Off to Gran Canaria!

August 31, 2015

My dearest family,

How is everybody this week? I thought I had already talked about Hna Turina, but I guess now? Sooo, Hna Turina is from Tahiti, but not actually Tahiti. Her island is called Moorea and its close to Tahiti, but it's a lot smaller than Tahiti. Her native language is Tahitian and French. She started her mission in Azuqueca my 3rd transfer in Alcalá. (Azuqueca is two or three trains stops above Alcalá, so we saw each other quite a bit.) She's got one older sister who served her mission in Florida and a younger sister. She's also got a half brother. She alwwwaays has a flower in her hair and I've learned a lot about the language of flowers from her. For example, if the flower's on the right ear it means your single, if its on the left, you're taken! She also loves Disney, almost as much as me so we've taken to singing Disney songs In a mix of English and French. She's the sweetest thing ever and a true island princess!

Ok so miracle this week. We've got a couple recent converts here, "D." and "R.", father and daughter, who are just great. "R." joined the church first and afterwords the sisters started teaching "D." and she got baptized too. Fairy tale right? ....yeah, no. Here's the catch Richard's wife hasn't been that happy with us coming over. For her Richard joining the church is something strange and unfamiliar and it's not something they share and she doesn't want to
share it. In my 2 transfers with Hna Sanitago I think we talked to her maybe twice and basically it was a "Hi, oh another rubia (blonde) ...you all look the same!" And this was not exactly said in the nicest way. Anywho, we got over there last week to introduce Hna Turina to them and "D.", the wife, actually stayed for a good little while we
chatted and Hna Turina told about how she lost her father. She left for the lesson, but she invited us to take us home the next time we came and drive us by some beaches. Yay! She's warming up! Honestly it really has been a miracle to see her progress. "R." also got his patriarchal blessing and he's quite sure she'll come around.

"M." is doing incredible. I love her. I love seeing the change the gospel makes in people. With her it's been an actual physical change. The first time she came to church in beach clothes. It looked like she was going to be bouncing right after church. Yesterday (and this has been a gradually change, she is coming in better clothes every time) she came in this beautiful navy and white outfit, her hair was straightened, her makeup was on and she was glowing. Annnnd she even said the prayer in our gospel principles class. Oh! She's so great! She really has climbed over mountains considering she thought praying was meditation. I love her!

In other news, we're on a boat to Gran Canaria for conference again. Wish I could say I was excited. I mean I am, but after the conference we've got intercambios so we won't be getting back to our area until Wednesday and we had to leave our area yesterday. I may have teared up a little when I realized how much time we'd be missing.  but it's good! The Lord is gonna take care of our area! And I've just got to learn how to be less of a control freak since I can't really control things when I'm an island away....Wooo! We can do this! Hahaha


Ps. I had a dream Thursday night that I was looking at my hair and I saw a black dot on one strand. It scared me so badly that it was lice that I woke right up got on my knees and said a prayer! Hahaha

Pps. The joke for this week. Richard comes up to me and says you grew up on a field. You know like chickens and horses and cows, well what's the laziest animal on a farm? The vaca (cow), why? Cause it's always on a "vaca"tion. Hehehe

Ppps. I still can't learn French. But my Italian's coming in handy. When we were waiting for the Guagua last night we started talking with the cutest Italian family who were super interested in what we do as missionaries! Io parlo italiano!

Pppps. We've got a German in our ward now. Ich spreche Deutsch.

Ppppps. We just watched meet the Mormons for part of zone p day and FRANK is in it! Hahah! I saw him and I said! THAT'S FRANK! Hahaha everybody was laughing:) tell Frank I love him when you see him next time!

 

My New Favorite Application.

August 24, 2015

My new favorite application. This equals comp study!

"Chaste" isement

August 24, 2015

Mi familia!

