okay. enough of this nonsense.

 Wed, Feb 23, 2011

this is getting serious now. xD

same descriptions/order of last week
1) Elder Black and I our second day together! :D
2)my name in the sand at La Guancha, Ponce


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Brandon Bryan
Date: Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 10:53 AM
Subject: Fwd: What's the dealio?

Re: Snow is falling all around...

Wed, Feb 23, 2011

Man! Are you serious?! You guys got more snow?! That’s so crazy! Í keep hearing that it's been really cold all over the world this past year... gosh, and it's already into the end of February and we're still getting snow. Goodness. Well, I hope you're enjoying it. Here I am, stuck in this horrible hot 90 degree weather. :-(

Ok. I'm sending those fotos. This time it better work, or I'm gonna be GRR! ANGRY!

Darn... no more large transporting large amounts of people to random places... *sigh* well, maybe I can just load them up in to the back of the truck, eh? :3 but hopefully the part will get here for the trailblazer on Thursday. That would be a nice bonus not having to drive dad all the way to the train everyday at o dark thirty... that sounds kinda early.

So, at least you're happy about who was picked to be the leader and Leo's pretty excited about me coming back! :D I can't wait to get back and show off my Spanish. :3

So, update on la familia Ruiz-Rivera. We weren't able to have an appointment with them last week... which was my fault... I didn't call to verify, but it turns out that our new ward mission leader actually works with him! :D they both are in the postal industry, and Nestor Ruiz has a private mail contracting business thingy thing, which is pretty cool. He’s pretty self sufficient, I would say, cause he also has a Fotografy company on the side that he does part time. Quite spiffy. But we have an appointment with them this coming Friday, so hopefully we'll get some good news. I'm really, really hoping... really bad. The blitz idea is pretty good, except for the whole getting up at five thing...:-/ but, I guess that’s a sacrifice that we have to make to get things going here. We've been able to find lots of full families recently, so we're goon see how those go in the next week. :)

Yeah, when Elder Hargadon first told me about, I thought it was amazing. I believe he's from north Cali though... and I dunno, so far everyone that I've met from Cali on the mission is pretty well off. ;) Ha, ha, ha, but really. and of COURSE I'm going to keep my mind focused on the task at hand, I'm just trying to be prepared and ready with a  plan, cause "it's the end, my only friend, the end" (who’s that by? :D ) and so I've just gotta get things in order or at least have a skeleton in my mind. Some structure, you know? Or even a foundation, if you will. And everyone knows that you need to build a foundation before you can build anything else. I just wanna build my foundation or have the plans for it. That’s all.

Ok! Donny has been emailed! *DING* so I'm afraid, my email, due to his, is going to be kinda short this week. :-/

So Ehren was a trainer? And he had a bummer experience then? That’s kind of a downer... I suppose I got really lucky with Elder Black, then... but what do you mean that it doesn't really surprise you that Ehren didn't really like being a trainer? And unfortunately, I'm sad to say it, but I do believe that I might have suffered from a little bit of greenie-prideitis... but not as bad as some others have had it, which at the very least I can be grateful for.

Wow, so Grandma and Grandpa are putting in a LOT of wood floors then! All the way to the wood stove... what color wood are they going with? And what type? Is it real, or the laminate stuff? Also... which dining area? The place that we always eat at? AH! And are they going to keep the pool table?! They aren't getting rid of that are they?! :-O

Ha, ha, ha! I love those tic tacs!!! :D those things are amazing! Did someone print those on there, or did they paint them?

Oh poop... ok, it's not time to go! :-/

But, I love you more than I love salt and Vinegar chips! (I just got a package from Grandma... :3 )

~Brandon (Elder Bryan)

what IS the dealio here?

