December 2nd

My new address:

Avda Sanlucar Nº8, 3B

El Puerto de Santa María, 11500 (Cádiz)

SPAIN

 

Greetings from the lovely little pueblo of Puerto de Santa Maria!! Oh  my goodness, so much to say and my little frozen hands can hardly type it all!! So I am in Puerto right now with Hermanas Hoffman and Childers. Hermana Hoffman is from Nevada and has 1 less transfer in the mission than me and is half Brazilian! She went to BYU and was studying biology. And Hermana Childers is from Camas, WA!!! She has 8 months in the mission and is rockin! She went to BYUI studying photography. They are both so sweet and funny and we already get along really well and work well together. I´m really excited for the rest of this transfer!

About Pueblo, its as precious as precious can get! I absolutely adore this place! Its a city (smallish) but is a pueblo of Cadiz. The branch is pretty small and pretty great. And here´s the crazy part, THERE IS AN ENGLISH BRANCH AND THE SISTERS WORK WITH IT!!!!!!!!!!!  Church was good, weird in English for the English branch, and so great in Spanish. I´m already falling in love with the people! And we´ve already seen so many miracles here, the work is picking up apparently! we have technically 2 branches, but they are both small. The English branch has like 5 families and the Spanish branch has attendance of about 65 each Sunday. There are 2 sets of missionaries here, us and the elders, and in Rota is where the Todd´s are. There is an American military base there!  We work with them now because the Todds go home in 3 weeks. Our area is so much bigger than it was in Malaga. I was so tired and so shocked by how much walking we do at first but now I´m getting used to it (although I´m still EXHAUSTED!)

SOO since there are a lot of Americans in our area, we literally had the best Thanksgiving in the mission, I´m convinced of it! We started out at the Todd´s and they had appetizers and we played games and stuff. It was us, the Puerto elders and the Jerez sisters, the daughter of the Todds and her family who are visiting, and like 6 marines from the base. It was so much fun! And so much English. It was actually really weird cause I was going from strictly Spanish to now all English activities. I think I forgot how to English. It was a struggle. But then we went to the restaurant of the English Branch president´s mother in law (weird connection but it makes sense) and had a big Thanksgiving feast with like 25 invites! IT. WAS. DELICIOUS. And the Marines showed up to that too. One of them is a member and he brings his friends to activities like this all the time apparently. Basically it was a wonderful Thanksgiving and they gave us the leftover turkey! I think I could get used to it here in Puerto :)

Our new apartment is incredible. One of the nicest ones I´ve seen! It even has a really modern kitchen! the only thing is that its FREEZING!! But that's okay, we have a heater and have closed it off in our bedroom and we basically do everything in there now. We even did comp study in there today cause the study room was FREEZING!!! Both Hermana Childers and I are new to the area and Hoffman has been here for 2 transfers already. I actually took 2 trains to Puerto. It was crazy and a little stressful but luckily my layover was in the city of one of the SHE´s, so they picked me up and took me to their piso to hangout until my next train left, and then both my comps were on that train so we actually met on a train!

Saying goodbye to everyone in Malaga was brutal. I lost it when I said bye to Estrella and her family. Such a dork. But they cried too so I don´t feel so bad. All day Tuesday I was like, this is stupid. I hate goodbyes. Why did I decide to do this! But now I'm good cause I like meeting people so I'm happy again!

 

Spanish food is bomb and everyone here is anxious to give us food! So I get fed... a lot. Hahaha one of the members apparently smacked a sister missionary Gibbs-style when she didn´t eat all her food so I´ll be sure to eat everything on my plate here... hahaha!!

LOVE YOU ALL!! Have a great week!!

Hermana Folsom