Arrived in Paraguay!

The space bar on this thing is like a rock so I apologize for any words where the spacing is mixed up. Its really throwing me off.

Alright Viernes: We had our last class with herman guitierz and got to take pictures and then every one in the district got to bare their testimonies. It was really good. I also finished up my last interviews with people and got to give one last blessing to an elder in my district. Also the week before I started asking the latinos ¿como està su gato? which they absolutely loved.. thought was hilarious, and then continued to blow it out of proportion by saying we were eating different animals for meals and things like that. It was super funny and I loved making them laugh… wish I would have used it for the other 2 groups. 

Sabado: We went proselyting and I don’t remember too much because its been so long but here’s what i do remember. We had a dog follow us for 2 hours, we named it dog, because that’s not a Spanish word and were cleaver. haha. My computer says all these words are spelled wrong so that’s annoying haha. Also there was this super awesome street market that was open for like an hour that was just the street filled with tons of different kind of shops. I wish it was open longer or that we could have gone back. That would have been cool. At night it was our last time with hermano Àvila which was sad but we got some good photos. 

Domingo:  I didnt have to give a talk in church at all! So that was awesome!  Also we had our last chance to take pictures, which was good, and we had just a normal good Sunday. Also there is a group photo on www.lds.org.ar I think. Try and find me if you can.

Lunes: today was full of meetings, like literally 12 hours worth of preparing to enter the field but I’m super excited so it was all right. Said my last good byes to the Latinos and Uruguay people tonight and got myself ready to get up at 3 in the morning. Whooooooo I love mornings... said the liar.

Martes. Today was the big travel day and big it was. We started by all the Paraguay people riding a bus to the plane in which it took an hour for everyone to make it through the airport. Then when we left to go get on our plane. We took a bus out to the runway and got on our plane via stairs. It was super awesome! I sat next to 2 very unfriendly people and had a silent flight thanks to that.     The flight was an hour and a half long and once we landed it took another hour for everyone one to get through customs because they did it one at a time. I was last, but while waiting i was able to place a book of Mormon with a couple other missionaries… it was  awesome!  After he tried to teach us some Guaraní.  I asked if he liked to read, then introduced the book of Mormon.  I told him it could change his life and just like that boom... one down! hahaha. After customs president McMullin was waiting for us- which was good. He is a great guy and I cant wait to get to know him more. Then we went to the church building with the mission office, had lunch and went and visitied a park. Did you know that Parley P Pratt was a main contributor into opening south America as a mission? crazy!!!  Also after the park we went to visit the temple grounds! They are beautiful and hopefully I’ll be able to upload all my pictures so you can see them. After we returned for dinner, I met with president, and he asked lots of good questions so that he could get  a feel of who I was and what companion would suit me best. Then all 24 of us slept in the house of the ap and office workers. It was a little crowed but a last good night with all my friends from the ccm. Oh also we ate dinner at a restaurant. It was good, i have no idea what it was, but it was good. 

Mièrcoles : this was the big day.... trainers and our first companion and then entering the field! It started with breakfast followed by 2 hours of personal study, and we got fingerprinted to become more legal here... the office actually holds all of our travel documents and gives us a copy. Kind of scary, but if there is one thing I have come to know for sure, the church knows how to take care of travelers. Especially ones that dont speak the language here. After I got my new companion elder Rodriguez! He is from Columbia and turns 26 on the 14th of august... so yes he is old…and wise! He can speak very broken English, but enough that I can understand and has been in the mission for 11 months. He is super patient with my spanish which is awesome, is a convert of 3 years, and the only member of his family. He is a great missionary and I have already learned so much from him. The area we got assigned to was the one he was already in. Remansito. It is one of, if not the poorest areas, in the mission. Its about 30 minutes outside of Asuncion and is great. I traveled in the van of a members to get there and the roads are all most all dirt and very pot holey.  if not then they are cobblestone. Once I got to the house I unpacked a little. then we planned for the lessons we had that evening… I know crazy. We have one branch in our area, about 400 members.... yes 400 and only about 40 that are active.... so as you can guess one of the goals is to help reactivate people. I first went and met the branch president, preidente Olviedo, and then we went and taught froilan a recent convert. After we taught 2 more lessons and but I cant really remember who to because the names are so different here... that’s harder than the language I think. The nights here have been very cold so far; I sleep in a sweatshirt and sweats -its crazy.

