So we didn't die. That's good, right?

OK! First scary experience of my mission! So we were at a member's house for dinner, and it was really storming. Then the weather radio came off with a tornado warning, and so we turned on the Weather Channel (I know, no TV, but whatevs.) So we sat and watched as a tornado formed and started to go right up towards Conway. It ended up going about five miles south of where we were, but i say that's close enough. Form the last I have heard, there are 15 confirmed dead, including someone in my ward. I didn't know them, but still. Sad.
Apparently, the weather here in Arkansas is absolutely insane. It was really hot and stuff, and then it dumps rain and tornadoes, and then next week it will be in the 40s. Can't handle it.
so, as for the rest of my week, it has been pretty good. We have been finding people a lot, which is good. to update on Ricky, he was not at church this week due to a prior commitment, but he will be there this upcoming Sunday to be confirmed, finally! We also managed to get Milton and Sis. David to church for the first time in years, which also went well, from what I understood.
this week also is the last week I will have with my companion, Elder Dalton. He will be heading home on Tuesday. Sad. But I will take this opportunity to relate something that happened my second week here, that i keep forgetting to mention.
Us, talking about celebrity news he missed out on:
Elder Dalton: And then there's Miley Cyrus...
Me: yeah, it got weird with her, especially with the whole twerk incident.
Dalton:...........what's twerk?
me: ....you serious?
Dalton (confused) Yeah, really. What is it?
Me: ...... A) you don't want to know. B)thank you.
Yep, gonna miss that guy. But he's going back to AZ, so you all can say hi to him.
Well, running out of time here, so I don't think I will be able to write you all personally. I will next week, promise! Have a good one! 

Our investigator gets hijacked

Hello everybody! Happy Post-Easter-jelly-bean-hangover! I hope you all had a good Sunday. Yesterday was another reminder that missionaries really don't get holidays. In the handbook, it refers to holidays as "prime proselyting time" so if anything we are busier. It's all good though.

So yesterday we were going to confirm our new convert, Ricky. We talked to him the night before, set up a ride, and it was all good. But when we came to pick him up, he was not there. We searched the neighborhood, all over. We talked to his mom, and she said, "Oh, he went to that church he's been going to for a while now." New Life. 

Now, let me just explain about New Life. I refer to them as the "great and spacious building" it talks about in the scriptures. For you Arizonans, it's about the same size as CCV. And they really do not like the LDS church at all. So, you could understand we were a tad concerned when we heard he went there for Easter Sunday without telling us or anything. 

So we went back that night, and he still wasn't home. But as we were leaving, there he was on the side of the road. so we stopped immediately and started questioning him about what happened, as nicely as we could. Here's what happened:

Ricky was about ready to go to church with us, when the bus from New Life (yes, they have a bus) stopped by. Apparently one of his neighbors, who was also his pastor there, had noticed that we were taking him to church. So he came over and basically told him that he could only pick one church and that he had to choose right then and there, with the bus of New Life folks watching. Seeing as Ricky is a bit disabled and easily... confused, I guess you can say, he chose to go with the bus. So, when we met him that night, he informed us that we could no longer meet with him, and that he was going back to NLC. However, we had had the same problem with the question of baptism, and that was explained pretty quickly. That being said, we are meeting with him Wednesday to reestablish the fact that he needs to get confirmed a member of the church. I hope that that works. 

In other news, I was sick at the beginning of this week, so that was not too cool. I literally did not sleep all of Monday night, and so Tuesday was basically me napping and almost throwing up. I'm totally fine now though! Also in other news, we got a new sister missionary in Conway from Mesa, so now a third of my district is Arizonan! Represent! Also, as my companion's time is coming, he's been stressing out like crazy. He has been preaching the message of "by the time you leave for your mission, you're going home" to all of us. I'm sure he'll be fine. 

Well, that's about all! I'm off to go hunt down cheap Easter Candy and maybe play some volleyball. Have a wonderful week!

