Happy New Year

Hello Everyone!

Well this week has been pretty good. A little tired. But well. Yeah so Tuesday we had an appointment with that one lady. It was super bad. The spirit was not there at all not even 1%, frustrating and the guy was just frustrating in general. He presented his church like a business plan. Clipboard with paper. Along with a little bible. and grrrr. I know the bible is not perfect but the longer I’ve been out here the more frustrated I get with different bibles. Every translation is different and they all word things differently. Well. Basically this other church believes the sacrament is the Passover and is only done once a year. They don’t celebrate holidays, and oh they believe Jesus Christ came again already in 1940 or so. We asked if we could start our conversation with a prayer and they straight up said no,

Because we don’t believe in 2nd coming Christ and so forth, and they they started doing their prayer. Super weird and the spirit literally left and it just made it hard. Owell. Also the same day we got cussed out by some dude on the street. He started calling us devils and cussing and basically spiting at us and they he started threatening us so we just left. I hate that street, for many reasons now. owell. Wednesday we did our studies and they went to Mario’s and I made my call. I felt bad, my companion called and no one picked up so for 2 hours he just sat there. But right after that we went to Isabel Morales and taught the law of chastity. It went well. She said that her mom left her dad because he didn’t want to get married, and she said she might have to do the same thing. So that gave us hope, because noel does not want to get married at all. After that appointment my companion called again and got to talk to his family for a while. It was just a trade off.

Thursday was alright. My companion had a Leadership meeting that we had to go to. It was alright, president has a lot of new rules that I think are good. As my companion said, he’s glad our district has no problems with these rules. After we went to find Marcos but he was not available, but we ended up talking to his neighbor for a while and his name is William. He came to our church before and really liked it and his aunt is a member who is coming back. He wants to get baptized and also his cousins are interested too. It was a great find and I hope they will start to progress. He came to church, but left before we could talk to him.  Friday was splits. So I went to another area. It was good, did a lot of riding. Let’s just say one of the companions is leaving this transfer and the other is a follower, so they don’t do much I think. Then that night there was a call and Elder fiddler, the Elder I was on splits with, and he was being emergency transferred the next day at 10 am. So he stayed up till 12:30 or so packing up. It was a long night. Then because the zone leaders had to drive that companionship up to the office, they were short teachers for English class. So we taught the intermediate class. I was super confused cause I had no idea what was going on. Then after we got back from class. We had to walk 2 miles to meet up with other elders to get a bike. Yeah my companion's bike's chain completely broke. and the bike died. Now he has a super awesome bike so we get around a little quicker.

Other than that nothing much new has happened. I was super happy to be able to Skype with you. It was a great day. I loved to hear your voices, and see you. Thanks for all that you do for me. For your prayers and love. I know that this is the Lords work and no matter what happens I Know that it is for a purpose. I Love each and everyone of you  and pray for you all the time. I hope you all had an amazing Christmas! and have a happy new year. I’m assuming that president will sent a message about a curfew that night. Thanks for all your letters and cards that you sent me. It was a great time to read and hear about each of you.

Have a happy new year.

 Love

Elder Hollingshead.

Merry Christmas!

Well Skype should be a go. The member said they should be able to hook me up with a camera and computer. I honestly don’t know when we’re calling. Probably around 12 here. Remember the time difference.  I guess I’ll call you first or shoot you a text or something saying I’m ready. I’m excited to see everyone and talk to you. 

 Well first things first. Yes *** got baptized! It was an awesome service even though we were not very prepared. Our Ward mission leader is supposedly the one who goes before hand and turns the water on. He told absolutely no one that he was not going. We were running a little late because we forgot something at the apartment. When we got there like 5 min before it was supposed to start the font was just barley to the 1st step. and it was supposed to be at the 4th. Oh and we heard that it takes close to 2 hours to fill. Let’s just say there were many miracles. The Zone leaders weren’t coming, but they had the clothes. Thankfully there was a Tongan bishop who had a bunch of plus sizes that we could use.  But over all the service went well. It was his birthday the exact same day also, and he was just super happy. His face was beaming when he got out of the font and came back into the room. Sunday was good. *** came to church. She is progressing really well and is very prepared. Her guy friend she’s living with ( yeah, they’re not married) is a little hard headed. He loves meeting with us and talking with us. does not see the need to change. He smokes and has no desire to quit. and that’s not the only one he has problems with. The word of wisdom lesson went awesome and a goal that Isabel made even before we met with her is that she wanted to celebrate the holidays Alcohol free. She is more than willing to give up coffee and follow the word of wisdom. This Thursday is the law of chastity. Let’s hope it goes alright.

 And then randomly a lady stopped us on our bike and started talking to us and we planned a little bible study and since she does not celebrate holidays we doing it Christmas eve. yeah... she’s interesting. She insists that the Sabbath day is on Saturday, and that holidays should not be celebrated because they are of "Men". It sounds like a very interesting religion. So we are going to study and then share the restoration. Thank goodness it’s in English not Spanish.

 Sunday is also played for the choir in our ward. The program went well, and from my point of view, the guys sang a whole lot better than the women. Kind of the opposite of all other things. Oh and we had a mission Christmas devotional on Saturday with president. It was good. long we left at 7:15 or so to take the bus, and got back at 4 yeah. owell. Just a very simple read aloud sing along part then lunch. I honestly don’t know why it took so long. And I was expecting mail. I got the package not last Friday but the Friday before that. I told the ZLs to drop it off and they never did and I’m still waiting for it now. They are dropping off all the mail tonight finally. I’m excited.

That’s really all that’s happening around here in LA. I Hope everything is alright back at home. Enjoy Christmas Eve’s eve. I have learned that Hispanic and American traditions are very different. For them any holiday is an excuse to party and play loud music. For them the holiday is Christmas Eve. That’s when they party all day and night till midnight and then open presents then. Christmas day is just a day off. Basically. I’m the weird white kid who does everything the opposite. And my companion is Hispanic so for some reason he thought we called on Christmas Eve and I had to tell him that it was Christmas day. It’s super weird. I’ll get used to it. So yeah it will be Wednesday when I’ll see you.

I love you all and hope you all have a very merry Christmas. Enjoy breakfast at grandmas and having all the Christmas traditions. See you Wednesday!

 Love,

Elder Hollingshead

Making Tortillas



 

Los Angeles Temple



Z in the Apartment

Hola

Happy Holidays. I think if finally hit me that Christmas is next week, even though it does not feel like it at all. I was just getting used to the cold weather, then I got the blanket n stuff, then Tuesday, our apartment got checked and the guy lite the pilot on the heater, so that was working, and he also called in the window. Needless to say, we have a nice warm, non-drafty apartment now. and then this week came, no rain and it warmed right back up. So yeah it definatly does not feel like Christmas. Many has this week been tiring. Wednesday we had Temple day. President wants us as missionaries to use the bus more, to contact people. So yeah we took the bus to Santa Monica, which meant we had to wake up around 4 to be at the bus stop before 5:30. Then an hour and a half bus ride to get us to the temple by 7:15. Yeah, then we took the bus back. so it was a long day. at one of the stops where we switched buses. there was a couple of members from the 4th ward. It was in Hollywood. and he started joking around with us, and another member tried to sneak up and scare us, thinking we were their missionaries. It was funny. They helped us out, and asked the bus driver to let know when to get off. Super funny.

The rest of the week. has just been long. We had a 2 hour lesson on the plan of salvation with our new investigator Isabel and her hopefully husband. It got super long and repetitive, but they did go to the Christmas party on Friday.  Social conversion is completely down, now we got to get them to come to church. That’s the #1 problem with most investigators, church attendance. Most of early afternoon times were helping *** find a place. He found one Friday. We were super excited! so we had a plan to move him the next day. The only problem was he was working a double shift, or almost 24 hours. and of course he got of super late. So we could not find him. He has no phone and no way to contact us. He finally got ahold of a phone and called us. at 7:30. He said he went straight from work to the bank cashed out basically all of his money and went to the new place and paid, but he couldn’t move in till the next day (Sunday). We called the Zone leaders and they told us that unless we were 110% sure he was moving the next day, he could not get baptized. So yeah it did not happen at all. We were afraid to break that to him at church the next day. We were bummed, but relieved cause we were not really ready at all.

