Week 25...1/26/15...Second Companion, ELDER GARBOZA and Herba Magic

Well, I was writing this email and then the lights went out. And lately, they've been coming and going for days at a time. So I thought I wasn't gonna be able to write. But then as we were leaving walking to go back to San Pablo from Malacatan we ran into this Internet cafe that had a ''planta'' or energy generator! So we are in that one right now and super happy that we get to write home!

This week was insane as well! I'm going to apologize right away for no pictures because I forgot my cable to my camera at home;(.   This week was crazy for real though!  On Tuesday we got news of the changes in our district meeting. And Elder Lagos my companion and trainer for 3 changes got changed to go to Serchil which is waaay up in the mountains where it's super cold! He wanted to go say goodbye to all of the members and one of the others in our area.  He went with another Elder and I headed out with Elder Toala. We only had one lesson in my area and then we went to work in his.

That's been the big thing this week.  Presidente Ruiz gave us a challenge, if we could complete our goal as a zone or find 20 new people to teach each companionship in the zone we could make a zone temple trip! So we've been working super hard for that. On Wednesday we went to go drop off Elder Lagos to go to the change meeting in Reu. I stayed and worked with Elder Moreno who had his Birthday the same day.  We also worked with Elder Bagley, his area is in San Rafael. They're both super cool guys! We made french toast for Elder Moreno's Birthday and then went to help him find ''Nuevos.''  We worked super hard in the morning and then headed to lunch where the people made a cake for Elder Moreno. The only bad part was for lunch they served us some Herbas.  Just looking at them made me sick, but I pulled off some magic making them disappear into a napkin and into my pocket.

Then we went to the Church to pick up our new companions. I'm now with Elder Garboza. He's from Peru and holy cow he is incredible! He's such a good teacher and an awesome guy and a super good missionary.  I'm so excited that he's gonna be my comp for this change! So we worked super hard on Wednesday but didn't find very many news. Thursday morning we had our zone meeting and then decided we would go help the hermanas find some nuevos the next day by having an Ataque de Area or area attack. 

We all met up the next day in Malacatan and just went to work, everyone with a new companion.  I went with Elder Goldsberry who only has one change in the mission and later with Elder Fickes. It was super cool and just in a couple hours we had met a ton of people! However, that only left us with a few opportunities to find and teach new people. We prayed and worked super hard and miraculously we contacted and taught 22 people the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. So now as a Zone we get to go to the TEMPLE!!!! Which is super exciting! I'm really excited! I don't know if you can tell...

But ya life is super good! We have run into a bunch of people lately so we have a ton of investigatores. But the most positive one is named Oralia. She knows everything is true and we are just waiting for her and her boyfriend to get married and then she's going to get baptized!  Also, something super cool is happening this next week! We're having Elder Ochoa (70) come to speak to us as a Multizone Conference! So that's incredible and I'll let you know how it goes!

I hope that everything is going well at home! I'm doing amazing here.  I'm super pumped for the opportunity that I have to work with my new comp. I know that this work is inspired and is the work of our Heavenly Father.  This church is true and is the only one that has all of the truth in all of the earth. I'm sure of it. If you're not sure I challenge you tonight to go and ask our Heavenly Father in prayer.  I know He will answer because He answered me.

I love you all and miss you a ton but I'm loving serving the Lord down here.  It's changing my life every day!

Love,

Elder Pugmire

In my letter, I asked if he made his bed every day. . .
"Mom. Did I make my bed when I lived at home? Haha just kidding! You would be so proud of me if you could see how some of the missionaries live here. The Latinos are usually hit or miss.  But all of the ones in my house have been pretty decent. I clean the house every week, wash the dishes every night, make my bed every day, and sweep the floor around 4 times a week. You would be so proud! Sounds like everything is going well with everyone!

Week 24...1/19/15...Building School Rooms, The Torta Guys, Stitches

Hey guys what's going on? Sorry, this email is gonna be a little short because I'm short on time. This week was great though! First of all, on Tuesday our Mission President came to all of the Zones and we all got to watch ''Meet the Mormons'' in Spanish.  It's like a super big deal because it hasn't been released yet here in Central America and President had one of the only copies! So that was super cool!

