Gonna keep it short this week, probably.

I turn 20 tomorrow!!! Can you believe it? There is no better way to spend my birthday than in the service of the Lord. :)

Haircuts.... *sigh.* I'm doing all in my power to make my hair grow faster. I'm even taking Biotin, haha... I think it's helping. My hair, ever since I cut it short, practically doesn't grow... It's also been falling out a lot.... My hair has gotten a lot thinner since I got here, haha.....BUT.... I'm going to take good care of it... And have long hair again someday.... Hopefully.

It's starting to heat up a bit here in Bolivia. It's still cold in the morning and at night, but during the day it is SUNNNYYY.... Been getting my tan on... It was crazy how much of my tan I had lost over the winter. My companion saw the tan lines from my shoes and said "I thought you were white, but you used to be even MORE white."

Yep. Pretty much.

Speaking of my companion, she is a POWERHOUSE. We have seen more miracles over the last week. This week we were in a lesson with Jefferson and Carla (These names seem so white, but they pronounce them differently, hahaha) and we talked about how the spirit will answer their prayers to know if the church is true... My companion described how the spirit feels, and then I asked "when have you felt like that before?" Jefferson said "I felt it right now, when she was talking." They don't believe in infant baptism and they are PURE GOLD. The only problem is that they aren't married... We're going to talk to them about it today though, and hopefully bring another awesome couple (the husband is a recent convert and they had to get married for him to get baptized). Pray for this awesome couple! :)

Also: Yisela and Victor

Elizabet and Israel

Felix

That's it from me this week! :) Love ya!! :)

                                                  photos from Vivian's baptism


 My companion is Hermana Limo from Chiclayo Peru. She's 26,
got baptized at 11 and has been dying to serve a mission ever since.
While we were walking around on
the first day she kept saying "I can't believe I'm on my mission!" and
"I can't believe I'm with my trainer!" I feel a little bit of pressure
to show her the very best of mission life.... but she's SO prepared to
be here. She keeps talking about how much baptisms we're going to have
though... Which is a little intimidating for me. I hope I can live up
to her expectations, haha...

I'm healthy as can be. My clothes are... Hanging in there. There are
always those little markets here where you can buy American clothes
here, so I've been able to buy what I need. You have no idea how many
times I've been asked by my companions (in all seriousness) "Do
Americans only wear their clothes once and then donate them?" There's
also a rumor that we don't shower....? I don't even know.

This week we've found a couple of couples! Jefferson and Carla, and
Yisela and Victor. They're both AWESOME, SUPER prepared, and both were
blown away by the thought of eternal families. Carla asked "how can I
know that that's true?" My companion is a POWERHOUSE of a missionary,
and she has so much faith.

We're also working with someone named Felix, who is the husband of a
member. He has gone to church practically every week for 7 years with
his wife, and leads family home evenings with his family. The problem
is that he has a couple of doubts that hold him back. But his wife,
Yuli, went to the temple to figure out the whole thing with him not
being a member. We taught him for the first time on Tuesday, and we
felt the spirit SO strongly. After we left, his wife chased us out,
and told us that their 10 year old son had dreamt the night before that an
angel was baptizing his dad... And
that two nights before he had dreamt "this. What's going on in the
front room right now." He had dreamt that me and another missionary
(I wasn't even with Hermana Limo yet) and Hermana Isabel, a member,
were teaching his dad in the front room.... Please pray for him,
because he's just a step away. We're seeing miracles with him.

You guys really are the best. My companions talk about their families,
but I just know that I have the very best one. :) I love you guys to
the moon and back, and I hope you have a great week. :) Keep us and
our investigators in your prayers!

So, transfers on Sunday nights wasn't just a one time thing, it turns
out. Now they'll let us know of the transfers on Sunday nights, and
we'll change on Mondays...It's kind of a crazy change, because there's
not much time to clean or wash clothes or anything.

Well... Last night while we were waiting for the call, and we were
speculating. Our prediction was that I was going to leave the area...

