Aug 22nd 2013

What a crazy week...

Starters, please please dont freak out at this, but, Im really sick. I woke up on Wednesday Morning at 2am and had the worst stomach issues that Ive ever had in my life. I wasnt throwing up, but the other stuff was happening. I didnt sleep at all that night so the next morning I slept till 8:30 and then went to the Clinic and saw the American doctor this time and he said that I either have a parasite or a bowel tract infection, so I had to give them a sample and their taking to a lab to be tested. He gave me so anti-parsite pills which are supposed to kill anything in me. I find out tomrrow what it was and then I may be making a trip to the hopitial depending on what it is... No need to worry! I never thought Id say this but Im hoping its a parasite because then Ive already got the pills working in me! I guess a lot of other Elders have the same issue and a bunch are getting whatever this is. They suspect its the food which has been pretty good lately, no need to worry Ill be okay!

We still have the house to ourselves :) Its a miracle... but we told our housekeeper guy to tell them that there was no more room in our house.. so that may be why as well. We are up to almost 1000 missionaries here and its completely madness! The comedor, the cafeteria is overwhelmed and a lot of the times there isnt any food left! Oh well, Ive began to gain a true appreiation of how good we have it in America. They have almost nothing out side those walls. Rent for a house is 250 pesos a month. I dont know how people live like that. We are going to pay on of the workers to bring us stuff in.. were not supposed to but we can smell the taco stands cooking all day long and it smells so good, also we want some coke! It turns out that we werent supposed to go to the temple last week, it was supposed to be this week and so the rest of the dictrict went and me and Elder Thompson stayed because we both are having the stomach issues and to be getting up every 20 minutes and have them pause it woudl not be good! So we stayed on a split here and the rest of them went! I wanted to go but I was in desperate need of a relaxing p day.

Remeber how I told you I was assitant to the district leader? Yeah, well Im not. For a lax of my spanish and a lax of the branch presidents english I thought I was. Last week we found out otherwise. Turns out Im assitant to the President, so Ive got to be a good role model for everyone around me and continually be a good example. This week was hard for me. We have a teacher Hermano Ralphs, Hermano is brother. But, he just pushs my buttons and he is real strict on the rules, not a bad thing but within myself I hadnt accppted everything quite yet.. Not an easy thing to go from a normal teenage boy to a representative of the Lord and drop everything that you loved and had. I had a tough day one day and didnt feel the spirit much that day or the next. About 3:00 pm that next day we taught a lesson. You need to know that we have been teaching proxy investigators, and they are our teachers. They act like investigators that they taught on their missions. So that day we had to teach Hermano Ralphs, and I just was not feeling it and not wanting to do it, but I said a prayer that I could have my heart softened and have true love and pateince for those around me and that if I had the spirit with me than I would love and accpet everyone. Hermano Ralphs investigator name is Timeteo. No one can get through to this guy, he is real tough, but, I went into that lesson with an impression that I was going to be harder than he was. Knocked the lesson out of the park and the spirit was so strong! I finally broke through to him and after the lesson Hermano Ralphs could only say "wow". We are learning how to teach by the spirit.

One thing that Ive learned whyll here is that this work is so much bigger than you or I, and we are only mouth pieces for the Spirit of The Lord. His work is hastening in these latter days and its not a matter of whether you want it too or not its a matter of if you want to be apart in this amazing church. I feel so many changes in myself already. I know that this church is true and that God and his Son live. I know that he died for us because he has true love for us and wants nothing more than than the best for us, and I have a strong testimony that through him anything is possible. You cant just belive in Christ, that he died for us, Joesph Smith was a prophet, but you have to believe Christ. Believe that he died for us and that through him and Only Him can we return to live with our loving heavenly parents again. Believe that through him you can ALWAYS go back and that you are never too far gone. Never give stop trying. I know all this to be true because without the Mercy and Love of our savior, I could not do this work. Its too hard. But with Him, Its a bearable load.

I love you so much and cant wait to hear from you!

