June 25, 2012

HI. So dad, I am so glad you got your letter. it is so great to hear that tay did good and it was successful. I had no doubt he would do good though. he will definitely be a missionary with exito haha that means success in spanish. Anyways. Dad, we eat pinto beans and then just white rice.The have planteans a lot and this cool cheese that the first week was strange but now i crave it every day haha.but yeah, rice and beans every stinkin day. hehe its fine but like no variety. the bananas here are great and I had my first mango yesterday and it wasnt how i expected. I dont like mangos sadly. The frescas...drinks... here are sooooo good. anyways sorry to hear hurricane is so hot haha. i hope the family had fun this weekend at tays farewell. when is the cabin this year? soon i am sure. that will be so much fun. I havent been able to take a lot of pictures yet because we are never supposed to look like tourists so kinda hard but i will try to send a couple today. ok so first. the people here are so chill. kinda like hawaii. they are like way laid back, haha like honeybadgers they dont really care about anything. Its funny. they all basically live in tents and when they are home their doors are always wide open and they are sitting there watching tv in a rocking chair. they dont have door bells we just yell hey whats up basically and they come over. funny huh. They are great people and so friendly here. so tuesday we got a text... all the girls have phones. so we got a text that was like surprise in granada today. we had no idea what was up and honestly i was a little scared. so we got there and met up with our zone and president monestel showed up with his family and i guess we were the most successful last week and so we had a pizza party and we did arm wrestling contests and i beat my component hhahahaha so funny. The elders were all cheering us on and it was so fun. Ok so i am not exaggerating when I say how crazy the spirit is when you are on a mission. When I feel it its crazy strong. every time. stronger than i have ever felt it and I know that Heavenly Father is there for me and he is cheering me on in all things. haha this mission is hard work. Its good work though. my district leader said he is seeing a huge improvement with me and I think he is right. I am understanding a bit more and I am learning just to talk and not care what people think. the spirit guides me everyday and I can feel it in my life. I am so grateful to not be alone in this. ok. so nevermind on pictures today. i am running out of time so hopefully next week. i am sorry. still not package but hopefully this week. I have almost been in nicaragua for 4 weeks I cannot believe how fast time is going. LOLO once again happy birthday my sweet best pal. I love you so much and hope you like your gift. its not much but I thought you would enjoy it. Love you baby girl. Fro, sorry I havent been able to get your letter off yet but it will be soon. thanks for being so supportive. and nat your letter is on its way so i hope you get it soon. so like i said houses here are crazy and their pet pigs just lounge in their houses. its a bit different than the us i would say. Ok... so my lesson. wow I am soooo glad that its over. it was so scary and the class of investigators staring at me for answers was hard. ha when they asked questions i actually understood though. it went really well. I am so glad its over and that I did good on it. I feel good about it. and i know it was not me teaching because there is no way i would be able to understand any other time. So saturday was a baptism and a wedding. it was way spiritual. not my baptism. yesterday was crazy because they had this huge fiesta in my area and we werent allowed to go into the town. we sat in our apt. which was horrible cuz i was bored but i studied some lanuage and it was fine. The funerals here are sad. they walk down the street with the caskets and the last two days have been little tiny ones. I have been sad for the families of their little babies they have lost. Well i need to go. i always wish I had more time but we only have 45 min for fam and then 15 for pres and its in spanish so actually about 20 for me. I love you all so much. proud of the decisions you all are making and pray for every one of you every day. haley, chan, jen. Miss you guys and hope all is well with you. pray for you. nat and dave, miles and holly. miss you so much and pray for you daily. same with you jeff, maya, katia and bijae. Hope all is well. thanks for the support. and mother. i am sure you did a lot for tays farewell. thanks. dad, you too. you are the best