--

Llamado a Servir,

Andrew Reay

Bike Week and Spanish Cussing

So! Today marks the end of my first bike week! I must say, it was not nearly as bad as everyone makes it out to be. Summer? probably going to stink. But this week wasn't too bad. i love my bike. It's definitely the fanciest one I've owned, with disc brakes and all that. it works really well.

That being said, it's been a pretty good week! pretty slow week, because of the fact that we can't travel more than 15 mph, but we got a lot done considering that. 

Anyway, this week my language comprehension skills have developed to the point that i can identify several of the worst cuss words. this is thanks to our investigator, Homero, who uses them quite frequently. i won't write them out, but I do know what they are. There are more of them in Spanish than English, I think. so that's sort of fun, but not really that much. 

Oh! one more thing. I told you about the gym, but there are a couple more perks of being a missionary here. For example, did you know that if you scan a Book of Mormon in Kroger's (Fry's for you Arizonans) it counts as a membership card? It's actually pretty nice, and it makes me carry a BOM with me everywhere in case I need to buy food. Also, there is a member who owns a chiropractors office down the street, and we get free treatment there! I just got an adjustment this morning, which felt part great and part like they wanted to snap my neck. 

ok, i think that's it! Hope you all have a wonderful week, and i will see you on the flip side!

Being the forgetful person that i am, i neglected to mention that we had one more investigator. "Had" being applicable still because he is a MEMBER now. so sit down, and I will tell you the story of Ricky.

We met Ricky on the 4th, right before general conference. He told us his story (for the first of about 15 times), and it goes like this: He was not the best person in the world, and then he got into a motorcycle accident that left him in a coma for a while. He got out of it about 6 months ago, and ever since he has been unable to do anything that isn't Christian or worshiping God or stuff like that. Long story short, we got him to general conference, and set a baptismal date with him for the 13th. I will be honest, I doubted it would happen. Due to the accident, he was a bit... disabled from a mental standpoint. He probably has the mental capacity of a ten year old or thereabouts. 

This guy was definitely prepared. Over the course of the week, we would have times where he was not there for the appointment, because he liked to take walks. For example, Thursday we couldn't find him anywhere. We prayed, rode around for a bit, and finally decided to move on. About a mile down the road, who would be walking on the side in the middle of nowhere but Ricky. Apparently, he was taking a walk, and decided to come home then. Go fig. Anyway, the lessons were incredible! He simply accepted whatever we told him as doctrine, just like that! The only thing he needed more than one minute to accept was Joseph Smith, and that only took one night of thinking. He is amazing. I'm going to make another message with the rest of my week, because he deserves his own spot

I discovered southern food, and it ain't treating me well

So. According to the blogs that I was reading about Arkansas, it said I would gain about forty pounds on my mission. i was determined to not do that.

And then came the dinner appointments. 

If I haven't said it before, the people in Conway feed us pretty much every day. That being said, When i checked my weight on friday, i was 161 pounds. when i checked my weight at the CCM, I was 156 pounds. sooooo yeah, I've gained five pounds in 8 days. Time to get to the gym. (Which we have, btw.)

That aside, my week was pretty fine! I don't believe that I properly introduced the rest of our investigators. so, here we go: 

The D. Family: Part-member, the wife is inactive and the husband is not a member. He has just become receptive to missionaries recently. Hma. D. is super nice. we have about half a dozen large bags of frozen pasta meals in our freezer thanks to her. 

The L. Family: Another part-member, but this time the husband is the member. We haven't been able to meet with them much, but the wife does seem to be interested.

R.: He's a bit of a mystery. 17 years old, from Guatemala. We don't know why he's in America, or where his parents are, or if he does anything for work or school. that's because we can hardly get a word out of him. We haven't taught him much. 

So, general conference! I did like most of it. The problem lies in the fact that when an investigator shows up (which they did) we tuned in to the channel that broadcasts in Spanish, so I understood just about a third of the words. and none of them were connected, so I basically missed the second two sessions of Saturday. But other than that, it was great! i loved Holland, as usual, as well as Bednar and Andersen. 

