From Kent 8/24

Subject: He éxitomente hacido semana tres

Haaaalloooooooooooo (In the manner of a Jagular) Fambly!

Muchas grácias por el regalo que dáis! (Thank you very much for the package! I actually am only allowed to say dáis to family, otherwise it's strictly dan. Dáis is the informal second person plural, and missionaries are not to use the informal/intimate second person, unless in prayer.) I did enjoy it very much, and will continue to do so! Also, thank you very much for the addresses, I don't really have anybody's so that will be very nice.

Elder Dushku and I are officially Zone Leaders now! And we started our new leadershippery by finding out that they're changing the way new missionaries handle their first few days, and they're giving us a slew of new and more responsibilities. We take each new district our Branch/Zone gets and give them the tour of the MTC. We also help explain their schedule, give them the lowdown on culture and expectations at the MTC, teach them how to do Companionship Inventories, plan, so on and so forth. Every week. Well, every week that our branch gets new missionaries. We're pretty much the example missionaries, the presidency of the MTC can only say so many times how things are supposed to go, but once the greenies (kinder term than n00bs) see actual missionaries following it then they believe it.

We can't seem to keep our teachers for too long at a time, once Hna. Scaife came back Hno Harrington's Grandpa passed and he had to take the week of for family and funeral type things. We've been lucky to have one steady sub for him though, Hna. Beeston. She's been great, and she served her mission on Concepción as well. In her words, I don't know what cold is yet. Insulation apparently doesn't exist in buildings, and it's so wet and humid that it makes it worse no matter what temperature it is. So I took that as a yes, I probably will want some type thermal garcias.
We got to attend the Oquirhh Mountain Temple dedication, it was very very nice, strong Spirit. They closed the doors at 2:30 and just had silent meditation until it started at 3, which was very nice. Over the past few days my testimony of the Restored Gospel has grown a lot, primarily because of Temples and what happens in them. And we did some serious investigating of Facsimiles in Abraham, and Abraham in general, and it witnessed how authentic and pure The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is, God has restored in full the blessings of old. The verses to "The Spirit of God" have taken on new meaning, very neat.

We've had some excellent teaching experiences this week! In the T.A. (Volunteer scenarios) we taught an excellent lesson, very strong in the Spirit. Earlier in the week we got a new investigator in the R.C. and challenged her to read some passages in the Book of Mormon and pray about them. We haven't gotten a chance to hear back from her yet, we haven't been able to check the R.C. email for the past couple of days, but it was a wonderful experience to talk to a real person who was struggling to "decide whether or not she believed in the Book of Mormon." She was raised Christian and didn't have any objections to what she had read so far (she was about half-way through it). Fingers crossed! Hna. Beeston also took us through a progressive investigator scenario in one of the observation rooms (FBI interrogation style, there's a mic'd "home" set up and a 1-way mirror). Each companionship in the district got a chance to teach, and base it off of what the last had gone over. I find most teachers when 'playing' an investigator will often assume the characters of real investigators they taught. It makes it a lot more authentic, and it really feels like you're talking with this other person who's had all these problems in their life. The Spirit is phenomenal. Elder Dushku and I were the last companionship to teach her (Susan was the simulated investigator's name), and at that point she had become comfortable with the missionaries and really opened up her feelings, why she really hadn't been to church etc., so it wasn't according to any lesson plan, but it felt like it was.

Spanish is coming along great! I can understand most of it if I read it, get a gist when it's spoken, but can hardly speak it... interesting. Anymcwhoozle, time runneth out, I must be trangling off. Two of our missionaries are heading to the Guatemala MTC tomorrow, and we lose all of District A today. Fantastic group of Elders.

Love you all, The Church is True!!

Elder Kent Pímentel