I hope you all have a fantastic week! Island life is beautiful and I'm so glad I have the chance to share it with a real islander too! This week I started to learn French for my compie. It. Is. Hard. Ugh. Ha, we've been reading the Book of Mormon on the Guagua (bus) when there's nobody to talk to and I feel like who ever made up the spelling in French was completely whacked out. My companion taught me "Just don't pronounce half the word." I started doing that. It actually worked! Boy you really know mission calls are inspired when you learn Spanish instead of French! 

The other day my comp was explaining some boats they have on her island and I was like "Oo! Oo! Are they like the kind of boats on Johnny Lingo?!" She was confused so I started explaining Johnny Lingo to her and she's like " Ohhhh! Kolipoki!" Bahahahahaha!!! Yep Kolipoki :) You know you're an from the Pacific Islands when....

Onto spiritual matters: I can't remember if I've talked about this before, but I have gained such a testimony of visiting teaching on my mission and on Tuesday I had the opportunity to see visiting teaching done right. We were invited to the birthday party of one of our less actives and her nonmember mother. Annnd the visiting teachers we there. Not only were they there to share a message with this family for her birthday, but the love they held for this dear sister was palatable. This sister knew that her visiting teachers loved her and they loved and cared for her nonmember mother as well. What a great example those two woman are for me!

We ate lunch with "M." (our wonderful investigator), "C." (a recent convert), and "M." (a member) at the house of Hno "C." yesterday and later we visited "M." in her home and we asked her "M.", do you want to be baptized?" I was generally wondering. We've been teaching her forever now and she's one of those people who just looove learning and I just wanted to know how she was feeling about it, heaven know we talk about it often enough, and she's shot us down often enough, and with the lunch yesterday a lot of the conversation had been focused on earnest seekers of truth. And she shot back "Well, I'm the process of that aren't I?" Haha! I love Spaniards! Then she asked us "When do you have those baptismal services anyways?" "Well actually we're having one on the 12th....;)" "Oh! that's way too early! I've only been learning with you guys 7 weeks!" Ha. I love her. She is so meticulous about her life and she truly wants to know exactly what she's getting into. I wish she would see what we see. She is honestly the most prepared person I have ever met. She is striving constantly to better her life. When we walked into her house last night. She had a huge book case filled with self improvement and learning books. She is so earnest and I love her for that. She'll be baptized I know she will, even if she's too meticulous to set a date right now.

Our other wonderful friend, "E.", accepted a date to be baptized this week! I'm so excited for him. He is the epitome of childlike faith. He has pure good desires to follow Christ and when we taught him the gospel of Jesus Christ this week he responded without hesitation to our invitation to be baptized. "Lo haré." (I will do it!) Ah! Chills!

We also had a pretty powerful lesson with "P.", our Cuban friend. Law of Chastity time. :) You see "P." learned his English from songs. And they weren't church hymns either. It's actually kinda frustrating to hear the things he says sometimes. So when teaching we put a pretty powerful emphasis on keeping our words chaste. And he tried to make a joke out of it. It. wasn't. funny. In fact the lyrics he responded with to a statement we had him read in the pamphlet may have been the most disgusting things I've heard my whole mission. Maybe it's cause they were in English so I actually understood. But he looked at me with a kind of ¨Ooo what's the teacher gonna do now look´ that you would see of the face of 13 year old pubescent boy instead of a 65-ish year old man. I was.....righteously indignant? The room was silent as I proceeded to chastise/testify. "P.". You are a son of God. We are here to teach you that. It doesn't matter that you are just repeating songs. They are vulgar and you know it. So it's time for you to act like the person your Heavenly Father knows you are." I can testify that we truly are set apart to call people to repentance. If those had been any other circumstances and I had not been saying the things I said with the Spirit it could have been some very hard things to hear. But something in that (the Spirit) touched "P.". It was after that that he apologized and committed to live the Law of Chastity, all the Law of Chastity, thoughts, words, and actions.

Whew! Ok! If you made through all of that congrats! Haha! I love you all! I hope you have a wonderful week and go about doing much good! Remember who you are and live up to your divine destiny! 