So yeah at church we talked to him and he told us that it was completely fine to push it one more week cause his birthday is on Saturday! Yeah so that was fine and then we needed to move him out that day, because the Hermana wanted him out. Nobody was available to help, obviously so we went to lunch at someone’s house. and the Less Active member there, who has a huge hauling truck was available. But he had one condition, we had to help someone else move that was living next door. We were desperate so yeah we moved two people yesterday. Not the Sabbath day I expected. But *** is moved and Plans are being made for this Sunday. Then Only Problem is that he absolutely has no money until Thursday. So we hope everything is alright this week. But even with this financial situation he wants to pay tithing, but can’t cause he not a member yet.

After the moving yesterday, we went to a missionary fireside. *** and his Sister are Eternagators. I think it’s been 2+ years. He has a testimony, but doesn’t want to change, but they wanted to go to the fireside so we went with them and even though we were like 25 mins late it was still a goodtime. got a ride back from a member, and then we waited for the transfer call. We were both a little anxious, but president did not make many changes and were both staying in the area.

Even through, the tiredness, homesickness, the hard work, and just crazy life here in LA, I am glad I’m here. I’m learning so much and it just beginning. 2 years will go by fast and I just can’t wait for the next crazy thing that’s going to happen. I love this gospel and I love this Christmas season. I can’t wait to talk to you! Enjoy the holidays and truly remember what Life is all about. This week has been hard to focus on what this season is about because of all the things that have gone on, but I know that our heavenly Father Loves us and Cares enough for us that he sent his Son Jesus Christ To this earth, to be Our Brother, Our Savior, and Our Redeemer. My 2 favorite Christmas Songs this year. O Come, O Come Emmanuel, and What Child is This.  Why? First of all they are awesome! and they really remind me of the true meaning of this time of year. I love you! (or as Elder Stone emailed me today) I Love Y'all! I keep you in my prayers, and I hope you keep me in our prayers also. Have Great Week.

Love

Elder Hollingshead.

 

PS Enjoy the pictures! That’s our apartment. yeah its messy, we didn’t get to clean it up last week. That’s the temple. and us on the bus. And find the Hollywood sign! Probably got some of this mixed up.

Z with a Member at the Temple

 



Some of us at the Los Angeles Temple



On the bus to the Los Angeles Temple!



Elder Hollingshead,  Elder Marin & Some Members

Do you see the Hollywood Sign?

Brrr....

Hola Familia y Amigos

ummm...it’s been cold. Like really cold. I don’t think as cold as mesa but we have no way to escape the  coldness, it’s just cold everywhere. Even everyone here in LA is acting like its freezing. It would say upper 50s to low 40s maybe and they just complain. I think it’s nice other than the fact that when I’m riding my face turns to ice and I can’t see cause my eyes tear up in the cold. Oh and I think it’s been on a role. 4+ weeks in a row with rain. It poured last Friday, It poured this last Saturday, and so it never gets a chance to warm up before it rains. So put it this way, I got all the packages you sent and I am Eternally Grateful for the PJs and the Warm Blanket. I finally slept warm! I really shouldn’t complain, cause it snowing everywhere else. But Over all this week was good and bad, mostly frustrating. I think we really only had like 3 lessons. We had tons planned with backups and everything and seriously I think almost all of them canceled. Super frustrating, especially when it’s only like an hour before, or as we pull up. But yesterday ended on a super good note. No *** did not get baptized, BUT, we did find a place. Basically all Saturday night and Sunday afternoon was taken up helping him find a place. But He found one and he’s planning on moving in early this week. So yeah this Sunday *** is getting baptized.  Also yesterday was the Christmas devotional and he took us there and he enjoyed it. I thought it was a great devotional, music was awesome and the speakers were great, I thought it was interesting that only President Monson spoke and only for 5 min.But Overall it was great. Me and my companion feel bad sometimes because *** is our go to guy, any sort of activity and we want to go we just call him up and he takes us. Also Mondays, because we are lazy and don’t want to ride our bikes, we get a ride from him for shopping. owell, he’s willing and loves the missionaries.

We did visit the family that came to LA English. They seemed golden but,...not as golden as we thought. Lesson went well, the dad likes to talk a lot, and ramble so a short lesson turned out to be long. and at the end he said no to the baptismal information. So we will try to keep visiting teaching. Oh and *** ***, he Moved and we were supposed to help him, but when we got the member and truck and went to his place he had already moved. and we still haven’t been able to call him to see if he lives in our area. So he’s on hold right now. But Last Monday, we called one of our investigators and invited her to a FHE and she came on late notice and LOVED IT! She wants to do her own now, but she lives in a super small apt. she offered to bring refreshments tonight though so yeah. Social Conversion Down now she just needs a ride to church. Other than that nothing much has happened that has been super crazy. OH Before I forget. So as a mission normally 30% of all baptismal dates that we set actually end up being a baptism. President Weidman wants to double that so as of the 1st of Dec there were 140 or so dates for the month of December. So on a normal month only 44 would get baptized. He wants as a goal 89 for this month. So he has asked us missionaries to Invite Every Member, Investigator, and us personally to Pray for 89. So if you would like you can join to. It would be greatly appreciated. When we told Marcos about this goal, he got a smile and then look at us and said so ill pray for 88, cause I’m the 89th. WE got a laugh and that to me just shows how ready he really is. 

Well on Wednesday we have Temple day, so I’m excited to do a session, in English again. We’re going to try and get an investigator to come with us and see the lights sometime cause I personally want to see what they are like. Then Next Sunday is the transfer call. I can’t believe it’s already here. I had my final training meeting and in it president asked all the trainees if they think they would be ready to train next transfer.... I said "I’d be nervous but if you feel that I’m ready I will gladly accept." yeah so who knows maybe I’ll train. My companion really wants to stay another 6 weeks, but he thinks he’s leaving. So who knows maybe I’ll be the senior comp in the area. It’s crazy to think about.

Well I miss You ALL. I love you and pray for you each day. Thanks Mom and Dad for all you do, and for all the things you send me :) Christmas would not be the same without the music. It’s something I’m defiantly going to miss this year. Singing in choir, especially Holiday dinners. I love the music that you sent me and when I saw Piano Guys I was a little confused cause it wasn’t on the list but I thought owell. Well needless to say I’m glad you sent it. I had no idea they had a Christmas cd. Thanks for the Tree, My companion got a kick out of it but owell. It still needs to be decorated but who knows maybe it won’t ever. At least there’s some Christmas spirit. I love you all and hope you all have an enjoyable season. Merry Christmas.

Love

Elder Hollingshead

 

Hello Everyone!

 

Wow this week has been crazy. The beginning of the week was alright Tuesday was frustrating because all of our planned visits when we got there, no one was home so yeah super frustrating and then our day was cut short because of LA English, owell those classes are awesome. IT has been super hard keeping up with the advertising. Big area with lots of people who need the class. Our biggest problem is money. It costs to print and buy tape right, and it’s becoming a problem, we asked the ward if they have a missionary fund that we could be able to use a little bit of money to keep up with all the materials for the class, but they never got back. Oh and our bishop is out of town for 5 weeks to El Salvador. So Yeah isn’t that Great! Owell His counselors are awesome and are willing to do a lot for us so I think it will be alright. Wednesday was interesting. There was a missionary fireside for our ward on the 30th that we had no plan, so we needed to plan. So what went from a 30-40 min. meeting to plan what we were doing. Ended up being almost 2 hours of prime Proselyting time. Me and Elder Marin were getting very frustrated and just wanted to leave. Owell we got it planned. but the rest of the night was hard because that meeting threw everything off. That’s the one thing I didn’t expect was all the different meetings. Thursday was Interesting. We wanted to visit with *** because our 2 previous appointments got eaten up by other things out of our control. So we went over to the house and The *** family was working on Thanksgiving stuff. So we offered to help and she said that she needed a bigger table and more chairs so we called ***( a recent convert who will do anything for the missionaries) so he picked up a table and we went with *** to pick up chairs from the Church building. Then after a while we went over to the *** who were actually coming to the *** also for dinner. After that we had about an hour with no real plans because what do you do at 6 o’clock on thanksgiving night. No Investigator will meet with you. If you go to any other member’s house they are going to feed you. so we just went back to the Tobars and just chilled. I felt lazy and not very productive, but what do we do? Dinner was good. I was kind of expecting a somewhat traditional Thanksgiving dinner, but nope. Pan Con Pollo (a very authentic Salvadoran dish that is super good) also tamales with lots of horchata....it was awesome. So yeah. Thursday was good. Defiantly was homesick, for my first real holiday away from home it was pretty hard. I defiantly miss you all. But just think in 23 days I’ll be calling you. or skypeing... still not for sure. I’ll keep you updated on that. I hope I can Skype and see all your faces.

