Working in Chiquilajá!

THIS is what happens when we don't have a firm foundation built upon Jesus Christ.
We need to read and pray and have a strong testimony.

In the Book of Mormon, Helaman 5:12 - And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.

Hey family! How goes it? Well, life here is pretty good. I am finally back out in the workforce. My leg is doing well. I don't see any damage coming from the walking or loss of movement. I just need to continue to be careful.
 

View of the mountains.
 

Different view.

First, I will start out by telling where I am and what kind of area it is, and about my comp. I am in a place called Chiquilajá. It is in the zone of Bosque. It is a cool area. It's like on the outskirts of Xela. When the assistants told me where I was going, they were like, "We know that it is not too flat and that it is kind of big, but we know you can do it." So, I was like, "okay." It is really cool. It's like half city and half aldea (village). Where we live is like city, but it's on the top of a mountain. A lot of our area is like everyone is in Corte and when you say "buenas tardes," they say either "bueno" which is not correct, or say "hasam num" which is Quiche. We visited some members and only 2 spoke Spanish, and our gospel doctrine teacher barely speaks Spanish. I am not sure if he does speak Spanish, but that is good because his Spanish is more on my level so it is easier to understand. But there is nothing like sitting in sacrament meeting with half or more of the people in Corte. And yes, I gave a talk again! There are missionaries who have never spoken in church. I am just getting slammed, but don't worry, my comp said that they will have the gift of interpretation. Haha!







But my area is good and we are kind of opening this area. There are missionaries here already but we are being added to the ward so it is a little hard because we don't know anybody. We have hardly any investigators, but we do have a new house and it is pretty nice. We have a warm shower and a counter top and a wood stove tortilla cooker. There are some upsides, but also it is a big area.  It takes about 15 minutes of bus ride to get to the church, and 20 to get to the aldea of Chiquilajá. My comp is Elder C-- from Guatemala City. He is really cool. He has about 16 months in the mission and has only had 2 areas - 8 months in each area. That is crazy, but he is fluent in Spanish, Portuguese, English and part French. He is a good comp and we will work well together. He does tell me that he is a bit of a hater, but he is trying to work on it. It will be interesting to see what will happen - if he will leave and I will train in this area or if I will leave and he will train here in Chiquilajá. The Spanish is coming along well. I feel like I am making progress.

My comp and I... and yes he is short, but he is crouching a little bit on purpose too.

This is our neighbor. He is sometimes a little noisy, but they are going to sell him soon!  Our real neighbor in traditional Corte clothing, and that shack in the background is the pig's house.

Doing work.  This is how a lot of my area is.  In this area about 50 % do not speak Spanish.
I might learn a little Quiche.

Sign on the side or a member's house.
That was nice of them.

Well the quote for this week is:  "Character is not made in a crisis, it is only exhibited." - Robert Freeman. I love this quote. This means you can't just be a good person when someone is watching or when you are with someone of authority you have to build your character over time. This is a big problem in the mission: people being good with their leaders, but not as good in their areas. Well, love you guys and hopefully I will have more to write about next week...and some more time to write. Well, got to go.

Love,

Elder Reinhold