Besitos, Hna Finch

Ps. Be like Luis a drunk guy we met on the street this week! While trying to hit on us we asked "Are you a person of belief?" No answer, just coming dangerously close to our faces. "Soooo...are you?" Luis: "Siempre siento Dios en mi corazón." "I always feel God in my heart." Ha! Loves!

I don´t think I mentioned it, but president changed our schedule, now it looks like this. 

7:30 arise,  exercise

8:00 get ready

8:30 breakfast

9:00 personal study

10:00 study language 30 min

10:30, proselytize

2:00  lunch

2:30 study language 30 min

3:00 companion study

4:00 proselyte

10-10:30 return home, 30 planning session and prepare for next day

11:30 sleep

My comp's flower skills. Yellow with yellow.

Couscous with Fatima and her daughter! So cute and so yummy!

Soooo Tahiti

August 17, 2015:

Guessss what?! Transfers! Yep it's already that time. I can't believe this transfer is already gone. It seems like just yesterday that they were calling to tell us that the elders were being taken out of the area! So our companionship got hit with changes this transfer. Hna Santiago is going to the north of Spain to Gijón! Can you say dreamland?! I'm going to miss her so much. I really have learned so much from her. I'm going miss how well we feed off each other, whether it's jokes or teaching we were a great pair. Love you Hna Santiago! Good luck in the North!

As for me, I'll be with Hna Turina from Tahiti. She is the sweetest little island princess ever! She doesn't speak English, since Tahiti is part of French Polynesia so hopefully I'm gonna be learning some French this transfer! And some Tahitian as well! I'm really excited for the opportunity I get to be so immersed in Spanish once again, I haven't had that since Hna Chavarría left me. I was really praying to have another all Spanish experience with a comp so this is definitely an answer to a prayer. It'll be interesting though, since neither of us are native speakers to see how we communicate. Haha. I love Hna Turina. I was in Alcalá (my first area) when she entered the field and remember going Christmas shopping with her for our companions. Btw she loves one direction, so we'll get along just fine;) I'll send a pic with her as soon as I can!

Onto this week. We had a great week. Saturday we had the BEST activity ever! The three wards in Tenerife went up above "El Mar de Nubes" (The sea of clouds) to a picnic area on the mountain. We had the best view of Teide (the highest mountain in Spain and the volcano that made this island) and the food was great. A couple of members made some paella (traditional yellow rice with seafood dish). Enough for everyone! And everybody brought food to share. Then we played games and visited. It honestly felt like a family reunion. Our ward was all the cousins you do know and the other two wards had the occasional cousin you actually do know (aka the other missionaries serving in the other wards). I figure it's makeup for missing the giant Heaton reunion a few weeks  ago. "M." and "E." came to the activity. "M." drove us there in her car so we were able to take some great pictures and stop at some lookout points. We even stopped at a fish hatchery and took some pictures!

Also in "M." news. She's planning her conversion story. Yeah. In every lesson she asks the members their conversion stories. In our last lesson with her this week she said, "What am I gonna say for my conversion story? I saw a sign for classes of English?" Hahaha she's the best. She still doesn't want to set a baptismal date....ugh! Cause she is like the most prepared person ever, but we're gonna hit her hard this transfer and see what happens.

Hmmm what else happened this week...we set up some members yesterday at church. "F."'s (our ward) been back from his mission a few weeks and "J." (different island, Lanzarote) is a recent convert of Elder Davis (served with him in Alcalá). She comes to visit and we're great friends and yesterday we got "F." to ask her out! Cutest little Spanish couple ever serán! I shook "F."'s hand and said "you owe me. You owe me big. You owe me a wedding announcement." Just helping the work move along here. Future little missionary kids of "J." and "F."....you're welcome.