So yeah Investigators. Jose the self-referral is super awesome Elder Marin met with him I went on splits Friday night so I didn’t get to see him but they set a baptismal date with him for the 29th of this month. Here’s the catch he’s moving. Which is good because the environment he’s in right now is horrible. But he said 58th.... 58th place is in our area because it’s before Slauson. 58th street however is on the other side of the Slauson in a completely different Zone. owell we were going to help him move yesterday but there was a misunderstanding and our truck we were going to use was unavailable so he’s moving Thursday. So we hope he’s still in our area. Oh Yeah So Splits. Since Elder Marin is DL we go on lots of splits.  I went to another area, on the other side of the zone. We live 5-10 mins away from the church building. They live 45+ mins away from church, yeah and I was on another person’s bike.... let’s just say it was small EVEN for me, and it was in not the best shape. It was a long ride! Then we had English class again, super good also got 2 other dates with investigators. The ZL's are smart. During the spiritual thought they just did the restoration. And also a baptismal invitation. So we have 4 dates this week that was awesome. After class I went on splits with the zone leader. Elder Haro, from Where? Sacramento California. Yeah that was cool. We visited a less active and then Marcos. but the split was cut short because of the ward fireside we were in charge of. I would like to explain what we did but it would take forever so in short it was about bringing people to Christ through missionary work. Super spiritual and even though there were only like 20 people there it was good. And after that I finally got my package. Wow I really didn’t know what to expect all I know was It was heavy and it had my name on it. Thanks for all the food! I’m super excited. You do really know my favorites.

 Well To end as this weekend has passed I just want to express my gratitude for each and everyone of you. I love you and pray for you always. I'm Thankful for This AWESOME opportunity to serve the lord in Los Angeles. I know I have a lot to learn and a lot to do better, but it really has been the best 3 months of my life. Defiantly not easy, sometimes not even very fun, But worth it every second. Though the homesickness, and the trials and the tiredness, it is still worth it and will bring great blessings. I’m thankful for the gospel. Throughout the last 2 months or so I have seen the gospel literally change a person’s life. I have seen the blessings that the atonement has given, and the love that our Heavenly Father Has giving to each and everyone of us. I know that This is the True Church on The Earth, without a shadow of a doubt I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ changes lives. Make sure that throughout this Christmas season that you remember What it’s all about.  I love you all. And I’m thankful for all the love and prayers for me. 

Love

Elder Hollingshead

Hello Everyone!

Hey so yeah this week has been pretty great. COLD! Yeah it rained a little bit this last week, but mostly got colder. I Thought Arizona was a desert. Yeah it’s a desert here. Hardly any rain. Just humid and cold. Most of the rain was just enough to get the streets wet and make it miserable to ride a bike. I think I wore my jacket all day for a couple of days. If there is anything I do want it’s a blanket. Our Apartment has a couple of windows that don’t close, at all! so that’s cold, on top of that our heater doesn’t work. sooo.... let’s just say 2 sheets on top of me and wearing a jacket and socks just aren’t cutting it anymore. IT just cold. During the day its fine with my jacket it’s usually in the upper 60s and night it’s just humid. Owell. We’ve been trying to contact our referrals from English class or just referrals in general but either the address is missing the apt# or the apartment complex is locked up. My companion has something against calling cause he says it’s easier to refuse an appointment over phone. Which is true, but if you still haven’t been able to contact in a week you need to call so that’s on our list of things to do tonight. But one of the referrals just randomly called the zone leaders and said he wanted to learn more about the bible so we went and taught the restoration. The only problem was that he lives in the back of a computer repair shop; literally his room is like 5 2x4s with drywall slapped on the side. So it was really loud and hard to feel the spirit. He’s a super awesome guy though, so we are just going to have to figure out a place we can go and teach instead. 

I hope there was nothing in the package that needs to be taken out or eaten quickly. I probably should have told you, but Mail day is Friday after district meeting. so that’s then only time I get mail, and also this last week we had zone conference so mail day was Wednesday. So yeah it’s going to be a week and a half. Owell. Yeah Zone conference. Was good, but super long. I don’t think I’ve been to a meeting with president that did not go over time by at least 20 mins. The conference was supposed to be 8-1 we didn’t get out of there till 2:30 cause we had to get mail, but still way too long. The meeting was great talked a lot about making better use of our time and how Elder Ballard thinks a good # of contacts is 20 a day. Let’s just say me and elder marin are not even close to that. So were trying to do better on that. He did get one Christmas CD to start the season off. and thanks for sending the CDs I’m excited. It’s so Weird to think that its Christmas time. Thanksgiving came way too fast. IT does not seem like it’s been 3 months already and I just hope I don’t get transferred. Transfers are a week early on the 18th. So yeah it’s going to be a shorter transfer.

Man are we going to get fed a lot this week. Saturday was the ward party and lots of food was there and they also gave a to go box, that I filled with lots of food. Sunday We had lunch with a family in the ward and there were 8 missionaries there, and also a bunch of other people. Lots of food, and it was super good food. Then we also had dinner later that night with a less active. Today we have dinner with a member who makes awesome food. Thursday we have A Thanksgiving dinner with another Family. So yeah lots of food.

Well I love you all. I hope you have a Wonderfully Awesome Thanksgiving! Is the ward going to do the usual Party the night before with the deep pit turkeys? Send me some pics of the family. And enjoy the food! Tell everyone I love them and can’t wait till Christmas to talk to them! I hope as we go into this Christmas season we will all remember the True Meaning of The Season. Have Fun Decorating the house. I will tell you that I’m going to miss sharing this time of the year with all of you. You don’t realize how much you will miss it until it comes. Thanks for all your love and support, and always remember to pray. I love and Pray for you all the time. Have a Great WEEK! I hope Grandmas house get finished finally and she is enjoying being at home again. Send her my Love.

Love

Elder Hollingshead.

Hello everybody!

 

Man has this week been crazy. Tuesday was normal, and we had a few more people at English class. Wednesday was alright. We had dinner at Mario Martinez’s house and it was great then we had ward correlation and all the mission leader wanted to talk about was planning a ward activity. I guess technically it could be a good activity for missionaries, but I feel like the ward should be planning it not us! owell since they asked us to we are doing it.  Transfers were Wednesday, and so we have a new zone leader, Elder Haro, super awesome! people say he is probably one of the best missionaries in the mission. He had awesome ideas on how to get English classes in a better condition. we were all kind of lost. He has great leadership and knows exactly how to do it and what we need to do it.  We got 2 other elders. They are cool, just haven’t talked to them much. Also got a new sister. Her Spanish is awesome and she just got out of the MTC, then we asked her how she learned such good Spanish? she apparently has lots of years of classes. but she is super ready and has and awesome spirit of missionary work. Thursday was interesting. last minute President called all the district leaders to a training. so I thought I was just going to go with another elder in our zone for the 4 hours, but no as we were going to get picked up, I realized that I was also going. so yeah there went the whole afternoon. it started at 1 and finished around 3:30. The training focused on how to improve numbers. Even though Numbers aren’t supposed to really be our focus it should be on people. But He had a meeting with Elder Ballard recently and made a few changes to the mission. Instead of mission standards, he created Area standards. So we make the standards. In the next 3 months we plan to have around 5 baptisms, so with a little math supposedly we should have like 5 people to church, 6 progressing, and 8 new investigators each week.! talk about a major kick in the face! yeah our numbers and new people we have talked to are not even close. so lots of things to work on.

