Mole y Fiestas

Hello everyone. I send you a cordial ´hola´ from Mexico. This week has been pretty interesting. I don´t have much time either so I´m not going to send pictures and this might be a shorter email :(.

On Tuesday, we had a pretty good day, we had lessons with 2 investigators that have baptismal dates, Ivette and Teresa. They are both really solid. So Ivette is an investigator that is 19 years old and was actually going to be baptized a while ago but didn't do it because her parents were against it. We contacted her because she started coming to church again and she says that she wants to be baptized. Now, when we met with her, her testimony seemed very strong and she put her own goal to be baptized. The only thing that worries us is that we haven´t been able to find her for a few days and she didn't go to church. We´re hoping to run into her today or tomorrow. Teresa is doing great though.

Traditional Mole Sauce

So in the week it was pretty normal. We went to the district meeting of Elder Philippe which was good. Elder Philippe is crazy, but funny. On Friday we had interchanges with two Elders in our zone, Elder Whiting and Elder Villa. I was here in the area with Elder Whiting, and it went very well. We had some really good lessons and ran into a lot of people. We also taught Jazmine, who is going to be baptized in a couple of weeks. She is also doing very well! 

So the really big thing that happened this week was that the town party of Nopalucan started on Saturday and Sunday. Well on Saturday it was mostly preparations, but on Sunday it was crazy. Seriously, it was nuts yesterday and still a little bit today. The streets were full of cars and people yesterday, and literally everyone in the town made and is making mole. If you don´t know, Mole is a food that is tradicional to Puebla and Tlaxcala, and its like a salsa with tons of condiments and chocolate that is put on meat. All of the members and investigators invited us to drop by. We ate so much mole yesterday it was ridiculous. Its just nuts, literally in every house there are just chairs and tables set up and everyone is serving Mole. On Saturday we also helped our investigator Teresa prepare a little bit. We went with her to help kill and dress the chicken. It was quite the experience, and I can no longer say that I've never killed a chicken haha.

Anyways, it was a interesting week, and we are going to be eating mole for probably all of this week. We´re hoping that we don´t get sick haha. Everybody enjoy the end of July!

- Elder Hartvigsen

Elder Hartvigsen's mom and sister meet his returning Mission President,
President and Hermana Christensen, prior to their Sacrament Meeting report in Utah.

A week of meetings and sickness:D

Hey all. Hope that you are all well. This week we had a lot of meetings and my companion was pretty sick at the end of the week. The worst thing in the mission is when you or your companion is sick. You just have to sit in the house. I've been learning patience haha. 

Early in the week was good. On Tuesday we had a meeting with the stake president and mission president, Pres. Nelson. It was a good meeting. Interesting to get to know new stake leadership. The stake president it a good guy. The stake has a really high vision for missionary work which is great! We´re excited to work with them. In the evening we had divisions with some members and had some appointments with was great. We had an appointment with an investiagator named Teresa who is solid! She is always there for our appointments, we always find her reading her Book of Mormon, and she always goes to church (even when we don´t go). She also had two kids that are super funny. They always make fun of my companion's accent. On Wednesday we had interviews with Pres. Nelson which was good. It is good to be able to get to know him and his wife better. In the afternoon we had interchanges with one of our District Leaders, Elder Puente and his companion Elder Sarver. I went with Elder Puente to his area in San Martin Texmalucan. It was a good day. We taught a lot and felt the spirit strongly in a few lessons. Elder Puente is a great Elder.

Time marches on - 1 year in Mexico

On Thursday we had to go to Puebla to renew my Visa. Its such a pain to go to the offices when you're so far away. It was also really interesting to see all of my generation there in the offices. I can´t believe that it has been almost a year ago when we arrived here in Mexico. It's crazy, I can´t wrap my head around it. After that we came back to area but Elder Breceda got really sick on the ride home so he stayed in the house that night. We did divisions with some members so that I could leave and go to a couple of appointments though.

Friday we gave a training to the zone on how to do the monthly forms that we fill out for the progress of our wards and investigators. That was alright. Not the funnest thing to do, but it was necesary haha. In the afternoon we had a few lessons with a recent convert and a few new investigators that we found. The recent convert works making tortillas and they are super good. A good tortilla with salt really hits the spot! The new investigators, Olita and Katia are really solid as well. They were skeptical at first but later they started to become interested. Cool lesson.

Saturday and Sunday my comp got pretty sick. We didn't leave accept for Sunday in the afternoon when Elder Philippe and Elder Neuwirth came by to help us go to a few appointments. Out of the four sundays that I have been here, I´ve only gone to church 1 time. Someone should probably visit us so we don´t go inactive haha. Well, I hope that you all have a good week, and enjoy Pioneer day!