One of our recent converts had a friend come with her ("D.", age 15) to church last week so this week we went to her house to teach him ("I.", age 16). We had the lesson and presented him with a Book of Mormon and he said "oh I can have that? I was actually looking at them at church, but I was too timid to ask for one!" Also get this our ward pianist is leaving to go to college in the peninsula in September so the ward has been playing for a new pianist. Annnnd guess who plays the piano? Yup! "I."! Literally answering the member's prayers. Love it.

Joke of the week. At the activity we were with one of the cooks, another recent convert and father of "D.", named "i." and while he's cooking the paella he tells us this: "Sabe que cuando se casan en la iglesia católica, cuando la pareja salga, todos tiran arroz. Y después, cuando hay el divorcio  todo es "paella". La casa "paella". El coche "paella". Los niños "paella". ¡¡¡Jajajajajaja!!!
Translation (warning not nearly as funny, I'm still gonna try to get it across!): you know in the Catholic Church when they get married, when the couple leaves and everybody throws rice? Well after the marriage, when the divorce happens, everything is "paella". (Cause paella sounds like para ella, which means "for her". So he goes through saying everything is "for her". And it makes it double funny cause before the wedding it's just rice and then it's cooked rice. Wow...that's a lot funnier in Spanish. Haha

Anywho, love you all! Love the gospel! And I love the Book of Mormon! Read it! Muah! Besitos! 
Hna Finch

PS! Thanks everybody for the nice I mean lice comments. They were gone when I wrote the email last week. Hahaha I guess I forgot to include that!

El Mar De Nubes:

Me, "M." (our investigator) and Hna Santiago 

Paella! La casa paella. Los niños paella. El coche paella (translated thanks to google: The paella house.  The paella children, the car paella. Must go along with her joke!)

She's Coming Home December 8th!

4 August 2015

Dear Sister Finch,

We realize that your mission will not be ending for several months, but we need some important information from you as soon as possible so that your travel arrangements can be made well in advance of your release.

First, whether your information has changed or not, please send the name of your current home ward and stake, as well as your parents’ current home address and email address to the office at 2019159@ldschurch.org.

Second, please let us know the city and state and the name of the closest major airport where you would like to arrive, as many cities have more than one airport.

Third, if you wish to be picked up by your parents, we have been asked to have your parents call Church Travel at 801-240-5111 or the Mission Office (34) 91-623-7030. They will share some important information about your travel with your parents.

Fourth, you are scheduled for release on 08 Dec 2015.

The above information is very important. Please send it to us as soon as possible and we will coordinate with Church  Travel. They need to schedule flights at least three months in advance in order to have all arrangements ready when your release date comes. If you do not know this information, please email home this week and ask for it.

Remember that you are entering what can be the most productive time of your mission. You have acquired language and proselyting skills. Do all you can to emulate D&C 4 and serve the Lord with all your heart, might, mind, and strength to the very last day of your mission. May the Lord bless you in this mighty work.

Thank you for your dedicated service,

President Kevin B. PackSpain Madrid Mission

4 August 2015

Dear Parents of Sister Finch,

On 08 Dec 2015, Sister Finch will conclude her missionary service in the Spain Madrid Mission. It is with mixed emotions that we anticipate the release of another of our missionaries, yet we know that the experiences in the mission have prepared her for even greater service when she returns home.

In regard to your daughter's release, the following information will be helpful to you. The Church pays for the return fare of all honorably released missionaries directly from the mission field to their homes. However, when parents travel home with the missionary, the parents are asked to make travel arrangements, pay for them, and will then be reimbursed for the missionary's return trip, up to the amount the Church would have paid had the missionary returned directly home.

About one month before the release date, you will receive the itinerary for the travel arrangements indicating times and flight numbers.

The following information from the Church Handbook of Instructions, “Missionary Service, Release of Full Time Missionaries” page 35, will help to clarify some common questions: “Missionaries should travel directly home from their missions. Any other travel is permitted only when the missionary is accompanied by at least one parent or guardian. If parents request the privilege (of picking up their missionary) they should understand that: Their plans must be based on the release date. They should inform the Mission Secretary or the Church Travel Office at least 3 months in advance, if they plan to travel with their missionary. Missionaries must dress and conduct themselves according to missionary standards during travel from their missions because they are not released until they report to their stake presidents.”