 

So yeah that was an interesting meeting. The drive there was long and even longer on the way back. usually we take the 405 cause it’s the closest. instead we took the city way. Let’s just say I forgot how nice LA can be! living here in the hood for 7 weeks now definaly changes your perspective.  And I hate Traffic. meeting got over at 3:30 we did not get home until a little after 5. usually it takes 20-30 min. so much traffic. Friday district meeting, went alright my companion is still not feeling prepared. So basically I’m his assistant even though that doesn’t exist. Got a letter from Ben and Hallie so that was super fun. Then we just had a normal day. Marcos is ready to be baptized. He just needs to move out. Monica is ready, just we can never meet with them, cause they are "busy". owell we have an lesson planned for Tuesday with them. We still a little stumped on how to teach a 10 year old the law of chastity. The only thing we came up with in District meeting was to talk with he parents before and have them as much in the lesson as we are.  Sonia and Max are super nice and kind old couple. They have lots of health problems and money is tight. He can’t read cause he had some sort of stoke and lost the use of his entire left side. she has horrible vision and can’t read the book of Mormon. so we are trying to come up with a giant BOM and or some way of getting it on their phone if they can. other than that nothing new with investigators.

 

LA English. Saturday we had 7 new people plus 5 returning, and a few members. And there is a family that came, and we gave them a church tour and they said that this is what they want for their kids. and they live in our area! along with 2 other referrals from The classes. One of them has a book of Mormon and said that she thinks god led her to these classes, and she is dedicated and took an hour long bus ride to get there. she’s in our area too. lots of cool things are happening. Then Last night there was a fireside at the Visitor center. Chad Lewis and his wife. He was an NFL player and a lifelong member. so we had to bring and investigator for us a missionaries to come. so we called Marcos, and he seemed very interested and told us he would take us. so when we arrive at his house at 6, he wasn’t there. :( something with some stray dogs and he called the police and took pictures then the owner walked up and started arguing and claiming he was doing something with the dogs, so he walked inside grabbed hymns and a Book of Mormon and drove away. so we started going to others houses on our backup plan and about 20 mins later he called and said sorry and told us that he was still ready to go. so we rushed back to his house and quickly got there. I mean quickly! for a clam mellow guy he drives like a maniac, and then the left arrow right before the temple took like 10 min to change. He said he would have run the light if we weren’t there... Owell we got there just has They started to speak. Awesome fireside. Talked about lots of experiences he has had. and the bulk of his talk was about a trip the NFL asked him to take with some recently returning military. 3 had artificial legs and one had depression problems because of things that had happened. They were to hike Mt. Kilimanjaro (probably just butchered that spelling) in Africa. 4,000 feet to 19,000 ft. in just over a week. Lots of stories of how some of them couldn’t make it. they were not required to be on oxygen, and that really took its toll on all of them. Between 17000 and the top was called the danger zone because of the lack of oxygen. it was so bad that one of the team members was so sick they had carry him down the mountain to go immediately to the ER, but as soon as they dropped out of the danger zone he was completely normal. So moral of the story is Don’t go into our danger zones! we know exactly what we should and shouldn’t do. don’t push the limits. That fireside was a changing moment I think for Marcos. He was glued to the speaker the whole time and within the last week his whole attitude and testimony has changed. I can’t wait.

 Other than that life has been good. lots of good and lots of long days. No matter how long the days feel like though, I feel and know it’s worth it. I hope I stay here for a long time. scripture I found this morning that I thought was good is Ether 12:4 look it up  and always have hope for the best, cause that means its hope in Christ.  Thanks for all your love and support. I pray for you all every day, and hope for the best with all of you. have a Great week!

 

Love

Elder Hollingshead

 p.s. squid is not that bad of a meal. all the Mexicans have the craziest food.

 

Hola!

 

Well the no big news, still going to be here in the Same Area for 1 more transfer, except the only difference is that they split our district and My Companion is one of the New District leaders. He does not want leadership at all! It was funny when he got the call he defiantly let the AP know how much he didn't want to be DL but that's about it. Let’s see where to Begin. Los Angeles English, Tuesday first class 5 members showed up that was it. Kind of boring so me and a couple of other elders played the piano and I tried to play the organ. Yeah didn't go so well, maybe I’ll figure it out someday.   Wednesday was alright. We visited a less active member whose son just arrived here in the states from El Salvador. He’s 17 and it was good to hear that he got here finally. Last we heard was he was in Texas at Immigration trying to get his papers ready, and they didn't know how long he was going to be there, it could take up to 3 months, but it was about 2-3 weeks.  He doesn't know any English so were trying to get him and his mom to come and learn English. In Salvador he was very active and is preparing to go on a mission so we hope it will re activate his mom, and convert his step dad. It will be a slow work in progress. But there is progress. Thursday We taught ***, and his wedding was called off again and now it’s for sure so we just have to wait until he moves out of the house and then he can get baptized. He has come to church 2 weeks in a row by himself in a white Shirt! That’s big progress. It used to be his the Hermana in the ward trying to drag him out at least in a polo, but now he does it on his own. Also in that house there is a less active Returned Missionary who works Sunday so he can’t go to church. But he just told us that next week his schedule changes so we are going to go hard and get him back to church. Friday was Zone training meeting. It was super good. About prayer and I have a few goals and things I'm starting to work on in prayer. Then later that night as we were putting up LA English signs up we locked our bikes and came back and some Hispanic neighbor told us some guy was checking out our bikes but the man kept an eye out thankfully  and got him to go away. They were locked! 2 locks to be exact, but as my companion said, his got stolen with 3 so hopefully it never happens but its LA you never know. But as we rode away after that, almost in the exact same spot/ corner. My front tire basically blew out. It was flat in about 15 seconds. That just made the day a lot worse.  Thankfully when we got to ****** house he had patches so I fixed the tube while dinner was being cooked. He is a lifesaver. Saturday English class. About 16 people showed up, half were not members and 5 or so said yes to Missionary lessons!!!! We were super excited. Then because there were 4 people in our zone who needed to go to training, my companion being one of them, the rest of the zone got ice cream and then chilled at the chapel for a while until they came back. It was a very boring 2 hours.  We visited a less active ***, he has such a strong testimony of the gospel and me and companion can’t figure out how he became less active. But the LA English class is the key. He said to us that this is the start of him coming back, cause he wants to come back. Yesterday was just a normal Sunday nothing to exciting. Walter, a referral, we visit him the last Sunday, he is super prepared and wants to change so we hope to start making progress with him these next couple of weeks.

Well that was this week. Oh and if forgot the mission just got a new language. Farsy, probably just butchered that spelling. It is a language spoken in the Middle East and 4 elders have been called to speak it. One for sure was in the MTC with us Elder Larkin. He is super excited and supposedly there's another missionary that is going on his 2nd transfer that is starting this language. The only problem is that a Book of Mormon has not been translated yet into the language, no MTC material, only members and probably a dictionary. Super weird, and not quite for sure the reason for it but yeah.

But anyways what about home? Anything New? Did grandma move in yet? Tell here thanks for the note on the letter. I Love her So much. I also got a letter from Blake.  Yeah it was nice. His mission is completely opposite. He said he drove an hour to another city in his area. Jokingly but probably true he said his area is probably the size of my mission. Oh well. Life has been good here. I got cussed out the other day as we rode by a house. Not the first time but the closest I’ve been to someone like that. Today is going to be a little tight schedule. We had to go to the mission office to do letters right now because the library is closed for Veterans Day. LA Traffic is horrible.  Then we also want to do lunch with zone. and we still need to shop and do laundry. I guess no nap today :(....  Well I love you all. Sounds like Ellie likes here new swing up in flagstaff. Hope you all had fun up there. Weather sounds great up there what's it like in Mesa. Here is probably 70s in the day but because of humidity it gets super cold at night so long sleeve works but it just gets hot during the day with it on so it’s hard to decide. Love you all. Stay strong and Love the Lord. Work on Prayers, it’s something that may seem small and insignificant but if you work on more specific and detailed prayers that make you closer to your Heavenly Father you will receive blessings beyond your imagination. I love you all and thanks for all your prayers.

Love

Elder Hollingshead 

HELLO!

