis) and I ask this lady where this man lives... she tells us and also tells us that he's currently working

Me: "Oh O.K...um, well have you guys heard about the church?" (there are four people at this house)

Lady: "Yeah.. your... the the... Mormons."

Me: "Well, that's what people say, but were the missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ etc..."

Lady: "Ahhhh"

Me: "Yeah, so I don't know if you'd have a little time to ta-"

Lady: "WHAT is God's name?!"

Me:.. "Huh, God?"

Lady:"Yeah, what's his name?!"

Me: "GOD. God is his name."

Lady: ...."You got a bible....?"

Me: "Yeah."

Lady: "Lets see."

(So I pull my comp"s bible out of his back pack and hold it up. She has us come in, and she starts reading.. IDK, some scripture about ''Only the Lord God who is named Jehovah'' somethin' ect.)

Me: "Well this scripture is talking about Jesus - Lord is referring to Jesus right here. Where's your church?"

Lady: Begins to argue (meanwhile pulling out some other scripture)

Me: "You didn't answer my question."

Lady: "TESTIGOS DE JEHOVA!"

(My companion pulls out a scripture about prophets and how they work with God. Then I looked up a scripture in Proverbs 29:18 (which is not translated right, and says that where there isn't a prophet the people don't know what to do...)

Me: "Is there a prophet in your church?"

Lady "No."

(lady gets super upset and starts looking up all this other garbage)

Me: "Thanks for your time, but we've got other things to do today. Sorry, good bye."

Lady: "Fine."

Me: "But remember... you're always invited to the church ..(while backing up slowly) ... THAT'S TRUE!"

So that was a super contact that we ran away from 'cause there was some serious contention between us and this woman who was just asking to argue... but we can't say we didn't invite her.

That's how things are sometimes... people just want to fight.

Then almost immediately after that we contacted two more Testigos de Jehova and my comp was like,

"Hi, we are missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ and we share a message about how Jehova is Jesus, and how through our belief in Jesus... who is Jehova ,we can be saved."

We just tell it how it is... Anyways, I got to go, but have a good week!

Love, Aaron

This is the only picture we received from Aaron this week

2011-03-17T16:26:00.000-07:00

Young Slung Hung

2011-03-17T15:38:00.000-07:00

jas che quitzibajtal le walal jas cubil le wanima jala y le wallal kavisinik chi guatemala bueno cabison la cal chi

bueno que malos padres tiene elder howard porque no le quiueren please favor de escribirle ya que necita tu apollo no sean mala onda bueo asi que nosotros los elderes de tu distrito le estamos ayudando a darles cincho a ustedes por chanbones cheque pues bye

So this is what you get for not writing me..... scoldings from a Salvadorano and a Kiche'.

So, what's going on? Is anyone alive?....

Are you guys O.K. or what? I love it when I know what's going on in the real world... but when the only email I have in my inbox is my email from Chase telling me I have tan quetzalitos and an add from Orbitz trying to get me to fly to Hawaii next week... It's pretty tempting to just go to Hawaii.

me pusieron triste

moko ut ta naq ink'a xextz'ibak we.. naraho' sa' inch'ool rik'in a'an! ka'ajwi' nawaj xnawb'al k'a'ru yookex chixb'aanunkil!!!!

K, well I sent you some pics. They're all random. There is the baptism that I had at the start of this change, and then the baptisms I had on Saturday, when we went to the caves.. and just some of my area..

Still don't know who my new comp will be until Wednesday.... Life's good I HOPE YOURS IS TO!!!

I <3 my area..

LOVE YR SUN

A Vicious HOWARD

Umm..... this is awkward. I just sent you that email getting mad at you for not emailing me, and then what should appear in my inbox but my letter.... sorry. Thanks for writing me.. Now I don't really have that much time, but no I didn't get my package yet (probably this week). I'm glad you guys are better. It doesn't help to hear that you've been sick for so long and then not get an email you know, but I got it so... More importantly than how how I am (coming from Mike Mason), is how is Pacific Life Funds? Dying? That's cool dad has an Ipod touch. I knew brother Christiansen called me on my birthday 'cause I remember when I picked up the phone and he asked for Peter... and I was like, "No.. he's in Japan." "Oh well, tell him happy birthday." Sweet man. So whats Nikki going to do now? What did she graduate in? I'm glad Adam could get a job at Pineae, I guess Hilary is going to be woking with him, so that will be cool. I'm sorry about your car accident. These things happen; sometimes people just drive into things. Sorry, I don't really have that much news nor time... but next week I'm sure I will. We are going to go to Rio Dulce for P-day and it should be really cool. I'll have a new companion etc... Have a great week!
Tell me if you got my pictures I emailed, k?

love ARN

Jesus walks, God show me the way 'cause the devil's trying to break me down

2011-03-07T13:40:00.000-08:00

March 2011 Zone Leader Conference

So, this last week was pretty good, even though I'm like suffering from exhaustion... but I'm feeling a lot better this week, and tomorrow we are going to Senahu for a capacitation. I'm worried for my companion a little, but at the same time not really 'cause he's about to get into some huge trouble for doing some irresponsible housing contract stuff haha, but he's going home so whatever, I'll have a new comp next week... Wednesday. I'm excited. I got a new watch from a ZL in Coban last week. '' Hey, E. Jennings, where can I buy a cool watch?'' ''You can have this. I never wear it'' -buenisma onda. Um, I'm sorry you guys are still sick... keep eating that Costa Rican honeydew.. Oh, so this morning E. Snow (who lives with us) and I went to the market to buy food and on the way back I saw this Lizard -Chab'olak se llama- It was huge and fast (the lizards that are around here are like the Jesus lizards that can run across the water and are super fast). We caught it, and when we came back my comp was showering so of course I threw it on him and he was screaming so loud hahaha! Oh freak, it was hilarious and he came out of the shower and threw a bucket of water on us haha then we re-caught the lizard and I tied floss around his neck and we walked him to District meeting. It was pretty funny. Two of the people we were going to baptize this Saturday didn't show up to church so we're going to move their baptismal date. We are going to baptize Ricardo and Karmen - super old and awesome- we are taking them to Panzos to get married on Thursday. It's going to be sick... k have a great week and get well soon,

Love A rizzle
da mic fizzle

2011-03-03T08:06:00.000-08:00

Hey, sorry to hear everyone's sick but... you know, it happens. You'll be good, I'll pray for you. Um.... sorry nothing really phenomenal happened this last week.... I played pool today (billiards). It was killer. (BTW, we had a meeting yesterday so today was our P- day). Um, yeah not much is going on though. We are going to baptize 4 people on the 12th of March... I saw a bus driver that looked exactly like MC Chris. I got on the tightest microbus of my life

14 year old / 7 year old / 16 year old / BUS helper
HUGE (happy fat lady) / My Comp / Me / HUGE (angry fat lady) <----- this is one isle of the bus (8 adults) that lady was totally freaking out at me

Sorry if you can't visualize this...

Have a good week. Love, your son

2011-02-23T08:29:00.000-08:00

New President for the Mission has been called

Edward Dale Watts, 60, and Lorie Porter Watts, four children, North Logan 15th Ward, North Logan Utah Stake. Brother Watts serves on a Hispanic council for the Utah North Area and is a former stake president, high councilor, bishop, bishopric counselor, elders quorum president and missionary in the North Argentine Mission. President, Andigen, LC. Born in Hollywood, Calif., to Alfred Dale Watts and Ella Lue Hargrave Wood.

Sister Watts serves as a ward Relief Society teacher and is a former counselor and president in the institute women's association, stake Young Woman President, stake Primary president, ward Young Women and Primary president, Primary music leader. Born in Provo, Utah, to Lloyed Aldin Porter and Shirley Faye Palmer Porter.

Their anticipated arrival date in the Mission field will be on or about July 1st, 2011.

So goodnight, cruel world, I see you in the Mornin’

2011-02-23T07:57:00.000-08:00

This was a good week. It was raining like crazy the other night and my shadow and I went a gas station to buy some food on our way home. There were drunk people everywhere. They were all asking me if I wanted something to drink, and speaking in broken Q'eqchi/Spanish/English and I wasn't even giving anyone the time of day. I just grabbed my food (flour tortillas and beans) and then I asked the lady how much these ''Panquecitos'' (little Hostess cup cake deals) cost. They were 7.50 so l said no, that's a rip off. Then this drunk guy got super mad at me and slammed the ''Panquecitos'' on the counter. HE was like ''EAT IT!!''... no I don't want it ''EAT IT!! I'LL PAY FOR IT!!!!''.... ok..so he bought it for me. Thankx. As far as STAFF goes, I had all the symptoms. I didn't go to a doctor, but I did go see Hna. Torres and she has seen it a lot, and when I talked to another missionary who had it, he described exactly what I had. I'm fine. Um.. Yeah my pictures are just on my memory card (which has recently been giving me trouble 'cause I used it in other peoples cameras so the formatting of the pictures is different). Today I bought a new memory, and I'm going to be nice to it. My areas good. I like it a lot. The only problem is my comp. seriously does not know what to do (nor do I cause I just got here two and a half weeks ago) so it's hard. I live with three other missionaries (I don't know if I already told you). We live w/the missionaries from Canlun 'cause they have to wait for their house to get finished, so I live with E. Snow and E. Chanchavac -he's teaching me Quich'e (his language). They're cool and we go on divisions with them sometimes. E. Snow and I found a really cool family a little while ago. That's pretty much what's going on right now in my life. I completed 15 months last week. The new mission president is Edward Wats or something. He's from Logan, Utah and served his mission in Argentina. I'm sorry you've been sick. Get well! ok. That's cool Michael and Lisa are moving to Turkey (doesn't only Michael speak Turkish though?) That's cool though.. Sorry, my life is lame too sometimez, but have a good week!
çççññ``ç´-Aça`^ñññ H0w@r)

