Hola Familia! Things are going great here!

All of us stuffed in a car

Best companion picture haha we were sight seeing in the elders pensionista's car last Monday.

I'm finding out that our area is bigger everyday. But it's also more beautiful and big and open and I love it! It's a big change for it to be quiet on occasions and to come in contact with more cows than dogs. We do have to travel forever to get places, right now we are in Huancayo and we have to come to Huancayo three times this week. I guess we did last week too though because I had mission council. We walk a lot too sometimes it takes 30 minutes to an hour to arrive at appointments since lots of it is farmland but I have learned to enjoy walking and talking.

At a lake in Jauja

Speaking of the whole traveling thing, we usually travel in vans called combis. They are really 17 passenger vans that have routes and we just jump on them and get off wherever like a bus system except they are a lot cheaper. We only pay an equivelent to 50 cents a person to travel from Concepcion to Huancayo about 40 mins to 50 mins. So cheap! The only thing is that they pack people in them like sardines to not waste any space so its not always very comfortable for us because we are too tall for them. Many of the Peruvians can stand up straight and hold on to the bar but when we stand we have our neck pointing down. I can't believe how many people they fit in one sometimes, this week I think we broke a record or something. They had 34 people and two large sacks of potatoes in the back part, not counting the people sitting up front. We didn't even need to hold onto the bar because we were so squished and they couldn't close the door so people were almost hanging onto the outside. So Crazy! Everyday is an adventure because you never know what you will get.

Lots of photos this week

My district

This week we had a lot of success. More than this area had had the entire last cambio. When our district leader asked my companion what we were doing differently, she responded, without skipping a beat said, its because one of our companionship goals is to eat ice cream or chocolate everyday. We all laughed. Our companionship gets along well and it increased our ability to work I guess. But even with the jokes we were talking this morning and we honestly don't know what is different. All we know is that it is the Lord's work and we have to trust in him and his timing. We are so happy to be part of his successes!

Catholic churches are everywhere here

Women washing clothes in the river

Happy moments and awesome miracles from this week are.....

- having a family with a recent convert answer the door that hadn't for the entire last transfer

- having an inactive member that hasn't come for months show up to church that we visited

- finding one of our little old cute couples that we teach in the church Sunday morning trying to find their way to church

- having a woman come to church for the first time in 17 years and bringing her two daughter investigators after giving lots of excuses. Lots of people hugged her at church and were happy to see her, many that had been baptized the same time as her. So cool.

Church house where we meet on Sunday

Hope you all have a great week!

Hermana Rhoten 1