Nuevo Año

entonces voy a hacer que todos de ustedes van a google translate este.

esta semana fue super bien. realmente me encanta Bolivia y voy a stop talking in spanish now.

we have this investigator and he is literally the best. he is about 60ish and he is super nice and everytime we go to his house he is sitting with all the stuff we have given him waiting for us to get there. also we will explain stuff to him and he is super accepting. sometimes it takes him a second to proccess what we said, but when he does it is locked in.

it is like we give him a piece to the gospel puzzle, and it may take him a second to see where it fits, but after we explain it to him and he finds where it fits he clickes it in place and there it is.

tomorrow will be the start of a full year in the mission. i am honestly pretty excited. a whole year of eating saltaneas, wearing the exact same shirt every day, standing a lot closer to people in micros than i would like, waking up at 7:00, going to bed at 11:00, being a missionary. i am excited. here just so you actually believe me, i am going to put an "!" in there. i am excited!

this p day we hiked up a mountain. there is a mountain you can see from my apartamento that has the word cristo written on it. so we climbed to the top. it was pretty fun. i like mountains. 

i definitely think there is a reason that the lord always asked his prophets to go to the top of a mountain to recieve revelation.

picures to follow. because my momma asked for them.

 this is from the top. a cloud rolled in around us so you cant really see anything.

ya... we were in a cloud...

elder arkoudas

Feliz Navidad

dearest friends, family, and all the rest of you who snuck onto my email list (just kidding i hand select each and every one of you each week)

this week i would like to forgo the usual lightheared story telling i usually start with and instead jump straight to the story from this week that talks about the savior, and missionary work.

a couple days ago we had a zone activity. it was in the morning of a friday... any ways we went to this bakery and were going to make cookies and then the next day we were going to hand them out to some of our investigators.

i was feeling kinda grumpy, because instead of weekly planning we were doing something that would postpone weekly planning and cut in to our time spent out in the streets. i kinda wongly feel like any time i dont spend talking to people and teaching or contacting is a waste of time. so i was kinda grumpy

so we were sitting thyere and there were 20 of us in total. so 14 of us we just standing there watching. so i really felt like i was just wasting my time. but i took a step back and thought about why i am here. and i am here to help others come unto christ. and i realized that if i was grumpy no body would want to talk to me or interact with me, and then i couldnt be the example of the savior that i wanted to be.

so i folded my arms right there and asked for help. as soon as i ended my prayer i got up and started trying to be happy and trying to help. i can honestly say that it worked. i was able to help wih the cookies and we also helped our zone leaders move and i was happy.

this week i just wanted to let you all know that prayer works. there have been other times in my life when as soon as i asked for help i recieved it. whether that help was spiritual, mental, or physical. and i promise. i gaurantee. that it will work for you too.

no matter your problem, big, small, medium sized. your father in heaven wants to help you. 

and that is exactly why 2018 years ago he sent us our savior. he didnt come in the way you would expect. there was no chariots of fire or algo como asi (anything like that). there was a baby. just like how every other person enters this world.

but this one was different. he changed the history of the world. because of him we can forgive and be forgiven. we can overcome anything. any sin, disability, error, infermedy, injury, sickness, sadness, guilt, shame, every single thing in this world that is not perfect.

have a very merry christmas

elder arkoudas

 looking out my windo

 so we just throw our garbage out the window... and a bag of used matte got stuck on a power line.

 me and this fridge got something in common.  dos años gaurantee

this is how i dress when im cold. because i dont have a sweatshirt

this is how i dress when it is hot... jk jk i never wear this hat outside of the house. even though it is presidente approved, i look like a testigo de jehova.

week 13/104

i couldnt think of anything cool to put as the subject. this week was hot. like 35 degrees! (i´m not being sarcastic) (I am using Celsius) (like a scientist) but seriously it was hot. one day we bought three bags of juice for each of us. on the topic of juice i have been drinking a lot of juice lately. mainly because the water from the tap is poison and probably more importantly the big jugs of water we get leave your mouth tasting like garbage.

after lunch on day i was trying to study, but it was so hot i didnt want to sit at my desk. so i went and laid on my bed with my scriptures, and after about 5 minutes i learned a very important lesson. if it is very hot, and you lay down, you will fall asleep. even if you just woke up from a three year nap. you will fall asleep.

