April 2, 2012

Well, our weekend was pretty cool. We took a trip to La Romana but more on that later! We did lots of work and are having lots of fun too. Glad to hear about everybody's (but Tys) weeks. Seems like everything is pretty normal so that is awesome. I hope everyone is doing better (Aunt Teri and Scott) I am sure they will be fine.
So right now to the questions!

Q: How was conference? Where did you watch it? English/Spanish?

A:It was AMAZING! I loved it. So on Saturday morning we took off from El Seibo to go to La Romana to watch the conference in English. So I got to see everything in English and oh, my goodness, it was awesome. I think that was one of the fastest weekends in my life, even though I had to sleep on two yoga mats Saturday night. It was great. I learned so much. I would have to say Bishop Edgely gave a really good talk. It was probably one of my favorites from the first day. What he said about inactives is so true. At first it is just one person and then that person has children who have children who have children until generations are lost and to me that is super sad because it is something I have seen here in the DR. The crazy thing is that it is happening across the world. And some of these people want to come back but they just don't know how. His story about the young student that he interviewed to be a stake missionary and then she told him that she was inactive and he had no idea and she had been trying to get the strength to go back to church. It sounds crazy that she said that but I totally understand her. They are afraid that nobody will say hi to them or sit by them and even though they have a testimony they are just scared. I really liked that talk. I also liked the stories that dad talked about. And we really don't have the door slamming on our face problem here but it can be pretty devastating when you have someone that you want the best for to find the truth and they don't do everything necessary to get there. It is tough but it is relieved by finding the people that do change.
UPDATE: Miguel got baptized two weeks ago! I guess it was a really spiritual baptism.
It is knowing that you helped someone get closer to Christ that makes this the best two years of our lives. But yeah, I loved conference this weekend. I hope you all enjoyed it as well. I cant wait to get the Liahona with all the talks and get to go over them again.

Q: How is your voice?

A:Fine. I got a nice break this weekend.

Q: Are you doing an Easter Egg hunt?
A: Nope.

Q: Does Santa Semana start today for the Dominicans?

A: Yeah it does so this should be a pretty interesting week.

Q: Do the Dominicans have any Easter Traditions?

A: Um, Semana Santa when everyone gets drunk and stays in big above ground swimming pools all day. But that is all I know about OH and Habichuelas con Dulce which is something they eat but I haven't tried it so we will see how that is this week.

This week was nice because we had a lot of return lessons and didn't have to do as much contacting as the weeks before. So it was good to be able to try to keep developing the relationships that we have started to form here in El Seibo. And we will keep looking for new people because that is what we do. At the beginning of the mission I didn't like contacting people because it was awkward and I didn't understand everything but know I like to contact. It is kind of weird how you change throughout the two years. It is funny because I start to feel like I am Dad making friends everywhere I go. Last night on the bus ride back to the Seibo I talked to the guy next to me for a while. Something I would never had done before the mission. But it is something that Elder Rosado really taught me (And I guess Dad did too before the mission). Just be super friendly and they will talk to you. Dominicans like to talk so really all you have to do is get them started and they will go on forever. But we have had some pretty cool experiences and then also some weird ones. We have had so many people come up to us and contact us. I have almost never had that. And these are people that want to learn. It is pretty cool. 

Now for the weird... we saw two roosters fighting in the street without any human provoking. They were battling for territory or something.  It was cool. 

Also talked to a guy that we were pretty sure was a drug dealer because it was a Dominican that was dressed really nice with a gun and he talked to us about his Russian wife and how he speaks English, French, Russian and Dutch. He spoke English really well and he had a nice car. But that is just what we thought. I think that is it. 

We are going to keep up the hard work and try to make our best of this difficult week ahead. Love you all very much and have fun weeks!

Con Amor,

élder miguel felipe coñiam