That day I went on divisions with Elder Fickes!  It was super chill and the coolest part of the next day was we went and taught these two people that I know from San Pablo!  THE TORTA GUYS!  They always come up to San Pablo to cook and sleep every night but they live in Malacatan!  They are super cool and always give us discounted tortas and the lesson was super good!

Wednesday I went on divisions again with Elder Toala because my comp went to show Elder Solorio the area of Tocache.  We had a miracle happen.  We contacted a house we felt like we should visit and we ran into a lady who says she was a member and was going through a really hard time.  We were able to share a message with her and she gave us like three family references to go and teach!  So that was awesome as well!

On Thursday we went to contact one of the people we met a few months ago.  His name is Santos P.  When we met him he was super drunk but knew a ton about the Book of Mormon!  We had seen him like three times since the first time and every time he was drunk.  The miracle was when we visited him he was sober!  He introduced us to his family and told us he used to work for the mission office or something like that and he really liked to study the Book of Mormon but he had given his away to someone!  So we gladly gave him another and he was super happy to get back to reading it!  We're going to go visit him again this week!

Elder Lagos had his birthday on Saturday and I gave him a deck of cards and the promise to teach him some tricks.  Then we left in the morning to go give service at this school.  They were building three new rooms and so we with the branch went to go work construction. We mixed all of the dirt, concrete, and rocks on the ground and then carried it by buckets or wheel barrow until we finished!  Man, it was tiring!  But still super cool!

But ya that's about this week hope everyone is well!

Have a great week everyone!

Love,

Elder Pugmire

P.S. I didn't include this part in my letter home because I didn't want mom to worry. But after we were done helping with the school floor, we went to play soccer on the cement cancha nearby. After a little bit, we were just playing around and I started playing with my arms in my shirt trying to be funny (fair enough right, like you don't need your arms to play soccer....wellll...). Anyways, I suddenly realized I was the only white guy on the field, the ball was right in front of me and there was only one guy between me and the goal, and if I could score armless, I would forever go down as a soccer legend in these member's eyes. So as I skillfully moved the ball around my opponent, my foot caught his ever so slightly. I soon noticed two things, 1. I was falling, and 2. I had no arms to stop myself. In desperation of window elbow rolling, I landed on my face, elbow, and knee. On the ground, I examined myself from the privacy of my own shirt and figured my face was just scraped up and no serious harm had been done. Well, that was until the members gasped and pointed at the "hole" in my arm. I ended up having to go to the hospital in Malacatan in the back of a pickup/ambulance to get 7 stitches. Everyone was following us thinking about what could have happened to the town Gringo to warrant a ride in the ambulance. Somehow, I never knew how or if we ended up paying anyone, maybe the church just picked up the bill somehow but who knows. We just smiled and waved to make it seem like it wasn't a big deal. It was a sketchy hospital, but everyone jumped right away to help me out! I felt kinda bad because I feel like there were a lot of people in worse condition than I was in just in the waiting room. But ya, that was my gift to Elder Lagos, happy birthday, one experience he would never have with any of his other companions.

Hermano Daniel, Elder Solorio, Elder (first name not missionary) Romeo, Elder Lagos, Hermano Romeo, and his sons.

Week 23...1/12/15...Teaching and we believe in Soccer

Well Wow! I'm sitting back at the computer. This week went by insanely fast. I honestly don't remember what happened. I think I got sick this week but maybe that was last week. I don't remember. Ummmmm well this is awkward. . . I guess I'll give you an update on a few of our investigators and hopefully I'll remember some things that have happened. 

So, we're teaching this lady named Oralia. She's super cool and has a huge desire to learn about the gospel and already has told us she wants to be baptized! (Is baptized in with a z? I don't remember how to spell!!! UHHHHH! Oh well, it never was a strong point of mine.) So that's super cool! All we are waiting for is for her and her boyfriend, who is a member returned missionary, to get married! They've got a wedding scheduled for the end of January. But she's super cool!