Alright! I get another hour of email after we go visit someone... so ill be back with the rest of my week, and upload some pictures then, but I’ll send this one now so you can start reading. Ciao for probably 30-40 minutes.
  

Also the lady in tan and black came back to church for the first time in forever this last week so that was super exciting and we took a picture. my companion did at least. He said reactivating people is equal to baptism, especially in this area, which I have come to learn is true.

Alright so...

jueves- oh and this key board doesn’t show all the letters so bear with me... sorry....Super full day today. And I met the sosa family. I have decide that sister sosa is like the grandma of the ward even though shee isn’t that old- hahah. But she is very kind and always trying to feed us. Which is awesome!  We taught 4 lessons today which was great. I can only say so much... most the time I pray and bear testimony of the things we teach but I’m slowly getting better.  I cant remember if I said this in the last letter but we have a baptism scheduled for each Saturday of September so that’s super awesome... starting with this Saturday!!! The problem is their are all girls and even though its good that they are join our branch needs way more men... we have about 12 priesthood holders that are active in our branch- including ourselves. Tonight was cold.... but starting to get hotter... yep!

Viernes- I found out that we get lunch every day from members except for pdays which is great cause we rarely eat dinner. My Spanish is pretty bad still, but I am getting good at practicing my patience. People love to laugh and make fun of me when I cant understand anything... so that’s cool. Also i found out that most 18-20 year old guys date 13-15 year olds and I think that that is soooo gross... but like everyone has a girlfriend or boyfriend and it seems to be totally fine to them... i think its super weird.. oh and today was supper hot!!! Like really hot.... summer is going to be a tough one for sure.

Sabado- also supper hot!! We taught 4 lessons and one house we went to their power had been down all day. We said a pray with them and within 5 minutes it turned on!! I truly believe that it was a miracle. It was so awesome. We also fast from lunch to lunch here... so fast Sunday was really rough. It was super hot and we weren’t allowed to drink water.. Because the mission president hasn’t said anything about that.. My companion is sick and so for our fast he asked me for a blessing since he couldn’t take any medicine.. I gave it to him in Spanish it was super hard. I am running out of time to write and trying to send as many pictures as possible but don’t know how to send more than like 5 at a time... if you can teach me through email that would be great.

Domingo-

Super hot.. Also I learned that punctuality doesn’t exist here. We were like 10 minutes late to church cause we had to take church clothes to a member and the meetings didn’t even start till half an hour after they were supposed to. it was crazy. I did get to stand up in front of everyone and introduce my self at church.. That was fun.. Not really.  they all laughed but its all good... I know that they care. We taught the young men’s president tonight who is less active and he cried and said he knew that he needs to change his life… it was super cool! I sleep with no sheets now. Its so hot....

Lunes- today is pday and has been crazy busy in short cause I have no time... I ate burger king and have been all over... ill try and include more next week...

cool things about Paraguay:

Animals ive seen... horses, parrots, chickens, dogs, turkeys, pigs, sheep cats, frogs (i even kicked one for fun it was funny tehehe. oh and cows... the dogs chase the cows everywhere its halattious. 

My first American song I heard in south America was diamond by riahanna... thought of Kelby naturally...  ill try and include other cool stuff next time.  have to catch the bus or will have a really long walk ahead.. Sorry I couldn’t send that many pictures... I’ve taken over 300 and dont know how to send more than a couple at a time. also mom if you send a package do not put over 100 dollars for value the airport takes it and then keeps it for a very long time and its way more expensive... sorry the second half of the letter was so short we are pressed for time ill try and answer all your questions next time.

ççççç´.ñ´-ñ¡¡¿¿??'''ç´+- cool i know

Much love para siempre

Ciao

Elder Jace Gummersall

Kisses in the Street ( the story of the lost pen)

Hola!!

Today is my last pday, but i do get a little bit of time to write you on monday beacuse we are leaving tuesday and pdays in the feild are on monday, so be ready for that and the switch coming up!