Pictures from Elder Martio's visit to Aaron's Mission

2011-02-18T10:42:00.000-08:00

Elder Martino of the Seventy visited Aaron's Mission
These are pictures from Sister Torres' Blog

2011-02-17T10:16:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentines DAY!!!! Oh, this computer is terrible!! Teleman is in between Santa Catalina, La Tinta and Panzos. I just saw a grown woman who I swear was no taller than 2 and a half feet tall. My area is cool. There are a lot of palm trees and watermelon. The branch here is super awesome. The people actually help us. We found a really cool family yesterday, and on Friday we set some baptismal dates with this super older couple. Tomorrow we're going to get them married, then on the 5th they are going to get baptized. My friend is cool. He works hard and is easy to get along with. I jammed my finger today playing volley ball so it's giant right now. We are supposed to write about being sick ,but since I'm getting better, I figure I'll tell you that I got STAFF infection and it was nuts. I'm fine now though, don't worry. Don't write hna. Torres. I met a Seventy this last week. Elder Martino. I also got to go visit some people in the capital in La Laguna. The guy elder Carlson and I baptized is getting the Melchizedek priesthood in like a month and a half. Anyways thanks for sending me stuff. 'priciate-it. Sorry I can't watch that video, but I'm sure it's good. Have a good week!
Aaron

I pay homage to the best of 'em, like Christopher Wallace

2011-02-08T07:54:00.000-08:00

Hey, so right now I'm in Coban (but just for zone conference) which, by the way, is very exciting 'cause I'm going to be able to see Elder Carslon (for the first time in 8 months). I don't get to see a lot of missionaries because of where I'm at. It's kind of sad 'cause I have so few people to do things with on p-days. Anyways, right now I am not Elder Smith's comp.; but what a do, I'll still see him a lot. I'm in an area called Teleman. Its super nice, hot, and there is everything to eat I could ever want. Our house is super nice and my bed is super comfortable. I really like my area except there are a lot of people who speak Spanish (problem). Well it's o. k., but I'd rather be talking to Q'eqchis in the mountains. One of my favorite families ever -from the capital (my old area La Laguna) moved to Teleman. I especially love this guy named Marvin, who drives a tuk tuk. We also had a baptism last week that I walked into so that was cool. I am trying to send you pictures but this adapter doesn't work right. In the pictures, Elder Larson and I are sitting in this thing with one of the kids that got baptized in our white clothes and it's super funny. Oh, I forgot to tell you my comp's name is Antonio Vàsquez. He's from Guatemala. He's a nice boy. He's in his last change so I'm going to ''kill him'' juno. Yeah we also had a lession with a kid named Amilcar and we set a baptismal date with him for march 5th. He's super cool A1000KR He's almost 18 years old. So I left this morning at 1 a.m. to come here. I'm super tired! We also had a zone activity today in Coban with the Senahu Zone. We went to these Gruetas de Rey Marcos. Caves. It was really cool (I have pictures) ((of which I cannot send to you right now). Sorry* I have some cool pictures. We had to rent boots and helmets with headlamps and it was worth it 'cause I hit my head like a hundred times, and I didn't have a flashlight. Oh, and I almost lost my boot 'cause of how deep this mud was inside. It was fun. Hey, sorry for the late happy birthday, Matthew--and Haittie mala onda 'cause I have a hard time remembering these things these days. I'm getting old. Hey, a 70 is coming to this zone conference so it should be good. We always get good food this day (tomorrow). I'm singing in the Spanish/Q'eqchi choir. Thank you SOOO much for sending me those PERFECT PUSH-UP's I'm missing them from Elder Smith. So it's cold in Utah a little.... yeah you should send some of that my way. Study hard for your ACT Chip 'cause I didn't and I should have. It will make your life easier (financially) but seriously. Keep up the diet Paul, and ignore the fact that the first three letters of diet spell die. Bingo is fun, and so is brick-breaker revolution mode on Sony Ericsons.

abounding love,

Aaron

2011-02-07T12:48:00.000-08:00

Pictures from Guatemala

2011-02-07T12:36:00.001-08:00

Ya'll read King James O What

2011-02-07T12:17:00.000-08:00

Hey, guess what? We had a baptism! Yeah, Maria Alicia, se bautisò. It went way smoother than I could have imagined 'cause we didn't have (well we still don't have) any water or power. She got confirmed yesterday, and it was killer. Um, I have hardly been in my area this last week 'cause I had to do divisions with Elder Norton and they had four baptisms this Saturday also. I went on a nice man date with Elder Norton at a burger place in his area. I love that kid. I also did a division with Elder Larson and we took some incredible pictures. This was a good week though. I almost got mauled by a bull, and I had to throw my backpack at it and run. My comp lost his agenda (an important thing) when he left it in the car of the man who gave us a ride to the Tinta (this town) today. Today I'm eating incredible flour /bean tortillas. I have a change and I'm really happy (as usual), but I think my next area is going to be very very cool. I'm excited, and looking forward to new people. Anyways, I'm going to try and send you some pictures, but this computer is really not working so we'll see. I'm glad you got to have a fun week with Rozzi. Tell me what's going on in da hood. Go skiing for me. Eat a snow flake. Build GUS.. k
much love

A Vicious H

L.O.L. Smiley Face

2011-02-07T12:13:00.000-08:00

Hi. I am... FINE! How are you? This is the last week of the change. I think we might have a baptism this Saturday. We need to talk to President Torres about it. Oh, you have no idea how bad the drinks are here: K'AAJ, café de tortilla, corn tortilla coffie- this is my favorite and it's always super hot and is basically black gritty water (if it's not hot you should worry 'cause it might not have been boiled or it has been sitting out for a while). Q'EM HA', agua de masa, dough water: this is the most common drink that's given to us - its nasty and thick and there is always a not of crushed up tortilla dough at the bottom. CH'AM B'UUL, atol chuco, dirty corn: this is the worst, it is like thicker than oatmeal and its rotten corn that's been cooked in the sun for like a month, and it is usually served cold, also usually induces vomiting. I hate drinking things here. No one just drinks water. Right now I'm eating Hershey's kisses that I got in Cobán and they are amazing- We have interviews tomorrow. Today we played with water balloons. I didn't know what a Holga, was but that's cool. Tell Ben to send me some cool pictures. Happy birthday Ben! Sorry I missed the party but.. what a do? I can't believe Ben got an Iphone! What is going on? And you never told me you redid anything like the bathroom. That's cool. Elder Smith is good. I don't think I will be his companion in a week so. I'll pray to get someone cool.. I kind of want a Latino. I got Liza and Jeff's Christmas card and everyone was looking at it and saying, ''That is a BEAUTIFUL couple'', which is true. Oh, speaking of being good looking, and Elder Smith not being my companion, there is something that I would like... PERFECT PUSH UPS (the travel kind), 'cause Elder Smith has them and I have used them like every day and I am in love with them... There's one other thing that I would really like, a card game (BIBLE MEMORY). Hilary sent me Bible Memory when I was in the MTC and it has saved my life with Family Home Evenings! It is the only game that Q'eqchis understand. I tried to play LAJ SIMON NAXYE (Simon Says) and the kids just couldn't do it, and my comp won every time. But memory is super fun for people, and everyone always wants me to lend it to them. Anyways... I'm feeling kind of sick (probably 'cause I just ate this whole bag of Hershey's kisses). Tell Liza to send me some pics of Hawaii, and YES I want to go to Rocklin when I get home! kkk love AARON

No, I'm not tryn'a lead you on

2011-01-18T07:32:00.000-08:00

Aaron's district at the Christmas Zone Conference

No kidding, it's January here too.. oh, and Martin Luther King Day as well. Tomorrow I will have 14 months. You know I don't actually know what weather is like anymore, ni siquira know when there are changes in the season. I think it depends on where you are in Guatemala. If you're in the capital, May June and July is winter but here in Polochic it's later, and it' s just starting to be winter in Petén. So pretty much that means nothing, idk. Sounds like you're going to have a fun week with Rozzi dog, and Eliza and Jeff will have fun in Hawaii. Livin' on da beach like everyone wants. So Dad wants to go to Guatemala, alright. Do it. Hey, we might baptize this girl named María Elisia in 13 days, 'cause she lives with Rosalina, Lorena, and Leter. She wants to get baptized. We just have to ask her dad (he works in the Capital), but I think it will happen. She's been coming to church for a while now (walking 2 hours each way). The other people I don't think will be baptized for a while. Waldemar wasn't sincere, and Miguel Ramon couldn't come to church last week ,but I think we'll wait till he's 18 years old before we'll baptize him (which is in like a month and a half). Um... Mom, of course I still speak Spanish, I have to speak with Latinos every day. I only have one book that is in English and Q'eqchi. I mostly just read Los Principios del Evangelio (Principals of the Gospel) and Li XB'EENIL NA'LEB RE LI EVANGELIO together, Spanish and Q'eqchi. I am happy. I'm having a hard time right now with some things, but I'm looking more at all the good things I have that God has given me. I like being here, even though it's super frustrating sometimes, but it's going good. Thanks to those of you who are praying for me.
Love Aaron

I'm back 3peat

2011-01-13T11:51:00.000-08:00

How do you know that I'm writing in my journal? Pedometers are cool. Some days I wish I had one 'cause we walk really far everyday. I am so happy Rachel Kime is going on a mission! Who would have thought, right? Well, what's currently happening is the Latino sitting next to me is typing faster with one finger than I am with ten. Today we are in Elestor, and I ate an amazing burrito today. My companion and I went to the furthest area in our area two days ago, and everyone was rich and spoke Spanish. Like thee furthest I have ever gone so far. It was cool. Ummmm... yeah, Waldemar came to church, and we are going to go teach him on Wednesday. We set a baptismal date with another 17 year old kid (Miguel), and they both came to church yesterday, so thatssss goood. A lot of people came to church yesterday (58) the most ever. Anyways, not a lot else is happening. Have a good week!!!
Love Aaron