We also have this one family, well actually like 6 families up in Colima 1.  They all live in the same house but it's actually a really big house. We are really still working on learning names and figure out who is related to who because everyone is related but we don't know-how.  We have a soccer activity scheduled for this next Saturday! Oh, that's something fun about the other churches. A lot of the Pastors here preach against soccer. They say that it's a sin and a lot of churches don't permit their members to play. They say playing soccer is like playing with the devil's head... kinda strange. So that was a concern of this family because they like soccer. So that's a fun fact of the day!

We play every Friday Night at the Cancha de Wally. He's the owner and plays goalie for us. When we had Elder Lagos and Gavarette we were a force to be reckoned with. Elder Lagos and Gavarrette each played for semi-pro teams in Honduras and Costa Rica. I was just big and tall compared to Guatemalans. We'd have teams from an hour away come to play us which was a blast. We even kind of had a personal tuc-tuc guy come pick us up. 

We are also teaching this family who are super cool. The coolest member of the family is this little girl who's 8 years old named Angie. She's the town Beauty princess or something. She's has wanted to get baptized for a year but her dad works in the military and never is home. So we've been working with them forever to get this family baptized but the big problem is time. The good thing is Angie finished up the year of being the town queen so that should free up the family a little bit for time. The dad is still praying to receive an answer and the other 2 kids said they don't want to get baptized unless the dad does. So that's what we're waiting for with them. Other than that we have a ton of people we've taught or been teaching.  The main problem is getting the people to come to church.

So ya, that's about this week! the only other thing that I remember is we went and gave some service by moving a big concrete pila and a chicken coop. Today's P-day was super fun! We had a huge water balloon fight with normal balloons. It was super cool! Then we went and got tortas which are the best things here like I've always said. But ya! Life is good! Changes are coming up on the 21st and my comps birthday is the 17th so things should be super cool! Hope everything is good for everyone! have an amazing week!

Peace out from Elder P!

Week 21 & 22...1/5/15...Holiday Food, Food, Food and Rat Killer

Translation:  "I will share the gift by filling Christmas with magic!``

Holy cow time has gone by soooo fast!  I'm almost to the 1/4 way mark! Sorry, I didn't write last week! The internet place hadn't paid for the internet so it was closed ;( dang it. But the good news was I got to talk with my family! And that was amazing! I really don't remember too well what happened three weeks ago or two weeks or this week so I'm just gonna try to lump everything together.

So first of all, once again my pictures have been lost.  I lent the memory card to our District leader and he seems to have misplaced it. I'm trying not to make him feel too bad about it because he feels pretty bad. But the good news is most of the photos are already sent home and I have more cards to use! But still, it's kind of a bummer.

Christmas here was insane.  I don't remember what happened when.  But basically, all we did was eat. Members, investigators, less actives, drunks on the street... everyone was inviting us to come and eat food at their house. But not just any food. . . TAMALES!!!! They are delicious but I'm pretty sure I've eaten enough to hold off for another year. We visited almost every member in over 3 days and ate at least one tamale at almost everyone. Then they would send us home with like 12 more. Our fridge was sooooo full! The other thing they serve a lot here kinda like the states are Cookies! But they all come in packages and they just eat a ton of them! That and sweets!

Christmas Eve Sweets and Food

My Comapero Loco

More food from our Presidente de Rama.
 It was soooooo good!

Man, I was soooo full! The cool thing was on New Year's  Eve we had dinner with our Branch President and his family! We had turkey which was soooooo good! But I was so full it was kinda hard to enjoy it. Right at 12 is when everyone lights off all of their fireworks so it's basically impossible to sleep!  Then we got to talk
to our families on Christmas Day and continued eating food. OH! I also was helping Hna Suceli set up skype so they could talk with their brother who is on his mission and guess who his companion is!!!??? ELDER COE!!! One of the coolest kids from the CCM! I was so pumped to say hi to him but that was all.