But they called us and told us that I was staying... And that I'm
training. Hermana Kofoed, even though she's only been here a transfer,
is leaving for Santa Cruz again. Poor thing was in Santa Cruz, came
out here to Tarija for only one transfer, and then left again...for
Santa Cruz.

I'm really sad to say goodbye to Hermana Kofoed... We have had the
funniest transfer ever, and I'm going to miss her a lot. She is a
MACHINE of a missionary...But she's going to kill it wherever she is.

I'm going to be with another sister from our zone for two days and
then on Wednesday morning we go to Santa Cruz to pick up our new
companions.

Okay. So getting to this week. The 6th of August is Bolivia's
Independence (sorry if I spelled that wrong... no spell check) Day.
The stake (ALL of Tarija...A giant stake of 10 wards) had a huge
activity where each ward was assigned a department (kind of like a
state) of Bolivia. Then it was their job to prepare a lunch of food
that's traditional to that department, and organize a dance that's
traditional too. We got to go for a couple hours because our
pensionistas were there and if we didn't go we... like....wouldn't've
been able to eat. It was AMAZING. Every ward had a stand, and there
were people in traditional clothes EVERYWHERE... It was amazing. So
fun.

That's pretty much all that happened with us this week. We've been
finding some AMAZING new investigators... But I think I'll have more
on that next week. :)

I love you guys! I love missionary work! I love Bolivia! :) I hope you
have a great week! Love ya!

This week was... interesting. Well, mostly this weekend.

So, on the weekends, we eat lunch with the members and the relief society gets who we're going to eat with all figured out.

Well, Aeropuerto, as a ward is HUGE. It doesn't have a limit until it hits Bermejo, which is a city south of here, right on the border of Argentina. Our relief society president lives like 20 minutes out of the city in car, like a block away from her first counselor.

This week, we were going to eat with a member, supposedly, that lives a good ten minutes out of the city.... But once we got there, they told us that she was going to give us lunch NEXT Saturday, and that the 1st counselor in the relief society had to give us lunch that day.

So we were just like... Stranded in the middle of nowhere for a good hour because none of the little bus/car things that haul people out there would stop for us and we had to go FARTHER into the middle of nowhere. Finally, by some miracle, the relief society president passed by with her family in their car and hauled us out there...

Then, yesterday, we had a couple of free hours and there's a part of the area that had been closed (that's ours now) that we hadn't had time to go into yet.. So we went out there yesterday and it is straight up farmland. Like pigs, and goats, and chickens and cows.... Pigs just walk around up there like they own the place, and I didn't even know it was part of our area. Hermana Kofoed and I took a picture out there in the boonies (both times...) but it's been a pretty adventurous week.

We contacted this lady and she had a pig and I asked her what his name is and she said Pancho. Pig in Spanish is "chancho," so her pig is literally named "Pancho el Chancho."

That's pretty much what I've got to report this week.

You should see the computer I'm using... It is STRAIGHT out of the
'90s. I don't have too much news this week either, so don't expect the
longest email.

It's FINALLY starting to warm up. It has been COLD this month.... Today it's really nice
though. Not too hot, not too cold.

Really, this week not a lot happened. The coolest thing though was
that we met a 19-year-old girl (one of our investigator's sisters) who
was visiting from way far. In Bolivia, there are a lot of "pueblos" or
people who basically just live far from the city in smaller groups...
And she's from one of them. The church isn't out there yet, but we met
her when we came to pick up her older sister to see if she wanted to
go to an activity, and she answered the door. We were like "uhh.. We
came to see if your sister wanted to come to an activity..." She was
like "oh, she's not home." We were like "Do YOU want to go?" and she
DID. And she LOVED IT. We wound up giving her a Book of Mormon, a For
the Strength of Youth pamphlet, and the Restoration, Plan of
Salvation, and Gospel of Jesus Christ pamphlets. She really ate up
what we talked about and me and Hermana Kofoed kept talking about how
she's "just going to go start the Church out there in that pueblo she
lives in."

