9.17.12

What is going on fam?--
So it has been almost one week here, whoa that is crazy! I wont lie.. this week was loonnggg.....and HOT!! Man it is soooo hot here; I blaze up on the daily. But it's all good cause hopefully I am sweating off all the pupusas that I eat on the daily. They are just as good as everyone says...every night I ask my comp if we can go and get more. ha ha well I will give you a little bit of the low down from this week. I got here on tues and we met the pres and his wife and their 3 kids that live with them in the mission home. That night we ate at their home...it was way nice. Hermana Cordon said its the nicest place in the Santa Ana area. Anyway the next day we met our comps and were off. My comps name is Hermana Romero..she is the bomb. Besides the large language barrier its been a-okay...ha ha but seriously she speaks basically no English so our common friend is the dictionary. I am with her until Dec 5. My area is called Chalchuapa...I think is is one of the nicer areas here in Santa Ana. but I don't know because its my first area...it seems like it though. So our apartment is small but it's just us so we don't need much room. The first day my comp said "la ducha no funciona"...yep our shower doesnt work, so its showering with a bucket in the pila. The pila is a little concrete area usually at the back of house where you wash dishes and such....ha ha i just laughed...its actually kinda nice because we don't have hot water so the cold kinda wakes you up in the morning. I need to learn how to be quicker though...showering with a bucket takes forever...seriously try it you will see what I mean. We also went grocery shopping the first day for a few things...I had no idea what to get (because everything is different here) so my comp helped... I got dry milk...yep thought that only existed in mom's 72 hour kit....apples and cookies. good thing we are going again today because i have been living off of tortillas from the neighbors for a couple days now. When I got home from my first day all my food was covered in ants (I think our apt is built on an ant farm) and I thought to myself...well, jokes on them because I'm going to eat it with or without them! ha ha we bought some Raid though and that has helped a ton. Man I'm trying to think.. everything is so different here it is hard to pick out what to write about because i have such limited time!! But we basically walk everywhere except when we go to zone mtgs...the busses are nuts! They are packed and you just squeeze in where ever you can and hope you dont fall out the door...it's awesome ha ha all the people are nice though and always try to offer you their seat. I get yucky kisses blown to me on the daily and they say stuff like "hey bebe i will cya you later"...its kinda funny but kinda not. I can see now why missionaries may want to dye their hair. I am not going to but i stick out soo bad! There are no white people here besides the missionaries! and I am the only one in my area though so that's a good time. They have these HUGE grasshopper things in my area that freak me out! I hate them! This guy in our ward that speaks a little english said to me as i was hiding behind my comp when I saw one on the street...."welcome to the jungle"...ha I laughed but secretly I have nightmares about them. I will try and attach a pic of one I took that was dead. The church here is different too...when we first went there I was shocked because it is so beautiful but filthy. No one takes care of it and that kinda bugged me so hopefully we can do something to help that. Also sacrament meeting yesterday was a little different.. there were kids running everywhere playing on the piano during the sacrament songs..(well all the songs)...oh and in relief society this lady just started feeding her child in the middle of everything...haha i was like WHAT is this!! but i guess thats pretty normal here.....we had a zone activity on Saturday called the festival of mice..or corn....it was El Salvadors independece day on the 15th- anyway it started raining really hard and then...lightning hit the chapel dead on..it was one of the loudest things i have ever heard! It was awesome....i was thinking "Satan your gunna have to try harder than that if you want to stop people from coming to this activity because it was mainly to find investagsators because everything was free". Anyway I will write more next week I hope all is well. Love you all so much!! Keep on keeping on. Cristo will help you with everything....I can testify to that...even though i still can't communicate in Spanish and I have days where tears start rolling down my face because i am frustrated and tired and hungry and hot and sad, I know I have a friend that knows exactly how I feel...and that helps me press on! Lean on Cristo for everything! Love you! Here are some pics! I have tons more but i will attach more next week! xoxo Hna Ahrendsen!

