April 6

Thanks for the letter and pictures. I only had two pictures this week and the computer was giving me problems, so you´ll get them next week. 

I finally got your letter (Dad) this Friday along with a letter from Grammie in Newburyport and a Christmas letter from Brother Gentile. Thanks for the news and thoughts. 

I´m sad to hear that Grandma and Grandpa are thinking of getting an apartment. I´ve always had an unrealistic dream of living in the big brick house in Allentown. I agree that they do have a lot of stuff to be moved. I´m thinking of all the old kids books and comics on the little bookshelf downstairs. 

I don´t think there are any mormon spanish phrases. We never say adios, just like in English you rarely say ¨goodbye¨. We say cuidese and hasta luego ( take care of yourself and see you later) when saying goodbye. The missionaries have plenty of slang, but half of it is english. 

It´s interesting to see how people adapt to new places. For example, one sister who has been in the mission a few months longer than me has had a lot harder time adjusting. From what I can see, it´s all about attitude, and also that she came not speaking a word of Spanish and changed areas four times in the amount of time that I´ve just been in one. 

The difference is that she is always finding the things she doesn´t like about Bolivia or all the says that it´s different from the US instead of just accepting it as a different place. Also, she misses home a lot more than I do because; I think, she was a lot less independent before the mission. She was really sad to not be home for Easter, while I was really excited because there are kinder eggs here (I have yet to buy one, but I will this afternoon). 

The only really big thing this week was General Conference, which was great. This is the first time that I actually watched all of conference and I really enjoyed all the messages. It was so much more fun to watch in a group of missionaries (all the norteamericanos watched in a different room to have it in English) than alone at home. The general themes of the conference to me were the family and the atonement of Christ. One of the main messages I got from it is that salvation is not something I can earn through my own works, but only through relaying on Christ. However, we still need to keep the commandments to show our love for God. 

There was also a great message about the parable of the prodigal son that concluded with the message that we are really all the prodigal son. The speaker said that he had often thought of himself as the good son who stayed home, but that he realized that to God we are all prodigal children that must be forgiven even though we have made so many mistakes. In general, it was a beautiful conference and a vacation for the missionaries because we got to watch conference instead of working for two whole days. We only had two hours in the evenings to go visit people. 

Also, semana santa is a big deal here. On Friday night I saw a bunch of Roman soldiers walking down the road, no doubt, going to a reenactment at a nearby church. The tradition is to cook on Friday 12 different dishes and eat fish instead of meat. Most people cooked fish and a couple of the dishes, but not all. We can´t eat fish. :(

I love you all and look forward to the emails each week. Keep doing exciting things to write to me about. :)

Thanks for the reminder that germs cause illnesses, not weather. Everyone mentions the changeable weather when explaining why people are sick and I don´t even know the word for germs in Spanish, but there was clearly a cold or flu going around last week as the weather turned a little colder (not that much colder, in my New Englander opinion).

I´m glad you could figure out how to help Charles´ health. Hna Graciela, who got baptised a few weeks ago, has really bad asthma and ends up going to the hospital every couple of weeks. I am embarrassed to say that almost all of my knowledge about asthma comes from fanfiction, but it was very well researched fanfiction, so I know a lot more about asthma than Hna Nuñez. 

Hna Anavel's struggles with her kids (who are 8 and 4) seem very familiar to me. She is contantly fighting with Joanna, who is 8, over her homework. We try to tell her to be patient, that she´s only a little kid, and that it´s okay if she makes mistakes in her homework, but Hna Anavel is often upset with Joanna, which makes the whole house unhappy. My apologies to the boys for all the times I was yelling at you and they were just trying to eat dinner. Any advice we can give Hna Anavel? 

Oh, thanks for the family photos. Everyone says I look just like you (Mom), which I take as a compliment, and that we all look the same.