WEEK #78 Pants Burnt

Hey everyone!!  Well its been a most excellent week with everything and Im loving Santa Cruz!  Its such an awesome place!!  Were doing really good here and getting some good stuff done!  Weather has been super whack this week being really cold one day and rainy and I have to wear a jacket the whole day to a super hot day where Im sweating buckets and have to use a fan!  Reminds me of Utahs weather a little haha!  Got some pretty legit Aerobie time in on Saturday morning cause we have this huge field right by our house and man was that fun!!  Trying to teach my comp how to throw a frisbee good, and also thinking about practicing some field goal and football stuff being as there are big goals on both sides!  Gonna be fun!!  Today we went to the Joya Grande Zoo and it was super legit!  I went there like 8 months ago and it was good to see it again this time with new people and crazy to think about the old people one of them being Elder Wing who is now married.  Pretty crazy stuff.  Rode a dinosour today and the funniest thing that happened was seeing Elder Harris getting his backpack bit by a camel hahaha I was trying to touch it and then it looked at him and went to bite him!  Funny stuff!

So I dont know if I mentioned it in my last letter but my new comp is named Elder Lorenzana!  Hes awesome!  He speaks English soo American its hilarious!  So this week we gave a capacitation to our zone and it was awesome!  Just got them super pumped to contact and it worked!!  We had 125 more contacts this week than the previous!  So were gonna keep at it!!  Also one of our investigators named Jose got an answer to his question through prayer and could feel through a dream and the spirit that the Book of Mormon is true!! The other Elders here baptized his daughter this Saturday and I was able to interview her and she was super awesome and hopefully her father and the rest of her family that lives apart can follow that example and be baptized as well!!

We had dinner with the Stake President this Tuesday as well and he told us something very important about choosing wives.  He was asking us why almost all missionaries are afraid to marry a return missionary and stuff like that but then told us that we just need to look for a wife that 1)  Loves God above all other things 2)  A wife thats a better person than you to help you be better always    Soo pretty good tips from Presidente Flores in my opinion!  But thats a ways out still haha

We had a super dope lesson and week with our investigator named David!!  Hes 17 and just the biggest stud!  We have his baptism planned for this Saturday and am so stoked for him!!  Our lesson on Thursday for him was the determining factor cause he told us he still wasnt ready but through sincere testimony he was able to feel the spirit and make the decision to be baptized this Saturday!!  I seriously feel like Ive met this kid before, maybe even before this life, hes so cool and gonna be a good buddy of mine always!!  Lets pray everything goes well this week!  But seriously such a good kid and gonna be such a fine missionary one day!!  His family is super legit as well!  His mom is a member but was less active for a while and her husband is gonna get baptized too but they just gotta get married but there already in the process so Im excited for them as well!  Such a cool family!!

Burning of the pants- 18 months out!

Not gonna lie this house was a wreck when I got here!  Probably the most messy and gross apartment Ive ever moved into but we gotta it ship shape clean this week.  So Im super happy about that as well.  Hard to feel the spirit if your surroundings are a mess!  This week it was just amazing though to be able to feel the spirit so strongly guiding my comp and I and our words!!  Love it!!

Read what he wrote on his pants!  Funny!!!

Cool so that was my week in a nutshell!  Im excited for this next one that comes as well and were gonna echar some fuego!!  The church is true!!  Jesus Christ guides us!!  I invite all of you to share our message of the Restoration with one of your friends or acquaintance this week.  Pray for more opportunities to share the gospel and God will open little doors and opportunities every day!!  and also as a stake we our doing a stake fast for the missionary work here!!  maybe you guys could help and join in and fast for all of the missionaries here and all over the world!!  Alma 6:6  Love you guys!!

Love Elder Hunt

P.S. I was gonna write in OFF on the brick wall behind my pants a big 18 and light it up but figured out that would be bad if the neighbors or anyone saw cause thats a big gang number here.. hahaha close call

WEEK #77 Santa Cruz De Yojoa!!