-Elder Hartvigsen

A Week of Work :)

Hey, how´s it going everyone. I hope that you are all doing well and enjoying whatever you all are doing. This transfer is flying by. We are already in week 4 our of 6 weeks. Time seems to keep going faster and faster. Hay que aprovecharlo. (We must take advantage)

Companions in Tule

OK, Tuesday was an interesting day, my companion was stuck in the house again because one of the medications that the doctors gave him. We had a few appointments so we called the Elders from San Jorge to help us out for the few appointments that we had. So we were on divisions with Elder Neuwirth and I out working and Elder Philippe and Elder Breceda in the house. We have some good appointments. Some interesting ones as well. We have some investigators that say that it isn't OK that we baptize in fonts, that we need to be baptizing in rivers haha. It was an interesting lesson. They were the investiagators that thought that Adam and Eve were little birds before the fall haha.

Elder Hartvigsen's Zone

On Wednesday we had our Zone Meeting which went well. We talked about how we can work better with members, go on divisions with them, help them get involved in their own personal ministry. We also invited a recent convert to accompany us for the demonstration on how to teach the members from Preach my Gospel to help teach a lesson to a friend. It went very well and I learned a lot from the meeting. The truth is that I love to have zone and district meetings because I learn just as much if not more from the missionaries in the zone! Its awesome to learn one from another. Also on Wednesday we had divisions with the Elders from San Jorge again officially. As leaders we have to do divisions with our District Leaders at least once a transfer. I was with Elder Neuwirth in our area again. Elder Neiwirth is a great Elder that has about 2 transfers in Mexico and speaks Spanish really well! We had a good time working together.

Friday was a good day as well, we had a few lessons and our ward mission coordination meeting. I met the ward mission leader which was good as well. He´s a great guy, and on Saturday we went with him and his wife to a little town in our area called San Diego to go meet with a less active and search references. It was a good experience to be able to teach and find with our mission leader. On Sunday I finally had the opportunity to go to church here! It was great to be able to get to know the ward. It is a lot smaller than I am used to, but there are some really powerful members here. I also was asked to give a talk right before the meeting started haha. Have to love that when it happens. It went well though.

Last week - hanging out at the hospital for two days

Yup, we had a good week in which we actually worked! Sometimes we forget it, but it really is a great blessing to be able to work and be healthy enough to do it. Everyone have a great week!

-Elder Hartvigsen

Mexican 4th of July

Greetings from Mexico, I hope that you all enjoyed your 4th of July´s. I had an alright one in the Hospital haha. It wasn't me that got sick though so that was good, but I´ll get to that.

It started off as a good normal week. We had a good lesson on Monday night with an investigador that has a really good spirit about him. He seems to really have made changes in his life, the only thing is that he doesn't feel ready to be baptized and says we wants to read all of the Bible before he gets baptized haha. Tuesday was a great day! We had a good number of good lessons with investigators and members. It was a really productive day.

On Wednesday we didn't have as much as a productive day because we had to do the monthly forms. We also had to do divisions with one of our District leaders because his companion was sick and the District leader had to do his forms as well. So we were running around doing that all day Wednesday. 

The new area. Great to be out of the big city.

Thursday was a really interesting day. We did our weekly planning which was great as always. And in the afternoon after la comida, we went to a zone conference to meet our new mission President, President Nelson. It was very strange. It made it real that Pres. Christensen had already left. President Nelson is a good guy. He´s from California, a foot doctor, has 4 children, and a few grandchildren. They arrived in Puebla on Wednesday in the afternoon because their flight out of Houston was delayed, so they flew into Mexico City and stayed there for the night on Tuesday. They didn't have the chance to see the Christensens because they arrived late. They also said that before they arrived they were with one of their daughters as she was giving birth to one of their Grandchildren. They said that it had been predicted that there were going to be some very serious complications with the birth, and they were very worried about that as parents that were about to go live in Mexico for 3 years. However they told us that there weren't any complications and the mother and child had both gone to their home. It was good to get to know them.

On Friday we had the leadership council with President Nelson which was also pretty strange without President Christensen. It was interesting to be able to interact more with President Nelson. We talked a lot about how we can work with members and help them get involved in missionary work. It was as organized as previous councils but that´s to be expected from a new mission president haha. I also got to talk to him when we were eating and he and his wife told us about how  the process is to be selected as a mission president. Its pretty interesting.

OK, so Friday night and Saturday morning my companion was having some pretty bad abdominal pain, and hadn't been feeling great for the whole week. On Saturday morning we called the mission doctor and she told him to go to the hospital to get checked out. So we went to Puebla (1.5 hrs. from our area) and we stayed there until today. So my companion has had a history of stomach illness, so they gave him some medicine and watched him. He´s doing a lot better now, they gave him some prescriptions and told him to watch what he eats. But it is so boring to be in a hospital for 2 days straight. I was also super bummed out that we didn't go to church. I still haven´t gone to church here! But this week I´m sure we´ll go. It was nice to get some sleep though.

Yup, so here we are. We just got back to our area about an hour ago, so we have to do our wash and clean still. Oh well, I´m glad that they let us leave today. I´m looking forward to a week of working well here. Everyone have a good week!

-Elder Hartvigsen