Well this week has been very long. Thanks for the Jacket. Monday night as we rode to they **** it started Pouring! so needless to say I got soaked. it was an interesting night. Tuesday was interesting, My companion had a little training thing so for 3 hours i just sat in the hall of the church building reading and talking with other Elders and trying not to fall asleep. Then the rest of the day was pretty uneventful, our Appointments that we had planned all week and scheduled most of them didn't happen, and we ended up having lousy Numbers. And no I'm not playing the Numbers game, but when you make plans and prepare for an hour each day for each of the lessons you are going to teach, and then you end up no teaching it gets very frustrating. Wednesday was alright other than having a crazy dinner. A Less Active called I thought to confirm the appointment, but it was actually to change it to 7, but we have weekly coordination with the ward at 7 at the other end of the area. needless to say, he convinced me to order a pizza for us cause we wouldn't take the money he was trying to give to us to buy food, cause were not allowed to take money from Other People. the pizza ended up not getting ordered somehow so we were late to the meeting and still hungry. he made it up for us and bought us a pizza after the meeting. Thursday was uneventful. We have our normal studies but we also have the 2+ hour weekly planning session that is always held right after lunch. Oh and since it was Halloween President wanted us in our apartments by 6pm as you can see there isn't much time to do anything. so we got our bikes from the house that we left them at, then taught a lesson, and ate dinner at the same house then went back home! the rest the night was boring. All the other missionaries were calling and trying to occupy time by talking to us, most of it was time to relax and read conference addresses. and I found a new Favorite Speaker. Elder Christofferson. I have found his talks lately to be my favorite. and I cant wait to get this months Ensign. Thank goodness my Companion has years of conference addresses sitting next to his desk. Friday was Exciting, and super tiring. We had our regular District Meeting, but with very Important news. Los Angeles English Classes are starting up in our zone.

LA English was created by the Mission. It is super professional, and very planned out. There are 3 classes, beginning, intermediate, and advanced. The purpose behind these classes are to 1 Teach and 2 most importantly Get Referrals! Here are some statistics about the Program. In the Arcadia Mission right next to us. A similar program has reported that in some areas approximately 90% of all baptisims were referrals from the English class.  WOW that surprised me a lot, then Statistics from LA In South LA and Inglewood Cities, the Hispanic population is between 40%-50% depending on the area. Lots of people that don't know English. So now instead of walking up to people and doing street contacting if a Hispanic person is walking well pull our English class card out and tell them about it. What Hispanic in LA doesn't want to learn English,  and its Free even better. So the last 3 days in the early afternoon when people are usually not available that's what we do, walk up and down streets taping signs with pull tabs and giving people cards. We hope it will have great success.  Because we are walking a lot and its hot and sunny, it definately wore me down. I was so tired, and it was fast Sunday so yesterday until about 4 it was hard to keep walking, when you have no energy left at all, bu you know how they say work is good for you. I Believe it as soon as we started to ride bikes and walk I seemed to have a little bit more energy and it definately woke me up and kept me going till about 5 when we had dinner. But there is one benefit from Day light Savings time. The Change happened Sunday Morning, which meant we got one more hour of sleep that night. It was good me and my companion were both super tired and the extra hour did me good and refreshed me, but the extra hour only happens once a year so still no sure its worth it. I was just getting used to of it being dark when we wake up and now its light again. Oh well.

Other than that Language study is hard. it happens only 5 times a week, for an hour, definately not enough. I understand 80% of what people are saying but I don't talk much at all which is a problem. I'm not saying its my companions fault but he's a native Speaker and he doesn't have to think about it so he can just ramble off whatever he wants. so sometimes I hardly get to answer questions and talk other than where I'm from, how long I've been out here. so understanding is alright but speaking is hard. Oh and its a super small world! so in our ward there is a guy  named Ivan. he looks American but from Mexico. Super nice guy and Guess what! He's from mesa. he speaks fluent Spanish and decent English and also graduated from Westwood. I remember the first time we met and I told him was from mesa he was like " don't tell me you went to mountain View" oh well he's super chill.  He got married right after high school and about a year ago he got a divorce. So at his rock bottom time in his life he decided to come back to church. and has been active for a year now and has definately changed his life around. But he has a 2 year old son who lives in mesa so every 2-3 weeks he goes back and visits his son for a week. and this was the week so at church he came up to me and was talking about Mesa and they showed me a picture of him at Backyard Taco! he says that is uncle is the manager. So then i told him that they church building right across the street is my building. and i live right down the street from it. He was super wierded out that we have so many connections, and how we probably crossed paths multiple times. he said he grew up by Mesa Dr. and University and I told him that I have a bunch of family there and I told him the name Lamoreaux but he didn't recognize it.  so yeah super weird and awesome.

A scripture I found this morning Mosiah 5:15. Steadfast and immovable. I've always like that phrase and this scripture has an awesome promise if we are steadfast and hold to the rod. Keep up the good work everyone. thanks for all your prayers and love that you have. I  love you all and hope be able to write you soon, now that I finally got addresses. Oh and that super cool that Katie Holt is going on a mission, to Puerto Rico! if you see her before she leaves tell her good luck for me. And Thanks again for all your examples that you were to me growing up.  Hope you all had a fun Halloween!   Love you all and I'll email you next week, as the last email of the transfer, hope my companion or me don't get transferred from this area cause its awesome.

 

Love,

Elder Hollingshead

Hello Everybody!

 

Well this week has been very interesting to say the least.  lots of biking or walking should i say. Tuesday we had new missionary orientation. That was long and super and kind of boring. The talks were good in the beginning other than the fact that our ride was late so we arrived almost to the end of the first one of 3. President is super excited and our practice for the meeting was to see if we could do a restoration lesson in 5 min. Super Crazy right. they want us to be able to teach quickly clearly and plainly. so obviously 5 min lesson doesn't include time for questions but its the thought of getting it to the point is what president wants. the other hour and a half was for driving safely videos. most of them were like drivers ed all over again. Owell. then that night while we were at the ***. We usually don't lock our bikes up because there is a fence and they are way in the back behind another house, but if you remember the drunk guy a week or so ago. yeah he stole my companions bike. im still not for sure why he didn't go for mine,(probably cause he was drunk) but yeah so the rest of the night was walking in our areas we probably shouldn't. So lesson learned Lock our bikes up even in gated places. So my bike was locked up on a window for two days till we got the time to go there an picked it up.   

Then next day was completely walking. My companion does not have the money to buy a new or used bike. he is literally broke right now. So walking day was long. my feet were on fire! as much as we could though we would ask members if they would give us a ride from place to place. Thursday during our lunch hour, my companion decided to try and take the 2 broken bikes and put them into one working bike. I though he was crazy, and soon he was stumped. Thank goodness i'm a somewhat mechanically minded person. I guess more than i thought. I took the back tire, and gear changer off the one bike, and some how put it on the other. and It WORKED! its not perfect, and the gear thing likes to get loose so about twice a day i have to get down there and tighten it back up. When my companion saw me put it together he was super amazed. So yeah anything is better than walking. so by thursday we were back on bikes. then friday came, as we turned a corner all the sudden i hear a very loud hissing sound coming from my bike. at first i thought it was just something stuck in the brakes or around there but then i realized my tire was getting low. Yep a piece of glass went right through the tube no problem. After that the tire stayed somewhat pumped up and it was enough to get me around. then after another stop it was completely flat. so i pumped it up hoping it would get me home and it got me half way and then i walked the rest not wanting to do any more damage. We got to our apartment and my companion went to grab his keys and they were not there! we backtracked a little but no luck. knocked on the mangers door at 9:45 but no answer. we had no chance of getting in. all the windows are barred. our Zone leaders called us about this time and we explained the situation and they said if we had no chance of getting the keys to call and they would let us sleep at their place. So yeah we called them a few min. later and told them to pick us up. Needless to say it was a long night, didn't get to bed until 11 and this was after a super tiring day. they were nice and let us sleep in their beds, while they slept on the couch and floor. Then next day i fixed my tire then had District meeting and Interviews with President. Didn't leave until 4:30.  

So yeah it was a long week, and i'm just super tired. As far as it goes with investigators nothing is super new. Didn't get much of a chance to meet with them alot.  but the one who has a baptisimal date came to church again, and a baptism without us even inviting him. His Girlfriend i think basically told him, that if he didn't come to church continue to read and pray as a family that she wouldn't marry him. Owell I hope that it will still go though. And yeah there was a baptism yesterday, A teenage kid whos mom was a member, but dad was a muslim. His mom died 5 years ago and his dad gave him the choice of which church to join and he decided to be baptized. Super cool kid and he was super happy. And the ward found out yesterday that I play piano...... Needless to say I'm using my Hymn playing skills for the ward now. I played 4 songs For sacrament meeting, the one for priesthood meeting, and the 2 at the baptism. Then next step is organ. They asked me if i would play the organ but i told them i didn't know how. So if i get a chance i guess ill need to figure out how to play organ. Supposedly they have the hymns programed on the Organ but people don't know how to figure it out.... So yes i put my piano skills to work, I feel this will be a pretty often thing. So I don't know what else to Say. Other than I am tired and hope to take a nap later today.  