9.10.12

Well I made it here and I'm writing you from the mission home right now! How cool is that? We are only allowed to write three lines so this will be kinda short. Anyway, I made it here safe and it is HOT! The mission president and his wife are really nice and the mission home is way nice. It took us longer than usual to get here because there was a massive bus wreck right in front of us...kinda crazy! anyway I better peace but I will write more on Pday! Love you all! xoxo Hermana Ahrendsen

9.8.12

Family and friends!! I love you!  I love reading all your emails...I spend my 22 minutes of internet time each week mostly reading....I love hearing about everything. I am SO sorry, I wish I could respond better to everything but they are a lil craze here and give you the boot super quick but its all good, keep writing me!! I look forward to it every week! Well Its been another week and on Tuesday I am officially leaving for El Salvador.....its so crazy that I have already been here for 6 weeks! I have loved my time here, it will be
sad to leave for sure. Yesterday we got a little class about what to say when you get to El Salvador and they ask you why you don't have a Visa...ha ha it was pretty funny. So nope we are still waiting for those but going anyways! We are actually taking a bus so I wont be able to call :( but that's okay because you know what?? Christmas is right around the corner! I am glad to hear everyone is still doing well! Well my companion is Hermana Allison Bowers. We went out tracting again on Tuesday..it was an awesome experience. We talked with lots of people and met our goals we made too which was awesome! If the Lord
wants it done it will get done...i really saw that as I was surprised a couple times when people could understand me about things I was saying. Well the chronic stomach problems live on here...ha ha you
know how they say sometimes the Latino culture doesnt even realize they are having stomach issues because its a daily occurance. I think we now all understand...its a little weird but you get use to it quick! Man I cant believe how many experinces I have had already and its only been 2 months I am so excited to be able to continue the Lord's work in the mission field (I was starting to feel like the CCM was my mission ha ha) People are waiting and need to hear the word and I can't wait to help in the process of bringing them to the fold! Every time I think about it, I think about how incredibly blessed I am to be doing this work...its the best in the world! Thanks again for all the support and love! Xoxo Hna Ahrendsen

8.25.12

Hey there! Whats going on? Sounds like everything is doing well in Idaho...the family reunion sounds fun and the BBQ beef sounds soooo good...I will admit, the food has really been an adjustment for me..I
didn't think it would be but it for sure is..i am always trying something new. We are going on a tour of Guatemala this tuesday and going to the street market which I am excited for. We are all SO excited to get out. The CCM here is triple-gated with 24 hour guards on watch armed with guns...and when we walk to the temple or out to the street they have guards set up all along out path with guns and walkie-talkies.... somewhat resembles jail?? maybe...haha just kidding its all good...They are good to us here. Speaking of
the temple- we went again on thurs and went to the distribution center after and seriously everything is so cheap i couldn't believe it. They have quetzeals here and its about 8 quets to a dollar...and the garments at the distribution center were about 4 quets....50 cents roughly...is that not crazy? we all wanna stock up before we leave. They have the testaments and legacy DVDs for a dollar- its crazy. This next time we go to the temple they informed us it will be all in Spanish...yes everything!...I'm a little nervous but it will be cool for sure. I have 3 more weeks! Isn't that nuts!? We went out tracting on Tuesday and were paired with a
Latina companion....it was awesome. I said "we are representatives of Jesus Christ and we want to share a message with you".. and then my companion took over and I basically didn't understand anything from
there.....ha ha, but my companion was super nice and so cute. We handed out pamphlets and got lots of people's contact info for the missionaries to meet with them..and then on the bus ride home I sat by a man and talked to him and gave him my Book of Mormon they gave us to hand out. Actually my Latina roomie in front of me spoke mostly ha ha, but i started the convo and wrote my name in the book and gave it to him so
that counts right? Anyway it was awesome to interact with the people- they are so nice and willing to listen to you. So this last sunday..i spoke in church. They give you the topic before hand and then at the
pulpit they announce who will speak...I was dying when they said "hna anderson".. I turned to my roommate and then looked back at president from the stand and he just smiled. I'm sure my spanish was horrible but its all a learning experience and i had this sense of..'ahh..you did it...loving feeling from my heavenly father when I sat down' it really was a cool experience. Really this whole experience thus far has been so humbling. I am learning what it means to rely soly on the Lord because without him you really cant do this work. Also I have really gained a testimony of how incredibly important the book of mormon is....it is SOOO important that you read every day. Never never let a day go by that you don't read...that is how true conversion happens, and hey the stories in it are amazing once you get into it. Really though, you learn so much. Love you all sooooo much!! Sending my love from C.A.!
Hna Ahrendsen

