It sounds like you guys are staying nice and busy at home! Thanks for the updates on everyone.
I am attaching a picture of our room. It is a pretty decent apartment with a kitchen, iron/fridge/supplies room, a room with our closets, a bathroom (we have warm shower water which is cool), a laundry room, and a room that we don't even use. We walk through two gates, a flight of stairs, and a big door to get into our yellow home. Very fortunately we have Air Conditioning as well. It is a good home. The only less-good part is our constant war with cockroaches.
The Spanish is coming very well. I must say some of the slang here is pretty funny.
There are a bunch of Spanglish words that are pretty common. Among my favorite are: Catchar- to catch (I found this one out because there is a priest in the ward who plays American Football and he told me this and a bunch of other words that are the same like 'touchdown' and tacklear- to tackle), watchar- to watch, mopear- to mop, text- text, feys (face)- facebook. But yes, the people can understand me and every day I am able to communicate more fluently with them. I have to stay on my toes when we meet someone new because if I don't understand a part and ask them to repeat, they switch over and start using the little English they know or start making grunts and hand signals. Ugh.
There are a bunch of Spanglish words that are pretty common. Among my favorite are: Catchar- to catch (I found this one out because there is a priest in the ward who plays American Football and he told me this and a bunch of other words that are the same like 'touchdown' and tacklear- to tackle), watchar- to watch, mopear- to mop, text- text, feys (face)- facebook. But yes, the people can understand me and every day I am able to communicate more fluently with them. I have to stay on my toes when we meet someone new because if I don't understand a part and ask them to repeat, they switch over and start using the little English they know or start making grunts and hand signals. Ugh.
The weather has been CRAZY down here! During the day it is usually super hot, but because there is a huge storm over Mexico right now, every night there are crazy storms and the streets fill with water (which I think is kind of funny for some reason). But the craziest part is the lightening. Holy cow. The strike rate is at least double down here in Mexico. As we were just about to go to bed one huge bold illuminated the city, in an instant we saw, heard, and felt a huge BOOM and the power was gone.
The rain is actually a bit of a problem for our investigators whose homes are less stable. Last Saturday we met with a humble family on the edge of Los Mochis, the Montenegros (Guillermo is inactive, Vanessa and her toddler are not). They enjoyed the lesson and said they would come with Vanessa's mom if it didn't rain on Sunday (because when it rains they have to move a bunch of things in the house to keep them dry). Well, I prayed really hard for them Saturday night that they might be able to attend church and I assume Elder Richards did the same. The next day, it did not rain. Although there were clouds all around the city, there was no rain. But to our disappointment, there were no Montenegros either. I hope and pray that they still have a desire to go if something else held them up. We will find out this week.
The carnal cool moment of the week was on Thursday when I got to use a machete to chop off large, dead limbs of palm trees for service. I felt like Ammon chopping off the arms of the wicked thieves. It was a fun couple hours. The whole district came down to help out and we had a good time cleaning up a park with sister Cruz from the ward who organized it.
The tender mercy of the week was probably on Sunday when the ward pianist wasn't there I was able to play. I was very grateful to be able to use that talent for a major reason of why I developed it. It was great, although the first song was a bit bumpy because I think it was one of the few that they only have in the Spanish hymn book, but I caught on by the last verse :) A few ladies came up to me after and asked if I could give piano lessons to their kids. So, after English classes on Saturday (oh yeah, p.s. we started English classes this past week) I will be teaching a young girl and boy. In Spanish. Ay ay ay.
The productive cool moment of the week was probably our Zone Conference on Friday. Our zone leaders gave a cool lesson on being virtuous and being obedient and how these affect our work. The power of the Spirit and the power of the Priesthood act according to the worthiness of the individual. If we are being exactly obedient and keeping ourselves pure from the junk of the world we will have spiritual power ; power that comes in part from faith that the Lord is with you because you have done your side of the deal. I am so grateful for the promises and covenants we are able to receive as we simply obey our Father in Heaven. I know that obedience is key in our journey to become like our Heavenly Father.
Well, I love you. I thank you again for the love you give to me. Seeing some of the parenting styles down here, I am evermore grateful. I have everything that I could ask for.
I love you,
Elder Clement
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