February 23, 2015 I don’t believe in the Gripa,

hey guys, its me,

so first of all is good news, i feel completely comfortable with spanish now (have for a bit, but still good.) bad news, i can’t talk english anymore, ok well i can, i just feel like an idiot (but we don't use that word here, so please insert a more appropriate substitute) at first i couldn’t speak to well, then it got to the point that it was just good enough to tell just how awful my Spanish was, now its fine. still don’t know all the words, but I’m really good at saying what i want in different ways. right now for language study i am mostly focusing on rolling my r´s, so i just go outside and read the book of mormon, focusing on that. at first i couldn’t do it, but then i figured out that if i tilt my head back i can do it... i just look like a word that we don’t use here. but other than that my accent is apparently not bad, we were contacting a woman this week, and when she saw my name she asked me "where is your name from?" "its from argentina" "oh, that’s why your accent is so beautiful" ... that’s right,.all the native latinos say its like a cross between an argentine and a spanish accent, so i don’t really know what that means.

elder v wasn’t really feeling to great this week, he was feeling bad in his stomach, and also had some gripa. gripa is kinda like the flu, but stronger, i eventually figured out that it is more accurately the swine flu, the only thing is i don’t actually believe that it exists, whenever somebody sneezes or coughs or anything "oh, guess i have the gripa" (the gripa... sounds like the plague) so they kind of overuse it. they kinda over treat it too, i realized again why it is a bad idea to get sick here, because everyone and their dog decides to diagnose you.
"oh, are you sick?"
"yeah, i have the plague, i mean gripa"
"are you taking anything for it?"
"yeah I’m taking these pills"

"oh those dent do anything, what you have to do is eat a potato, then spin around three times, stand on your head, and then drink this concoction that i have, it will make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside."

"...will i feel warm and fuzzy because mold will be growing inside of me?"

"...don’t ask questions"

this week we had the mission president come down for a zone conference with his assistants, it was pretty good, but there wasn’t too much new stuff, as apparently we are doing pretty good. sounds like he had to straighten out some other zones, but one of the assistants stayed the night at our house (there are three right now) and he said he was glad that we weren’t doing anything too different. the other reason that president came down was to give temple interviews, as the ward had a temple trip this weekend. 

it was a great opportunity that the ward had, the temple is a good 6 hour bus drive from here, so it was a sacrifice of time, but almost the whole ward was able to go and participate in the available ordinances. it’s always good to remember the importance of the temple, and often easy to take for granted as we have one readily available, its always important to take advantage of the great blessings readily available through temple service, especially when so easily available.

that’s it for now, don’t have too much time, but continue to look for opportunities to share the gospel and to help others receive the great blessings that we have. 

love you guys, be good.

elder gandola