P-day has been fun so far! We get free adjustments at the chiropractor, so we went there and I got electrotherapy on my back, which is basically mild tazer patches for ten minutes. it felt pretty good. then we played mud soccer and ultimate frisbee with our whole zone. it was messy, but pretty fun! 

Sorry I don't have pictures, I keep forgetting to take out my camera. Next week, i promise.

--

Llamado a Servir,

Andrew Reay

P.S. Happy birthday to my companion! 

The field is actually pretty green.

Hope you get the reference. Hello from Arkansas! It's been almost a week since I got here, and it has been a blur! So, let's go through the days.

We left the CCM at 2:30 am, and i was not pleased. I had a cold, so I was quite short of breath from pulling luggage all that way. We sat around until customs opened at 4. We got to the plane all right, and we flew to Atlanta. Nothing super eventful on the fight, i just kind of zoned. In atlanta, we said bye to all the other people with us except Sister Norman, who was going to the gate next to us. Georgia was pretty fun, we ate lunch at Five Guys and sat around. Elder Schoenfeld an I met up with four other elders from Provo who were heading out to Little Rock, and we flew there!

We were met at the gate by President Petersen and his wife, along with the APs, Elders Armstrong and Barney. They're super cool, and in our ward, so it's cooler. We spent the night there. It was fun. You should be getting a letter in a few days that has more, so I'll leave it at that. 

So! now I'm in the field. My companion is Elder Dalton, of Gilbert Arizona! He lives across the street form the temple. He's pretty chill and stuff. We are serving in Conway, Arkansas. It's about an hour from Little Rock. Fairly small town, which is nice. We live in an apartment building.
  Here's  the address: 
401 2nd Street, 
APT. #321, 
Conway AR 72032.

You can write me at that address for the next little while, I guess! <cough cough>You can mail me direct, you don't have to go through the mission office.

Now, about my investigators! First off, we have two baptisms coming up on the 12th. Two girls, 9 and 11 from a less active family. They're coming back to church, which is good. Then there's Omero. He is an eternal investigator who has been coming to church for about 5 years. He says that he believes in the church, but he won't get baptized because he believes that baptism by water is symbolic scripture language for birth, so he doesn't need to do that. He is.... interesting.... yeah. For example, he gave his testimony in church this week. Someone was translating for him (we're in an English ward), and thank goodness! He opened by talking about how Satan and sin does not exist. He continued with stuff like that, with the translator "getting the spirit" of what he had to say. He's interesting. And those are our main investigators, most of the others I have not been able to meet yet. 

Well, I'm going to sign off now! I am ready to serve everybody here for as long as I can. Hope you all are doing good!

--

Llamado a Servir,

Andrew Reay

Happy Monday everybody! So, i'm pretty much all packed now, so I won't be working when we party like it's 1999 in my house tonight. We figure that because everyone won't be able to sleep anyway, we may as well stay up till 2. But yeah! i'm all set to go!

So, my weekly summary. The day that i emailed last, we went and played tennis (or tried) for about 2 hours. I did not think it would last that long, so I ended up with some lovely body art on my arms, legs, and head. picture is attatched. I'm all better though! not much else happened this week though. President Pratt informed us that we had to take down our lovely fort, so the room is empty now. Es triste. 

It's also triste that I have to say goodbye to everyone here. You become such close friends here, it's crazy! We said goodbye to the hermanas and Elders Rogers and Harris. Everyone else is leaving today. It's sad, but I know we'll be meeting up with each other later, so it's not horrible. 

Can't really think of much else to write, so I will be mailing y'all from ARKANSAS next week! 

Tennis sunburn - OUCH!  That white skin.  

My asombroso scripture cases these are the coolest things ever, just letting you know

Mi maestro, Hmo. Trejo. He has Darian Comsa's sense of humor. It's adorable.

Look at us photogenic bosses.

our tennis opponents Yeah, I get the feeling we're weird.

Calle De Abbey