January 13, 2014
Elder Dana Sorensen -- Logrono, Spain

This has been a great week. We´ve been pretty busy this week with visits and contacting. Logroño is very nice. I enjoy contacting here because it´s fun to walk through the streets.

 Here´s a little history about my companion; he´s a great example to me. He´s Romanian but he´s lived in Madrid since he was 15 (12 years ago). He was baptized 2.5 years ago by two missionaries that stopped him in the street. He left for the mission a year later. His family doesn´t share his beliefs, so he doesn´t have any family support. He served in Romania for 8 months, then was transferred to the Barcelona mission. He speaks almost no English, so we communicate in Spanish. (Romanian and Spanish are actually very similar.) He´s a great example to me because he understands that we are working on the Lord´s time, so we work all day and don´t waste any time.

We ate out today with a less active. We went to a place where they have 100 different kinds of these "montaditos" (little sandwiches), and on Mondays each one costs 50 cents. It´s very traditional Spanish food.

We live in a piso with Elder Perkis from England, and Elder Westfall from California. It´s not a very big piso (it only has one bathroom), but it´s right across the street from the chapel. The man who owns it is actually an area seventy that lives in our ward. There are also two Hermanas that work in Logroño. Hermana Haglund is from Alpine, and Hermana Foncubierta from... not sure.

The ward here is great. We have the area seventy and the stake president living in our ward. We found a new investigator that came to church this week, and the members just took off with her. She´s good friends with at least 4 relief society sisters now, and they have invited her to all their activities.

Logroño is not very big, so there´s no tranvía or metro (tram or subway). They have a bus system, but we don´t travel to the other side of the city so we just walk everywhere (around 8 miles a day). They only speak Spanish here, as opposed to most of Spain. There are about 7 languages unique to Spain, so although almost everyone speaks Spanish, depending where you are there are other languages as well (Euskara, Catalá, etc.). But here in Logroño there´s only Spanish.

It´s great that you met the McArthurs. I met them in Barcelona when I came in (they were on their way out of the mission). I've heard a lot of good things about them from other missionaries.

I´ve talked to Ander. He says Logroño is about 1hr 15mins from Zarautz, so he can come and visit some time. I´m thinking about inviting him for a preparation day when we go hiking in the mountains with some members (there are very beautiful mountains around here, or so I've heard.)

       

There are some nice mountains in the back there... maybe we´ll go hiking there with Ander this month!

I finished D&C today for the first time. It´s been great to recognize more closely the blessings that come from having modern prophets and apostles. It´s really what sets us apart from other churches. If we didn´t have prophets (the priesthood) and modern revelation, we´d be just another church. I´m grateful for the opportunity to share that message with others.

Thank you for your support, prayers, and letters. I will send some pictures later today when I take them.

Love,

Élder Sorensen