Love Kolby

Visit to the Mexico City Temple!

First visit to the Mexico City Temple. Place was awesome!

Holy Cow a McDonalds in Mexico City!

I went to McDonalds in Mexico City and everyone there were White and spoke English, Ha Ha!

I made it!

Where to begin.. what a week! its been so fun so crazy! Remember how they said i should get a flu shot?? yeahhhh... i got the flu not a cold. i went to the doctor and they dont speak any english so he gave me some meds but thats super sketch cause i dont even know what he gave me and the meds are all in spanish! mexico is nuts. theres no other way to say it. every two weeks they get paid so the we here "fireworks". but being around guns i can tell what some of them are. the city is a dump and the traffic is soooo loud and it goes all night long so sleeping isnt the greatest. we have a casa which is a house, we are soo lucky, no one moved in after the first week so we took the empty rooms for now and each companionship has there own room, bathrrom, and two closets. the flip side would be 4 too a room sharing a tiny bathroom and one closet which is imposible to do. so we are literally praying that no one moves in. my district is amazing. there me my companion which is elder rallison which you already met in the airport. elder mangum this elder is the byu up and coming quater back and is in the elite 11 which is the top 11 quater backs in the west so hes way good and me an him have become so close and we both are already saying were going to be life long friends hes from idaho. his compaion is elder gold who is a farm boy from idaho and he is such a nice kid. theres elder dudley who is from nevada he honestly could be codys twin i love him he is so funny. he played golf at byu hawaii and is giving me tons of tips so when i get back i can play way good, he is like a south cali kid cause he lived in hawaii so he talks with a lot of shredds bros an gnarlys. his companion is elder herring. smartest kid ive ever met. hes a published molecular biologist from michigan. then theres elder thopmson hes from seatle and is a major music guy his companion is elder munson from idaho and he plays football for snow. all of my district is in my casa so we are all really close. theres two others that live in our house but arent in our district. their a little different but we love them. its elder soloano and elder parker. we call them elder cilantro and elder parsley hahahha.. theyre super nice and funny though. i feel so blessed to have the district that i have. the food. oh the food. it blows. they seriously dont know what they are doing. they served us hot dogs with onions and cheese for breakfast one morning! who does that!? its been CARB OVERLOAD every meal has bread and juice and friut and its just not good. it really sucks but they have cereal so ive been living on that and salad. this first week was incredibly hard by the way sorry for the misspellings im trying to type fast and frankly i dont care. but its been a really spirital week. we taught a proxy investigator which was all in spanish. words cannot expain how hard it was, but by the last lesson i was understanding and speaking spanish back. i can truly testify that the gift of toungues is real and the spirit does the teaching not us were just there to say what it wants to say. we were succesful and got him to commit to baptism on sep 3rd. it wasnt a real lesson but we felt so good that we could do that and it made us so excited to get into the field and change peoples lives with the gospel of christ. its an amzing work and its so much bigger than you or i. 18 hours of classes are rough but its a important part of learning everything. i am the 1st counsleor to the district leader in our district! leadership is a great oppurtunity to learn and be a role model to everyone around you. the CCM (MTC)  is reallly lax and its on 90 acres so we have tons of space and we get an hour everyday to go play sports. the water is "theoretically" drinkable according to the mish president but they say not too and gave us filter bottles to use. i havent been using is cause i just i go an buy bottled watered at the store :) they give us 100 pesos a week which is 7$ haha so we get nothing but everything in the store is super cheap. a liltre of water is 5 pesos or 40 cents so i get a bottle a day! ive been the food runner cause i have so much ha itll be nice to not have all that weight with me when i leave! i really want to get into the field and get outta here! theyve bitten off way more than they can chew... were supposed to be up too 800 missionaries next week because peru aregentina and provo are at their max.. the work is hastening in these latter days. send me some back today ill be able to check the computer till 6pm our time so 5pm yours! love you so much send some emails with questions and ill respond with answers!

love you!

elder strang