ya i got nothing

Whaaatttupppp peeeeps in teh big United States?!?!  another week down here in Colombia!!!  Man i started wondering if maybe, being closer to the equator here in Colombia, we travel faster (cover a larger distance) with the Earth`s rotation, and for that time goes by faster (it makes sense if you dont think about it) but ya anyways, my point, TIME IS FLYYYYING!!!!

the week was normal without anything overly exciting, i mean cars always honking, sweating like crazy, nonestop sounds of frogs croacking and other animals in this tropical costal jungle (ya, not sure if ive emphasized that yet about Buenaventura, but remember how cool it was to wake up in the youngs old house in Australia when we were there, how cool it was to wake up to the sound of soooo many different animals and stuff???  ya thats EXACTLY how it is here, SOOO COOL!!!!), salsa music coming out of everysingle inanimate jungle, but ya other than that, just normal until wednesday when we went to Cali for the leadership meeting with all the zone leaders and office missionaries!

So wednesday we headed out for the big and famous Cali again and got there in the night and stayed with some good friends there in Cali Elder Dean and Elder Tolentino, from Provo and Peru.  Then the next day i had my first leadership meeting!!!  Haha honestly it wasnt anythign overly amazing but really fun to catch up with other missionaries!  We jsut talked a ton about how we are going to use the ``Èl es la Dàdiva`` iniciation during Christmas time (im sure you guys have seen that video the churh made right?  ``He is the gift``?) and we talked a lot too about how many new missionaries there are, over half teh missionares here now have less than 3 months here in teh mission!  So they want us leaders to do more divisions and stuff with them... 

Ahhhh but then back to Cali..... we got stuck in sooooo much traffic, not sure why, but we were stuck in this little shuttle van with limited leg room for even a latino, so for a gringo it was rough, but finally got home a little after midnight... (dont worry mom the shuttle dropped us off directly in front of the house, so no we were not out on the street after midnight in Buenaventura...)

so ya we set some really high goals with everyone here in teh zone in the zone meeting while we relayed all the announcements and all from the leadership meeting and we are all suuuuper pumped and working hard in the zone!!!  K one small probem though thats been a bit tough is one of teh elders in our house has gotten super lazy and his comp isnt great about whipping him in shape, so ive been trying to help him get up on time and get dressed and all and actually study, but he jsut wants to sleep in always and hates studying and has been getting pretty annoyed with me, the younger guy, getting on him, but its alrgith im learning a lot about being a leader

alight so we had another baptism this week!!!  The guy who said he saw me in a dream sure enough got baptized and confirmed!!!  K it was sweet and all, but a small bummer haha i thought i was gonna be able to perform the baptism but he asked another guy in teh ward to do it, but its all good, ill have my chance in teh river soon enough

Alright few funny things from the week:  First off, so with the ``He is the gift`` video, they gave us missionaries a disk with a few other christmas videos as well to wath with the members and investigators and all, and we were watching one of teh other videos in our house one night when, i realize, amongst a group of people carroling are THE OLSENS!!!  Hahahaha i jumped and was like ``NO WAY`` cuz all the olsen`s daughters are in it and i explained to the other guys that they are my good friends and all and it was pretty cool...

Alright another random little thing about Buenaventura, the stairs here, are NEVER even!!!!  like, every single group of stairs, every staircase, big or small, has completely uneven steps!!!  There will be one big step with a big drop and then the next step will be like half the size, so IM ALWAYS FALLING!!!  I trip and fall ALL THE TIME on the dang stairs here hahaha so youve got to look straight down and really focus directly on the stairs while ascending or descending them, and even when you are going up and down them without falling, it just feels awkward usually to be taking big steps and then small steps and ya... there have been a good number of moments when latinos looked down and laughed at the gringo lying on the stairs holding his knee... but its ok, we are working through it...

Alright so one really neat but humbling experience this week.  I did divisions with the other gringo Elder Nail from texas in my house one day and he took me to the area called ``los puentes`` or ``the bridges`` which are houses built directly over the water of one of the inlets of the bay, and WOOOWWW im pretty sure you dont get much more poverty than this.... it was sad..... you can find all sorts of pictures online im sure, not a great place to take out a camera, but i sneaked mine out real quick to snap a picture that i will attach, but ya so they are just a few logs stuck into the shallow and absolutely disgusting water, with houses built around them and two by eights connecting them all, little bridges you walk along to get to each house... ya the houses dont have bathrooms, just holes in teh floor... and ya... ill let you use your imagination from there...

hahaha ohhh i knew i was still in Colombia though because some of these little houses, just a few, STILL HAD GIANT SPEAKERS!!!!!  I have no idea how, but yes, some of these houses were still blasting slasa music, and honestly, im not sure where the power comes from, nor how the houses dont break and fall, being rattled by the loud vibrating speakers, but ya its nuts....  So there is one family of members who live there, the poor people are sooo lazy, never come to church for teh dumbest excuses, but they have one son bless his heart who is suuuch a great kid, always goes to church, and is filling out his mission papers!!!!  Hes gonna be pretty soon the first missionary from Buenaventura, and everyone is soooo excited for him cuz the missionaries are who have constructed everything here and chyanged the peoples lives sooo much, and ya its neat!!!

Entonces, la verdad, no sè còmo puedo contarles mejor acerca de mis pensamientos de tal pobreza acà, pero me hace humillarme por lo menos, y me pone pensar en mis bendiciones primero, y despuès en la belleza de mi trabajo de traer este mensaje a toda la gente aqui en Colombia, el mensaje que salva a todas clases de personas!  Sè que un mensaje tan hermoso, solamente puede venir de un Dios no solo todopoderoso, sino todo amoroso tambièn.  Se me llena de Su amor cuando pienso en Su hijo tambièn, Jesucristo, a quien Dios enviò al mundo para darnos la senda a seguir, y sè que el Espìritu navideño que disfrutamos durante las celebraciones de Su nacimiento es el Espìritu Santo, el mismo que siempre me testifica de la verdad de este mensaje, y que testificarà de la veracidad a todo el mundo!  Sè que Èl vive, que me ama, que me dio su vida, que es mi Redentor, y mi Salvador, y lo digo en Su nombre, aun Jesucristo, amen.

les amo 

nos vemos  

Èlder Tenney