Week 42

Everybody-

Ecuafact: They don´t have sprinklers in Ecuador. The city waters the grass with a water truck than has a fire hose. It´s pretty entertaining to watch!


Well, this was one of those weeks that wasn´t the greatest but makes for some interesting Homecoming talk stories.

First of all, I thought that you would all be interested to know that one of our Mamita´s (member families who feed us lunch) has a restaurant and we have lunch with them every Tuesday. Anyway, as I was eating imagine my horror when a cockroach crawled accross my spoon. Yeah, really. Get this, I didn´t even scream, just kept eating. How desensitized am I? YIIIIKKKKEEESSS!!!


Also here in Ecuador, I really don´t have much chances to Bible bash because most people don´t know the bible. The evangelists seemed to come out of the woodwork this week! While making a street contact we presented the Book of Mormon, I started to doubt my spanish skills because he was suddenly unintelligible. Turns out it was just the "gift of tongues". Ummmhmmm. Yeah, we got out of there.

Doesn´t end there though, later we were invited to study the bible with another street contact. Turns out it was really a chance to save some poor mormon girls from being damned. The first scripture read was Galatians 1:6-8 which reads:

"6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—
7 not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.
8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed."

They pretty much damned us. My companion took it pretty hard and cried off and on the rest of the day. I thought it was pretty cool. She wanted to continue to bash, but I got us out of there as soon as I could.

Marina will not be getting baptized, her husband retracted his permission! I´m pretty upset about it. I don´t think any one person should be able to excercise that kind of control over another, but what can I do?

We have a nice pool of new investigators though, especially Monica Freire. She came with us to the Relief Society broadcast and she really liked it. Anyway, we are hoping she will be ready for baptism soon. Keep us in your prayers!

Love from Ecuador,

Hermana Whitney Tanner

Week 41

Can you see the teeth? EWWWWWWWWWW.
Poor little Hector, that is my ginea pig!
Why, yes that is head of ginea pig. This is what pretty much all food looks like.
A slightly better picture of my companion and I!
You know you love me, and miss me lots, and are going to send me letters and or packages!


Everybody-

Ecua-fact: They don´t have public food heath laws. I´m going to come home a lot less concerned with sanitation when I come home!!!


Marina is getting baptized!!! I asked President Sloan for some advice and he told me to read Moroni 7:19. He told me to call him out and ask him why he didn´t want a better spouse and mother for his children; because he´s a bully and bullies don´t like confrontation but they will usually back off afterwards. Totally did it and it totally worked! I have his permission in writing! I was surprised and how well it worked. I read something the other day that said: "Overbearence is Boldness without love." I´m so excited because Marina has wanted to get baptized for so long now. We have her date for this Saturday, but I´m not convinced that she is ready. So we might be moving her baptismal date to conference weekend! It´s even more special though because Marina Heréz is one of my contacts! I´ve yet to have a contact get baptized!
It was a long awaited answer to prayer to be able to talk to Luis, and I´m so grateful that we had the opportunity.

Looks like I will be staying in Ambato this next change! Which is great news for me, I´m ready to stay in a sector a little longer than a month and a half! I really love it here and there are so many good people ready to hear the gospel. We are still desperately looking for new investigators and have been stood up more than usual this past week. Yesterday alone only one of our appointments was home when they said they would be; we had 7 appointments lined up!

So yeah, I ate ginea pig, or Cuy (cu-wee). Although I definitely did not enjoy the texture or taste, it wasn´t as bad as I had imagined. It´s like really fatty dark meat. The worst part is that they leave the head with teeth and everything; also the claws. I would have to say that I prefer it to chicken foot though. I don´t know, it´s a toss up.

Love from Ecuador,

Hermana Whitney Tanner

Feeling Fluent

I think right now I could totally pass High School Spanish.

¡TAKE THAT MR. SKYLES!

Week 40

Doménica Garcia y Marisela Solís

On the way back from Zone Conference. What a good looking group.

Elder Cedeño is our new assitant! I thought his jacket lining was pretty cool.

Everybody-

Another really great week. Marisela del Rosio Solís Molina and Doménica Monserreth Garcia Solís got baptized. In other good news I think I´m finally used to them having a million names too! The water was freezing again, which was too bad, especially because we didn´t know and therefore Marisela and Doménica had quite the shock going in. We met with them yesterday and unfortunately they aren´t doing well. Marisela can´t pay her rent, somebody broke in and stole their rent money. Her family is also giving her a hard time about her baptism. They kept telling her that she and Doménica were baptized in Rio Ambato which is famous for being filthy. Anyway, they were a little dis-heartened, but I have faith that they will pull through. She even brought some friends to see her get baptized and we have some new investigators because of it. I love that our new members and investigators have more enthusiasm for the work then the members sometimes.

Javier is still doing well and looks like he will be here for a bit longer than we had planned on! I´m excited, it looks like I will also be here for my next transfer, but really you never know with me...seriously.

We also had our Zone Conference this past week. We had to wake up at 4:30 in the morning to get to Riobamba on time. So we were pretty wiped out but as always we left feeling more excited to work!

We have a new Bishop in Recreo (my ward), Ulipano Fernandin Ruiz, it´s a mouthful. Unfortunately he didn´t quite recieve a warm welcome. He was only sustained by about 25 people. We have a lot of work to do with the members...reunite. It´s not the most fun situation but I´m sure I´m supposed to learn something from it.

Week 39

I know it´s blurry, but this is probably the most important picture I have. I snapped the picture just as he came out of the water and he was praying. I can´t even tell you how great Javier is.

Javier Jojoa (Ho-ho-a), Johana Pineda, and Kenny Reyes (husband and member).



Seriously, one of my best days ever!

We just happened to be in Riobamba for P-day. Veronica Quilismal was baptized! Vinicio was baptized 2 weeks before so he preformed the baptism.

My companion, Hermana Ovalle, and I. Yeah, I know you love it.

Everybody-

Ecuafact- They eat potatoe chips with ketchup and mayonaise. It´s pretty decent.

The mission is AWESOME! Probably my best week ever...at least in the mission. Mostly because Javier Jojoa was baptized. All of the baptisms that I have been a part of have been special, but never like this one. I´ve never had a convert who is so converted. We usually have newly baptized members share their testimony after. Javier thanked us first, then Kenny and Johana. He started crying, he just kept saying: "I don´t know what to say." Then he would put his hand over his heart. I really can´t explain it. He´s amazing! Too bad he will be moving to Guayaquil in just a month. I´m so lucky I got to know him and be a small part of his conversion.

Johana Pineda was also baptized this week with Javier. We owe a lot to her husband, Kenny, who helped us get her prepared and ready for baptism. She´s also moving this next week to Guayaquil. Can´t really blame her though, she and Javier have a great opportunity to open their own practice there. They are both specialists, he operates on the skull and Johana operates on knee´s, ankle´s, and hips. It´s sad to see them go, but at least we know them, right? She was so great, especially because she had to be baptized 4 times in freezing cold water. Her dress kept inflating...poor thing.

Javier will be recieving the Priesthood next week and also will be blessing the Sacrament next week as well for the very first time. So I´ve decided the law of Sacrifice really does pay off in the long run.

We are also ready for Marisela Solís and Doménica Garcia to be baptized next week. Hopefully the water heater will be ready and fixed by next week. The water really is so cold here, sometimes it surprised me that people actually go in!

Since we are losing so many investigators to the waters of baptism we will be furiously searching some new people to teach this week! Keep us in your prayers!

Sister Tanner