Jueves- last pday was great, we got 2 new latino roommates, Elder trucolo and elder admin, elder admen is from paraguay, in the north and his dad is a ward mission leader! they are both great and very up beat people, but there first night here was kind of rough. We all went to bed on time and i fell asleep fine, but then at 1 in the morning i woke up to the loudest snoring that sounded like a man was dying in the world. It was like alex at school, with a megaphone, mom and dad whisper at night compared to this guy he was louder than a bear!! after 2 hours of no sleep i finnally made some make shift ear plugs and got a couple more zzzzz´s the rest of the week hasnt been that bad, we turn the fan on to help drown out some of the sound and i wake up 6-10 times a night for about 10 minutes because of it, but none was a bad as the first night. Also i went to the distibution center and found a book of mormon in guarani! it is imposible to read, but it only costs a dollar so i had to get it. Also mom i csant get garmets here because if all the missionaries did, they wouldnt be able to keep it stocked for everyone else, its a really small distribution center down here.

Viernes- Today i woke up after that rough night of sleep tired as ever. i lost mypen but was able to find it later that night. it was very scary to think my favorite pen here could be gone, also we had the strangest dinner for the second time, its been described as really soggy grits, but is basically like a cornbread soaked in water and spegehetti sauce. Its not a horrible taste but the texture is unbearlable, every other nmeal here is fantastic. We also got new areas for prosoliting tomorow and i was super excited!!

Sabado- ive been getting better sleep, about this day is when i adjust to sleeping with a bear in the corner (dont get me wrong elder admen is a great guy and will be a great missionary its just tough to sleep at night haha) and we had prosolyting! it went really well today! we went and bought 2 more spanish books of mormon becasue they are only a dollar and that was super good because we placed all 4 of them. The first one was this lady walking down the street smoking a ciggarete. We stopped her to talk about the book of mormon after introducing it to her she dropped the cigareete and said she wanted to learn more, we got her info and while doing so i grabbed a word of wisdom pamphlet and gave her that with the book of mormon.... then i shook her hand to say good bye and she started to pull my arm like she was gonna whisper something in my ear. Right as i started to lean in i realized that she was trying to do the kiss on the check thing everyone does down here so i pulled back and just said no cause i didnt know how to explain it in spanish. Also iut was a good thing that she was like 4´8" because she couldnt get close to my face at all, my companion then just shook her hand and we left, he said it looked so awkward and funny! i couldnt believe that it happend it was crazy!! After, we were walking through the streets and we saw this lady standing in her doorway, normally people duck into there house when they see us but she didnt and she had three little girls running around so we took the opportunity to talk with her, she really was intrested in the book of mormon and ecspeacially the plan of salvation, we testified about hoe the gospel blesses familys and that she could live with them forever. Our next big contact was maxamillian. He was about 15 or 16 and had hurt his ankle and was sitting outside his house. We went and talked to him and had an amazing lesson on the first vision restoration and book of mormon, he said he would pray to know if it was true and that he too wanted to learn more. I then said a prayer for him and it was awesome! i just prayed in the street. The first part of our area was very busy, but as we neared the backside it quickly became the poorest area ive ever seen in my life, mexico smelled worse when we visited those people, but their living conditions were just unhumane. i wish there was ways to help them, but the people we saw were all drinking and looked like they wanted our stuff, becuase we were way over dressed, then a message about the gospel, we could both tell that it wasnt safe for us to be there, but it was an image that will be in my head for a while. After we talked to one more lady and her daughter about the church, she said she doesnt want another church, but that she loves to read and she would read the book of mormon, we told her to pray and ask if it was true and that god would tell her that it is. Over all it was a great saturday and an awesome time prosolyting!

Domingo- 1 month!!! wooooo i can see how the mission flies by fast. im definately ready to leave to the feild, but it doesnt feel like i have been here for a month! church today was good, i didnt have to give a talk so im assuming that i will this week. Two people forom my district did, and our district performed a musical number, i wasnt in it, but they did very good and i was so proud haha. sunday was pretty routine and there wasnt too many exciting things that happend.