I love you all. Thanks for your emails, And Samuel Opie. I'm So excited For you, You will Do great. I hope your reading this or that would be weird. And Russia,...that's going to be Awesome. Ben Good luck. Enjoy you last week at home! and i Would like your Email and or Mission Home addresss. I love you all and wish the best for everyone. There is a scripture i would like to share but i done have my Book of Mormon with me, so it will be next week. And Yes i did get my package along with Kelcies Letter. Its nice to have a jacket now. I'm not used to this at all but the last week, every morning it is super foggy and cold, then  around 10 or so it clears out and then comes back around 7 or 8. super wierd. just very Humid compared to Arizona.

Love you all again, and your all in my prayers. Hope to hear from everyone soon. 

Elder Hollingshead

 

Hola!

Well another interesting fun week. Lets see. well over the course of the week we got 4 new investigators, which we were excited about. There were a couple of really long days. hot, biking for 3-4 hours straight stopping at peoples houses for a few min and most the time no one was there or they didnt have time to talk. those nights i was super tired. Owell as everyone says Get used to the next 2 years always tired. Most the time I do most of my exercise at night before bed. Mornings im usually too tired, groggy, and cold to get up and do much so we go run around the block a couple of times then get ready for the day. Sunday cause we dont have exercise time, i made biscuts, my companion was super happy and he at most of them in just a few minuets. He acted like it was super hard to make them, then i showed him the recipe and he realized its really not that hard. this week is going to be interesting though cause when we got our dinner list back (its weekly in this ward) only 3 nights were filled of the 7. yeah ouch. so i think were just going to call some people up and ask them if they are available to feed us. most the time they are so its not a big deal. As long as there not too many nights with 2 dinners. that was yesterday. at 2 we had lunch with the Islas, which was super good, then about 4 we went to the Elders Quorum presidents house cause they were having Seafood soup. The soup was good, but i was so stuffed and so tired i could not eat it. i felt bad cause they thought i just didnt like it i kept reassuring them it was great, and it was, but i was not hungry.

SO the fun story this week. last week at the ****, (the family we visit almost every day) there was some drunk guy who they dont know was sleeping on the porch. The next day when we went to go back, he wason the street and he stopped us and they just started yelling at us. "yo  no quiero aqui" (i dont want you here)and a bunch of other stuff. he was acting like he owned the street, but he doesnt even live there. He said he was going to call the police on us, and we jsut kept telling him go ahead, but he wouldnt ever do it. then he started pushing us around. My companion was getting ticked off and explained to him why we come and what we do. then he was telling us how we were keeping him awake at like 11 o'clock at night (which is not true we have to be in by 9). Owell we ended up just leaving. and then he was there again last night! grr.... he was just making the whole family mad, and it causes a lot of issues. Owell hopefully we can figure out what he wants from them.

 So yeah with all the biking and exercise my appetite has definatly grown and i feel like im gaining a little weight. Good right! but me and my companion are opposite. Hes trying to lose weight so im the one packing as much food as a i can. after my exercise ill eat another bowl of cereal or oatmeal and he as a smoothee twice a day. So yeah its just funny. On to our investigators, its weird cause alot of the older ones expect us to be some sort of marriage counselor. every time we have to refer them to the bishop, But they still expect us to fix thier problems. For one of them we watched a conference address from earlier this year. the Home School Of life. and we show them that a happy family needs to be founded upon these priciples but thats as far as we well really go in counseling them. But our one investigator who we thought was gone for sure, randomly without invitation came to church. Me and Elder Marin Looked at each other and said What???? so were still not for sure if the marriage is going to go through but as of right now it is scheduled and so is his baptisim, but its not till december.  So well see. Another one is a little girl, her parents are members but definatly do not have a testimony of the church, or the Book Of Mormon. really frustrating cause she kept interrupting our lessons with nonsense ???s the girl is ready so we just need to review all the lessons cause shes already been taught everything  and is super ready and super smart. i think the family comes to church because of her. The other 2 investigators are an older couple who were a refferal. we hope they progress, but they would not set a baptisimal date, and she works sundays. Another family has and interesting story. His son lives in Mexico and just left on his mission a couple of weeks ago. he reffered his dad and his family to the missionaries. he super nice and i think wants to change but he hasnt come to church yet or gotten married so we hope they can get marrried soon and then start progressing. Other than that all the other people we talk to are potentials, less actives or part member families.

Well its been good to hear from you all. Remember i still would like addresses!!! I can only write a few people right now and i would like to write you all. even if its just an email. anyways I love you all keep up the good work. Thanks for all your prayers in my behalf. A scripture that i really like this week in my studies is In Mosiah 16:9, It basically says that We always need to look to the Light or Christ to be spiritually born again. I thought it was good and i hope all of you look to the light! i love you all, and pray for you daily. keep up the good work, as Blake stone always says to me. You are all awesome and great examples to me. And for those of you receiveing Mission Calls soon Let me know i would greatly appreciate knowing.

 Love

Elder Hollingshead

 

Hello again!

 

Well week 2 here has been just as interesting. Days seemed long, but the week seemed short. Well to start out wow I have a new niece! you will have to send me pictures. i cant wait to see. Although this week i learned a lot, it was kind of frustrating when you make plans that are very very reasonable, and then as you go through the day nothing goes through our no one is home or as this week our Investigator who was not really progressing, but then became progressing and  yesterday basically it sounded like he dropped us. that was a bummer because whenever we taught him and  listened to him talk, he sounded golden and was super ready to be baptized, but it ended up not working out. Thanks for my bike! yeah i got a call Tuesday from the office and they said it was in the garage, i must have missed it. our Zone leaders had a meeting up in  that area so they went and picked it up and dropped it off at our apt. later on that  night. I set it up the next morning and and did some adjustments the next couple of days and its an awesome bike. Defiantly makes the long rides much better.  Wednesday morning it was cloudy and basically the whole day it rained/drizzled all day. so i was a little wet, but the best was at around 6:30 we just finished a visit with a Part Member family and as soon as we said Amen. it started pouring like none other. not only did we need to go somewhere else, that somewhere else was about 5 miles away at the church bldg. Thankfully the member gave us a ride and we picked up our bikes the next afternoon on our way over in that direction. So yeah. 

 

But because it rained the couple of days right after that, were super cold and windy. Mornings were the worst. i found a huge jacket in closet from another elder so i would wear that. And also one of those cold days we went to an 88 year old members house, she was cold and felt bad for us and gave us little hats. it was the best. One morning it was super foggy and cold but it warmed up that day. I was going to get a sweater vest today at the store but we ran out of time. So a little bit about the ward.  our apt. is the closest to the bldg in our district. 12 missionaries 10 elders and 2 sisters all go to the same ward. that just tells you how big the areas are. Lots of different things happen that us elders don't agree with. one of which is that members choose which ward they want to go to. they know they shouldn't but no member, bishop, or president will stop them or try and change their mind so yeah. that just one example. people don't really work on activity. that's a major problem cause there are so many inactive members in our area alone we don't know what to do with them. Oh and you asked if i speak Spanish and English at different lessons. No There is an English ward that covers about the same area, and there are i think 4 elders over that area, and that makes up our zone. So no I do not teach English. But Most of the parents and adults don't know any or very little English, it depends on what they do for a living. BUT, all the kids usually speak English and Spanish, so if we are just talking to the kids we usually talk English or Spanglish. 

