Zone Service

Howdy all! 

Well... This week... What did we do? Oh yeah! 

We went to Sabaneta to do a Zone service by cleaning the streets. Fun? Yeah... Except I should have followed my mother´s advice and put on sunscreen... I was told that I looked like a tomato the rest of the day. We also found a dead dog among the piles of trash... 

The streets and fields here are just filled with trash. It´s really sad because it´s such a beautiful country. 

On Saturday it rained. and it rained. AND it rained. And the drainage sistem here isn´t that great, and of course our house is at the bottom of the gradual hill that Mao sits on, so we had 3 feet of water outside our house. 

Afterwards the streets look even worse because all the trash from other parts of the city are outside the house. We also had the farmer´s market that day, so there were dead fish and stinky veggies all over the streets too... We began singing ¨I like to look for rainbows, whenever there is rain. And ponder on the beauty of an earth made CLEAN again.¨ Obviously that song wasn´t written in the DR.

We also have been giving English lessons every Tuesday and Friday as a service. Lots of people are interested, and it´s super fun to help them learn. It´s funny sometimes because their tongues literally can´t make the ¨TH¨ sound, so we tell them to just say ¨d.¨ So it´s ¨broder¨and ¨dem¨ and so on.

Our house is so much fun! We live with two other Hermanas... Hermana Potter and Bradford. This week we had an oreo face race... where you put an oreo on your forehead and try to get it to your mouth without your hands. I have a video of it, so I´ll show it to a few people when I get home and then delete it so it doesn´t end up on Youtube... 

We also eat and have discussions on books and other things. I have also told them about my ideas for the book that I want to write, and they love the idea!!! 

Ok so you guys have been waiting for it... BLONDE MOMENT!!!

Today was our Santiago PDay, where we go to the city to buy food and go to the mission office to get supplies and such. While we were waiting in the office for our group to get there, we were reading the Liahona. It happens that we got a large order of Portuguese versions, so we were reading it trying to see how much we understood. I understood a lot, but not all. 

Well ANYWAYS, my companion was reading a liahona while I was talking with someone else. When she was done, she said that she really liked this article, so I began reading it. I was surprised with how I could understand basically every word... I said to my comp...

¨Wow, I understand this!¨

¨That´s because it´s in Spanish.¨

(Some random Elder walks off laughing and I slap myself with the magazine)

So another story about my special investigator Mariela...

We told her about the temple and how it´s the house of the Lord. Her eyes opened wide, and she said, ¨Wow... I thought people lived in there and that it was just a pretty church, but now it means so much more!¨

She then told us that her goal is to eventually go there to make covenants of her own. My comp and I were literally bawling because we want that more than anything for her. She´ll eventually get there. I know it.

Well anyways, That´s the story of this week! I can´t believe how fast time has flown by... We´re already into February! I love you guys and you are always in my prayers! Always know that you have a loving Savior who´s always there to listen when you need it! The church is true!

Con todo el amor en el mundo,

Hermana Krislee Twiner

Mao, Dominican Republic