I got my package from Aunt CaMee and Uncle Travis and my Grandparents and it was awesome!!!! My comps loved it too! 

Some of my comps using the portable ping pong table Uncle Travis and Aunt CaMee and Grandma and Grandpa sent. They love it!


I made an incredible unhealthy invention from all of the food. . . my fantastic invention with all of the stuff that got sent in the packages. Featuring the all-powerful holiday oreo, Nutella, peanut butter cup, more Nutella, and a rolo. Yes yes, it is unhealthy but you better believe it tasted fantastic.

We've continued to teach a bunch of people and we should have some baptisms next week! But we've been praying really hard for them for a couple months so well see what the Lord has in mind!  Our Branch Christmas Activity was a huge hit!!!! We just were a little low on room.  

Wonderful New Year's Eve Meal w/ Presidente & Family

This week was pretty interesting. On New Year's Eve Day (is that a thing or did I just make that up?) We went to eat lunch and we got 3 things of meat about the size of marbles, rice and a ton of what's called herbas. Basically herbs but I think it was some spinach and other stuff other herbs.  It tasted terrible.  I almost died eating it. I'm super proud of myself because I ate all of it! Then I realized I had a problem. None of my companions had eaten it. Or at least all of it. I guess I was so busy choking it down I didn't realize no one else was going to eat it.  I had expected everyone else to eat it.  As soon as we left I started to feel sick.  We taught all afternoon and then about 7 o'clock we went to ask Hermano Daniel if he had something that could help my stomach. I drank some vitamin water and Alka seltzer but then threw up. We went home and for the rest of the night I was throwing up.  I didn't sleep at all. Finally, I got it all out of me but I still felt awful.  We left the next morning to go to work. But we returned to go pick up something.  I laid on my comps bed for like 2 seconds and passed out for 3 hours. The next thing I knew my comp was waking me up to go eat lunch.  I couldn't even bear the thought of eating.  Unfortunately, it was New Year's and so everyone once again invited us to eat. I ate a little bit and by the end of the night when we went to eat with Presidente I was feeling a lot better and right now I feel great! 

Sometimes in these weeks, we've had a great zone lunch.  So we had a great lunch as a zone someday after Christmas! Here's what it looked like from the second level of the church in Malacatan.  I took a photo but no one really was looking so I took another but I decided it was best to close my eyes for it. ;)

Here's our zone today.  We played volleyball and my team won the Tourney!
(Elder Bagley, Elder Heyrend, Elder Jensen, Elder Moreno? Elder Fickes, Me, Elder Goldsberry, Elder Arias, Elder Lagos, Elder Toala. Font: Elder Lovett, Elder Walton, Hermana? Hermana Cabrera, Elder?

OH! Today we played volleyball and our team of 4 elders, Jensen, Godinez, Heyrend and I won the championship!  I went on divisions with Elder Fickes the other day and it was awwwwsoooommmeee! The highlight happened in the morning. Elder Fickes'` house has a rat problem and in the night he said he heard them all night. (I slept like a normally do and didn't hear a thing.) Then right as we were about to leave for the day he saw a rat.  He called me over and I ran into the room with my slingshot and some pebbles and shut the door.  By then there was no escape and I felt like a Viking, Cave Man Warrior (or whoever uses slingshots to hunt) when I killed the rat with one shot from my slingshot.  Actually, I hit it twice but I think the thing that killed it was when it ran towards me and I drop kicked it across the room... But anyway we both were pretty pumped with our conquering.

The rat I killed with my slingshot. Ya, I'm pretty proud of it.

That's basically a quick or not so quick summary of these two weeks! I'm doing great and excited for this new year! I'm learning a ton and Spanish is coming so quick!  As long as I am doing my part of studying and praying the days come easy. There's such a difference between the days when I study and the days I miss.  I hope that everyone had a fantastic Holiday season and that this new year is the best one yet! Love and miss you all!

Love,

Elder (the rat killer) Pugmire