PS Be jealous of the weather; it is perfect everyday...rains, and then sunny with a tiny draft...Beautiful! A nice change from idaho ;) just sayin.....

8.11.12

Fam...wassup! Well it sounds like everyone is doing well..This week we got to go to the temple...it was
pretty small but very beautiful. There were also TONS of people there...2 busses full of people from Honduras came to go the temple. It was a 16 hour bus ride! How crazy is that? Anyway the MTC here is
connected to a building that is housing for people when they come to go to the temple so they were all around the MTC and at the temple. Anyway our session got delayed 45 minutes so we had to wait outside the temple and attempted to talk to a bunch of them. My companion is really good at understanding and responding and its pretty cool/sometimes discouraging because i cant say much but its a process
always....the people were SO nice! And after a while they started saying "photo!!" "photo!!" so we took lots of pictures with them....a lot of the time they just stared at me and my comp (my teacher said it was because we have blonde hair blue eyes and white skin) I wished i would have had my camera but the MTC took out camera passport iPod...basically anything valuable the first day and we only get it back the second to
last day we are here...kinda lame. Anyway i have another medical training today.....I think we Skype with the other nurses who know i will let you know about that though. I better get going though...thanks again for the emails and thanks mom for sending my package! I love you all so much!! have a great week! xoxo Hermana Ahrendsen

8.4.12

Hello Everyone! 
Well I hope you got my last email but I didnt hear from anyone....but I'm here and things are going. We have a mix of Latinos and north americans. I try to talk to the Latinos but mostly I just don't know what they are saying and just smile and nod ha ha. The food here is very different. For some reason I just thought it would be kind of the same but it is most definitely not. We had chips and salsa yesterday for breakfast...and a couple days ago we had a seminar about the rules in the MTC and one of them was to eat EVERYTHING they give you so I have been trying but it is way hard...i.e. last night they gave us this massive piece of fish...and so I was like 'you know I will try it' so I took one bite and thought it would probably be more offensive to throw it up than to throw it away...but I at least tried! It really has taken some getting used to. They have huge freezers full of ice cream too which are SO good/will be the death of me. If I could only eat that I would be happy....ha. So the gym is a dot big....they have a few machines but so many people have gym at the same time that we usually end up watching the Latinos play soccer. Hmm what else....oh yes they have snack time every night like one hour after dinner where you tell them a new word you learned and get a treat...one of my favorites. The temple is very beautiful. We went there yesterday as a class which was awesome to get out because we haven't been outside these gates since we got here....anyway we had to go and find a member at the temple and share a message with them. That was a little scary but they were very willing to stop and listen...no way would that have been the case anywhere in the US just saying. So mom about my glasses....I don't know what to do. It seems super sketchy to send them here, but I don't know what else to do! A girl got a package yesterday from her family with treats in it and it was opened with a bite taken out of a Rice Krispy treat they sent her.....anyway let me know what you think. I am trying to just write everything out in this short time and its not organized at all, so sorry. So we have Latino teachers that speak a tiny english but hardly anything. We have this one teacher that tries so hard to speak english and I cant help but laugh every time.. and then I think 'what does he do when I try and speak spanish, he is probably dying!' It helps being around spanish all the time, unlike the Provo MTC, but I still have to try really hard and listen to pick out words to understand and usually I have to tell them to repeat it a few times too ha ha. Well we had a cool experience yesterday where we took turns teaching the missionaries in our room how to pray and the teacher played Paul Cardell's piano song 'Baptism' (which was amazing because I have not listened to music since I left), and even though we knew they weren't real investagators, I could feel the spirit really strong testifying to me again that the things we were teaching were true and the things they said during their prayer were true as well. My companion is really good and patient with me because she can speak fairly well and understand me, but she is good about teaching me and answering my questions. Tomorrow is Sunday and they told us that they will randomly call on two missionaries to speak 5 minutes before sacrament
starts...and then in district meeting they will call a companionship up to teach a topic for 20 minutes....I am so nervous about that....scares me for sure...so guaranteed I will get called on because they said the new ones always do! Well I better wrap this up. Love you all! Xoxo- Hermana Ahrendsen