Sister Pack and I would like to express our appreciation for the opportunity of serving with Sister Finch. Our choicest and most memorable experiences have been those shared while working with our missionaries. We have seen the blessings that result from their dedication and service. May the Lord bless you, and may you continue to find joy and satisfaction in your daughter's missionary service.

Warmest regards,
President Kevin B. PackSpain Madrid Mission 

Well This Week Was .... Lice....

August 10, 2015
Yep, you read that right. But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Monday was great. We went to the best place for shakes on the island with some recent converts and when we were running to the mall to look for a new watch for Hna Santiago we even ran into a less active that we didn't know existed. He was baptized in the north of the island. I love little miracles:)

Then Tuesday came... I don't know what it is, but for some reason every blood sucking creature on this island finds its way to me. I don't think I have ever had so many bug bites in my life. But I've gotten used to it, but Sunday/Mondayish I had a really painful head. Like my head had a rash...or bites... But we put off calling Hna Pack (Mission Presidents's wife) cause we wanted to enjoy our PDay without having to go to the doctor or something. So Monday passes and Tuesday we had
just came out of a lesson and Hna Pack calls me back.

(Quick aside) THE SECRET'S OUT! I connected to our investigator's wifi (Tuesday, right before Hna Pack called back) to show a video when we were at her house and got an email. Opened it up later to read my 5 month email. Nothing too crazy right? Just the typical "Hey this is your release date, let's figure out your flight plans" email, right? NO! Apparently the church has a black out period for a certain part of December on flights. So what should be MY release date, December 21, the end of the 6 week transfer period, is changed. My new release date is December 8. They're cutting my last transfer short 2 weeks and tacking on the two last weeks of what would be my last transfer on the
next transfer. So they'll be having an 8 week transfer. It's real. I called the office and everything, thinking they got something wrong. It's a little raw that my 5 month email really became my 4 month
email, but I'm excited to work to death these next months. Viva España. Viva la misión.

Anyways we pick up. I describe my symptoms to Hna Pack and then "You have lice." My companion starts itching her head. "Oh my gosh, my head itches! I think I have lice too!" Hahaha (she didn't). We were commanded to go to the store, start lice treatments immediately and deep clean our piso.

Sooo our week basically consisted of us picking through each other's hair, cleaning our piso, and LIVING in the shower, I'm not even kidding. My hair is shot. We had to leave the lice shampoo in our hair for 15 minutes, the lice conditioner in our hair for 15 minutes, and sleep in Listerine with a shower cap on our head. Thank goodness for piso finds because we're not allowed to use our clothes for two weeks. Also thank heavens that our piso had a ridiculous amount of extra sheets cause we've been changing those about nightly as well. We've now learned a few very important things:
-DON'T let your hair touch anybody's hair in the islands! (Apparently lice is going around out here. Hna Marsh (my old companion) and her companion are on a different island, but they got lice as well this
week!)
-Choose your poison. Keep your nasty lice hair in the shower drain or clean it and let the cockroaches in. (Cause every time we do clean out the drain, cockroaches come up from the drain! Our nasty hair is the only thing keeping that drain clogged and those nasty suckers down there.
-Lice like clean heads! At least that's what Hna Pack told me. She may have just been trying to make the blow easier.
-Remember when you were little and your mom would yank out your hair to do it? Yeah, that's what lice picking is like...except with more hair.
-Nit picky. I know we're that word come from now. So glad my comp is so nit picky!
-No matter how many times I watch the district movies I still love them. Not my fault they always make me cry. That's right Jynx! That's why you gotta read the Book of Mormon!!!
-Nothing strengthens companionships like 4 hours with one comp's head between the other's knees. Every day.
-Oh! Oh! I'm learning Italian! There's so many Italians in this area, I figured if some people can learn dialects plus a language on their mission I can learn Italian! This one's for you Dad! Sono una ragazza. Una mela.