Hi Everyone! Finally able to send some pictures. The one pic of the little taxi and the road is right outside my apt but I need to take some really pretty pictures for you but haven’t been able to just whip out my camera a lot. But I will. The taxi is hilarious though huh!!! It is so tiny but its fun to ride in everyday. Sorry It was after p-day so I am all sweaty and gross looking but you know... this is Nicaragua!!! I am used to the humidity now. Took me only about 5 days so that is great!!!!! Um wow I do not even know where to begin. we are teaching a lot of people. I told Lauren there are these two sisters that are just adorable and we are teaching them. they are having a hard time because their dad hit their mom and left them and now its just them and their mom. it was hard to hear them talking about it. I started crying. When we were leaving the one held my hand for ever. I could tell she was just hurting inside. I felt so bad for her. It has been nice to teach her more. I hope our message will reach their hearts. I have been able to contribute some in our lessons. Sometimes I get completely lost and then I just try to figure out what is going on and bear testimony of it. Haha. It’s really hard. I know it will come. They say it takes a good 6 months. So only 4 more to go. ok... my very favorite old man we are teaching him and wow.... first time we taught Louis I was just feeling the spirit so strong... more than I have in any of our lessons. I bore my testimony to him and I started crying. it was very spiritual and I asked him to follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of God. He said yes but he needs a little bit more time. That was the second time we taught him. Then he got a baptism interview and things are good. He just needs a stronger testimony of Joseph Smith. Which I think will come. We are going to go over the restoration with him again in our next visit. He is a rich one here. And he is very intelligent. I want him to truly be so happy. I feel a lot of love for these people. At first I did not. I was just like ok I wish I could just speak in English haha. But now as the days go by I think of these people and I look a little deeper. I know Heavenly Father loves them and I know that they all deserve to hear this message in their own language. So I am in this area for the next 12 weeks and possibly for 12 weeks later. Which I wouldn’t mind because I love it here. My area is so nice. It has a ton of Catholics though. Haha. Every time we contact I’m like hello we are representatives of Jesus Christ and they are like ok cool well I am catholic. Anyways i sent off some letters today so I hope they get to you soon!!! No I haven’t gotten any letters yet but hopefully soon!!!! I miss you all so much. gosh this email time goes by so fast. Today for p-day we went and had some Mexican food and played baseball basketball and soccer with our zone. our zone is way cool. I miss my mtc group though. Anyways I am the only new one in my zone so I’m the only one who doesn’t know the language. yeah its hard but everyone seems to be really accepting and my Branch President tries to speak to me in English sometimes. the church here is tiny!!!!!!! There are barely any members. There are a couple families and that is it. We need to work harder. The elders are working really hard too. one of the elders in my district is Cory Hintons cousin. His name is elder Hinton haha. He went to Lehi high school and played basketball... sorry i said that in my letter i just sent too. haha funny. Anyways i love you all!!!! UNTIL NEXT WEEK. Tay have fun at the temple and tell me all about it. Thanks for the dear elder josh I hope to get it soon! Thanks everyone for your letters you are the best family in the world!!!!!!! Love Hermana Parker

Updates....