Hey everyone!  Its honestly been a crazy week.  Full of new places, people, and adventures.  Probably one of the craziest weeks of my mission.  Just lots of new stuff going on with the changes we had and everything!  This new area that I'm in is awesome!  I went from a hot, dry, flat, dusty place to the beautiful mountains of Yojoa.  Its so awesome here.  Its nice and cold!  The scenery and new views here are amazing.  It kind of reminds me a little bit of Santa Barbara but a nicer more civilized version.  My new companion is dope as well!  Hes a nice, positive, outgoing guy!  He was born here in Tegusigalpa, Honduras but moved to Guatemala when he was 14.  He speaks like perfect English as well and its super fun being comps with him!!  Were both assigned here as the Zone Leaders of the Yojoa Zone.  Its my first change as Zone Leader so hes showing me the ins and outs.  Super crazy.  Our zone is pretty big and we get to travel around alot to do divisions with other Elders and interview the District Leaders baptisms.  Ive been loving being able to travel around tons and see all the pretty sights around, and meet new people!  But ya its been a crazy week getting situated in the new house and trying to figure tons of stuff out.  The members here are super cool though.  This is probably one of the best wards Ive been in with members actually giving us tons of refferals and helping us out tons!  Good stuff.

We traveled a lot this week having to go to Villanueva like 3 times for different conferences and such.  We had the opportunity on Wednesday to hear from Missionary Executive Deparment of the Church and it was really inspiring everything that they said!  I loved it all and learned a ton!  On Friday me and my comp went to Mochito which is clear out in the middle of no where to do baptismal interviews for the DL there.  Ive always wanted to go to Mochito cause Ive heard that its super beautiful and nice and cold.  So it was fun being able to finally go there and see it!  We had to take a Taxi to get out of Santa Cruz then we took a Bus down to Joyoa from there we took a moto taxi to Rio Lindo and we waited for a bus to take us to Las Vegas and then we had to take another moto taxi up in the mountains to a little rural spot in Mochito.  and we had to take the same route out on the way back!  so that was a super fun experience.  soo pretty.  honestly an adventure!  on the way back we found some white people on the bus a dude and 2 girls and so we started talking with them and found out they were from the Netherlands!  they spoke pretty good English and it was funny cause I approached them saying hola como estan? and the girl was like no hablo espanol.  super funny hearing that.  but they were super interested in what young people like us were doing and so we were able to have a great conversation with them about the church and the Restoration and they said that they are going to go attend church when they get back to see how it is and find out more in the Netherlands!!  Hopefully it goes well with them!

Sunday was pretty crazy as well cause we had to give a capacitation to the whole Stake of Villanueva and all their leaders.  There was about 150 people listening to us as we introduced the new mission plan and vision that we had for the Stake.  Kind of nerve wracking to be honest but cool.  If you all recall I was in Villanueva like 7 months ago in the Ward El Plan.  So it was super cool cause i was able to see a bunch of my good friends and the members from my old ward and it was a great experience seeing them all!  Its funny cause after 7 months of not seeing them a lot of them had changed.  Like they looked different.  Which makes me wonder after 2 years of not seeing all of you guys hows it gonna be?  hahaha well we will see I guess.  So anyway cant really remember all the other stuff that happened this week.  Just lots of big and new exciting things going on!  Also it changes it was super cool to be able to see all my buddies from the mish!  weird cause lots of my buddies went home.  time is flying by way too fast.  

Anyway I love you all and hope you all have a great week!!  Enjoy the snow!!  Ill try to write more details next week and send pics.  Just got to get a grip on things this week!

Love Elder Hunt        

WEEK #76 Adios Trincheras

Hey, how are ya??  Hope you all had a great week and that your all enjoying the cold and falling snow!!  I dream about that stuff haha!  But still blazing hot over here!!  Soo got some news last night that I have transfers and am heading out of Trincheras!  Im excited and happy about it for the most part cause ive been here for quite a long time (6 months) and Im ready to see new sights, meet new people, and have new experiences.  Changes are always fresh and exciting!  But Its been really cool getting to know such amazing people and being a part of their family and being able to see the changes in soo many people over this period of time and feeling their love for me as Ive been here in Trincheras!  Ive definitely made some great memories and friends that are gonna be with me forever!  Kinda sad having to leave everyone but Im just stoked and excited to be starting a new chapter of my mission!  Just time to hit it harder than ever with everything Ive learned over my mission!!  Bring it all to the table and not hold anything back!!  But ya next week Ill be writing all of you from a new location and with a new comp and hope its all the best!!