It-be-that-it-be-that GIRL

2011-01-03T14:06:00.000-08:00

Ahhhh, going to church at 9:00 is SUCH a drag! I can't believe I'll have to go to church that early! Oh wait, that's what time church is here... even though it almost always starts 40 minutes late. Tell Bob and Ruth thanks for the money, and Gail Jordison as well. I really appreciated it. This week was super tiring, and I'm falling asleep right now, but yesterday we got a lot of people to church (54) and we had our best investigator in church. I taught the Young Men /Young Women, and I pretty much just taught the first lession. I talked about how God has always called prophets and how Christ set up the church and how the church was restored. Then I talked about how we have to do things the same way Christ did them. I had my picture book (most valuable teaching resource ever made) and showed the picture of how Christ got baptized, and how the apostles received the priesthood. Then I showed the modern day baptism pictures and I asked, ''So you all got baptized like this right?'' I showed the pictures of the kids receiving the Holy Ghost. I then said, ''K, raise your hand if you got baptized in water and then received the Holy Ghost like this.'' Everyone raised their hands, (except for our investigator: Waldemar*) so I just bore my testimony of baptism, and then said to Waldemar, ''Everyone here has been baptized like this, and it's super important to be able to enter into heaven, so.. we're going to be having a baptismal service on this day....will you follow the example of Jesus Christ by being baptized in Lix Paab'aal Li Jesukristo Reheb' Laj Tikilal Sa' Roso'jikeb' Li Kutan.'' Eehe chan (yes)! O. K., sweet. So that was the best thing that's happened this week. On the flip side, during our P-day activity, a Sister Missionary had a seizure and it was pretty scary. She's fine now, but I thought she was going to die. I'd never seen anything like that before. We gave her a blessing, and she doesn't remember anything.
Anyways I'm out of time, but much love,
Aaron

2010-12-29T06:50:00.000-08:00

2010-12-29T06:47:00.000-08:00

2010-12-29T06:43:00.000-08:00

Dinner with the Elders in Guatemala

2010-12-29T06:40:00.000-08:00

When herd came in and the truth came out I just didn't know what to do, but when I become a star we'll be livin' so large. I'd give anything for you s

2010-12-29T06:33:00.000-08:00

I don't really have a lot to say, other than it was really good to hear everyone's voice. I hope you all had a Happy Christmas.... um... I found a really confusing letter from Ben/Adam which I'm just going to assume is a joke 'cause I didn't get the whole coffee joke right off the bat. Simba is alive right? Oh, and Adam better be wearing his own Zurrik shoes and not mine or I'm a bust a cap. K, so here are some pictures of real food I get to eat once a week - some grilled meat, guacamole, beans, onions, nasty salad (diced cabbage and mayonnaise) tortillas, and pepper coffee. I really like this stuff, CHURRAZCOS se llaman. There is Elder Gonzalez, Elder Turek, Elder Smith and me eating them. This little girl is beautiful, right she just helped slaughter a pig. For our Christmas activity we had caldo (soup) with chicken in it. It was pretty, pretty good. Um, they put pine nedles all over the floor so you couldn't see the floor at all, and we had a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with ghetto guat lights. I had a good Christmas though. It was better than last years for sure, and I really like my presents. I'm such a gangster with my LA ring now; and my watch is really awsome and needed. Anywaysss, I hope you enjoy the pictures 'cause they took forever to load, That's how things go around here, REALLY SLOWLY and EXTEMPORANEOUSLY.
I guess I should be wishing eveyrone a Happy New Year as well.... and asking: Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind?
Peace and love, aaron hoWARd

We're all * up on Eggnog

2010-12-20T14:37:00.000-08:00

You don't know how much I don't know of this dialect. k k, so I think I'm going to call you on Christmas at like 4:20 AM!!! haha ha jk jk k. Really I'll call you at 9:00 AM, and if that doesn't work out.. we'll figure some other time out. Sorry my last letter really wasn't too great. I fell asleep, and I was upset about something, but Coban was good. Elder Smith destroyed his pants on the bus. The food was really good. We had baked potatoes, salad, ham, and candy canes. The only thing I didn't like was the drink, Hawaiian Punch! I hate Hawaiian food, right? haha.. We sang some crazy Christmas songs, and I played a bell. I ate at McDonald's, an Italian place that was really good, and another really good restaurant. I bought a bunch of really good candy, and pretty much just ate cookie dough yesterday, so that was good. Um, we are going to have a Christmas party on Friday. That should be really good. I didn't get a change!!! K'A' PUT!!! MAS RA INCH'OOL, so I think I'm going to die in my area. Seriously, I don't even know how I'm going to live. The thing is, it's not so much hard to find people to teach ('cause every single person lets us in their huts) as it is finding people who are teachable. O.K., no one listens or takes us seriously. We taught a family of fifteen, and they were really excited to let us in and watch us talk, so we sang and we started teaching. After 10 minutes, one of the men said, "O.K. just pray." I was like O.K. that's fine. I told everyone, ''Oh, he's bored. Well that's alright , we'll just pray and go.'' They were all like, "Well, before you go, um... we just want you to do us a favor... our father is really sick and his medicine costs 600 quetz for a bottle." (By the way, I almost always carry medicine with me to give to people.) I told them, "Sorry that's a lot of money, and we don't have money to give out." Then the man got super mad at us, and then I was like, ''Could we just pray and leave?'' They were all, ''O.K., we'll pray.'' I had to tell them, ''Sorry, but my companion needs to pray so that you can all see how God wants us to pray, because what you just said wasn't acceptable.'' k, so we prayed and left. ( This is how teaching is in our area). I'm just trying to ignore all the apostasy and mockery of God that is everywhere around me all the time. I'm trying to just focus on teaching people really, really simple things like in Elder Uchtdorf's talk (but even more), like folding your arms, a prophet is a man that talks to God, etc... Anyways, I'm glad I'm with Elder Smith again, 'cause I couldn't be in my area without him. Cody is amazing! Thanks for sending me his last letter with his testimony. It's amazing to see my friends doing this. I'm really impressed how things change around me. Hey, I hope you're talking to my friends for me when you see them,( like Rachel Kime, Cody, Hilary, etc..) Um .. yeah, you know ,all of those friends of mine. Today we played Frisbee, and it was super fun. But I'm a terrible catch. Um... I'm having all my clothes altered 'cause I like to look fly, and it costs less than 70 cents. Cheap swagger. K, I love you! ''HAPPY CHRISTMAS HARRY'' -yeah, I know, I totally know, that I'm getting that Griffindor tie. I can shake my present and feel it.
Merry Christmas!
Love - Dis kid lil A ron

Na Na Na Na Nana Kill Me

2010-12-16T13:29:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I got your package. December 16. I don't know anything about calling you yet. I'm currently in Coban, so I ate at McDonalds, and a really good Italian place (way better than The Olive Garden). I had a Calzone and Parmesan Chicken Pasta (it was super good). There were 19 baptisms in our area, however they were all children in the wrong church. I did a division in Tucuru w/ Elder Norton and it was a good time. I got no sleep last night. We left at like 2:30 am so we could get here. I printed out some pictures and bought some peanut butter, twix, chocolate. gummy worms and strawberry soy milk. I'm like really tired right now and falling asleep at this very moment. Nothing is working right, right now, this internet place stinks and I'm going to sleep. Umm... tomorrow is the Christmas meeting, and next week we have changes so we'll see what happens.... k love and take kare happy hanajaka and a new year.....Aaron

To get on my level, you need a forever ladder

2010-12-06T12:29:00.000-08:00

I love Christmas! It's such a great time of year. So we are not actually going to Cobon 'til like the 16th, but it's good .... I didn't want to go anyways. Hey, tell Grandma that I'm very grateful for her contribution towards my mission, and I pray for her often. And you can tell Ruth thank you very much from me, and that I think of her as my third Grandmother or something great like that. But I'll write her a hand written letter also. I saw the Christmas Devotional yesterday in English in Saqsuha'. It was great. I totally got everyone in our branch to go too. 'Cause I didn't know about it 'til yesterday, and our branch president was like, ''Oh, we forgot to tell everyone about it, and we didn't hire a truck to come pick us up.'' But I was like NO! we've got to go! So we called all these people and stole the Camion (truck) that the Tinta hired. It was like loaded with like 40 Q'eqchis when we went through the Tinta to pick up this other branch. It was good though. President Uchtdorf is loosing his accent. Anyways about me... well nothing's really going on with me idk... my comp and I ate lunch by this huge waterfall this week (which I would have sent you pictures of, but my computer kept electrocuting me so I couldn't). My companion and I got to the top of this huge mountain and stopped for a while and sang James Brown. lkdlkdlkdldkdlkdldkldkdl
You should send me some pictures... of my siblings... family, Christmas trees.... snow.... etc. porfa.
love love Aaron

2010-11-30T09:06:00.000-08:00

HEY, Happy THANKX GIVVINNGG...Oh, hey, thanks for the PACKAGE. I was just too anxious, and so I opened it, and woh whow jk jk jk haha. Hey, so that's cool that everyone bought all that food for three inches of snow. Ahah, I wish it would snow up here once in a while. Sounds like a good Thanksgiving, especially with Cranberry Sauce and Chris. Sounds like that "Swedish brand" is taking over our home. 16 year olds should be driving up to Alta! That's how you get them to be good drivers... and skiers. K, so lately I've been insanely tired. Yesterday I just passed out after church on my bed. Then we were working, and I was like ''I need to eat something, I think ,so we went and found some mandarin trees. We sat down in a Coco bean forest and ate some mandarins. Then later, on the way home, we went to this member's house (Joseph Marry). We had to hike up this huge mountain, and we were both just dying, so we stopped halfway up and planned in the middle of the road. It was a good week. We had a lot of lessons with members (4). (That is more than I had during an entire change). Hey, so my comp is really cool, but he makes me homesick 'cause we're always talking about home. My current favorite CD is David Archuletta's Christmas Story, or what ever. You should check it out. He sings in Portuguese, Italian and French... It's good... Anyways, here's a picture of Elder Smith and me wearing coordinating ties. Cute, huh?... I'm currently reading Gospel Principles in Q'eqchi, and it is incredible and funny. I found these Mayan heads, and they're pretty pretty.. pretty cool.. I was also going to send you a package, but my companion sent a package like 3 months ago to his girlfriend, and it never got to her. I really don't want the things I've got for you guys stolen, so you might have to wait for a while... Sorry. k k that's what's up.

k l LOVE you

ARN

TEACH ME HOW TO JERK! WHAT

2010-11-22T12:41:00.000-08:00

That is tragic what happened to Scott Davis, and I hope his family understands that they will see him again. That's hard though. Death is a really common thing that one doesn't think about until it's near. The closer the proximity, the worse it seems, even though it's all just the same step from this life to the next.