Lunes- Today we took the group picture for everyone that is leaving next! its crazy to think of how close it is! Today was also very routine and had nothing to exciting exceot for the new trick i learned! i can now tear an apple in half with just my hands!! its all about pressure and hand placement but its so cool and truely is the best way to eat an apple!! try it sometime!! its tough until you get it once!

Martes- Today i woke up and my voice was gone. I didnt feel to sick but have no explanation to where it could have gone. I will not admit to being sick though because then my mind will let my body get sick. Also tongiht my pen that i almost lost ran out of ink. it was a very sad day. It was right before hermano avila taught an amazing lesson. I had a pencil so was still able to take notes, but he taught about the attonement and how everything in our church, and everything in our lives, and every lesson we teach should be centered around the attonement, because only though christ we can be saved, and only through christ we can be changed! it was the best lesson ive had at the CCM.

Méircoles- í bét yóú wísh thát yóúr kéýbóárd cóúld dó thát!! ñññññññññññññ yeah. Today we had devotional in the morning by the Mission president of the Buenos Aires North mission. President Ayer. It was very good, he spooke english which was great and taught about the nessity of faith and obedience in our lives as missionaries. it was super good. I also have been getting pretty good at soccer, i just pick up differeñt little things from the latiños and theñ am able to do acouple of the things that they can. Today i got a my second hair cut while being out here. the guy cuts hair in like 4 minutes its incredible. Then ibefre bed i went to the bathroom and a latino elder was finishing up cutting someones hair. I asked him if my hair was bad and he said yes. After he offered to help and while he was cutting mine a little bit, i found out that he has been cutting hair for 7 years! since he was 13!! crazy i know and it actually does look alot better!¿¡¡¡¡¿¿¿¡¿¿¡¿¿¡¿¿¿¿¡¡¡¿¿¡ haha

Jueves- today has been great! i had my second to last district leader interviews with presisident and am getting ready to leave. We had pday during the day and i played fútbol for all of it. After we got to go to the tempkle here in buenos aires fo rthe last time! it was sad to think that but ill come back and visit someday im sure!!. After that i got to come up and write you guys!!! hope all is well!!

Also if you could throw in the box a tide to go pen, i really love mine and am afraid it might run out soon, and some more of that medicated face lotion, i need some more, and only need one tube cause it is more of a just in case and every now and then thing. that would be great! you guys are the best and i love reading about your lives!!! love you all!!

Love

Elder Jace Gummersall ( its so funny to watch latinos try to read my first name!!)

One Month

On sunday ive been out here for a month and it doesnt even feel like it!!!

Jueves- We set new district goals after i emailed you last week, we kept them pretty close to the smae but added that on wednesday our district would only speak in spanish.. also that night we got to listen to president which is truely always amazing!

Viernes- During our IP (Invistagidor progesivo) we taught the law of tithing... during the lesson i said pegamos diezmo.... trying to say we pay tithing... which is actually pagamos diezmo.. the practice investigator laughed because i said we glue tithing... it was preety funny we also got to do service today! i love doing service we go to the hostile and this time we cleaned all the walls upstairs... that didnt have enough rags for everyone so i went around and just asked people if they need more in spanish... it is always a great time. Also we had fish for the second time here, and i have learned that with enough ketchup or salsa barbocoa i can eat anything. ( salsa in spanish means sauce).

