Elder Tadje in Guatemala

FELIZ NAVIDAD!!!!!!  I hope that everybody had an absolutely FANTASTIC Christmas!!! It was strange having a Christmas without snow.... but I heard Utah got a little so those of you there got a white Christmas! Sleeping's been a little hard the last few days, because in Guatemala everybody celebrates holidays by burning. Every single house has a fire going in the street in front of them, burning whatever they can find- But especially, fireworks. There are a million tiendas or little stores on the streets, and every single one sells fireworks. Some are as cheap as 1 or 2 cents, so EVERYBODY buys them and lights them off. We got permission to be up at 12 and go on the roof Christmas Eve, and the entire city of Chimaltenango looked like it was exploding and filled with smoke!!   But Christmas was amazing, and the best part was the Facetime call home!! Because it's Guatemala and nothing works here it almost didn't happen, but after some earnest prayer we got ...

Yo yo, what's up?  Elder Tadje here for one more change in Chimal 2 with Elder Campbell! Stats of the change: Together we took 750,000 steps, or over 500 km. (About 315-320 miles) No one said missionaries wouldn't walk! This has been another good week- we were able to confirm Cecelia and Berta during sacrament meeting today!! It was amazing to see how happy it made them, and the value that the gospel has in their lives. After church I had the opportunity to baptize Santiago Mansilla. He's cousins with Jeremy, and turned 9 last September. His family is super active in the church (they just live 40 min away) but Santi hasn't wanted to get baptized because he didn't feel ready, and he's a little scared of water. But he came to church with his dad 2 Sundays ago and talked to us, and I don't know what we said, but from then on almost the only thing he talked about was his baptism. Every time we see him he brings us bags of cookies (for Elder Flaccito and...

Hola!!  It's hard to have a weekend better than 2 baptisms! Cecelia and Berta Fuentes were both baptized on Sunday, and I can honestly say I have never seen happier people! I was able to baptize Berta (64) and Elder Campbell was able to baptize Cecelia. (27)  HOLY COW THE WATER WAS FREEZING COLD!!! I think I saw a spider crawl into the font, but as soon as it hit the water it curled into a ball and turned into an ice cube. Berta came out of the water gasping, but grinning ear to ear! She started jumping (or kind of bouncing) with her arms in the air and saying "I did it! I feel so good!!"  (only in Spanish) Then she tried to hug me, but I kinda ruined the moment with an awkward handshake instead... That's one of the super hard things about this- that in such happy celebratory moments we can't do something simple like hug. Haha! Elder Campbell got hugged by Cecelia, and another member who was there at the baptism. I keep telling him it's ok, but he still f...

I have rarely seen more miracles and blessings being made manifest, but first off- who the heck is Marshmello?? Literally every other shirt and sweatshirt here has a picture of him on it- so someone please tell me who he is.  And also, I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Elder Campbell and I didn't even know it happened! Haha, Dia de accion de gracias apparently isn't a super big thing in Guatemala... but we feasted on bread and bags of pureed beans that we bought. Then I dreamed about a turkey last night, so overall the experience was basically the same!  This week we incredible- especially Sunday. Nothing will make your day like a dad walking up to you and saying my son is 9 years old- can you baptize him? But the highlight of the day was testimony meeting. Hermana Burgos set the tone. She is 93 years old, and one of the most faithful members I have ever hem. I'm also convinced she is the funniest lady on earth. Every visit with her I laugh so hard,...

Sun salutations from your favorite two canches down here in Chimaltenango!!  We're surviving, thriving, and WE GOT A FRIDGE!!! Some random guy names Tobias called us at 4:30 in the morning and said he was outside with a fridge, and we now have cold food!! I bought one apple to put in it- we don't have any bleach to wash it so we couldn't eat it, but it felt good to have a fridge with something in it all week. This weekend was probably my favorite on my mission so far- so full of miracles! I can honestly say that I don't know if I've ever felt this happy!! First off, on Sunday Jeremy Garcia got baptized!!! I actually felt kinda bad about that- the whole reason we didn't do it last week was because he wanted to do it in the stake center with hot water. We didn't realize that the water still comes out cold, but gets run through a system to heat it up. So it takes a few hours to get warm. We filled the font 20 min. before the baptism...Haha. We went dow...

Ayoooo, How's life back in the 801? Ok first of all I wanna clear up some confusion about what exactly we're doing- opening an area can mean a lot of different things. Usually it's what they also call a white wash, where the 2 missionaries who are in the area are pulled out and 2 new ones are put in, with only the carpeta (or area book) to rely on to find your way around. That's what happened to us, but the missionaries were pulled out a year ago. This area (barrio/ward) just hasn't had missionaries assigned to it. We have an awesome chapel, and the ward members are just as amazing!  Because of the special Guatemala broadcast we didn't have church in our building, but we were finally able to get to know them! They are all super excited to finally have missionaries here again, and we want to start working with them a lot. There are miracles with the members! Jeremy Castro Garcia didn't end up getting baptized on Sunday... He wanted to do it in the st...

HOLA! The kindness of the people here continues to amaze me. The other day we were walking down the street, and crossed to the other side to contact a family. They were walking out of church and the dad had on a tie with a wiener dog wrapping around it- really strange! So  started out the conversation by saying, "Hey, nice tie!" He immediately said, "You like it? Here, it's yours!" and started pulling it off from around his neck. I tried to tell him that I didn't want to take his tie, but he just said that he has lots of ties and doesn't need that one. They ended up not wanting anything to do with the church, but he gave me the clothes right off his neck because I said I liked it. There is a special feeling here in Guatemala that I've never felt anywhere else. The people in general are amazing, and the members even more so! Some of the strongest and most faithful members I've met here. Two of the converts from El Bilbao are Victoria and ...