Despite everything, this week was actually really great! We were still able to get work done and since it did effect the time we were able to leave the piso we ensured that every lesson we did go out for we had a member and it was the bombest lesson. We had the highest number of member lessons this week than I've ever had in this area and we also had the most people to church this week than I've ever had in this area before! FIVE! Haha maybe it's silly, but we were so excited to so many of the people we've been working so hard to get to church come! And so many come for all three hours of church! I never realized how important it is to stay for all three hours, until my mission. I mean
yeah we can all agree that it's probably important, but I've seen the difference of the progression of the testimony of those who attend all 3 hours versus those that just come for 1 or 2. The investigators that come for all 3 hours grow and progress so much more! And if that's true for investigators, who haven't even made the same covenants that we've made, how much more of a need is it for us to go to all three hours of church. No skipping. No coming late or leaving early.

"M." (our English class lady) is doing great. She loooves church so much and loves learning about the gospel. Please keep her in your prayers that she'll be able to pick a baptismal date and feel prepared for it!
"P." finally came to church! With his brother in law, "V." (The Cubans) we were so happy to finally have them to church for the first time!
One of our recent converts "D." (age 15) brought her friend to church. He seemed to really enjoy and the ward did great at making him feel at home.
We've had some troubles with a few of our recent converts coming to church, but yesterday everyone was there! "C.", "C." and "C.", and "M."! So good to see how loving the ward is to them!

Next up, our ward is incredible. I can't even begin to describe the changes I have seen take place here. They have such a desire to do missionary work. Last week, I was sitting by an investigator and a
member made me move so she could sit by him instead of sitting with her family. The members of the bishopric are so willing and eager to help with lessons. And last night we even got a text from the bishop thanking us for our work and inviting us to go with him to visit a less active and her non member husband this week. Member reference from the bishop! There's a ton of reasons the ward is changing, the stake presidency, seeing us bring investigators to church, trusting us, but I honestly
feel like one of the biggest is "M.". We've had the strongest members of the ward accompanying us in her visits and since she is so golden and earnest in her desires to learn I think that the leaders are
reminded of when they were learning the gospel and the feelings they felt. Then they want to share those feelings. I'm so grateful for them. I love my ward.

I love all of you back at supporting me. I know I really don't say it often enough, but thank you so much for all of you who keep reading my emails ;) (even though I know this one's really long) and for the work you are all doing in your own lives to be disciples of Christ. I love you all so much. I love my Savior and am so grateful to be about doing His work.

Con cariño,
Hna Finch

Miracle Stories

August 3, 2015

Missionary payday week:) This week was great. We definitely had the sweetest spiritual experiences that I have had in this area this week. 

The first came from one of our progressing investigators, "M.".  "M." is Canarian and your typical non practicing catholic. We had our lesson with her this week with a couple of my favorite members ("C." and "T.") and "M." testified that when she read the BoM she felt something, she went off about just how much she loves church, and the best part: when she took out 3 pages of notes that she had taken on 2 Nefí 31 and (even though we had been planning to teach her about The gospel of Jesus Christ) she began teaching us! The Spirit was so strong. We invited her to be baptized and she accepted. She doesn't want to rush into anything so she then fasted with us Sunday to help her recognize her answer and know the date she should be baptized. 