This week was a good one to end of Trincheras!!  I was super happy with the turnout we had on Sunday!!  Lots of less actives that weve been working with and investigators as well were able to come and we had our church assistance higher than ever!  Highest Ive seen it in my 6 months here!  So that was really rewarding to see my last week here!  I hope it just continues to go up!  Also just feel good leaving some investigators here that I know are going to be ready for baptism this next change and the change after.  Hope the new guys will be pilas and excited to get at it with all the investigators we have!!  Leave it better than you found it!!

Something else that was really cool this week is that I was able to baptismal interview 2 people on Friday to see if they were ready for baptism!  They both passed good and it was amazing to me to be able to feel the spiritual promptings that came from the Holy Ghost to let me know what to say and more than anything at the end to tell me Yes with both of them.  The 1st one was a 13 year old boy and he was just soo excited about being baptized and the 2nd one that night was an 28 year old man who just had a killer testimony of the Gospel and was sooo ready and excited for his baptism and already looking forward to going to the temple in the future!!  It was so awesome to just see his testimony burning and it was a great experience for us both.

Well we'll see where these changes take me!!  Cant wait to tell you all where Im at next week!!  Lots of my good buddies are ending the mish right now like my comp Elder Ririe and its pretty crazy stuff.  Just gotta live it up while your out here cause time is flying by so fast!!   Love you all!!  Have a great week!! 

Love Elder Hunt    

WEEK #75 Sica

Well looks like there's a new Virus out that comes from Mosquitos..  Gotta love it haha first it was Dengue (which I got) and then it was Chickenguya, and now its the SICA.  The Sica has been pegging everyone down here and it got my comp this week.  Kinda blows cause with Sica you get a high fever and your bones ache and then you get a mad rash all over your body and it makes you super itchy.  Soo lets pray I don't get that but ya poor comp.  We had to take a break this week during the final days of the week so that he could rest and try to get better.

Umm so ya this week was chill.  Not much to report other than the comp being sick.  So pray for him that he can continue to get better please.  Had interviews with President and such and it went really good!  He just makes you feel like the best person ever.  I love President!  Umm our investigator Jose Luis is progressing really good!  He has friends in the church and we were able to brotherhood him even more this week.  His little daughter loved church sooo much last week that she was bothering him every day asking if it was Sunday already.  and he kept on saying no and finally asked her why and she said cause I wanna go to church again!!  so that's was really cool!  hes likes the church as well!!  but bummer cause he cant go for 3 weeks straight cause of his work schedule!!

But ya that was about it!  Kind of boring week.  Sorry that there wasn't much to report!  This is my last week here though in Trincheras so I'm gonna be saying goodbye to everyone and we will see what happens next week!  I'm excited though!!  been here for 6 months now and ready for a change of scenery and new experiences and challenges!!  loved it here though no complaints!

Alright well have a very good week all of you!! Love you guys ton!!  Hope your all accomplishing your goals!!

Love Elder Haden

p.s. I'll try to send loads of photos next week! but here's one of the beach!!  enjoy!  haha flippy

2 p.s. i can eat Jalapenos now and it doesn't bother me hahaha #mexicano

WEEK #74 Vision

Hey everybody!  Happy New Years!!  I hope you were all able to pass it well and have a good time welcoming the New Years in.  I honestly love New Years cause its a good time to take a good look at your life and see your weak points and try to figure out how to improve them.  Its a great time to leave bad habits in the past and replace them with good ones.  A good time to leave all the bad behind and look forward to the future and have a vision of what you want to become.  I hope you all were able to come up with some goals for this new year on what you can improve to be the best you that you can be.  To achieve your full potential wherever you are at in life.  These goals can be for in the church, in your work, in your personal life, or in your family.  But whatever you have come up with make sure to write it down and put some specifics on it about how your gonna accomplish it, when, and then start doing it!  There's a 20-80 rule which means that the first 20 percent that you put into a goal getting it started and planning it out well will usually have a great determining factor on how the rest or the other 80 percent goes.  That wants to say that if you start off super strong and make plans and get your goal going chances are that you will be able to do really well with that goal in the long run!  So get started!!  Also make sure to put down the most important goals first and ask yourself if I could only do 1 thing before leaving on a trip for 3 months what 1 thing what I get done or what 1 goal would I try to accomplish before leaving.  Whatever it is jump on that goal first and tackle it!!  Get it done!!  I hope we can all write down our goals and have a great new year!  Lets all make the changes and be the people that we've said we've wanted to be for the past couple of years!!  Lets Go!!!