Sabado- We got to go prosilting today! As district leader i get a cell phone when our group goes out, but it doesnt make to much sense why cause no one else has phones.. its cool thouhgh. also its crazy how much i dont think about my phone or facebook or instagram or anything like that.. i havent had any sort of withdrawls or anything! theres one kid who had a little in the begging it was funny to see everytime he reached for his pocket. As for prosiliting, we returned to the same area as last week, and we did not have as much success. At one point one lady was going off about how she was catholic and she didnt need another religion and so before it escalted more i said thanks for your time... gracias por su tiempo.. but she must of heard templo (temple) becuase then she yelled at us about how here boday was hers, and that was her tample and then just started screaming caio and walking away it was crazy. We tried to meet up with alecander for a return appointement but he was never home, we went to his house twice first his little sister answered and then his dad. We talked to his dad about the church but he wasnt intrested... he did say he would give alexander our pamphlet about the restauation though. Like i said we had a pretty rough day but with 20 minutes before the bus came we ran into pablo. He was probably 14 to 16 and was so patient with our spanish and really wanted to know more about the church. We taught him as much as we could in the limited time we had, and then asked for his address so he could learn more. He couldnt remmeber his address though so that was super sad. i told him to look out for anyone else in name badges and white shirts, and where the church was... i hope he is able to find what he is looking for, but looking back on it i think he was just a blessing to us from god so that our spirits could be a little more lifted for the day. It was a good day and very tiring at that. The city is crazy, there are stop lights on the main roads, but they dont have stop signs, they just honk as they drive and hop there isnt another car going through the intersections. The house are all crammed in there two, its not super poor horrible living conditions, but its definately way smaller then the states. Its eye opening, but the people here really are great!

Domingo- Today i conducted sacrament meeting. I was a litttle nervous but nothing to bad. Also since president hand the person conducting the 5 names of whose speaking, once he handed me it, anytime i looked up into the auidence people were looking at me trying to find out if they had to give a talk, it was hard to say yes to the few that had to... and i didnt enjoy having to say the 5 names, but there was nothing i could do about it. Idid learn about how the church conducts meeting when the presidening athourtiy speaks last. Dad could probably tell you since he was a bishop and all. Also we got to take pictures today! i got some good ones... ithink it was a lot more than last time because both north americans and latin americans were hedaing out into the feild... Which means we are the "old group" now its great. I also interviewed everyone today. There is serious struggle at the homefront in some peoples lives and it is really hard when i cant do much to help them here. It does make me count my blessings and i do really enjoy the interveiw time and getting to know people better.

Lunes- Today our district had meetings with the president. since its our last two weeks he set two new goals with evryone. 1) anytime that we have unsupervised time we need to break the time chunk into 15 minutes and choose what we are going to do in planning the night before. 2) we need to set 2 companioingoals that will strengthen our companionship. I have implented both it is has deffinantely helped me, my companionship, and our district in our focus as we approach the end of our time here. We also had a difficult spanish lesson that was hard for Elder McRae to leearn ecspeacially, he started rasing his voice because of the frustration of it not making sense... my companion then strated to sing "Love at Home" as a joke but still a lot of people joined in it was so funny and totally reminded me of home! We sang "Llamados al Servicio" that night to the leaving north and latin americans. elder posada left at 4 in the morning so we had to get up to say good bye to him. Elder copa didnt leave tell wednesday because his visa for ecuador didnt go through so he got re assgigned to a mission in argentina until its good.

Martes- Today was BUSY!! after everyon taught ip in the morning that had it, our teacher pulled me out into the hallway, she said she gave some feedback and critiscm that wasnt taking well, and long story short me and my companion Elder Hall had to be the mediator between the two... it wasnt fun for sure but its part of my duties so it was something i had to deal with.. i think a bandaid got put over it and hopefully it doesant get worse over the next couple times here. The new group that comes in latter today is small, 28 latin americans which is just a little undersized, and 13 north americans which is tiny! they are sending american missionaries that are going to paraguay or uraguay to the mexico mtc now beacuse its easier for americans to apply for a visa when they are down here, so we are some of the last with this mission call to get to be herre. im grateful im here because i love it and have been truely blesed by all the expierences ive had! Elder copa gave our room all a gift tongiht. Choclate!! from argentina i saved it tell wednesday though because i wanted to dip it in dulce de leche... it was amazing, not difffernt i just havent had chocolate in a while.

Méircoles- Today we spoke all spanish as a district. Elder copa left in the morning and he will be a great missionary, we get new ones today. We taught in the morning and were told we were great teachers and taught by the spirit but need to use simpler words and pretend like were teaching children. That made me miss my primary class! tell them all i said hi! We also get tnew investigators for the last time.. its crazy and exciting to think ill be in the feild soon, itll be a long wait though.. i just want to head out now! our speak spanish goal failed at night because we started learning the hardest spanish because there is no direct translation to english. We all had to speak english to help us understand more and to help explain it to each other. After we started, we didnt stop, but we did really good for the resst of the day. We will have learned all the spanish language by the end of this week, and then will get to practice for our last week here... its crazy how much and fast we have learned i just hope im able to retain alot of it.