Sorry for writing you a bunch of Q'eqchi casaca I was just a little bit enojado 'cause I'm in this ridiculous place again!! Hey, but my comp's the man, haha. I asked him (as we were walking by a field of pineapple) ''Hey, how do you think they harvest pineapple? Do they just put on a big sweater and gloves?? ('Cause pineapple plants are really prickly) and he said, ''Well they just dig them out of the ground with a shovel or something!" Then I was like....'' Pineapples DO not grow underground.'' It's been really rainy around here though, and crazy muddy and my comp has almost died like 5 times. He slipped down this HUGE hill, and he bounced off his butt then skied down this 50 degree slope and then grabbed a tree and was on his feet again. In less than 2 seconds he dropped like 20 vertical feet and it was incredible. Then, like two nights ago, it was super dark and I went down this really steep part of the trail. I was standing at the bottom, and I was also shining my flashlight on the trail. I said, ''Don't worry. If you slip, I'll catch you.'' ...He slipped, but I caught him. I'm having a good time with this kid. He's my first comp that is actually good at singing. His voice is just like Will Ferrill's, and so's his personality haha....

Hey wait, Cami is turning her mission papers in?... and Nate is the same person that she's been dating since I was in the MTC, huh? Hey I miss snow.... did you know that?... I live in a cloud, and we have nothing......but I'll be in Cobòn on the 7th so I can get stuff from there.... Mom, you know you can take another class for free, you just have to wait till next semester. You should go back to school, Mom ,and study architecture with me so we can carpool and help each other on each other's home work. k. k. That is supper cool that Ben is learning the Mandolin,
kk I
love you
thanks for
all you do
<3 ARN hoWAR

Dis missionary got a year, ha!

2010-11-15T11:03:00.000-08:00

Where'd you go? I miss you so, so come back home.

2010-11-15T10:46:00.000-08:00

Hey, GUESS what!! I've been moved back to SANTO DOMINGO!!! MAS RA INCH'OOL INK'A NINWAJ NAQ WANKIN ARIN WI CHIK MOKO US TA CHINEEKAMSI CHINEEKAMSI B'ANUHOMAK USILAL MAS MAAKEB' LI KRISTIAN ARIN INK'A NEKE'RAJ AB'INK LI RATIN LI YOS ARIN!!!! Unbelievable. Hey, but check it, my last comp go ROBBED!!! I almost did as well!! So when we had changes, I was almost certain that I was going to go to this one area and so I almost left my suitcases in the Sacsuhà house. But in hope that I would have had a change the other direction of Polochic, I brought my bags with me... and it was worth it!!! 8 people broke into the Sacsuhà house and they stole E. Gonzalez's Ipod, like 2000 q's ( 250 dollars ), a bunch of his clothes, a clock that was there... etc. so I lucked out rightssss? k so I'm back in my hood but whatever. I don't care. My new friend is Elder Jordan Smith and he is like the best thing that has happened to me. He's from Lehi and he has the most serious girlfriend ever (with whom he has a wedding date with April 28th 2012). So with him being an old football player quarterback, whatever, he's getting me like 10 cheerleaders writing me haha, and he's like straight out of the missionary mall so anything that I would ever need he's got and I can use. I was actually going to ask for some ''perfect push-ups'' push-up handle deals for Christmas (because I do push-ups every day, and it's like my fourth grade teacher always said, ''Practice doesn't make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect.'' -Mrs. Crismer). But he's got them, so I'm good. Last night I was outside of the church, and there is sidewalk all the way around the church but grass in between the church and the bathroom/shower, so I thought that there was going to be water in the grass next to the sidewalk so I started to run to jump over part of the grass, but I didn't see this log that was on the side walk so I jumped and totally ate it cause my stupid flip flop caught on the log. It was really embarrassing, haha. kwhelll whhat helse do you whhhhant to know abhhout my life, wHHiskey?
check it check it check it
laj A a R o N

I'm goin' to conquer the worl, but first I'm a win the heart of that girl

2010-11-11T11:43:00.000-08:00

HEY, so I think I have a change... GOOD THING.... YES, but a la vez no. 'Cause I really like my area. My comp really doesn't get it, being a missionary that is. I don't really know what to say, I'm out of ideas. Thanks for the package. I'm sure my future comp and I will enjoy it. Hey, so today we played wiffle base ball and I hit a home run! Yes. kkk, seriously, I don't know what to write. I bought some really killer black levis from a guy underneath a lamina pavilion for 2 quetz..... I don't know what to say. I'm hoping this next change will be off da hook. Mom, I'm in zone POLOCHIC duhhh. Hey, are you guys going to do anything cool for Thanksgiving, or what? Oh, and is Ben going to the U or SLCC ? I forgot...It's hot here today, but yesterday it was freezing! They didn't even turn on the air conditioning in my church yesterday. However they did try and make me give the Sunday School class (which is ''Right out of the question'') along with asking us to talk and bear our testimonies, 'cause no one esle would <-- my comp and I did that... but the church is soo unorganized here. I guess they are finally going to officialize the name of the church in a month or two in Q'eqchi (pronounced kek-chi will sound right). k, well I'll keep my eyes out for your package, but thanks for everything! much love laj Aaron

I'm lookin' for a dime that's top a da line cute face lil wast w/da big

2010-11-01T09:23:00.000-07:00

Sup? So, I forgot to tell you that we went to Chulak last week, and it was really cool. It's this area that just opened up, and there are like 250 people that regularly attend church. They just redid the chapel up there and it's crazy huge. It's the second biggest chapel in the mission, and you have to ride on the back of a cattle truck for two hours straight up hill to get to it. The seats are even padded! Seriously, it is way nicer than our church (at home), and I can't imagine how long it will be before all the pews are just soaked with mud. ajaj The church was built so big 'cause every member is a full tithe payer. Another crazy thing is that there are mandarin trees everywhere, and the mandarins are sour and small, but those of the members are huge and delicious. Today I'm in Elestor and lovin' it! Our baptism went GREAT! I was amazed that everyone showed up. It was a miracle. It was an even bigger miracle that we found baptismal clothing for everyone. We went to every area withing 3 hours of Sacsuhà (where I am) to get everything. We baptized 4 eight year olds, 1 nine year old, 2 eleven year olds, 1 14 year old, one fifteen year old, and one 52 year old. We only baptized one kawachin (man)(boy), so 9 Relief Society(Primary). It was crazy though. I was worried about the lady (Rosalina) and her two kids, 'cause I didn't know if they would pass their interviews. I asked my zl how Rosalina did, and he told me that when he asked if she knew who restored the church, she didn't know, so he held up a picture of Joseph Smith and asked her if she knew who it was. She told him, ''I don't remember his name, but I know he saw God and Jesus Christ in the forest." So it was really cool. I baptized 5 of these people, and my comp baptized the other 5. I confirmed one of the kids in church, and that was cool. Anyways, sounds like Adam got lucky with his wallet, and Happy Birthday, Dad ayer and Happy Halloween.
k check it pues. aj aaron

Drop Me Like I'm Hot

2010-10-28T07:49:00.000-07:00

What a champ - Joseph - Why would Ruth send me a check? What am I going to do with a check? jaja The answer to your question is, no I haven't received a card from her yet. Mom, you could have knocked on Braden's door and asked, and it would've been given to you right. Hey, where is Brandon Barfuss ,btw? and Garrett Clementine? sach inch'ool. Hey, Happy Birthday, Dad! In 6 dayz. We are going to baptize 4 people this Saturday if they pass their interviews, if they understood anything I said to them. And we're baptizing 8 year old twins, so it's going to be a party. My interview was fine. President Torrez just asked me how q eqchi was coming. I asked him about my baptisms, and whether I should baptize them or not, 'cause there's a good chance they are going to move somewhere that they will become inactive forever. He told me that I need to teach them everything I can, and tell them if they have to move, they might have to sacrifice to be able to go to church. If they can't go to church they should still practice the teachings of the gospel in their home. So two days ago, my shadow woke up and I was rapping in my sleep at 2 am. He thought I was awake and just joking, so he starts talking to me ,''Howard, hey Howard''. I guess I stopped, dropped my flow, and then just started going off at him in q'eqchi in my sleep. I have no idea if this is true, but if it is, it's funny. The best thing that happened to me this week, other than preaching the gospel, was I taught this lady - pure q'eqchi - and she's listening to daft punk- one more time, and it was insane. K, I love you,
one more time I want to celebrate
know we're going to do it right
to night. neeeeed
celebrate and dance for free,
celebrate and dance for free
celebrate and dance for free
one more time

