Week 20: Feel the Burn!

The missionary life is not an easy one.  We have to get up early, spend hours studying for our investigators, go out and walk for miles, talking to everyone and trying to get into houses to teach people lessons.  There are some days where by the time you get home you just want to collapse into bed.  So my companion and I decided to make things even more physically difficult by waking up early and going to the gym with the other Elders.  The funny thing is that it isn't nearly as difficult as you might think to wake up at 5:00 in the morning and go work out for an hour and a half.  It actually feels really good to start the day like that!

We have a trip to the temple coming up in a couple weeks (2 April).  This trip is for investigators, so we're inviting everyone, and have asked the branch to invite their friends and family.  Everyone is super excited about it, even some of the less-active (or inactive) members.

I'm adjusting very quickly to having a companion who speaks very little english.  It's way different to speak spanish all day every day, but it's exactly what I need to really master the language.  I'm finally starting to think in Spanish!  Now I just need to get down the verb conjugations...

We had a very interesting contact this week.  The mom of a family we contacted told us that she had met with the missionaries... 20 years ago!  Pretty crazy, but it gets better.  She said, wait for a second, I'm going to go get something.  When she returned, she had the Book of Mormon that the missionaries gave her all those years ago.  It's a bit beat up, but it was so cool that she had it after all of this time!  We're going back to teach them on Tuesday, and they are super positive!

Since somebody asked, Mariela is still absolutely amazing!  She's working on her family history, and is going to go to the temple to be baptized for her mom and grandma next month!  I'm trying to teach her 1-year-old daughter Sofía how to say elder.  So far I haven't been successful, but I think she'll say it at least once before I leave!

Love you all!

Elder Colton West

El Salvador San Salvador East Mission

Editors Note: Elder West mentioned Mariela (who he baptized Feb. 14th) going to the temple to be baptized for her mom and grandma.  For those of you who are not members of our church who would like to know why we do "baptisms for the dead" please read this link: http://www.mormon.org/faq/baptism-for-the-dead  If you have any further questions about this or any of our other beliefs, please don't hesitate to ask me or email Elder West :)

Elder West and his new companion, Elder Chamorro, from Nicaragua

President Vasquez's daughter, Melissa, was taking pictures of everyone
and everything at change meeting.  So I took a picture of her taking a picture of me.
She leaves for her mission to SLC Temple Square in June!

Distrito Ilobasco (Ilobasco District).
Work hard, play hard, preach hard.
(Elder West 2nd from right; his companion Elder Chamorro far left).

There's a place by my house that makes some very delicious crepes.
This one is a chicken parmesan crepe, which is super delicious.

The market.  It's a bit crazy in there, but so cool.
What you can see is maybe 1/4 of the market area.