But. Yeah. That's it from me. I sure love you guys, and thanks for
being so awesome. :) Have a great week! :)

I don't know if you heard this or not, but on Saturday, the mission kind of took a hit. A returned Elder Merkley (from West Jordan) passed away in a camping accident. He served in this mission, finished the very transfer that I entered the field. He finished his mission in the very ward I am serving in, and everyone here remembers him very fondly. President Willard came to our sacrament meeting yesterday and spoke a lot about him. Send your prayers for him and for his family. 

It's a tradition in the mission that in your last conference of your mission, you bear your "last testimony." On Friday, I heard Hermana Mejia give her "last testimony." ALL of the missionaries that she had trained or started to train, were there to hear her bear her testimony for the "last time" as a missionary. It was a really cool thing to see for me. I love her a lot.

Gordon Rogers is bishop! I don't know how I didn't call that! That sounds like a stellar bishopric. West Jordan 28th Ward is the best ward... Except for maybe Aeropuerto. ;)

Not the most eventful week. One thing was pretty cool though.

We're teaching a lady who listened to missionaries with her family when she was just a little girl. I think it impacted her a lot, because even though she was just a little girl, she still remembers about Joseph Smith, and how happy she was to watch the Restoration movie with her siblings. 

Now she's older, with two children. One is an 11 year old son with special needs. 

 

She is SO loving and patient with her son, which is AMAZING. But it weighs on her a lot. She started to cry and tell us about what she's going through, and we could just see how much love she has for her son. Then I watched my companion with SO much power, testify to her that "her son is an angel." It was a really powerful lesson, and we could feel how much she needed to hear that what she was doing was right, even though it was not recognized by the world. It was the best lesson me and Hermana Kofoed have taught together this far.

 

I guess that's it from me this time...But I love you guys! Keep working hard and being awesome... And I love you to the moon and back!

 

-Hermana Hall

 

 

Okay, I cannot believe it's been a year since I got my mission call. I just remember seeing Bolivia and having no idea where that was or what to expect. And then I thought I was going to a land filled with llamas and devoid of hot showers... Then I got here and I remember that the first time I saw a car I was like... Am I in the right place? 

I love Bolivia. Even though I eat rice, potatoes and chicken every day, I LOVE this place. Especially Tarija. The day I leave Tarija (and Aeropuerto) will be SO hard. I have never loved a group of people so much in my life. They are SO humble, so devoted to the gospel, and so willing to serve those around them. There are so many people that I just love.

I was talking to the Barrientos Family yesterday (the family that the Elders got married and baptized but now they live in our area :D) and I just was so taken aback by how much I love them. They're not even my baptism, but they are such true disciples of Christ. Hermano Rafael (the dad)'s favorite scripture is Alma 48:11, which talks about Captain Moroni and what a good man he was... A man who doesn't delight in bloodshed. His HERO is Captain Moroni. If there's anything about him in the scriptures, Hermano Rafael eats it up. And you can see it in the way he lives, that he is following Moroni's example. 

And then there's his wife, Hermana Rosa, who I will probably miss more than anyone else in this area. She is ALWAYS taking care of us. She's got a soft spot in my heart, that's for sure.

Hermana Kofoed is my FAVORITE PERSON. She is the youngest of five, three girls, two boys. She's from Spanish Fork, and she is so darn funny. She is the hardest worker ever, EXACTLY obedient. She makes me be the best I can be, but she does it lovingly. I have learned so much from her. The language is harder for her, but that does NOT stop her from opening her mouth. While I try to use persuasion to get in doors, and in contacts in the streets, she uses pure boldness, like a true disciple of Christ. 

We've had a rough week with Vivian's family. Her dad is drinking a TON. Vivian's kind of just used to it. It'll still be a while I think.

Gloria is moving to Argentina in like a week and a half and we have completely lost contact with her. That's been kind of rough too.

Jenny has been traveling. A lot. We need to have a good, direct lesson with her. We feel like she hasn't been progressing.

This week we met someone named Aide. She's a 25 year old single mom who lives with her sister. She's a referral from a member who is her friend and felt the prompting to talk to her about the gospel, and families. She is SO interested and she came to church yesterday. We have a lesson with her tonight. :)