 

Red Districts or areas. These are just places to Avoid. There are specific rules for each area but we haven't been able to find much for ours. we did Find a specific area but not much about it, and it makes night time hard. basically its from Normandie to the 110 Freeway that we are supposed to avoid after 7 and soon to be 5 in the winter. What are we supposed to do? we don't know. we asked our Zone leaders about it and they said, if you don't feel the spirit don't go into the area. Well I hate to break it to you but when I'm riding a bike i its hard to feel the spirit because people are cussing you out, saying or doing all sorts of things. The only way to cope with this is to Ignore it. its pretty easy, once you've heard it enough times it doesn't even phase you. As My Companion said You are a servant of the lord nothing people do or say can bring you down, just ignore comments get used to them and never think of them again. And it works. So yeah. Lots of black people quite a few Hispanics. and don't think they are all Mexican. I've met very few Mexicans, lots of El Salvadorians, Guatemalans, and a few other central american countries. Its pretty fun cause each of them have their specific foods and specialties that are all super good. Defiantly getting Fed a lot and my Appetite has grown cause I'm biking around everywhere. That's pretty much all i know about the area. lots of cool and weird people. 

 

I could go on and on with all the different Investigators, but that would take forever. none of them are considered progressing cause either A) they are not keeping commitments, b)not going to church, c) were progressing but an issue came up are now not progressing. Its frustrating but as they all say, if we do our best with teaching and telling them all they need to know then at the end of the day they still have agency and can choose to accept or reject our message. That's the truth, it doesn't mean we wont be sad or devastated but we can still keep in contact and challenge them. so yeah that's about it. I love you all!

Thanks for you prayers and i'm going to be sending a some letters this week so yeah. Thanks for your prayers and ill talk to you all next week. I love each and everyone of you and you are all in my prayers. I hope you are all doing great. Send my love to amber and Lydia and send me some pics.

Love 

Elder Hollingshead

 

Oh don't worry about getting an over coat. if in need to ill get one as i need it but as of right now ill be getting a sweater that should do me good. im not really out side much in the morning. we don't leave the Apt. Until about 1.

And What Dorene is Getting Married. That crazy girl. Wish her my luck, if you see her.

 

First Week

Hola!

Well this weekhas been interesting. Started offat 2 am in mexico city, and when we got to the busses wegot yelled at because we werelate. we were supposed to be there at 2:30 butwe didnt get there untill about 2:45. owell we got there with plenty of time to spare in the airport. I was going to call but ran out of timeand then somebody else was always using the phones.  i wish i couldof but as far as i know itwould havebeen around $100 dollars so yeah lots of money. The flightwas long and not very comfortable so i didntsleep well. But i met an enginneer and an older coupleat the air port. The older coupleactually were from mesa/gilbert but i dont rememberthe name. He is a lawyer for the church and works with missionary legal problems. Then the enginner was there because they are starting a project on the temple. its going to be shutdown for a year or so and have somestructural work done. He was down finalizing project details so we chatedfor a little cause he satnext to me. Once we got into the states As soon as we went throught the doors, we were met by the AP and president with anothercouple and we also met up with 19 othersfrom  Provo.So in totalthere 29 of us there on the same day, a few are visawaiters so owell. We went to the temple and met our temp companions, andhad some interviews and got our medical and money cards. THen i went to my temp companions apt,for theday and night, we went and knocked a couple of doors and then taught an english class.

That area was weird. it covered west hollywood and that place is weird. one street was super GAY, rainbow flags and crosswalks n such. you couldnt hardly look outthe window cuas it was bad. But imnot there now. The next day we went back to the temple lot building, got our actuall companions because that was transfer day. My Companion is Elder Marin from Texas, Houston. We are in the CentralZone, Madden area, and Inglewood 2nd ward. ITs an interesting place. A little scetchy sometiems. but awesome. Oh and when is my bike supposed to be here. Cause it as far as i knowit wasnt in the mission home. Im riding the "legend" right now. it is literally a legend, its old and i sometimes wonder how its lasted this long. and yep i have a bike area. quitelarge too so it takes a while to get anywhere cause me and my companion cantride very fast. Last night we dont excactly know where are red areas are so we were just riding and themorethe night went on the more scetchy it got sowere stilltryingto find the red areas. Our transfer goal is to work on less actives, There are lots around hereand so were are just going around visitingevery less active, inactive and part memeber famillys. ITs fun and sometimes i wonder howthese people are inactive. Owell. Theres one family we visit almost every night causethey are a part member family with lots of problems. Mom is nice but has no interest in coming,the restof the family is mostly active or completly inactive. Were working really hard on the 3 teen age girls. So its fun, aparently since a couple ofmonths ago the family has improved a lot.

lots of Food, all the time people are giving us food. infact tuesday we have 2 dinners, thatsgoing to be fun. Lots of good food and not too much weird food. although i thought i was going to eat a guine pig onetime. A member who was playing a joke on us...long story short they couldnt help but laught at me the fresh out of the  MTC Greeny. we had chicken, needless to say.

I ve been so tired. last couple of nightsafter we get in its so hard to stay awake. I went to bed early one night on accitdent. owell. Conference was definatly a great time. great talks but i dont know about you  but i enjoyed saturdays talks much better than sundays.  they were all good but saturdays definatly stuck a lot more. inbetween seesions we would eat snacks then a member weould come in and ask if we had food and then they would bring us lots of food. it was awesome. we got a couple of our investigators to come and watch conference, so we hope it has an effect on them. And who said LA was nice. Its cold in the moringins like i need a jacket so mom if could send me my grey jacket that weould be nice, then the day time is just sunny and toasty, not as bad as mesa, but people said a month ago it was in the mid 90s and miserable. and were on bikes so we get pretty sweaty. Oh, and none of the apartments, at lest not missionary ones have AC so you just have to go with it. Owell. since we have bars on our windows we can keep them open so yeah, it just means you hear the traffic andall the otherstuff thatgoes on outside too. someof which iwould rather not hear. Lots of vulgur and crude people here. Its crazy. 

Well thats about it that has happened. P day is monday so ill talk to you in a week.

Id sent some pictures but i havet had time the scedualis crazy. my usual down times in the MTC are the busiest here so im still trying to get used to the schedual.

Love you all, thanks for your prayers and keep themup,these next feww weeks are going to be rough. ill try and write letters soon when i have time. 

Love

Elder Hollingshead

ps, mom umm it says on my bike paperwork, that i need to lock it up a certain way for the warranty to work but it doesnt say what that way is could you sent that to me. And thanks for the package it was great. thanks for the snacks. and keep me posted on the bike. maybe i just missed, let me know.

Arrived Safely

Zerin arrived in Los Angeles on October 2, 2013.   President Weidman sent the following pictures of Zerin.

Zerin with his companion Elder Marin

Zerin with President & Sister Weidman

Leaving CCM

October 1, 2013

HOLA!

Well this is my final goodbyes from the CCM. This last weekend has been crazy. Lots of things have happened and lots of things have changed. Ill be waking up about 2 in the morning here and getting on the bus at 2:45 and leaving MExico at 7:30. I should be in LA about 9:30. So yeah today has been weird and hectic. so have the last couple of days but to start out lets go with Friday.  All day friday was IN field orientation. It was long, learned a few new things but mostly just reviewed priciples and what the field is going to be like. it was very long, very repitious, and somewhat boring. that was our friday. oh but i did forget, on thursday our teachers brought tacos in. They were soo good.  definatly some of the best tacos ive ever had. but im still debating whether or not they beat the ones in rocky point. Owell Saturday was really fun. we just chilled out and did our studies and since it was our last language lesson we played games and activites to test and help our vocabulary. Sunday was fun. It was fast sunday we all bore our testimony in sacrament meeting. And had some awesome lessons given by our Presidency. Sunday devotional was different. instead of watching a rerun of a previous MTC devo, we had Our MTC administrator or basically priciple come and talk to us. It was an awesome talk. He talked about immersing yourself in the work and forgeting the past, and looking forward in faith. Great talk. Then after that we had dinner and then took pics for a good hour. our teachers came and took pictures with us. we got a lot of pictures, to say the least. We had a little testimony meeting after and said goodbye to 2 of the Hermanas, they left a 2 in the morning, that one wasnt as hard. It was watching the other hermanas leave at noon and watching them pull away on the bus that was hard on the rest of us. As much as were ready to leave the CCM we are going to miss them and it was hard to watch them go but we all know its the lords work and, its just part of a mission getting to know people and watching the leave or you leave. Anyways Yesterday was just kindof a casual day, nothing to big happened other that we saw our teachers for the last time. well kindof they stopped in this morning after our personal study to say thier final goodbyes. We all exchanged emails so we can keep them updated on our mission. They are super excited for us. Today has been interesting. we had somewhat of a lesson this morning. it consisited of watching 2 episodes of the District. It was fun. Oh i forgot. last night we had a good study about how we can get through the hard times during our mission. we all shared scriptures and then also talked about the atonement and its power we should use in our lives.  It was one of the better discusssions we have had for a week or so. i was sad the hermanas didnt get to be there to study also, but they were all getting settled in their missions. So yeah. the rest of today has consisited of laundry, getting our iternerary and bording passes printed, packing, emailing, and then tonight we have our final devotional, and  then were off in the early in the morning. Its just been a crazy day. and tommorow is going is going to be a long ,long day.