if any of you read my email last week i talked about how i have been tempted more in the last 3 weeks than ever before in my entire life. if you dont remember that far back, i got a package from my parents with my christmas presents in it. they were wrapped up nice and neat, and there was a note that specifically said dont open up the wrapped presents.

now, i didnt want to! I wanted to wait until christmas! so i hid them in my suitcase... 

but some how i found them! so i promised my self i wouldnt open them...

but i didnt keep my promise...

 one afternoon i was suposed to be studying...

 but instead i decided i would just open one to see what it was, and then i would leave it in my suitcase until christmas...

but i opened it up, and there was a sticky note that told me what one of the other presents was... 

so i had to open that one too... 

and then the unopened present looked lonely... 

so i opened that one too.

moral of the story, you can´t hide your own presents. and if you do, you cant open up even one before you are supposed too. and if you do, you definitely already opened up your presents early.

oh well, life is all about repentance and trying to be better. so maybe in a year, if i have any presents, i will be able to wait until christmas day to open them up.

one last story. we were meeting with this 17 year old kid Octavio, and we were sitting outside his house on the side walk, and the power went out, like in most of the city. it wasnt cloudy so you could see the stars really well. and normally i love looking up at the stars, and back home i know a few constellations, and how to find the north star, and i could spend hours staring at the stars.

but south of the equator the stars are different. there are different constellations and there isnt a north star. so as i was looking up at the stars instead of feeling peaceful and that same feeling of calm and of being at home, i felt lost. no matter how hard i searched nothing was the same. none of the stars i knew and loved were there. then i shifted my focus.

Earth only has one moon. and no matter where you are in the entire world you can find her in the night sky. and sure enough there she was. a little piece of something familiar when everything else had changed.

i share this story because i was able to relate it to my life right now. almost everything i know has changed over the last 13 weeks. the food, the people i see every day, what i do, when i wake up, what language i speak(or try to speak). but the one thing that will never change is who i am. i am a child of God. and he loves me. and i gaurantee with every fiber of my being, that he loves you too. no matter where you are physically, or spiritually. our heavenly father loves you wants you to come back to him.

and i say these things in the name of jesus christ amen.

Elder Arkoudas

ccm

here is a picture from the ccm. i forgot my camera cord so i cant send any of the new pictures i took. 

AIDS, Ants, Bananas, A Pepper, Christmas, and The Priesthood

so tuesday as part of the paper work i have to do to stay here in bolivia i had to go get tested for aids... so if i wasnt 100% sure i didnt have AIDS before (which i was ), i am now.

then this one night, i forget wich one, we passed by this foot bridge that had fallen down . we decided to fix it, and after lifting it out of the canal, i realized it had ants on it... the hard way. they started crawling on my hands,and then bitting my hands, and i started freaking out. so yeah not fun. seven bites later i now know that ants in bolivia bite too. 

down here they call bananas waleileis. that was important because it is fun to say.

then as part of the tramites(paper work) i have to do to stay here, i have to have an address, but here in bolivia they dont always do street names... or house numbers. so for an oficial government document i drew a map of where our apartment building is. yeah that is when i realized that i amdefinitely in a third world country

then we went to a members house for lunch with some other missionaries. and the mom of the house brought out a bag of peppers.they werelike kinda really hot. and a bunch of the other missionaries tried themand cried while they were eating them. so i wasnt going to eat one. then my zone leader put two in front of me and my companion... and then my compi ate his... and my momma didnt raise no chicken...so i ate mine too. i put itin my mouth bit down on it and startedchewing like crazy. then it hit my like awhen you bite down ona lemon wedge, but hot. not spicy, physical heat whacked me in the toungue. by the time i swallowed my mouth felt like it wasnt attachedto my body anymore. it hurt sooooooo bad. itwasnt even spicy after i swallowed, it just felt like my mouth was fullof molten hottness. now i have been hit by a truck before. and i can proudly say i didnt cry after that. but i have absolutely no shame in telling you all that i cryed. 3 whole tears.