Jueeves- that brings me to know. we had to write at 6:30 this morning because they need the computers free for when the new people come in. It also means i probably wont get breakfast because i leae from here straight to a meeting with president.. hopefully ill get to eat alittle something!

Love ya lots!!! cant wait to send pictures in a couple weeks, and to answer your questions mom, my companion is elder tyler hall from Kaysville utah. he is great! i cant remember all the questions that you guys had but will try to include them next week. I leave for paraguay on a tuesday mornign but am not sure what time, it will be the 27th.

Mom! wow sounds like you really killed girls camp!!!! i knew you would your such a great leader and person!!

Dad glad to here your using insanity well... i promise that if you keep doing it, youll get better at it and your health will deffinately increase... but only if you do it consistently.

Mckenzie! My companion said his sister works at a hospital in utah so if you every meet any halls, im probably her brothers companion.

Coble stone- your leaving so soon!!!! you will have to send me pictures from lithuania im so urious to see what the world looks like over there!!

Tmoney man- Hows football? what position you looking at? defense is the best.... just syaing! hope your ready for school and your first game i know that both are coming up soon!!!

Did you guys get that letter yet or not? the hand writting one? let me know how long it took im curious to see how fast the puoch travels!

Love you all and i know your all doing great!!

peace and blessings peace and blessings

Elder Jace Gummersall

Already A Baptism

Hola family! Im gonna try to format my letters a little different this week so let me know how you like it!

Jueves- I got Mom and Tanners Dear elder letters after i emailed you but i loved them! to answer some questions yes mom i have met elder larson he is a great kid! and everything here is going great! and Tanner People are always playing soccer and most the time ill join at some point but we play a lot of volleyball and basket ball as well! I got two new latino roomates Elder Copa and Elder Posada I love them they are great people and are really funny. They are from Buenos aries and Columbia. Last week at the temple i did the entire session in español it was tough but i was amazed at how much i was able to understand!. We also set new district goals of not being tardy and speaking more spanish and to say the least we have really struggled with them this past week but we are making new more relistic goals tonight!

Viernes- Fridays are alwys great beacuase we get to go serve the hostile right next store to the CCM that is used for people who come and visit the temple! We folded tons of laundry for them, all towels and sheets, its so fun to see all the kids there they are super funny even though we can barely understand them, our teaching of two investigators has been going really well as well! its getting alot easier to teach by the spirit. Tanner my advice for you though is learn it all really good now because there is no time to learn in the MTC its just practice! i did play soccer today and the Latinos said that i wasnt half bad!! but i still now that im nowhere as good as them. Tonight we also got our areas for prosiliting on saturday. I dont know how to spell proselyting in english so now its prosilitismo. After we got our areas and mapped out our plan of where to go, Hermana Ferrera asked me for a blessing because she was sick. Me and 3 other people gave it to her. My Companion annointed and i gave the blessing. It was a little nerve racking like always but it went really well. After the Blessing i went down to my room to ask elder copa if he knew about the area and he said that its half good half bad, and that all the young people have guns!! talk about scary, i was still super excited anyway!

