Little By Little I'm Learning Q'eqchi

Lin junkab'al! Ma sa sa' eech'ool?

Well another week has passed here in the Polochic and I am into my second change here in the mission. My new companion is a latino from El Salvador. Elder Lopez xk'ab'a. He is super friendly and a really nice guy. He's a convert to the church and is the only member in his family, so I have a lot of respect for him because of that. Things are a little different than they were with Elder Wixom in better and in worse ways. I feel good about our companionship though and I feel like we are going to work well together. It's a little difficult though because I'm still not used to talking in Spanish all of the time. But I'm getting used to that pretty quickly. I don't understand near as much when it's not about the Gospel haha. Elder Lopez isn't quite as worried about being really obedient and things like that, so I'm just going to have to try my best to be a good example for him and show him love to help him. He was in the Polochic 8 months ago for 3 changes but got transferred to coban and then to the cap. So he learned a little bit of Q'eqchi', but he's forgotten a lot. He can understand a little more than me and I can talk a little more than him. So for now it's working out ok. But I really feel pressure and motivation to really learn Q'eqchi' and really devote all of the time I have to learning it, so hopefully I'll be able to learn a little quicker now. During the week I was on divisions with Elder Gutierrez and we got along really well. He speaks Q'eqchi' really well so I took him up to San Jose concepción where Elder Wixom and I had a lot of lessons and contacts and everything. We didn't have nearly as much success when we went up there. There weren't that many people there and all of the kids just followed us around and made fun of us and annoyed us. The problem is that there is a church up there and people don't want to have to walk all the way down to the center just to go to church on Sunday, so they just go to the church up there. If we had a church building up there I know we could baptize at least half of the aldea. So hopefully someday that will happen. There are tons of areas like that in my area. Our area is so big and has so many aldeas and hardly any of the people that live in those aldeas will progress because going to church is so hard. So I think that I need to really focus my efforts on the parts closer to the center and strengthen our branch so that the church can grow here. We had a ton of people at church yesterday which was good. We had 80 people there which is about 20 more than we would have on a good day. Part of that though was that Elder Wixom was coming back to visit. With all of the people we wanted to come to church I told them that it would be their last chance to see Elder Wixom, and it worked with some people haha. It was actually kind of hard to see him with his parents there at church because, well, first of all it made me think of you guys picking Matt up and secondly it made me think of when you will come to pick me up. And I refuse to be baggy when I only have 4 months! But it was cool to see them and everything. I gave Elder Wixom a little package to send home to you guys once he gets home. It's not much just my pictures from this last change and then letters for everyone. Also his parents took some pictures and I gave them your email so that they can send everything to you. So you should be getting an email with some pictures from them soon. And they also took a little video of me to send to you guys so hopefully Matt will be able to help you guys open that and watch it. This week was a pretty good week though all in all. The only bad thing is that we haven't gone out to work in the morning since Wednesday. Thursday when Elder Lopez came to Tucurú he said he had to wake up at 4 in the morning and that he was really tired so he was going to take a little nap. Well he ended up sleeping until after lunch almost, so that was kind of lame. Then Friday we had to do our weekly planning session in the morning since we didn't get to Thursday. Saturday we had service that took all morning. And tomorrow we are going to have service all morning too. So I'm excited to be able to actually go out and work in the morning. Things are a little more challenging than before now. I'm the one who has to plan and keep track of our dats and things like that. So that's a little bit hard because I still feel like I don't know the area too well. But I can feel even more the Lord's hand helping us and guiding us to where we need to be. And Q'eqchi' is still really hard, but timil timil yookin chi tzolok li Q'eqchi'. (little by little I'm learning Q'eqchi')

Elder Jordan Smith did get transferred to the Polochic, and as a matter of fact he is in my district. He's a really cool elder and I'm excited to get to know him better and everything. He's really nice so we already get along really well. Plus we're both the new ones to Q'eqchi' and everything so we can relate. He's in a pure Q'eqchi' area and it's really mountainous there too so I'm sure it's difficult. But I can already tell that he'll do really well and that he'll work hard to get the language. So yeah it's fun to be in a district with him and everything.

Well I'm really happy that Matt is home and transitioning really well and enjoying his time with all of you guys. I'm glad that Kinzie and Jack haven't killed him yet. (just kidding!) I'm happy to hear he hasn't changed too much from his old self and I hope that he won't change too much from his old self in the next 2 years. I'm also mad that he didn't write me! Now that he has all the time in the world to write and doesn't have any kind of time limits the least he could do is drop me a line! Just kidding Matt I'm sure between Mom, Dad, and the kids, they are all keeping you busy. I hope you're having fun and enjoying the cold weather there in Kansas! I'm going to DIE when I have to go back to being in cold weather again. Matt, you should open a facebook account so you can socialize more! Mom and Kinzie can show you how to use it!

Well it's really hard for me to not be there with all of you guys, but I know I'm here for the right reasons and that time is just going to fly by now that Matt is home. So Don't worry I'll be home before you know it! I love all of you so much and I can't wait to get to talk to you all for Christmas. Sorry that I didn't get to write all of you more individually, but next time I will for sure! Nekexinrah chi anchal inch'ool. 


Love you!

Elder Norton