Sweet.  So for New Years we ate sooo many good things.  I think it may have won Christmas.  We started off the 31st eating a Pork Leg that was cooked in a huge oven and it was sooo juicy and delicious.  Probably my favorite meal of the month!!  Then we went to another house and had some Carne Asada that was also delish.  Then we finished off the night going to another members house that gave us Lasagna.  Pretty descent.  But it was like a Thanksgiving day.  Love getting fed by members!!  Then we stayed at the members house and were able to watch the neighbors and everyone in the street light off the MONO its also called the MUNECA.  What it is is they stuff up a dummy and it looks kinda like a scare crow accept for it stuffed up with bombs and fireworks and firecrackers.   Then at 12 o clock they light it off and get far away from it and then it started burning and ka boomed.  Tons of explosions and fireworks flying everywhere.  It was awesome!!  Made sure to have some sparkling cider as well!

With investigators we were able to have some pretty good results and turn outs this week!  Lots showed up for church including our new guy Jose Luis and his family!!  Hes super pilas and loved the church and everything!!  Super legit!   Also found about this little kid named Jorge from the Primary that is the little brother of a 14 year old kid named Jose short story is that Jose is the only member of his family but he loves the church and goes every week and has brought his little brother for the last couple of years and his little brother Jorge just turned 8 and wants to get  baptized so they talked with us this Sunday!!  so were gonna start going with the little guy and make sure hes solid for his baptism!  cute little guy!!  fun stuff!!

Anyways that's about it for this week.  We went to the beach today and it was cool.  Full of garbage and trash and rubbish and stuff from all the parties of Christmas and New Years but we had some fun throwing the Pig Skin and me flipping.  Still got it.  but I've lost form for sure!!  got burnt which is sweet!  anyway gotta head out now but I love all of you guys and hope you all kill it with your goals this year!!  Oh ya i got like 6 months left hahaha.. CRAZY.  See you in July!!

Love Elder Hunt

WEEK #73 Feliz Ano Nuevo

Hey hows it going everybody??  Hope you all had a Merry White Christmas and that you all enjoyed the heaps of snow!  It looked sooo good!!  Your all soo lucky!  While you all had your heaters going for Christmas we all had our fans running full blast and were trying not to sweat, cause it was super hot this week!!  But it definitely was a Christmas for the books!  One that Ill never forget!  We had a ton of fun and enjoyed sharing with others!

We had a Ward Christmas Dinner this week that was super delish!  Olaf even came!!  We saw lots of acts and dances and singing!  We even got to sing ourselves!  Threw on the Santa Hats and sang some Silent Night mixed with some Noche de Luz!  It sounded pretty legit for being kinda last minute!  Food was great though and we had a fun time hanging with the members and enjoying the Christmas spirit!!  Had some investigators there which was cool as well!

Thursday night was super cool!  Throughout the whole day we just went to the members houses and they gave us lots of Ticucos and Tamales and Sandwiches!!  Also Wednesday night another threw my comp a birthday party with cake and sandwiches it was dope!  It was fun being able to eat soo much food and go from one appointment to the other getting stuffed, it was basically Thanksgiving!  After about 4 Ticucos (basically are tamales) and 2 Tamales and 1 sandwich we went to our final appointment of the night and it was super cool.  I had (with the help of my parents) got some gifts for this poor family that doesn't have much and their 2 twin daughters and 8 year old daughter who just got out of the Hospital some little toys and gifts!  We went over there in the night and I dressed up kinda like Santa Clause and brought all the gifts wrapped into their house saying HOHOHO Feliz Navidad and jingling my keys!  They were so excited and I put all the gifts under the tree and just seeing the looks on their faces was priceless!!  Then the member gave us a nice turkey dinner cause he wanted to do something super nice for us as well.  It was sooo delicious and somehow we were able to get all that food down without problems!  

Then the 24th in the night was pretty crazy again!  As soon as 12 o clock rolled around the whole night sky lit up with fireworks and firecrackers and booms and bangs and colors and chinese lanterns!  It was super legit!  Alot cooler than Santa Barbara last year cause there were definitely more fireworks going off and commotion!  Cant wait for New Years as well!!  I'd imagine that being in a war zone would kinda feel like the 24th or 31st just lots of lights and booms and bangs everywhere!  Pretty cool stuff!

