Day 75

¡Hola Familia!
this question has been burning in my mind all week. dad- did you just have people call you elder veranos? i am seriously considering it but i enjoy listening to the people struggling to pronounce my name. i get really surprised when they actually know what it means and just say e´ veranos. the ward finally split? how many people are in the ward now? i bet obispo bashaw will be awesome. this week my comp and i walked into the chapel to find out who we are going to eat with for the week and a whole bunch of windows were shattered with rocks. now we have plastic windows in our church but i kept a small piece of a window to show people that it actually happened. this week was very very very hot but everyone gave us tons and tons of juice to drink. last monday, a guy came up to confront us with his gang standing behind him. my comp was eating some candy and the guy tried to rip it from his hand but e´ escobar is a beast and they just struggled for a bit. i walked up closer and said ´´hey! cual es su problema? por favor, dejanos en paz.´´ the guy ripped his hand from my comps grip and just punched him in the face. he started laughing and ran back to his gang while my comp just sat there and just started cussing him out. i had to drag him away because he wanted to fight them. if my companion would have done anything, im sure that gang would have a gun or a knife the next time but we haven´t seen them at all this past week. my hair is doing a lot better. e´ escobar promised me that the nick above my ear has grown over and it isn´t as bad as before. i actually like my hair this short and i think i look extra studdly, in a missionary kind of way of course. thank you thank you thank you for sending me the conversions for this stuff. it helps me a lot! the bottles of soda here are very different because they are 2.25 litros and they are skinny and very long. im sure that the bottles of soda in the U.S. will freak me out when i go home because i have gotten used to these. i love how it is summer here but sometimes i kind of miss the snow! there are peach trees in some yards and they are just starting to get ripe. when we find one that just fell to the ground we don´t hesitate to eat it because they are so good! i think they are ´´damascos´´ because they are mini peaches. to answer some questions: e´ escobar is an awesome district leader and things are a little different in our district. last friday, we had divisions for a whole day and my comp went with a younger missionary while that elders comp stayed with me in abásalo for the whole day. i was with e´judd and i felt a lot better about myself because he has been in the mission for 8 months and i think that i can speak just as well, if not better than him. although one guy answered the door and i said ´´good morning! we are the missionaries of the church of jesus christ and we´´ ´´i know, i can tell because of your accent´´. my heart was broken, but im working on it. i usually mix up my intros while we are clapping doors and i have even challenged people for baptism right off the bat. it hasnt worked yet but maybe in the future... mom- i love the scripture you shared with me about alma and their burdens because i just shared that scripture with a family a few days ago that has some financial struggles. one thing i noticed about those scriptures is that they say we need to have patience and bear our desafíos with gladness. that is the problem because the lord is not going to take our challenges away immediately and that is the worst part dealing with the challenges for a long time. i have been talking to my mission president about some of the things that has been happening and he gave me some tips to avoid more problems. he made it sound like i might be here one more transfer but we are going to see... Oh! my soccer skills are ok. we haven´t played a whole lot lately because we haven´t had p-day with the other elders in a few weeks but we are going to play today and i am stoked. Elder Judd showed me some tricks i can use while we are playing. when i was with him, we decided to just walk out to this area a mile away to knock some doors because e´escobar and i have been wanting to go for awhile but never had the chance. this area is part of our ward boundaries and one member actually lives out there. they told us that there are tons of great people out there but nobody answered their doors. they did peek out through the windows and shook their fingers to tell us to go away. That is awesome that Ryan Oaks got his mission call! i saw his sister in the mtc a few times and thats cool they will be in the same mission. i really think that this transfer is going a lot faster than the last one and it sometimes feels like the weeks are just slurring together. ok! i have some pictures this week. i love you all and i am looking forward to hearing more from you guys next week!
Un abrazo y 5 besos y más abrazos
Elder Summers

these are from the day we went climbed cerro chenque. it was very windy and it took awhile to set the camera up without falling and we had to position ourselves right. trial and error... the other pictures are of me climbing the roof on new years. we all climbed it to watch the fireworks and we had a party with our orange fanta. elder gomez, elder judd, me in the center, and elder escobar is in the red. i have some more... but those will wait for other times.