May 23, 2011

Elder Hafen and Elder Kapple

View from our apartment

Elder Kapple and Elder Harris

WOW! From the dusty streets of La Lima, to the busy streets of San Perdo, to the sandy beaches of Utila. - yup that's right!  I got changed to the island of Utila in the zone La Cieba, and wow is it a difference from the other places.  I don't even know where to begin.  The island has about 3,000 people with about 80 members.  At church yesterday there were 25 people there.  My Comp (Elder Harris) is the branch president which makes me first councilor I guess.  We’re the only priestood on the island, well I guess there are some people that have the priesthood here but they don't come to church.  So we do everything.  Bless, prepare, pass, give the talks, and teach the lessons.  It is crazy.  The island is really different. There are a lot of tourists all of the time and most of the people speak English but they have a wierd accent. So it really isn't going to help with my Spanish haha.  My comp is awesome.  His name is Elder Harris.  He's a 6'6" white guy from California. This is his last change so I'm going to be sending him home in 6 weeks, but he's still a super hard worker and a great missionary.  We’re kind of just stranded out here.  We only go to the mainland for multi-zone conferences and interviews and if one of us has a change.  We do a lot of work with the members and trying to get them back to church especially the men.  As Elder Harris likes to put it "We’re teaching the men how to be men!"  We still have some investigators but most of the work is still with the inactives. We have to teach a lot about the Sabbath day because almost everyone here believes that the Sabbath day is Saturday - haha.  It's really wierd, we do everything with tithing and fast offerings.  After church on Sunday we have to fill out all of the reports and everything, so I'm learning how to do all of that. We also have to take care of all of the welfare program stuff.  Like today we had to go take food for this lady and her familia because they don't have anything.  It's just crazy, all of this stuff.  We’re just 2 young guys and we are incharge of everything out here - haha.
Thanks for all of the e-mails everyone!  It's always good to hear from all of you every week.
I Love you all!!!
Cuidense
Con Amor
Elder Kapple