8.1.12

Well we got here at like 7am this morning finally!....hmmmm it is VERY different. Almost everyone on the plane was hispanic so I knew right there that nothing was going to be the same. We took a bus to the CCM where
I am writing you now. Everyone is really nice and ONLY, and yes I mean exclusively, speaks Spanish. Even the white missionaries have tags that say "I don't speak Spanish" and as I write this I am typing on a spanish
keyboard. So sorry for the spelling/grammer errors! Breakfast was interesting too...ha ha.. uhm it consisted of fried bananas, papayas...basically the only thing I recognized on my plate was eggs with tomatoes and
bread....I didn't love it but thats alright because its all new right? It is very hard spanish-wise.. I am already struggling and its day one! My room window looks right out to the Guatemala temple as well as the street where police come speeding by almost every 5 minutes, and by police i mean hispanic men in the back of a truck with
shotguns....awhh good times in central A! This morning I went to brush my teeth and used the sink water...the sister next to me says "uhm sister your not going to want to use that water to brush your teeth- that's why we have these huge Jugs on the counter"....she told me to put sanitizer on my toothbrush and told me to try not to get water in my mouth in the shower. I just rinsed my toothbrush off with the supposedly okay water and hoped I wasn't infested with parasites on day one. Haha. My companion is Sis Bowers from Orem I think. She is going to be the RN in El Salvador San Salvador. Anyway I gotta peace cause they are telling us to get off- anyway.....It was good to talk to everyone yesterday! I love you all!

7.24.2012

Why hello familamily....

What is going on?! I have loved getting all your letters and dear elders and emails! It makes my day everytime and I am sure that is how it will be for the rest of my mission as well. Well I just got out of a 9 hour medical training...yes on P-day of all days (8-5). I am SO tired. We had a couple 5 minute breaks and 40 minutes for lunch and the rest was in a chair lecturing from a powerpoint with a manual in front of us with 105 pages of front and back slides. The doctor that trained us was Dr. Wooley that is the doctor over all of the MTC's world wide. Him and his assistant seemed to get off track alot, and tell dry jokes i.e. "Shakespeare wrote about Tuberculosis in his Hamlet play when he said "TB or not TB... that is congestion" So it was a little bit of a long day, but they had lots of intersting information. There were 2 other sisters going to be nurses in Guatalmala and the other El Salvador mission (San Salvador) and then 4 doctors with their wives going to various places. So trying to bridge the gap between what docs vs. nurses need to know was difficult sometimes but I think I got some solid information. They gave us a "retail 150 dollars" (or so they say) medical kit. Who knows if I will be able to fit that in my bag....leaning towards probably not but I guess we will see. I wish I could write more but they give you no time seriously!