Sabado- today we prosolitizado. I started the morning by teaching a practice investigator here at the CCM and then we all prepared to leave. it was definately nerve wracking but when we got out there me and Alder Hall were so excited! It really is a great opportunity to get to actually prosolyte here. We found out that people in the city are pretty rude and the first 10 people we tried talking to barely even ackknowldged us. Then we came around the corner and met Alexander. He looked about 25 but we talked to him for an hour! we discussed the book of mormon, how to feel the spirit, challenged him to read it, and ahad a conversation about how God has an actual body. It was a very difficult concept for him to grasp but we set up a return appointment for next week. Oh and towards the end i asked him that if he came to know if the book of Mormon was true if he would be baptized into our church and he said yes!!! the first person we actually talked to agreed to baptism.. kinda.. it was crazy!!! all in spanish too! Then we went aroung the corner and talked to Gastón he wanted to here more but didnt have time so we got his adress and since he lives out of our area he will be taught by full time missionaries here. Then we walked for a while and couldnt find anyone, until we ran into Carlos Alberto Lopez who didnt understand any english but after an hour of talking to him told us how he was an alcholic and that he couldnt sleep at night because he had demons in his head we promised him that if he read the book of mormon he would be able to sleep that night, and he wanted to hear more as well. he also lives out of the area so unfortunately we wont get to teach him either. That was really the only people we really got to talk to but for our first time it was amazing!! the roads are so small and the drivers are way worse than in mexico, the houses are all crammed in so tight, and they wont let us take out cameras into the street, so we will have to come back down to vistit when i return. But over all it was a great 5 hours of proselitismo and i cant wait for it again this saturday. Kelby or Tanner or Mckenzie i need you to follow and friend accept Pablo Ávila on facebook and Instagram, he is so cool, is the minoion kevin and post stuff about our class everynow and then, and he said he added me.. gracias. That night we also started our fast for sunday, but it was a great day!

Domingo- We had a great testimony meeting, i didnt bear mine but you could feel the spirit so strong! i really do love it here at the CCM. It also was Hermana ferreras birthday so we sang to her during our district class and at dinner! President put on a show like he always does with the scriptures when he taught and we watched a great video of david bednar speaking after our fireside. Also i think fireside is one of my favorite spanish words... its Charla Fogenera how great! I also wrote a letter to you guys so let me know when you get it!! each persons explains a different aspect of life here at the CCM.

Lunes- Our room had weird smells for most the morning... incase you were wondering... also the ranch here is one of the most disgusting things that i have ever tried.. it makes me miss american ranch so much. But the Dulce de Leche is to die for. Hermana Jordan asked for a blessing tonight. Her Brother is in our district so he gave the blessing and Elder Devashrayee anoited the oil for his first time, it also was a great blessing. I switched my handwriting to all caps because its way more ledgable, it just takes longer to write now. Its all good though a pretty non eventful Lunes.

Martes- ONLY 3 WEEKS LEFT as fun and great as it is here all the time we spend in the classroom is getting old and i cant wait to make it out to the feild!! im so excited!. I eat so much bread here, its no where close to as good as the rolls Mom and cory make, but i need the calories and i probably eat like 2 of homeade sizes loafs a day, we dont get the all you can eat buffet like provo haha but the food is really good for the most part. I started reading the book of mormon in spanish with my english ones right beside, i dont have much time to do so but use any free time i have to do it. It has really helped me learn diffferent parts of the spanish language and now im in chapeter 14 of 1 nefi.

Méircoles- Today i set a goal for me and my companioin to only speak in spanish for the whole day, it was so hard! and i think i spoke about 10 words in english completely on accident, but it did help me  comprhend spanish better. Speaking english this morning was a great blessing, ive never wanted to speak it so bad in my life... hopefully the adjustment in the feild wont be that bad. It was a great expierence, also i finnaly used the Bday or Bdae... the water spray toielet paper thing... to say the least... talk about clean... its like a car wash haha. that was the highlighht of my wednesday

Jueves (hoy)- We went to the temple in the morning becuase of howmany people are here and it was great it also meant we got in hour more of activity time for when the ither people went to the temple.. i really am exhuasted from playing soccer, basketball, and volleyball... but it sure does beat sitting in the classroom! Its crazy how fast time flies here! During our temple session i did it all in spanish again.. im getting good and understandin but definantely still need practice.. that brings me to this point! one of the best parts of the week writing my family!!! Hope all is well and cant wait to here from you guys next week!

Love

Elder Jace Gummersall

Shower Sandals

Mckenzie Cumpleaños feliz cumpleaños feliz (insert something else in spanish) cumpleaños feliz!!!! WOW your so old now ,) hope your birthday treats ya well sister! send me your email adrress so i can sent out the email each week to everyone in the family!