So my feelings about leaving the CCM. well its definatly going to be a change. lots of new things to learn, and to do. Im going to miss this place. the first week all i could think about was when my 6 weeks was over and we could get out in the field. Although IM still super excited to go to the feild, it also brings a littly anxiety and nervousness. Im feel very prepared and ready and excited but im still nervous about the language, and the fact that i could very well teach a real investigator in the next few days is kindof freaky. Im super excited to teach, minus the huge factor that its in spanish. Owell ready or not LA is coming in approx 14 hours.

So something that ive figured out about Latinos here is that they love to take pictures. And to just joke around. sunday night we went and got some pictures with a few latinos on our floor, and they just went crazy, and longer you take pictures the more latinos come to be in the picture. They just love it. Its funny to talk to them about anything they make it so enjoyable to talk to them. So yeah but like everyone on our floor in our rooms left monday morning, so its been very quiet in our dorms the last few nights cause were one of the last people to leave this week. Oh and a new thing that is happening is international Missionarys that are coming to the MTC (like me) are coming wednesday not tuesday anymore and the Latinos are coming tuesday. Something weird but i guess it makes schedualing easier.

 
I think that is all i have to say, I love you all! You are all in my Prayers.  Good luck in all your endevors, and Remember that Christ is always there to help you.

I wish you luch from Mexico and Ill talk to you in LA, i think on monday, or whenever my P day is.

Love
Elder Hollingshead

CCM District and CCM Mission President

Zerin with CCM Mission President & Wife

District at CCM sign - now you know what CCM stands for!

CCM Campus

Zerin with instructor Sis. Velaquez

Zerin with instructor Elder ?Lara?

The District

Zerin with instructor Sis. Callejas

Last Week

September 26, 2013

Hola!

 

Well this week has been great. lets see where to start. the rest of last week was pretty normal, just regular days of language and study. umm sunday was great. We had our normal 4 church meetings and yeah, even though i dreded the thought of having to have to give a talk in espanol, by the time this week came around i prepared a good talk and actually wanted to speak but nope i didnt get chosen so it was a relief and sadness at the same time. Owell. at our MTC presidency class we learned about the priesthood and the different offices and keys but, nothing was super exciting about that. infact that is only meeting anymore i have a hard time staying awake in the whole time. its not that im super tired it just that it gets hot in the room and its just Presidente Pratt just talking about stuff. NOT that hes a bad speaker but he definatly doesnt keep it interactive very much. Hes super cool though. Then we had our Devotional an hour later and we watched a MTC Devotional by Richard G Scott and he gave an excellent talk on prayer and reciving answers. Great talk. That night for our video we watched one about John Tanner and all of his sacrifices for the church. Hes One of the really rich people who donated approximatly 50,000 dollars to the church and by the time he left Kirtland, he was completly bankrupt and had no food for his family, Im pretty sure you are all familiar with that story and then we watched To This End Was I Born. Not that it was bad, But the new bible videos do a lot better job of the life of christ. If you havnt watched them i Highly suggest you do.

Then Monday, was a normal day other than a language lesson that is super confuzing. Its called subjunctive and it doesnt exist in English. Im still kindof stuck on it. ill begin to understand a little and then they add something else and it makes no sence again. But Good news is that we got a new book. I dont know if they just didnt have the book when we got here or its new. Its a language review and before that we only had missionary language books. so we didnt know about anything other than religious terms. Its great and all but you kondof need to know some non religious stuff too. So we got that yesterday and its more of a textbook type, and it has a lot of review stuff and examples and things to do, so hopefully that will help me a little more. So since we dont have a frisbee anymore we started playing a new game, its called handball you play it in a basketball court that has the soccer net under it and you throw the ball into the net but its like frisbee in the sence you cant just run with the ball, and its soccer cause your throwing it into a net and garding it. SUper fun and really gets your heart going. Tuesday was fun when we were playing this because it just started Pouring while we were playing and the court we were playing had like an inch of water everywhere so people were slipping and you couldnt see anything cause it was raining so hard. But who cares if it was raining we kept plaing for a good 30 min inthe rain. we were completly soaked. I think that that was the hardes rain we have had the whole 6 weeks here. cause the main road going down the CCM was a river. It was fun to watch other elders try and cross and try and not get wet. My clothes took about a day to try and my shoes are still soaked.

Also the natives are awesome. its amazing how many of them know a little bit of english, enough we can communicate. so they speak english to us and we help them, and we speak spanish to them and they help us. Win win situation. Its fun. funny story with them, I think it was monday night when we returned to our dorm we started chatting with them and the our other roomates. then they were like LEts Take  A Picture so we grabbed our cameras and put them on a desk and took a few pictures. then more Natives came and soon enought we had a dozen cameras on the table all taking pictures. they were just so excited to take pictures.  Then Tuesday night we had a Devotional and It was a re run of a MTC Devotional from the week after last octbers general Conference. His whole talk was on learning how to get things out of conference. He gave us a few ideas of how to take notes, and what to look for. IT was an Awsome talk. so yeah. Just for me the first weekend in the feild is general conference. I think its going to be awesome. Today is really busy, we were supposed to go to the temple at 7 which is my preference but because of schedualing issues we left at 8 and didnt get back till 1:30. so that ate up most of our day and i still need to go get a hair cut. and finish laundry befor 5:15. Oh and im super excited becasue tonight we are going to have real Mexican tacos. We planned a little fiesta with our teachers and they told us they would bring tacos and such for us to night so im excited.... Super Excited. Lets just say im glad to get out of here and eat some better food hopefully. As much as I love the MTC im ready to leave. Im a little nervous for the launguage but taht comes with time.  It just a little weird to think that in a week or so we probably be actually teaching real investigators and putting to work all the things we learned here.

 

You can definatly tell that The CCM is having a few learning curves. you can tell because everyweek there is either a new rule, new variation on a rule, or a completle lesson on obedience or following rules. WHICH IS GOOD. Ive tried my hardest to go to bed on time, and be to classes on time. but its frustrating when otheres around you dont think that they are important. Im not saying i was perfect with all the rules, somtimes i didnt always get in to be by 10:30, or the one I stuggled with was Speaking your Langauge. Looking back over these six weeks i  think if would of spoke more spanish. I always pulled excuses or just didnt constantly think about speaking the language. especially when everyone around you doesnt speak the language either. and ill tell you what it definatly put a dent in my language ability. So yeah that last week and a half i definatly spoke more spanish and it has helped so much. so yeah. we all make mistakes and thats where we pick up and work harder and ill say this since ive started speaking spanish as much as possible im not as tired. Is easier to wake up in the morning and easier to remember words and phrases.

Well I love you all, its good to hear from you and hear about the things that are going on. I miss you, but Im always comforted Cause i know that im here doing the lords work. It always brings me comfort and joy. You are all in my prayers everyday. I wish the best for all of you. Read the scriptures and pray. without those things no one would ever be converted to this gosple and the blessings it can bring into our lives. I love you all. As far as i know i will be leaving wednesday moring. my flight leaves around 7 in the morning so i will be leaving probably 2 or 3 in the morning. I will be emailing on tuesday for a little bit, but other than that whenever my P day is i will email. so it could be more that a week so yeah.

So Pictures. First One is of part of our district and  a couple of others that left this week. 2, is of us after playing in the rain, 3, cool clouds after that rain. 4, is my entire district, my entire district had a little gift exchange for something to remember each of us for. 5, is me at the temple today.

 

Love you All

 

Elder Hollingshead

(or Zerin, Z, Uncle Z, Zman, or what ever your Preference.)



Part of our District



Soaking wet fun!

Beautiful Clouds after the Rain

District Gift Exchange

Mexico City Temple