sweet mother and father!!!! Gosh do i have the best parents or what!!!!????? I miss you guys so much. Thanks for the emails. Dad, I am glad that you had a good fathers day and I hope my letter reaches you very soon. I sent off another letter today so I hope that you get it. I wasnt able to finish jeffs so i will send that next week but I did write to dave and nat so they should be expecting one soon as well. Its crazy cuz we have to go all the way into granada just to send a letter. its about 45 minute trip in a hot bus. today we went and we ate chinese food. that was great!!!! And the server knew some english so I was able to communicate a bit of spanglish with him haha. WOW I got some letters and I am so glad!!! I was reading them all the way to managua on friday when we had a big conference. It was nice to hear from everyone. prom pictures were gorgeous and everyone things tay is guapa!!! hahah that means handsome and they think lauren looks just like me. Nathans cute little costume. that was so fun to get thank you!!! I love letters. they help me get through this. First, before I forget. is there anyway that you guys can help take care of my loans? I think mom will just have to call and act like she is me or something. with my social and prob my birth date and stuff. I know you are really busy and I am sorry to throw this on you but I just remembered this week that june is the month i was supposed to call back. Just when you get some free time. Um wow. The mission is nothing like what I expected. There is absolutely no free time and by the time I get home I write in my journal for 10 minutes and then I am in bed. Its draining but every day there is a miracle. Like yesterday... we have a family that we found who are investigadors. they are so cool. Our first visit they were asking so many questions and wanted to know about the book of mormon... prob told you about them last week. Well their names are gustavo and the wife is demaris. We taught them another awesome lesson and invited them to church and yesterday I was on splits with a girl in the ward and she came with me and we were going to see if they were coming to church and when we got to the door demaris was already ready for church and it was an hour early! I was so happy. I think she liked it. Katheryn was wondering why we need a prophet and how we know that thomas s monson is a true prophet of God so we taught her about that. It helped her a lot. She couldnt come to church though dang it. We had 4 dates for baptisms. This week was just throwing us blessings. We invited all 4 to be baptized this week and they said yes. Luis has been out of town so he hasnt been able to be taught but he has attended church 3 times so he is ready he just needs to be baptized. gosh I love him. Then nora will be baptized supposedly and also Arlen and maria perez. Maria perez is awesome... we asked her what she thought about baptism and she said that she needed it. wow... so there we taught about baptism and invited her to be baptized and without hesitation she said yes. I am so glad that cute little girl in your ward will be baptized soon. Thats so great!!! Jeff said the twins invited a friend to church. that takes a lot of courage and i am so proud of them. Wow. The gospel is everywhere. haha so some random facts. women here all give kisses when they meet us. its cute so that could be weird getting back into the states and almost kissing everyone i meet. haha. Also, everyone here on the streets calls me princess or barbie. Its funny. Guys on the street will try to speak some english to me and its like ummmm ok youre weird. haha. Anyways sorry I never put apostrophes in my words. I dont know where it is on this keyboard ever and it would take too much time to look. sorry, i do know how to spell. So... Tay has his talk next week and also i have to teach the lesson in church. Am I scared? yeah I really am. There are a ton of people in the class and I dont know the language. I am very nervous and I need a lot of prayers. This mission is scary every single day. I am out of my comfort zone every day. But I know that every day I am growing. haha so funny story. whenever we go to granada we are on this crazy bus... I wrote about it to dave and nat in their letter. but its funny because the bus is only supposed to hold 38 people and i counted today and there were 90. and just when you think no more can fit the bus stops to pick up 4 more. so I was there... standing on an old school bus. in 100 degree weather with crazy humidity, squished with all these nicaraguans. haha. Yep, welcome to nicaragua. They buy all their buses from the us. and they are all like old school buses that we dont need or are too old for us. Then they shove as many people in because there is only one bus every 30 minutes and they want more money. today I got a new skirt because I really needed it. Also I got 2 new shirts for 40 corderbas... which is like 2 dollars in the us. We get about 2300 every 14 days... which I think is about 100 american dollars. that is for our meals our laundry our breakfasts our other needs our taxis and all of that stuff. They love to listen to american music here so that is fun. what else... oh this week we had a huge conference with both of the missions in nicaragua and i saw brady maag and elder ewell. we got pictures. also I saw my roommate from the mtc... shes from guatemala and I was sooooo happy to see her!!!!! Also, when I saw hermana creel we both started crying. We were talking about how hard this is but we are getting to like it more and things are giving me hope all of the time. Yes, my place is a nice place, most of the missionaries including girls have dirt floors and showers outside so yeah I am living the high life right now. Everyday is an adventure. technically I have been out on this mission for 3 months on the 28 of this month. today howeever is my 2 month mark!!! But since I have 3 months I have 15 months left. This mission is already flying by. oh... so starting today, since my area is so catholic they have a whole month to celebrate st peter. ummm and only one day to celebrate christ??? I dont get it. But they party all day and all night and its a huge deal here. Weird. Anyways dad, I am glad to hear your fathers day went well and that you spoke... mom said it was good and I am so proud of you. Thanks for being the best parents in the world!!!! Hermana parker

Nicaragua

Sister Parker's zone from the MTC

Elder Tyler Kuhlman (from Hurricane, behind me), Other missionaries and me in Guatemala