Helllo family really frustrated cause i was half way through my email and everything just deleted itslef so ill try to fit everything in with the time i have left. First, things i left out from last week, I forgot my retainer, if you could send it down with brother chambers and have it at the mission home that would be great, my teeth will be fine until then. Also ive been getting more used to it but it is extremely straange and weird to shower with sandals on, i invite you to try it sometime it just doesnt feel right. This sunday I held interviews for my district, i got to know peoples needs better, and got to know them better, oh and mom Elder Craig is in my district, he is a great guy from south carolina. He is like the only one here from the East Coast. The interveiws went well and on sunday we got to take pictures with the latinos.. it was sad but they will be such great missionaries my three favorite had to be Elder haddad Elder Campos and Elder Aquino, hopefully ill be able to stay in contact with all of them. Also during class sunday Presidente Openshaw let everyone know the Parely P Pratt divided the BOM into chapters. How awesome is that!! He also amazed with his sciptorial knowledge again and i look forward to every oppritunity i have to learn from him. Elder Aquino taught me some really basic Guarani up until he left which was real good for me, i still have a lot of spanish to learn though so thats not my main focus. Both buttons already fell off my suit so either ive gotten really fat, or it was then plane ride over... ill let you guys decide when i send pictures home... which wont be until i get to the feild becasue presidente said we arent allowed to send them from here. The Hermanas in my district were extremely kind and sowed them back on for me. On monday my district all had interveiws with the president mine went reallly well i love talking to him even though alot of people are intimidated by him. The Fog here in the morning is amazing. its so thick you cant see three feet out the window and it lingers until about 2 PM its awesome. The weather here is not hot but its so humid that whenever we play sports out side we sweat pretty good, i cant imagine adding aton of heat to it, its only like 65 and its hot enough haha. I was able to get into my suitcase and get a new watch. Ill probably by one in paraguay but dont have the time or ability to by one here in argentina. we finished up teaching our first "invetigator" here which was great practice, but know we are teaching 2. It is really stretching us as a companioinship and as a district, but we are all really good. I had our district set goals last wednesday so we could get the most out of our time here, and we had 2 of them 1) only talk about gospel related topics before lunch, 2) only speak in spanish during lunch and dineer... if we messed up somewhere in there we would get a strike, and 5 strikes meant no pudding or yogurt or whatever sort of desert thing they had the next day for lunch. We started good, hit 5 strikes 2 days in a row, and then have been doing good since, we reset our goals tonight so only one more day left. We get new latinos today, i hope i get some new roomates that are latino so i can practice and learn more spanish! I know i told you about my teacher that reminds of a minion from dispicable me, specifically the minion Kevin, but there is a missionary here that looks like Gru too!! its crazy i love it hahah. Im always pretty tired here but i think that if thats the case it means im working hard and expect to be tired for the next two years. They have pear juuice here which is amazing! try and find some... and make sure its cold warm is no good. The birds here are super loud and fat.. they always soud like they are killing each other and have a scary look to them. We also have had a couple dogs come through our sports area and they have all been extremely nice so hopefully the rest of them are like that... no mom i dont pet them. Ive now memorized the First vission, the baptism question from preach my gospel, and the entire objective from preach my gospel all in spanish... if you have any ideas of what else would be useful to know how to sya please tell me!!! i cant think of anything else to memorize. Everyone here pronounces gummersall as gooomersall... even i introduce my self as that to the latinos sometimes because it is just so hard for them to sya  gummersall. there is an elder in my district they struggle with more. Thats Elder Devashrayee.. he is fresh out of highschool but is 6 5 and plans on playing basketball at west minister (soon to be D2) when he gets back. It was sad to say good bye to the latinos monday night and tuesday morning. We sang called to serve at 10 that night and Then said our goodbyes, Elder haddad left at three in the morning but he came in that morning to sya good bye again haha it was tough to wake up but his story is so amazing and i know he will be a great missionary. Also, I got freckleton his dirt the other day... its in a bag right now but that my be how it comes back to... nonetheless... he shouold have it unless the airport confinscates it. Well time is running short but i love you all! cant wait to send you pictures in a couple weeks, and see how your doing next week

Much love and good luck with everything!!

Happy Birthday kenz hope its a great one!!!

Love Elder Jace Gummersall