then (this was actualy before the pepper) i got a package from my family!!  i knew they loved me! (just kidding gifts kinda stress me out. but i did know they loved me. i wasnt kidding about that) it had 4 presents in it, wrapped ones too. and ican honestly say this is the most tempted i have ever been. i was secretly praying my package wouldnt get here till afterchristmas because  i didnt want to have to wait to open it up... and nowi have to waittoopen themup. so i hid them in my suitcase... but i know that is where i hid them and i honestly cant think of another place to hide them where i wouldnt be able to find them.

then on sunday we went to a members home to eat lunch. and their hijita was sick so they asked us to give her a blessing. we did and then we ate lunch and as we were getting ready to leave they asked us to say another prayer n their house. and it just made me realize how truly blessed i was to grow up in a home where the priestood was present and could be used when it was needed. i also realized that i now hold that same authority, and that nothing is worth giving up that authority. and that in this world to not be worthy of it, or to not be worthy of having the spirit with us is foolish. if onlyi could remember more frequently that NOTHING is worth givingup that gift.

i hope you all know that i am not just down here in Bolivia having fun. i am having fun, but more important than that i am showing my father in heaven that my testimony is more than just words once a month in fast and testimony meeting. i know that my savior, our savior lives. and this time of year is the perfect time to for us to share this truth with the world.

as a missionary i am always inviting others to come unto christ. these next two weeks before chistmas i invite you to do the same. it doesnt have to be on another continent. or even outside the walls of your own home. but someone needs your testimony. the world needs your testimony. it doesnt have to be big. just let someone know that you know, that he lives. ifyou are scared, send it to me and next week i will anonomously send them in a groupemail. si lo quieren

esta es total,

elder arkoudas

the week the mission got real

i have started this email three times trying to be clever but none of them worked. so we are just going to go for it. we meaning me.

no matter who you are the lord is always ready to give you help. even when you forget you need it in a sertain aspect of life.

there was a time when some one hurt my feelings. it was a pretty good story i wont bore you with the details, but basically my feelings were hurt and i dont think they cared. anyways i would tell this story to people because it made them laugh and i like it when people laugh, but everytime i did it would remind me of the hurt feelings and i would feel the same anger all over again. 

anger isnt wholy conducive to a representative of the lord, and this last week i told this story to my companion. he laughed and i got angry again about how i had been treated. the next morning i flipped open a study guide to the doctrine and covenants and looked at the table of contents. two sections stood out to me. one about forgivness, how to feel forgiveness. and the other i dont remember but it sounded cool and like something i would enjoy. 

after thinking about it for a second i chose to read the section about how to feel forgiven first. in this section it said that the best way to feel forgivness was to forgive those who had wronged you. well that hit me like brick. and not like a bolivian brick either. this was an american brick.

*side note*, bricks in bolivia are mostly air, because they are cheaper to make that way. so the clay is pencil thick and then it is mostly air inside.

i realized that i still hated this person for the way they had treated me. i wasnt totally sure how i was supposed to forgive them. i didnt believe that i could just forget those feelings of hurt and anger. but i kept reading and after i finished that section i realized i could just treat forgiveness like faith. 

by that i mean that if i just showed a desire to forgive and everytime those feelings surfaced, if i told myself ididnt want to feel those feelings and focused on other feelings i would eventually forget them. 

the best i can think to describe it is like pretending... but in a good way. if you pretend to believe, or act like you do believe. doing things like reading scriptures because you want them to be true.or saying your prayers because you want someone to be listening. you are showing heavenly father that you want his help in your life. you want that faith, and then over time thatt desire to believe will turn into belief.

if you want to learn more read Alma:32. but dont read it just to read it. read it pretending like you have to give a family home evening lesson about it. trust me it helps out a lot.

other things that happened this wek is i got sick. like  couldnt leave our house sick. but my compi tells me he got sick like this once and after that he hasnt gotten that sick again. so hopefully my immune system does its job and remembers this sickness. cause i do not want that one again.

also i saw a spider about the size of an egg (sorry Rebecca Oborn) not just any egg either. this was a AAA farm grade chicken egg. honestly the worst part was that i was in a lesson too! so i had to just sit there! the investigator saw it a little while later and went and killed it. so its all good now.

thats about all i can think of. oh we went to our wards talent show. we sang called to serve in spanish and english. it was pretty neat. well thats al for now

Elder Arkoudas