Hi Family!!

Well I mislead everyone.. I`m actually not in Palmira, I`m in Cali again! I am in a sector called Terron Colorado and it is absolutely beautiful here! It is on the mountain of Cali and it reminds me of Utah because it has huge green mountains! Our house has an upper deck that we can go up to and it overlooks the mountain valley of Terron Colorado and it is soo cool! 

 

-We live in a 3 story house and the owners below us are really cool! They own a little shop on the first floor so whenever we want something from the store we just throw a little bucket with money down the stairwell and they send the food or whatever we want up! I thought it was funny but it is nice in the night to just throw a bucket down and have it come up with some chips or something. 

-I missed the food in Cali because it is super cheap! In Buenaventura we were paying soo much with the raise in food prices and the transportation every day but here in Cali you have about every store you need within 2 streets and the food is a lot cheaper. 

-Finally got the birthday package exactly one month after my birthday! Don`t worry sometimes you never know how long it will take because it always depends on what area you are in, when is the next transfer, etc. I was just glad to get a package with a bunch of stuff from Hawaii! I am excited for that little book of missionary quotes and also I was glad to get another shirt and some socks. I have lost a ton of socks in Buenaventura, and with my shirts all of them are like a little bit stained in places and are now a cream color instead of actual white haha. Thanks soo much for the package! and thanks Grandma Griffin for the letter in there too.

-We have some  really good investigators right now in Terron Colorado. We had 10 people attend church with us here my first Sunday.  We had to kill ourselves to get the people to come in Buenaventura. This is one of the poorer sections of Cali, but compared to Buenaventura they are rich! No one had money to come to church in Buenaventura. We have 2 baptisms scheduled for this Saturday so they will be my first baptisms in about 6 months. 

-I thought that when I came to Cali, there wouldn`t be really any problems in the wards here. I was wrong. There are still a ton of problems I think in most every ward or branch in Colombia and it is amazing how many people go inactive for little fights between members, or because they don`t like something or someone in the ward. Being in Buenaventura made me realize how much that we can help with the organization and helping things go smoothly so, I am hoping that we can get some more people active and solve some problems here too. 

-Today for P-Day we went to a Subway. First time I have smelled that "subway sandwich smell"  in almost a year! 

Thanks for the update of the family! Sounds like the summer came to a good end.  Love everybody!

-Elder Armstrong

Well just found out that I am heading out of BuenaVentura. Thought for sure that I would be here longer than this because the majority of missionaries stay here either 4 and a half or 6 months! It seems like each new area I get more and more attached to, but that is the life of the mission. Maybe it is because I keep learning more spanish every time.

I am going to a new area called Palmira. It is about 40 minutes outside of Cali. I am soo soo sad to have to say goodbye to everyone here in Buena Ventura. Especially since I didn`t have one baptism here the whole time. My first baptism would have been this saturday. :( Anyways I am excited too for Palmira! Bye everybody! 

Love,

Elder Armstrong

Week 47

So this week was super good! Hard at first, but ended with miracles! 

Tuesday: Had our district and Zone meetings. We have 7 missionaries in Buenaventura and our zone leader doesn`t have a companion right now. He has to go in a trio because his companion was sent to the offices. They have a lot more missionaries in the office right now because two senior couples recently returned to their homes. I was thinking hopefully grandma and grandpa Armstrong will get called to serve in Cali, Colombia because we don't have any senior couples right now! 

Wednesday: We had our zone leader Elder Avalos come with us today. He helped us teach some people and we finally have some people getting ready for baptism. One is Judith and she is super excited about the church. She was a golden investigator that we found in an activity and is scheduled to be baptized this Saturday. She is always so excited to learn and loves to have us sing for her too! If I stay here in Buenaventura she will be the first baptism I`ve had here! She actually works in another church and could lose her job if they find out she gets baptized but she doesn`t care and is super excited! 

Thursday: We went to a military island in a boat today to teach an investigator. He is the husband of one of our investigators and was accused of killing someone falsely. He has been on this island for 2 years waiting to get cleared of the accusation but I guess they are just still trying to find the right evidence. It was only a five minute boat ride but it was cool to get to go to this little island! We are planning to go next week to and hopefully we can get this guy excited about the gospel! 

Saturday: The other missionaries had a baptism today. It is always so cool to see a baptism in a river. We take  jeeps out to the baptismal site with all of the people and when we get out, the missionaries start singing hymns to bring reverence and they just start baptizing right after the hymns. The people that get baptized always bear their testimonies after they get dried off and it is always so spiritual!

Sunday was the day of miracles.  The first miracle was that we had 8 of our investigators come to church! I think that is about the most I have had in my mission and In Buenaventura it has always been 2 or 3 people that come! The second miracle was that we found several new people on Sunday. We found 2 families that both have married parents and seem like they will be great! They just came out of nowhere too. One was a reference from Judith and the other was a reference from William, one of our other investigators. The Lord always provides in the end. We found 11 new people this week and 7 of them we found on Sunday! 

Love,

Elder Armstrong