Otavalo! July 19, 2010

I got changed this week.  Seriously, I haven´t cried so hard in a really long time.  I didn´t want to leave Quito.  We have been teaching so many families that have been really progressing and we just found a brand new awesome family of gold.  Plus, I love Hermana Groesbeck.  She is so awesome and seriously one of my favorite people in the whole world.  She is hilarious and smart and spiritual and has the biggest heart for absolutely everyone.  I miss Hermana Rial too.  She is so funny and I love joking around with her.  She´s kind of trunky and I like to tease her about it.  She really loves the gospel and understands it so well.  I tell you, I´m a leaky faucet...

The first picture is of me and our member firiend Nacy Chango.  She is so great.  She´s a ward missionary and basically whenever we ask her if she can come with us, she always says yes.  She was the one that threw the birthday party for Hermana Groesbeck.  

These other two pictures are of Beatriz and Ernesto who got baptized last Saturday!  I still cannot believe that he is got baptized.  He had a toughened rock heart and now he is so light and free.  He´d always recite poems to us and act out things.  I´m going to miss them now that I´m in this new sector!

I´m in Otavalo nowadays.  This is the sector where are the indigenous people come from and they speak another language: Kichua.  But, luckily I´m in charge of one of the two Spanish wards (out of 18 wards in total).  My companion is Hermana Morris from Panama and already I like her a lot.  Our apartment is small but very cute and we live right next to a candy store (woot!).  Otavalo is famous for it´s outdoor market with everything from sweaters to ponchos to blankets to nativity sets to jewelery to you name it.  I´m not going to lie, I´m pretty excited about it.  

Like I said, I was pretty upset when I found out I was going to be changed, but after I found out where I was going, I don´t know, I felt really calm and at peace.  I feel like this is where I´m supposed to be and I know that there are people here that I can touch.  Change is hard, but if I´m not changing, I´m not progressing, and the only way that I have the oppurtunity to become better is if I change.  One of the genious things about being on a mission is the change.  The minute that I get comfortable, the Lord changes something.  It´s one of His ways of keeping us humble.  When I don´t know what to do or where to go, I have no choice but to turn to Him. 

Hmmm... Don´t know what else to say.  Oh yeah.  I decided this change that I´m going to tell everyone that my stomach is sensitive to rice and I can´t eat it.  Because it´s true.  I thought at one point before my mission that I´d be able to handle it.  Sorry.  Can´t.  

That´s pretty funny that Ali was so picky about her food.  I´d like to see her face with a big plate of Guatita: a mountain of rice with cow stomach and intestines cooked in peanut sauce. No.  It wasn´t good at all.  

And you wonder why the food here has made me a little sensitive.

Anyway... Enough about the gross things I´ve eaten.

I love you all and I hope everyone has a blast in their 100 degree whether while I bask in the eternal spring of 75 here in Ecuador.  Yes.  It rocks.

Love. Love. Love.

Hermana Cooper