Anyway so I fly out to the Guat MTC on Tuesday at 8:30 from SLC. My companion Dansie and I are getting a little nervous. Crazy that it's in a week. Just barely when I opened my email I had an email from the mission president's wife saying how excited they were for me to come and how they were waiting for me. That was way sweet, got me excited again. So much happens during the week that it is literally impossible to tell you everything I want to but I will try to tell you a few things that happened this week that I thought were special.....So my comp and I are still teaching our (fake) progressing investagitor Mari and we had a lesson last week that I probably felt the spirit the strongest of any of our lessons so far. We were teaching her how to pray and why prayer is important in our broken Spanish but I could just feel the spirit so strong that I knew this was what she needed even if she couldn't understand anything we said, she could at least feel it. So she taped a video for our district as an investagor (shes actually one of our 4 teachers) and in the video she was talking to all 10 of us, generally, but one part stood out to me and I wrote it down- she said "Even though I couldn't understand a lot of what some of your were saying, I could feel how what you were trying to teach me, meant the world to you and it made me want to feel so strongly about something like you did so thats why I keep inviting you back." A couple days later I was meeting with her individually for a teacher student planning session or something that she does with everyone and I told her about how strongly I had felt the spirit that very last time we had taught her, and she said "I want to read you something I wrote in my journal" and then she proceded to say the exact thing that I had heard from the video and wrote down. The spirit it seriously amazing and works in SO many different ways.

One last quote Jeffrey R. Holland "Your first convert will always be yourself." Remember this, it doesn't just apply to missionaries but everyone....you can't bring others to the gospel if you aren't there yourself. I loved that, I hope you do too.

Love you all and am so grateful for everything you do for me......all the support and love is felt here is the Provo CCM. Can't wait to hear from everyone!

xoxo- Lyndee

7.17.2012

Fam....
So this is timing me and I have to be quick because I only have 30 minutes! So I don't even know if I am sending it to the right email addressed because I realized I don't have yours and you don't have mine...so hopefully this gets to someone! This week has been hmm....hard. All your Dear Elders have seriously been amazing. At almost every mail time I have something and the Elders think I have someone writing me because I always get something but I just said I have an awesome family which is true! I wrote home my first day but who knows if it got there. My companion is Hermana Dansie from Victor, ID and she is pretty sweet. We get along and have some good laughs everyday. There are two other sisters in our room that are in our district Hermana Ward and Hermana Sanchez. The first day we got here the teachers started speaking Spanish to us and then told us we were going to be teaching our first (fake) investgator on Friday. The teaching was..hmm...horrible. Kid you not we sat in silence for 5 minutes at a time just looking down and at our books and back at each other while the investigator would either say something in Spanish that we didn't understand or sit there and not say anything. So that was pretty sweet. The other thing is almost everyone in my district (10 of us- 4 sisters and 6 elders) speak some Spanish from high school or college except for me. Most can at least understand but I can't even do that. I can pick out a word here and there but seriously during our daily 3 hour class where our teacher, Brother Stoddard, teaches all in Spanish I maybe get 5% ish out of the class. All of church is in Spanish too so I don't catch things like "we are having a ward fast for an elder that is going in for an MRI on monday." I guess it's more than when I started but it's SO hard not to get frustrated when everyone around you is speaking it. There are so many things I want to say and express to our investagtor but I can't because of the language barrier so we rely a lot on the spirit to be able to tell her the things we can't and hope the little things we try to teach are testifying to her. It's hard, probably one of the hardest things I've done, but gotta keep on keeping on, ya know?

So I found out a couple days ago I will be heading to Guat MTC on just my passport I don't even need my visa! I leave on the 31st of this month. So about 2 more weeks-ish. My companion and I went to the Provo Police station today to get a clearence letter and said that was the last thing they needed so hopefully I will be heading out then. They also gave me my release date Jan 11th, 2014......exactly a year a half. Idk why they do that but whatevs. ha Hm what else the food? Not so great, it's okay but my companion and I get a wrap almost every lunch. Mom you would love those. I always think of tons of stuff I want to say during the week and now I can't remember a lot of it. Thanks again fam for all the support you're all so great. Regardless of how hard it is, I know it's the Lords work. He needs my help and knows I can do this, and that helps my confidence when I get down and discouraged. I pray for you guys everyday Love and miss you all! xoxo -Hermana Ahrendsen

See ya in 1.5 Lynd!

Hey everyone! Katie BFF here... :) Sister Lyndee Ahrendsen reports to the MTC tomorrow! We thought the easiest way for everyone to keep up on Lyndee's mission would be through this blog.. so I will post her letters and pics when she sends them. We're so proud of our favorite missionary.. Love you Lyndor! :)