2010-10-21T08:55:00.000-07:00

It's going for sure. Thanks for praying for my family. I hope they can get baptized, 'cause they are threatening to move to my old area, Santo Domingo, where they WILL go inactive. I don't know what to do. Their baptismal date is right before they are planning to move, maybe. The lady (Rosalina) is about 50 -she doesn't actually know- I love asking people things like ''How old are you?'' and seeing how often people don't know. I also wanted to see how much these members knew about the church. When we had a family home evening with them, we sang, prayed, and we started to talk about the scriptures. I asked them what the scriptures were. The word of God. O.K., good answer. O.K. now, from what two books do we read to learn the word of God? Um.... the Bible... and.... The Book of Joseph Smith. Great answer! They know who Joseph Smith is. Right now I'm in Senahu, using the worst internet on the planet. Hermana Torrez gave me blankets to give to Q'eqchi babies; oh, and Halloween candy!! I have my interview in a few minutes, and zone conference is tomorrow. Umm, IDK what else happened this week... The district president came and presided and spoke in church. He told everyone that if they weren't doing their simple callings in church well and on time they don't have a testimony. It was some really harsh Q'eqchi, but really needed. You guys should go to Braden's homecoming for me. I miss seasons, I'd like to see some colores other than the green of the banana trees and the gold on q'eqchi's teeth.
US
CHEERILAQ EERIB'!!!!
love
the one
son
Aaron

Please don't waste my time time time

2010-10-12T06:24:00.000-07:00

That's crazy Ben got in a bike accident. I hope he's doing better and wears a helmet. Jo'k'an aawi' rik'in lix tz'i' laj Peter (the same with Peter's dog), (wearing a helmet that is)). Um, if you must know, I want whichever of the two Harry Potter ties looks more classy -but I don't want it if it's silk ,like going to get ruined. Get me the more durable one, and if possible, the classier one at the same time. K, I sent you some pictures. Hope you get 'em. So this week, we found this super great family and I taught them lession one. I told them they needed to get baptized, and they figured I was right, so they're going to get baptized on the 30th and I'm stoked. Lix Rosalina, Lix Lorena, and Lix Lady. We took them to church and it was good. The only thing bad that happened is that the Mom of these two girls just got up and left during Sunday School, out of nowhere. Luckily the church gate was locked and she couldn't get out. I went to talk to her, and ask her why she was leaving, and she just told me ''I need to leave.'' "O. K., hold on." I said. I went to go get the keys, and when I got back she was gone. She went to the side of the church and went to the bathroom. I told her, "Oh there's a bathroom in the church fyi". She was like, "Oh I'm fine now." Sorry, I don't know if you understood that. Other things I've done this week.... I helped pull down a seba -a giant tree- with a bunch of Q'eqchi's. This week a parade passed by our house, and my comp got owned by so little girl, jaja. We were watching it 'cause it was crazy loud, and a little girl came up to my comp and said ''Do you want some candy?'' "Yes!'' Well then go buy some at a tienda'' haha. Anyways, that's what's happenin'. Love, yr son

I Got Me Some Bathin' Apes

2010-10-04T19:46:00.000-07:00

I am in Sacsuha' right now, and it is so great. We have a house that's really good, 'cause the bathroom works and there's almost always water (oh, there's always power in this house too). We also have a microwave, and we're getting a blender next week. I took elder Goodwin's spot, and now I'm sleeping in his bed every night and eating all his food he couldn't pack. My church is sweet. It's the Stake Center, so it's really nice and has air conditioning. (It's that one that you saw a picture of me standing in front of with the construction workers... and Mom, just because they're brown doesn't mean they're construction workers). So my companion is Elder Gonzalez, and he's a... nice kid. I like him just fine. He's from Nicaragua. He's been in Polochic for almost nine months and he cannot speak a lick of q'eqchi. I teach everything. He's DL here. I think I'll be in this area for 4 1/2 to 6 months, so I'll be learning a lot here. Conference was great! I liked the Saturday sessions better. Especially the talk that English General Authority gave. In my notes it says : wear shoes. That was in priesthood I think, so sorry if you have no idea what I'm talking about. That's cool Adam went to priesthood w/out his date, but with his date group. Only in Utah, right. All the missionaries slept over at our house 'cause everyone lives unreasonably far away. There were like a trillion people making food and destroying my house. Seriously destroyed. I cleaned from 4 30 am this morning to 8 00. My new thing is waking up early though. My new thing is waking up at 5 30 am every morning so I can study an extra hour of q'eqchi. I have to do it, or I'm not going to be able to do anything. My comp knows nothing. He has a 50 word vocabulary. Love the kid, but 9 months COME ON!!! That's crazy Sharon Neville is getting married. I played with her when I was 3. All these people are getting married no me llega esta casaca. That's really cool you're taking an institute class. I really loved my Preparation for Eternal Marriage class, probably just 'cause Dr Marcas Martines is the man. I'm happy though. My new area is going to be awesome! The members are still pretty crazy and apostate, but it's WAY better than St. Domingo. Now I have to use all the q'eqchi I don't know, and do and say everything and its crazy. Anyways nekexinra k k k
HAOAWRAORND

2010-09-29T08:26:00.000-07:00

Admittedly, I'll probably take it Subliminally

2010-09-29T06:52:00.000-07:00

What am I doing? GOING! Yeah, I got a change. I'm out of that apostasy. There will no longer be missionaries there 'cause of how bad things are. This may or may not be the best coming change of my life. Right now I don't know anything 'cause they do changes on Wednesday now, so I'm going to go back to my area tonight and pack, give my area and my comp. a big five-fingered hand, and leave forever. Today I packed one of my suitcases and hopped in the back of a truck, ate breakfast (beans, eggs, cheese tortillas and a strawberry smoothie). Then I went to district meeting to talk about how there is nothing going in my area. I played Bible Memory with Jeff G and Adrian G. Now I'm in this great internet place ('cause the owner kid has a great taste in American gangster hip hop.). Seriously, I looked at that picture of Matthew and you in front of the Frank Lloyd Wright house and recognized it before I read your letter. I'm a be an architect when I grow up, and build the biggest buildings. That's so crazy my friends are all coming home now. Braden gets home in less than a month, Cody in three months. Smart move, Paul, to rent out the condo, btw. Thats cool you got to go to that General Soc Soc CH'UTAM so close that if the prophet sneezes you have to wipe your glasses off. It'll be December before I get my November Liahona but I'll check his talk out. Sounds like you had a great time in Chicago. Sorry, I never have much to say, and it's usually complaints, but seriously, my area and companions have been ridiculous ever since my third change. La Laguna hadn't had a baptism for 7 months before I got there and Santo Domingo has only had 4 baptisms in the last 12 months (NOT NORMAL). I'm lookin' up though, seeing the light.. better and better timil timil. So these pictures are me: wanting to go skiing (by the destroyed road) 15 miles away from the church, after sweating off 10 lbs of water, jumping off a waterfall getting soaked etc...

much love yr son
A
a
r
o
n

2010-09-25T11:44:00.001-07:00

I MAKE MY WAY TO THE USA...I KNOW, I KNOW H.E.L.L.O.

2010-09-25T11:30:00.000-07:00

q' tranza Hey, so I'm not getting back at you for not writing me the other week. There was just this capacitation meeting, so all the zl's and dl's were in Senahu. We couldn't have our combined p-day district meeting until today (Thursday). So that's what's up. I'm still in the same area. I was just in Elestor ( the area by the lake ) for p day. This picture is of me drinking an amazing shake thur. We have changes next week. YES! and I'm set up for the worst to happen. (At least I won't throw over a table when I get bajared from DL to senior comp: like my current companion). A prayer of mine was answered the other day though, when I was told that I was to be senior comp for a week (in Santo Domingo, my current area) with E. Minero. Elder Lara went to his area and I was senior comp with the coolest Salvadoranian I've met here. This kid is hilarious, and he acts just like Jack Sparrow. He is being accused of making out with some member, so he's having crazy problems. I don't know what to believe, but I had the best week ever working with him. We got every member in the church to come teach a lession with us, and it was crazy. I baptized my first Q'eqchi on Saturday. (He was 8, so it wasn't ''my baptism''), but it was cool, 'cause E. Minero and I just got to the church to put some stuff away, and my branch pres. was like, ''Hey, we have a baptism but nobody know how to do it and nobody has clothes so would you mind doing it? O. K. cool, so I learned how to baptize in Q'eqchi. Elder Lara is my companion. Regarding Cody's letter, that sucks he has bed bugs that are killing him, and that he broke his shower. However, I don't have a shower right now. I use rain water collected in a garbage can, and I've had fleas and all sorts of animals biting me my entire mission. Thanks for sending me those letters, though. Thanks for the positive advice. muy agradacido. Next week will be good. Things are lookin' up. Send me some pics of Chicago. I think my area is going to be closed, 'cause of how crazy people are, and how no one I have ever taught has ever come to church 'cause it's just too far away , and the living conditions are really really xiik'ob'a bad, no power or water. My comp is becoming crippled 'cause of his bed, (the bed I slept on all last change) which really screwed up my back and I really want to go to a chiropractor now ect ect... Anyways, sorry for not writing for so long but ,what a do¿ luv Aaron

Automatic Supersonic Hypnotic Funky Fresh

2010-09-14T06:33:00.000-07:00

Hey, sounds like you had a lot of fun playing with the birthday girl. Happy Birthday Rossignol! And sad September 11th. Even people here know about that, surprisingly. Did I tell you that I sowed a corn field? If so, sorry. I'll recount the experience. Woke up at 5 something, walked to someone's house a couple miles away, and then we went to the guy's cornfield. We broke the corn and threw it into a pile in the middle of the field. Then we threw the corn into giant burlap bags and grabbed our TAP and threw these 200 pound bags on our necks and went to the house. I think I already told you that, so sorry. Not a lot happened this week that was cool 'cause my shadow was sick and then I got sick as well. I don't think that I got a good chance to recover 'cause my comp was singing crazy Q'eqchi children's songs so I couldn't sleep. There are problems in my area, but I'm doing good. Right now I'm in the nicest internet cafe in the world, in Elestor, and enjoying the air conditioning and fast loading computer. I'm in the place with the big lake. I just found out that one of my favorite members in La Laguna (Alvin Cotòn) got his call to Perù so I'm stoked for him. Check you guys l8tr HAVE FUN in Chicago (don't know how to spell anything). Listen to some Frank Sinatra for me. USB'I ARN

You can have whatever you like.