We also had a couple great experiences with "P.", Hna Santiago is a literary genius so I´m just gonna steal her words for the first story: 

"Remember "P."? the Cuban!?  We had brought a member with us that, in this one lesson, basically taught all five lessons for us! His name is Hermano "C.", he is from Uruguay, and was the former president of this ward when it was just a branch. (I also would love for y'all to just picture the type of spanish conversation we had going on here.  Picture: a couple of Cubans, a man with a thick accent from Uru-J-uay, and a couple gringo hermanas with a Madrileño accent. It was great.) Anyways, we got to this part in the lesson, where "P." starts expressing his doubts about whether or not miracles still occur in our days. We shared a few scriptures from Moroni 10. Then, I have this thought pop into my head ¨share an experience from when I had a blessing when I was sick or had a surgery or something, wait NO my companion totally had brain surgery, and that tops it all! Have her share something¨ So she shares her experience, (it was perfect, (she also has a great scar she promises them they can see later) WELL, next pipes up Hermano "C.", who had to have a surgery to remove some super rare something that he had in his stomach area. Something that almost no one survives from. He tells a story about how the doctors told his wife and daughter he would probably not live past the surgery, and how he received a priesthood blessing, and then ....he POPS UP, lifts his white buttoned-up-tucked-in-to-his-dress-pants-dress-shirt and shows us all this wicked cool scar. Then talks about how he survived, and how that was a miracle due to the blessing he had received and the faith he had. Well this started "P." off. (He was a surgeon back in Cuba) He then jumps up and says I know what you mean man! Look at my scar, and then he proceeds to lift up his shirt! I'm not going to lie, the scars were impressive, though I just feel like maybe next time we could arrive at the same conclusion and testimony that miracles do exist, just maybe with less nudity! Anyways, "P." continues reading in the Book of Mormon DAY and NIGHT, and we can't wait to see him enter into the covenant of baptism."

Hahaha! It was pretty funny! But now "P." understands: Miracles do exist. We ended up meeting with him again on Sunday and he accepted a baptismal date after hearing the lesson of the Restoration again. Such a powerful lesson. I think what really hit him was the reality of the Apostasy. Really did happen. The literally power of God to cleanse us completely from sin was taken off the earth. No man could be saved. (Another great reason to do family history! Our ancestors need us!) Then that power was restored. It really is incredible. I´m so happy for "P.".

CPdE:  Happy thought of the week. We were sitting on a bench in a park teaching our recent convert. In the middle of teaching him about priesthood blessings an African father hollers out to his son who is climbing a fence: "Daniel, I will cut off your ear! Get down from there!" But with a super think African accent! Hahahaha! I was laughing so hard! Especially cause the African man and his wife had been visiting with a Spanish lady in Spanish. The earlier warnings had all been in Spanish and then I think he changed to English so nobody would understand when he said "Daniel, I will cut off your ear!" Bahahahaha!!!! But I did. ^-^

Sorry this letter is so all over the place! My head is in a million places today! I love you all and I love emails! ;) 

Have a great week!

Love, Hna Finch

Our favorite recent convert that's not ours! Hipstering it in the guagua (bus)!

And then that happened! :)

The day of dirt roads and ditches:

From Hna Santiago:  "They changed the bus schedule on us. We pull into the pueblo we needed to be at for a lunch appointment. The bus normally pulls in, passes by about 5 or 6 stops. We normally (when I say normally, I mean to say EVERY TUESDAY) get off at the last stop. Well, the bus pulls in, stops at the first stop, then swings around the round about and goes out of the town. . . . I start slapping my companions leg. . . ¨Hermana! hermana! hermana! The bus is leaving! ITS LEAVING! as in leaving. Adeje.!¨ So we casually get off at the next stop, and what walk a mile to the stop that will take us back into the pueblo, then wait a half hour or more for the bus to even come? NO. we just hike right back up this mountain that separated us. Yeah that's right! We even sang that cute primary hymn.. ¨something something something and walked and walked and walked and walked¨ Then we get to the top and realize... Oh there´s a fence. That´s nice! But hey look at that view though! Right? Okay long story short. It was actually the fastest way! Hermana Finch tried to jump the fence (turned out to be the wrong one.. that actually led into a different fenced in area of the local catholic church. A lady came out, we quickly ran along and TA DAAA I found that the fence had an end, and it landed us just exactly where the bus would've let us in the first place! Well, that happened just two more times I think, but hey! those views though!"

Master the tempest is raging, but only in Guía de Isora