Christmas day was soo goood as well!  We all had a zone activity in the morning to play some games, exchange some gifts and watch some videos together and focus in on the true meaning of Christmas even more!!  It was pretty cool and then my favorite part of the day was being able to talk with my family!!  It was soo fun!  I enjoyed every second!  Its different here in Honduras cause basically no one is a Christmas fanatic and so it was great being able to share the same enthusiasm for Christmas with my family!  Love those guys!!

Anyway really cool week and had some great experiences!  Wish I could tell you everything with all the details but this letter is getting too long haha!  Hope you all had a Holly Jolly Christmas and that you have a Happy New Years as well!!  Make some goals, set your priorities, tackle the most important goals first and just stick with it!!  Hope you all enjoy the fresh new start of the year and that you can all set some great goals for your lives!!  I'm stoked about mine!!  Love you all and have a great week!!  Have fun in the snow!!  2016!!!  Lets Go!!

Love Elder Hunt

WEEK #72 Merry Christmas!

Well I hope you all have been having a wonderful holiday season and that you have been enjoying the company of each other and the Love that's in the air.  I hope your all enjoying the mountain of snow that's been falling and been having fun in it!  For me there's no better time than the Holiday Seasons and more than anything I just love how people just seem to be more friendly and filled with the spirit of Christmas!  One cool thing about the word Christmas that I saw this year and that Ive heard before but had long forgotten is that you can seperate the word Christ and Mas the word mas in Spanish means more so what we are really kind of saying is More Christ and with more Christ in our lives I think that's exactly why we tend to be happier around this time of the year!  As we are serving and helping others around us and doing what Christ would do if he were here, we will have his spirit more with us and because Christ is a jolly, happy person when we have his spirit we too will feel the same!  So I hope you all can take time to give a helping hand even if its the littlest thing and that you can take President Monson's invitation to just take a couple silent moments to think about the Savior and his birth and just to feel of his warmth.

This last week was pretty crazy to be honest and we found lots of cool new people.  Had some good progress with a couple of our investigators and it was a good week for sure!!  Hard to remember exactly what happened.  Funny thing is that we had about 10 people that were telling us without a doubt they would be coming to church this Sunday and everyone of them had an excuse the day of.  So kind of a bummer there but just glad to have been able to find some pretty cool people this week including 1 girl that is just sooo ready!!  She basically baptism challenged herself at the end of the lesson and got choked up crying feeling the spirit as we were watching the Christmas videos.  I really hope she and the others will be able to progress.  Just kind of hard with Christmas and everyone leaving to their Villiage in the south from where they are from.  Almost all of Choloma is from a Village from the South and they all leave to go there for Christmas to spend it with their family!  So hopefully everything will turn out great when they all get back!  

I'm pretty excited about all the food we are going to be eating this week!!  We'll see if we can beat the Tamale record from last year when we ended up getting like 30 tamales in total!  My stomach is finally ready for some more but it took me like a year to be craving these things again!!  Went a little overload last year!!  But will see what new food we get to try this year!!

This Sunday was my comps birthday and we surprised him for sure!!  Ended up throwing like 3 surprise parties in the end!! 2 on Sunday and 1 on Monday and he had no idea!!  For my Birthday here in the mish I got one cake a couple days after my Birthday and he got 3!!  Made sure to spoil him with the members for his Birthday!  It was a memorable one for sure!!  He was super happy and felt so special.  Soo that was pretty cool!! Ill make sure to send some pics next week!

Soo ya!  Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and that you can think about Christ more and reach out to others in small acts of kindness!  I sure love every single one of you and miss you all tons!!  Gonna enjoy my last Christmas here in Honduras in the 90ish degree weather, (its been super hot lately) and for me I'm just grateful to be a missionary serving the Lord and helping others the best I can!  I'm grateful to be closer to Christ than I ever have and to feel of his warmth and love for me.  I've felt great joy in being able to serve others this Christmas and helping to give people a Christmas that they've never had!  I know that God lives.  I know that he loves us.  I know that because of his love for us he sent his son about 2000 years ago to the earth to save us and redeem us and to make us more than we can be by ourselves.  The baby that was born in Bethlehem changed the world for forever and offers us all hope and a new life.  I know that Christ lives and that he directs this church today through his prophet.  May we all strive to put Christ in the center of our lives and strive to be more like him every day!!

I love you all soo much!  Merry Christmas!!

Love Elder Haden