2010-09-08T07:50:00.000-07:00

HOW DARE YOU NOT EMAIL ME?! I burned my finger the other day 'cause the tip of a match broke, and it fell on my finger. It was dark 'cause we didn't have any power. I didn't notice that my finger was being burnt, and now my finger really hurts. My shadow is crazy! He made me laugh when he threw off his backpack, handed me his camera and said ''me voy a bañarme, toma fotos''. He jumped in a river in all of his mission clothes and was sitting beneath (I don't know how to spell that, but it's RUBEL in K'ekchi) a waterfall. He was just being dumb and crazy 'cause he completed 15 months, meses, EB LI PO'. So that's what's up. Nobody came to church yesterday. There were 28 people there, which is crazy 'cause the church is so huge it could be in the States, but still nobody comes. There are just so many churches around here it's hard to sleep at night 'cause they just go till like 2 am. So I bought some more powerful sleeping pills today. Hopefully they work out. Saritas is open today (the only franchise that made it here) (ice cream shop) so I'm a go get some. Oh I guess you're probably in Rocklin. (Why you didn't write me?) no tegan pena its cool, as long as you send me some pictures. I'm making a K'ekchi verb list that will never leave the mission 'cause it's flawless. My name will just be in the front pocket of every gringo missionary to come here for the next 100 years until this language dies ('cause it will (due to TV)). Next week I'm going to a really cool place, I think, for p day called Rio Dulce. Nobody has come to church or been baptized since I've been here. lastima I'm dying, but I'm feeling a lot better about learning K'ekchi I figured something really important yesterday XINTAU LI RU but KAK'AJOM A'AN XB'EENIINKILEB LI KRISTIAN CHAALK K'AJEL RU LI KRISTO RE NAQ TE'XK'UL LI EVANGELIO LI KOJOB'ANB'IL WI' CHIK RIK'IN XPAAB'ANKIL LI KRISTO UT LIX TOJB'AL RIX LI MAAK, LI JALB' A-K'A'ULEJ, LI KUB'IHA', LI XB'EEN SUMWANK NOKO-OK WI', UT LI MAATAN RE LI SANTIL MUSIQ'EJ UT KUYUK TOJ SA' ROSO'JIK.
take kare one and all loVe Aaron

And while I'm at it,, throw in a couple a G's, yeah!

2010-09-08T07:30:00.000-07:00

Hey, did you get all those pictures I sent you or what? Um, props Adam boy genius. Calvin is the man, btw. Happy birthday SOBRINA ROSSIGNOL. That'll be fun going there. What I want for Christmas... well, the only thing I really want is Harry Potter 7 on dvd.. oh wait... I'm in Guatemala. That shouldn't cost more than 5 quetz ... jaja.. so other than that ... I would like some Harry Potter ties. You know, not like stupid graphic ones, but like a red and gold Griffindor tie, green and silver Slytherin algo así k.. that's all I can think of... or some Rossignol S7's or some Volont Spatula's. Yeah definitely Volont Spatula's. My shadow is ridiculous. He wants to be an AP, so I don't know what to think of him. He's a good guy, but I feel like he does a lot of things for the wrong reasons. I'm such a liberal person, and he's so conservative. Anyways that whats up with that.. we are teaching a bunch of people that lie to us... and nobody comes to church. We woke up at 5 something to walk 5 and a half miles to bring these three people to church (one of which has a baptismal date) and nobody would go with us. All the members are joining other churches, and I feel like we should just dust off our feet and leave this area. Someone died (who lived RIGHT next to us) literally 15 feet away from the church, and so I couldn't sleep all night 'cause someone was CRYING SO LOUD. Then in the morning, they had the craziest, loudest funeral I've ever heard of. It was louder and more obnoxious than any church that I've heard, and the coffin really sicked me out. Speaking of deaths.. a bird was found dead in my toilet... attached is a photo... I don't know what else to say about my life. My comp is always telling me that with how much we suffer, we are going to receive so much more in blessings. I was thinking about the blessings I would like to have after my mission. Right after the ability to telaport, I want to be a pro skier. I want to be taken up to the top of the mountain by helicopter rather than walking like I'm doing now. Anyways hope e'ry thin's good in da hood. check yah l8ter la walal AARON

to it to it so do it do it

2010-08-23T21:13:00.000-07:00

If you are reading this message, I do not want to hear from you until you take a cold shower. Get in your shower tomorrow, and don't even touch the hot. Full blast cold. So my life is a lot better, and my new shadow's the man. He kind of reminds me of the Green Lantern. So... we had this activity, and it was super sick. I didn't think anyone was going to come, but they did. That's one thing you can always count on around here. The Guatemala hour is about 1 - 2 hours late, so maybe if we unofficially changed the hour of church to 11:00, tons of people would come. Anyways, it went really well (2:22 make a wish). There was like more than 250 people, and I was really stoked. K'ekchi's coming. I can't teach like the first fourth of lesson 1 right now and tell people they're mad etc etc. Kekchis are really annoying, and it's kind of part of their culture ¨Where are you going? Where are you going? Where are you going???¨ ¨BAR XIK AWE BAR XIK AWE BAR XIK AWE¨, funny. So, what's going down in da hood? Adam's a JR. Ben's in school, new office, Dad, new pants ¨SIXTY THREE hundred dollar pant COME ON¨ Hey, I was thinking about Harry Potter the other day. Has the first half of the 7th movie come out yet? Or, the Arrested Development movie, and if yes, how were they? Sorry , I'm talking about stupid stuff 'cause I don't really know what to say, YES, I don't know what Cody's mom is doing for him, but do it for me... I'm glad you're friends with my friend's mom. Now we can all hang out together when I get home. Right. Oh, I was wondering if Tom Ostler ever left on his mish, and if so where? Crazy, Randy's home... Taylor wrote me just to tell me he has a year left (d-bag) jaja. This picture is taking forever to load, so now I'm just writing a monton de casaca but, ok re-trying...ink'a it's taking forever, sorry..
HAVE A GREAT XAMAAN!!! luv Aaron

2010-08-17T07:09:00.000-07:00

Some people say I've got clouds in my eyes 'cause I set my goals so high

2010-08-17T06:50:00.000-07:00

My toe is fine. I'll live. So, changes are this week, THANK GOODNESS! I don't have a change, but my comp is supposed to be incredible at K'ekchi. Word on the street E. Lara XK'AB'A', so that will be great. I went to this really boring place today called Agua Caliente, but it wasn't cool. Just a waste of 10 Q's. We're going to have an activity this Saturday, and there are going to be like 300 people there I guess... I really have no idea, but I guess if food is involved everyone comes to the church, so it will be good. Changes are the only thing that are really happening right now. Best thing that happened to me is I got my camcam and it is incredible. I can tag peoples names to the individual pictures, date, time location, ect... 14 megapixlz, 5x zoom. It's black, and I'm looking at it right now. Its a Kodak EasyShare M575 High Definition. It's my new most expensive thing, but everyone around here are buena onda, so I don't have to hide it. I can take pictures of people in the streets and whatever. That's too bad Adam has to go to school, but on the plus side ,he's goin'a get all da ladies rollin' up in the toyota, haha. No mejor con un METROPOLITAN va!! AYU k you didn't tell me about Laura's Jeep adventure, so hit me up with that. k..kk let me know what's good in da hood.
LOVE your FAVORITE CHILD LIZA.. oh, I mean aaron

Newest Picture of Aaron's Area with President Torres

2010-08-10T07:45:00.000-07:00

Some'in Special

2010-08-10T07:27:00.000-07:00

Right now I´m worried 'cause there is a rumor that I might get sent out of here 'cause I might´ve broke my toe (four weeks ago) ((kicking the wall))(((in my sleep))). That can't happen. MOCOCHAAB´ILTA 'cause I can kind of say stuff now, and I don't even feel discouraged about the language. I´ll learn it just fine. I love playing with animals. There is everything here, seriously. Flocks of parrots fly by the church. I was at this member's house, and I picked up a baby chick that was following its siblings and mama chicken. I wasn't expecting it to attack me. It just got lit and flared up its wings and went for my leg. I just kicked at it and then it came after me again, and so when I went to kick it a second time it ran away. Then I took off after it to steal more of its children. A turkey also tried to attack me ... after I tried to scare away its baby that was in the path, jaja. I feel really nasty right now 'cause we haven't had water for like a week and a half so.. bathing... hard. The dueño here in this internet is playing some really cool Fifty Cent, so sorry I'm distracted. We went to this bridge this morning. It's cool. The people here let us come and teach them no matter what, even if they want to fight, but it doesn't really matter 'cause the only thing I can do is pray, teach part of the first lesson, and bear my testimony. My comp can't do that much more. Nobody can read, so we just use pamphlets in Spanish for the pictures, and invite people to come to church. Rarely people come. There have only been four baptisms in my area in the last 10 months but we're working, and we're trying to organize an activity. Anyways, I haven't got my new camera yet 'cause Hna Torrez got me one and she gave it to the ZLs here ,so they'll give it to me next week. That's terrible that the car got hit. Good the guy didn't get away with it. Sounds like you're going to be doing a lot of traveling 'cause Passports? Pick me up? In while... Matthew wrote me and told me about Chicago. That's cool Paul is mnt. biking. I want to go with him when I get home. Anyways, that's what's good, that's what's SA' in da hood. KKK love, AARON