So first I want to talk about how my last few days at mtc were. ummmmm amazing. I absolutely LOVED the mtc. So great and I made ssssssssssssooooooooooooo many good friends who i will love my whole life. So my district and I sang come thou fount in sacrament. it made every one cry. the spirit was so strong and we practiced a lot. I have learned to sing more because come to find out I have a good voice says most people haha. so now Im not afraid to sing. When I finally left I cried and cried. Our district had a testimony meeting and I cried so hard. ok so then we got on a plane and flew to San Salvador... which is BEAUTIFUL by the way. Then off to Nicaragua. it took FOREVER and I was exhausted. Pres and his fam met us and took us to Mcdonalds and treated us. It was fantastic!!! Um can I just say I did not expect this heat. hahahahahah first thing I thought was oh dad would just love this heat... and it was 9 at night hahha. So yeah we got a hotel and I was with hermana Creel from Cali who I met day one and it was great. We went tracting the next day with random people and they of course dont speak english. but I went around bearing my testimony like a mad man. Then the next day I received my trainer... which was wednesday... I got my new area which is cooler than most of Nicaragua and i am with my trainer for 12 weeks. Yes we study language an hour every day. and you guessed it... NO one here speaks engish. hahahaha sooooooooo thursday was just overwhelming but it is honestly getting better. My comp is awesome the people are amazing. SERIOUSLY every one here is nice. I get a ton of attention here cuz I am white so that is funny. People yell GRingo everywhere I go. The taxis here are hilarious and we take one every night because we dont live in our area. so we walk to our area and then take a taxi back around 8. We pay people to do our laundry and to feed us all of our meals except breakfast. its nice. So there is an elder that got called to St George in 2 months. Look for Elder LArsen. He came with his family to get his brother, so my first day was his brothers last day on the mission. I told him you would have him over for dinner if you see him.. nice family. I hope you guys can come here when I am done. You will love it. Its so beautiful. I love it. it rains literally every single day here. I love the rain because its not so hot. haha. yes i have feet tan lines already from my shoes. it looks cool though. So our first day for cambios... which is changes in English we all got together and I saw Tyler Ewell hahaha We both looked at each other and were shocked it was fun to talk to him. He has like 4 months left. He is doing great and knows Spanish very well. I cannot wait to know this language. I want to talk to these people but it stops me from completely expressing myself. my journal is my best friend and i write every thig i feel in the journal. It helps a lot. Did I mention it is hot here? hahah yes its burning. people never have dry faces. just dripping sweat like its not big deal. I am still known as Spiderman here because Peter Parker its hilarious. you need to bring the family here though if you can. I want you to see it!!!! Today I saw my first monkey. I flipped out and everyone looked at me like I was crazy haahahaha. But who cares because it was cute and it was my miracle today. Made me so happy. So funny but at the Mtc everyone asked me if I was a Barbie and everyone called me Barbie I was famous for 2 months. So let me tell you a little story about this strange land called Nicaragua.... um no one here has floors. the rich people have tile and its way nice but its like a public bathroom tile. haha not like ours. and they just have chicken coop fencing to make rooms. they all have a set of plastic chairs so when they invite you in they go and get them because they are all stacked and lay them out for us. I have probably taught every lesson so far with my comp. we have an investigador getting baptized on this next saturday. Her name is Glenda. Anyways... Nicaragua... um my apartment on the first day had a full on lizard crawling on the wall... I guess its normal cuz last night there were 6 and now Im not scared of them. Showers are always cold. always... no exceptions. um a rat got into my cough drops and had a party in my suit case with them. haha it was actually quite funny my comp and i just laughed. i guess everything has to be in the fridge ha. yes I am a new missionary alright. Um I counted and I have 31 bug bites so far. and that is with my bug spray. Mostly around my ankles. Not bad just itch every now and then. I am a healthy soul. I am happy and in my patriarchal blessing it says one of my gifts is joy and I see that now more than ever. So women nurse their babies here with no privacy. it was so weird the first time but now I am used to it. They dont cover or anything just nurse and nurse and nurse. Its so funny. Anyways I will try to send a pic. I love you so much!!!!! thanks for everything hermana parker