Ice on my Fingers

2010-08-03T15:37:00.000-07:00

Hey, so this week was like Christmas for me 'cause I got your package, I got a pair of boots from someone in the cap, and I got a package from my friend Nijiko, "cause it was zone conference. We only have zone conference every three months now, so other than letters, I won't get any other packages until start of November, FYI. We had interviews on Sunday after church, and then I worked with Elder Vasquez on divisions and stayed in Saksuha overnight. Then we had zone conference, and it was long and funny. Happy Birthday was sung to me, and anyone who's birthday is between May and November, so there was a lot of people with me. Hna. Torrez está comprandome una camera nueva entonces la proxima semana voy a tenerla CHAAB'IL Hey thanks for the package. Now I have a Crested Butte sticker on my K'ekchi himnaro and some cool pictures. BTW ,crazy, that picture you sent of Ben and Adam at the Maya restaurant, or whatever. I could read the words on the table like XUL is animal and MOL is egg, idk, but it was weird. Thanks for the birthday card, and the letters from Cody were good to read. It sounds like he's doing really well. Maybe it's just me, but I think you gave me those letter to make me feel like I need to write better letters, or at least letters like Cody writes. jaja All I would have to do is just mention how crappy my letters are for a paragraph or two, say something like... so we were teaching a K'ekchi last week and I think you should look into adopting a K'ekchi so that when I get home I can have a K'ekchi little brother... then say ''true story''. Actually, he does write way better letters than I do, so you can just send me his, and I'll form my letters to you from his. O.K. CHAAB'IL My toe really hurts, and it's hot and I want an Ice cream, and the only atm within a hundred miles is out of service. I hope I have 60 cents worth of guate money to pay for this hour of internet, and what else?... I love hip hop flows, my boots are super cool, and I look like I'm in the military with them on all laced up. Happy b- day Adam, on da tenth, next week. Hope you get everything you want... the church is true even though church here is only two hours and the branch president doesn't wear a tie, and his shirt is half unbuttoned all the time and he wanders around during Sacrament to prepare his class, etc etc.... all these kekchis are insane. Pounded those gummy osos bien great laa'at tengan a xamaan chilera and maka'entendermeta you!!!! jun chic NAKATINRA you have no IDEA <3AARON HOWARD

Get Like Me

2010-07-27T16:05:00.000-07:00

Hey Aaron, look at you! Another year older... and another year closer to death. Thanks for that blurb about Cody and the pics. It's good to see familiar faces. Speaking of which I went to Senahu yesterday, and so I rode on a bus for four hours with Elder Jeff Goodwin (who went to Bountiful High) and we met up with Elder Jared Fadel (also went to Bountiful High).
So I was just hanging out with a bunch of B towners yesterday. The other pictures are of us at Elestor at the lake. That meal you made for the missionaries sounds delicious. All the meals I eat generally lead to scandalous buu jaja. YES ADAM! great job. Just be sure not to listen to all the crap you are going to get from everyone. Nice work on the car, Dad. Nice work on walking to church Grandma (on time too !) ). Nice work Tom Cruz. Summer sounds just like it should be: rope swings and concerts. Congratulations on beina a CNA Ben, and also being made of money. My birthday was just great, even though my companion was the only person who wished me happy birthday... after he asked me what the date was... anyways K'ekchi yoo chi wuluk. The past week's been kind of hard 'cause I kicked the wall in my sleep entonces me lastimé mi dedo del pie, but other than that I'm just wandering around and drinking really nasty corn drink (however a lot less now that I'm getting incredibly good at pouring it in my comp's cup while he´s not looking, praying, what ever). If nothing else, I´m getting super sneaky and good about not drinking all the puke drink, probable sickness inflicting drink, chicken foot, nasty throw up, kill me, you're too poor to be giving me this disgusting stuff. But it´s so cool here 'cause it's so different. People are just as lazy, but there aren´t as much haters here. One day we were at this guy's house, and the daughter wanted to show me her pet scorpion that she was keeping in a huge empty gel bottle. I couldn´t really see it 'cause there were leaves in the way, so the dad (not wearing a shirt) picked it up with his bare hands and let it crawl all over his naked body and I was freaking out. It was really cool. I decided that here in the chik every parent just has one pare of clothing for every two kids. You see one kid wearing a shirt and nothing else and then you see his brother just wearing shorts and nothing else, and when they have to wash their one set of clothing they´re both the naked kids, jaja. What else?... I killed a scorpian last night in the church... I talked to a girl who spoke Spanish, French and English fluently, just barely... Let me know if you get the pictures, k? I was writting you yesterday, but we had to leave 'cause it started to rain like crazy, and there was no signal. I didn´t get your package yet, but I will next week cause we have zone conference and Interviews. So have a GREAT WEEK! THANKS FOR WHATEVER YOU SENT ME!!!! CHERIL ERIB´ NAKATINRA

Pull up the curtains 'cause the show just arrived. Sit down in your seats, you're just on time.

2010-07-19T12:04:00.000-07:00

Wow mom (palindrome)-- A word, phrase, verse, or sentence that reads the same backward or forward. For example: A man, a plan, a canal, Panama! Or WOW MOM. Eleven O'clock, haha. Well Adam and Ben are just giving you crap 'cause you're more popular than them. (I wrote to tell Aaron how Ben was giving me a bad time because my friends, Colleen and Michelle, stayed to visit until 11:00 a few nights ago.) So, last week there were some marks in my shadow's butter that he left out, and then the next day there was a hole in his new loaf of bread and half his bread was eaten. So the next day we found the mouse in my suitcase and we tried to catch it but it got away. The next day we found a tarantula the size of my hand in the sacrament room. The next day we caught the mouse and fed it to the tarantula that we caught the day before. It was funny! We also ran out of food last night so we caught a crab that I saw in a river on the way home and cooked it up and ate it. I´m having fun. There are bugs and animals everywhere, and my mission just turned into a hike. We hike everywhere. There are no paved roads, It's just a ton of muddy paths, and the houses here are made out of bamboo. Every person we go visit gives us a nasty corn drink that makes me want to puke. A lukewarm, soupy, mashed corn mess in my mouth mmm.. I poured mine in a hole yesterday while the lady wasn't looking. Also, people don´t really like to wear clothes here very much. There are naked kids running all over the place. My comp and I were teaching this family, and this lady just took her shirt off just because it was hot. I bet one out of two kids wear pants here. The mountains are beautiful, and the roads are long and muddy. Just about every type of tree grows here. It's weird. It's like temperate, but it has tropical trees everywhere mixed in so there will be a field of lemon trees next to pine trees. Well, thank you for whatever you sent me for my birthday in advance. Muy agradecido, oh y mi compañero ya lo tuve. Fuimos compañeros en la MTC. Have an EXCELLENT WEEK <3 ARN

Stop, Drop, Kaboom

2010-07-12T16:25:00.001-07:00

'Sup? So, yes, I am in the greenest place ever! The church that I live in (one of the only buildings within miles of where I'm at) looks totally misplaced on the mountain. My area is just mountains. I have to walk for like an hour and a half to most of the houses. It's super hot here, but it's soooo cool. Someone is sending me their boots from the capitol, so I don't die out here. My camera broke the day I got here. The screen is just always white. NEVER BUY OLYMPUS, but don't buy me a new one 'cause it still takes pictures. I'm going to buy a new one next week. I'm doing good, even though K'ekchi is insane and it sounds more like German than Spanish. Let me know if you got my pictures ok. Tell Adam that it's the Snake River or nothin', 'cause the Green River doesn't even have rapids and it's freezing, and it's time you could be wake boarding in Flaming Gorge, but that's cool! I'm jealous... and hot. It is so bloody hot here. There is sweat running into my eyes, and things are blurry on top of this ghetto computer that I'm using. People are so nice here (to the point of turning off the world cup to listen to us sing). Kids are super cute here and they love to feel my arms ('cause I have hairy arms). Anyways, I'm out. Have a great week in B-town for me. AdHoward

I got money in the bank and I really wanna thank all those fans I wanna thank

2010-07-06T17:59:00.000-07:00

So the craziest thing happened the other day. We taught this girl, with a member, the first lession last Monday (some 16 year old). Then the member family that we taught her with, invited us to lunch on Saturday. The girl (Carmen) came over after we ate, and so we asked her if we could teach her again. The lession went really well. Everything was really good until it started to rain and we had to go. (My shadow had earlier bought and broke one of those ´´push button umbrellas´´ (the handle broke off)). So everyone stood up to say goodbye to us except for Carmen. My shadow was trying to fix the handle to his umbrella. The dad of the family asked Primo, ´´What's wrong with your umbrella?´´ My comp replied, ´´Oh, it´s just because it´s a Guatamalen crap product. ´´ So as he says this, he hits the umbrella and the center rod (thin, light, 1 foot piece of metal) shoots. It nails Carmen in the face. I almost died! He shot our investigator in the face. Everyone was freaking out. There was blood... It didn´t stop bleeding for a while. The rod hit her right below her nose and above her upper lip. Previously a flawless face, she now has a perfect imprint of the end of Elder Primo´s umbrella. I don´t think she will ever be baptized in this life 'cause the missionaries are trying to kill her. (She would have lost her eye if it would have hit it.) So Primo can talk to her in the spirit world. We both had a change, haha. Desués cuatro horas en bus llegué a coban y me dormí allá con un montón de misioneros era bien chafa porq´ tenia q´ dormir con elder vargas y elder turik en la misma cama pero no podía entónces me puse en el suelo y ya me dormí mejor. esta mañana me fui a las siete en taxi a un estación de mícrobus y de alla me fui a la tinta (un ciudad bien pequeña) pero todo vía me falta viaje porq´ tengo q´ ir hasta Santa Domingo mi nuevo área. q´ chilero el viaje fuimos por un busque se llama el busque nubioso, pasamos por cuatro ríos y aborrita tengo (dos q´ tres) nuevo companero aunq´ ya nos conocimos (este majé parry) ójala q´ no entiendan por q´ por eso podrían entender lo q´ estará pasando conmigo por un montóm de tiempo hasta q´ pueda hablar aca. será bien duro ya sé epecíalmente por q´ mi sombria no puede hablar el idioma pero al la vez estoy en un lugar más bonito q´ he visto durante todo mi vida. por eso estoy tratando de disfrutar mi misión más y aprender (porq´ hay q´ aprender cuando esté en un lugar q´ no se puede comprender para nada sin hacerlo) pues ya pasó el tiempo pero les extraño mucho a todos
les quiero, su hijo, Aaron

And that's whats up!

(Doug wrote to Aaron in Spanish this week. Aaron may have written the end of this letter in Spanish for Doug. For those who can't read Spanish, it basically says that Aaron is in a new and very beautiful area. He says it is the most beautiful place he has ever seen in his life. (And he has been to Hawaii). He is now speaking a new dialect, and he and his companion do not know it, yet. He knows it will be hard, but he has been wanting this. He knew his companion before he was transferred. For those of you who know Spanish, you can tell I don't know it very well. Gina

Shake me 'til you wake me from this bad dream

2010-07-06T17:56:00.000-07:00

I don't feel bad that I´m not receiving packages ('cause it´s not like anyone else is), so it's better not making the others feel bad. The most fun thing I did this week was drag my shadow around my area and work. We ate lunch as a zone today at Little Caesars and Elder Carlson and I split a pizza. Being in the middle of a mall plaza I dared Elder Carlson to pray out loud standing, and in English; he did it. Everyone is watching the world cup, and 68 of the 400+ members in my ward came to church yesterday. Elder Mays is a nice person. I barely know him, but he´s in my group. Happy Father's Day, Dad. The holidays are all mixed up down here so I have no idea when it was ¿Sunday? but whatever. I´m writing you a letter. Well, have an excellent week. Sorry I don´t have anything cool to tell you. ARN

Hates me, Never put my banger on safety

2010-06-22T10:19:00.000-07:00

(...) These three dots are called ellipses (commonly mistaken for two dots or four)... so this week wasn´t exactly as ¨up beat¨ as the last week, unfortunately. I don't feel like I´m doing anything (especially 'cause everyone is watching the world cup). That's is so cool Peter and Laura got a dog (jealous). I am getting your letters and pictures; just send them to my gmail 'cause it sends it to myldsmail as well as my gmail (when you send it to my gmail). I´m really glad to see Adam is wearing the best Nike shorts I ever gave them. Nothing is happening... I´m eating with my favorite family tonight... my bishop's wife washes our clothes. I´m tired of so many things, but I´m fine and healthy.
Have a great week!
AIR

Pictures from June 2010 Zone Conference

2010-06-22T10:14:00.000-07:00

Drivin´in my Peugeot ay ay twenty inch rims w/da chromed out play ay aytes

2010-06-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

Sup? So that's funny Adam. haha Just watch out for the "good" photo shoot offers if you really want to make some money. hahaha, Those are some cool pictures, btw. Thanks. How are you feeling Mom? Are you doing alright? Are you eating healthy? I´m just wondering, 'cause this lady in my ward that was my investigator DIED yesterday, and her son is the only member of the church, and he´s serving his mission in Honduras so .. it got me thinking, wow, what if you died? That would be just terrible. So you already heard that we did service and it was GREAT. Zone conference was good... oh, my interview with President Torrez was good.. I told him I want to learn Q'eqchi' ... so we'll see what happens ya ..'so what your telling me... is that you are interested in learning a third language" so we'll see. There are five different languages in this mission. Three weeks until I'll see. So, did I tell you that our mission vehicle was stolen? hahaha A brand new Toyota Helix (like a Mexican Tundra), but it was a cool truck and it was stolen. jajaja The only other interesting thing that happened since I last wrote was it was my comp's birthday. We ate pizza for lunch and played Uno with my district, and then we ate at a member's house and had some killer milhojas (million layer cake). Good. k I'm mailing a letter home pretty soon. k love your favorite son Aaron

Helping Hands for victims of Hurricane in Guatemala

2010-06-10T10:23:00.000-07:00

You can be my Cinderella

2010-06-10T09:41:00.000-07:00

Hey, whats up? All the pictures worked out great (that you emailed me), and I got your letter. Gracias por desanímarme vos no, but the sd card works! So this week was an enormous waste of time 'cause we had zone conference this week (snore), but there was a hilarious doctor that came and talked to us and told us that all animals come from hell. My mission president told us that President Falabella was complaining about missionaries having too ugly of ties, so my mission president gave him permission to cut them off of missionaries if he sees them. (Too bad I´ll only see this man once in a blue moon.) We did service in zone 9 the other day. We just broke down a ton of boxes and loaded them with toilet paper, food, tampons, water, etc... for all the dying people in Quetzaltanango. Fun. Hey I FOUND WENDY´S and I ate the most American thing ever - frosty and fries with a spicy Baconator - there´s some sick vandalism in the central mission but everyone says its the worst mission in Guat. Um, it's raining a lot.. What's new? I really want to go to Polo Chik. Tomorrow I have an interview with Papa T. so we´ll see what he says. Um, my amazing family that I was going to baptize (in two weeks) MOVED!!! my family of ten!!! I have nobody to baptize now. Oh, p day was moved to today 'cause of all the really unproductive things we´ve been doing this week. It´s my primo's birthday tomorrow. That was a nice picture by the way Adam! You can email me as many pictures as you want 'cause they just show up at the bottom of the email and I don't have to open them. For real it doesn't waste that much time. I´m fine, the volcano didn´t burn me too bad. k lov aaron

Get you in the Georgia Dome on the Fifty Yard Line

2010-06-01T11:24:00.000-07:00

A VOLCANO ERUPTED AND IT RAINED VOLCANIC ASH/SAND FOR HOURS!!! It was the craziest thing, and the streets and cars were all covered in it. It's the closest thing to snow that I can get I guess, but it was INSANE. PEOPLE DIED!!!!! They closed all the churches yesterday 'cause a hurricane was going to hit Guatemala!!! There also was ACID RAIN, and my arms kind of burned the night that it happened. It destroyed one of my favorite white shirts. All the schools are closed this week. There was some really insane rain the other day and we were walking in a river. The streets were rivers! It was ridiculous. We baptized this little kid last Saturday (even with the tropical rainstorm), but almost nobody came. The kid we baptized was super funny though. I was going over the baptismal questions, and I asked him about the word of wisdom and what things we can't use. He said this,¨Um.. tea, coffee, cigars, gallo (beer)..... and.... cocaine.¨ Haha! It was pretty funny. Anyways, maybe I´ll stop praying for snow because I get volcanic ash when I do, and people will die. I´m fine by the way... as far as I can tell, but I´m sure I´ve contracted some type of cancer from this filthy air I´ve been breathing. A reporter died, who was filming the volcano, 'cause a volcanic rock hit him in the head, and his camera man got burned (almost to death). Then the flooding killed like 13 people in the zone next to ours. A drain pipe broke and there was a 30 metro (like 130 foot) sink hole, and some houses fell into it. One of the chapels was like twenty feet away from it. Roads are being destroyed. Oh, and they turned off all the water because the pipes would have got clogged with volcanic ash, so we didn´t have water for like five days. We were using rain water to flush our toilet. I also went on a division with this kid who´s in my group, and I was in his area. We were contacting, and I talked to these two ladies that were just standing outside of their house. I asked them how they were, and they told me they were sad 'cause their neighbor just DIED. We told them it would be o.k., 'cause God has a plan for us and we can live with our families again, or whatever. Anyways, we kept walking and we saw this lady crying. There was a taxi in front of her house taking people to the hospital. We talked to her and we told her who we were. We asked her about what had happened, and I told her that we have a message that will help her and her family. She told us, ¨You can help us? How are we going to pay for the ambulance, and the funeral? She has four kids she left behind! How are we going to be able to afford this?!¨ It started to rain, and this woman clearly was more concerned about the loss of money more than the loss of her sister, so I told her we would just come back another day to share our message. But it started to rain hard, so she told us to come in her house. We went into the worst house ever, full of twelve people (all crying), two chickens, four dogs, and a duck. Anyways the lady told everyone that we could help them, and we taught the plan of salvation. It was pretty much the worst circumstances ever, and they probably didn't hear one word. I really had an interesting week, and I´m fine along with everyone else.. that didn't die. K, have a GREAT week! Lemi know how Colorado iz, k? love airn

Volcanic Eruption and Tropical Storm

2010-06-01T11:15:00.000-07:00

Make Me Believe Ya

2010-05-24T16:13:00.000-07:00

So, the worst thing that could have possibly happened happened. I didn´t get a change, and I could just die. So the most interesting thing that happened to me this week was this crazy Mother's Day activity that we helped out with. Our Bishop is insane. He put on this dinner for all the mothers in our ward, and he always plays Lady Gaga at all the ward activities, haha. He also hired a mariachi band, like pure ranchero crap, sombreros and everything, so it was pretty much the most ridiculous church activity I´ve ever seen. The other thing that happened this week is I tried for the first time a Guatemalan delight called chucos (dirtys) - they are these hot dogs, the buns are fried, they have guacamole, cabbage, peppers, cilantro, onions, mayo, ketchup, and a lot more dirty Guatemalan food, but they are really good and I ate like four of them on Saturday and just about died, (because they are so good)! Anyways, not a lot is happnin´around here. Just trying not to jump in front of buses. etc.. Oh, but our family went to church again which is sooooo good! There isn´t a lot other than that. Thanks for sending my sd card and everything. Sounds like everyone's having fun, especially Ben on those 3 am freezing rain scooter rides. Adios, love aarn danil howad

2010-05-18T13:24:00.000-07:00

2010-05-18T13:23:00.001-07:00