Wed, Feb 23, 2011

same descriptions/order of last week
3 )overlooking La Guancha from this super cool tower thingie
4) sunset over La Guancha
5) alternate sunset foto

Re: What's the dealio

Wed, Feb 16, 2011

just in case. :P

---------- Forwarded message ----------

*ahem* ... erm... anyways... eh... moving on? (1 Nephi 16:2)

Anyways, that’s really weird that my pictures didn't send... I'm gonna try and get that all fixed up first before I continue typing so that I can get those off. :)

So. Same descriptions/order of last week
1) Elder Black and I our second day together! :D
2) my name in the sand at La Guancha, Ponce
3) overlooking La Guancha from this super cool tower thingie
4) sunset over La Guancha
5) alternate sunset foto

so anyways... some cool thingies for this week.

this morning I had been talking with Elder Hargadon (Elder Radmalls companion/one of the four Elders in our apartment) about some of the places that he's been to (he's been all OVER EVERYWHERE. he's a very lucky man. most all the countries in Europe... Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico, Canada... and more. Lucky, lucky, man.) and when he brought up Ecuador, he mentioned that after he had graduated from High School he had been talking with a friend, and she had mentioned this program that you can sign up for and volunteer at an orphanage. in Ecuador.  and since he hadn't been doing anything after he graduated he went. Here’s the linkie-link: http://www.orphanagesupport.org/ he went and did it for four months after he graduated. he was telling me about his experience with the program (and in his free time there) and said that it was absolutely amazing. Quite honestly, it was kinda inspiring. He also mentioned that there was a pretty big need for volunteers as there weren't many people applying. but I had been thinking... I mean, that would be a fantastic way to keep up my Spanish. You know? plus, it's helping others. Can’t lose with that. Elder Hargadon said after explaining it to some of the people in his ward they donated money (now... he DID live in California... and he DID know lots of Rich people... but still.) he ended up not having to pay anything. but how amazing would that be?! :D I think it would be the coolest thing eva! and I can imagine I could get some kinda of college credit for doing it as well... so... yeah. it would be amazing. What do you think?

and in other news... WE FOUND A FAMILY!!!! :D and they are totally the coolest family ever! :D let me start from the beginning. So, was had a trade off with Elder Oviatt (our great zone leader guy person) back on the 25th and he contacted a grandma and her three grand kids. we got the info from him and since then we have been trying to contact the family, but every time that we stopped by the house, they weren't there! They just were not there. Granted, the grandma was taking care of the kids until 5 and then the parents would get home from work around 5 to 6... but after stopping by at least 3 times a week trying to contact anyone for two weeks, we finally got a hold of them last Thursday. And then had an AMAZING appointment with them on Friday. :D wow. First off. Nestor, the father, plays the guitar. *ding* His favorite band? Van Halen. *ding* his favorite guitarist? Eddie Van Halen *ding* the oldest son, also named Nestor (14) plays the guitar *ding* the next oldest, Gabriel (12) has the favorite colors of black red and white. *ding* and the youngest son, Ian (10) plays the trumpet. *ding* is there a more perfect family?! I think not. ;)  we started the restoration lesson by referring to the family: a proclamation to the world pamphlet and Eternal families. Then throughout the entire lesson we connected all the points to Eternal families as well. :) The only reason we couldn't share anything with them the Thursday that we talked to them is because they were working on homework as a family. :-O otherwise they would have let us in. the mother, Marlin, was a little bit apprehensive about the whole thing (both she and Nestor studied in a catholic university right here in Ponce) so we'll have to see how everything plays out. (I'm pretty sure it's going to play out for the better though. :) ) But at the end of the lesson, Nestor was willing to kneel down and pray to find out if Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. And he committed to read the Book of Mormon, and said that he was going to finish it within two weeks. Wow. He is amazing. :D but look at that. a whole family, and they are almost ALL priesthood holders. We have been blessed. Very much so. So if you could be so kind so as to include La Familia Ruiz-Rivera in your prayers that would be absolutely fantastic.


Plus, president has given us a new schedule for working. :) I think I might have already mentioned it... but we weren't able to implement until this last Monday due to schedule conflicts. And wow. We were highly blessed. We were able to find a WHOLE lot more people to talk to that early in the morning. There is a whole lot more families out that early, taking kids to school and the like. And now we have some appointments with more families coming up! :D I'll report on how those go next week. :D

To give a small report on Reynaldo... well... things didn't go as well as they could have. He has quite a few doubts... and he hasn't exactly been reading because he doesn't like the style that the Book of Mormon is written in (in columns like the bible...) and he believes that Jesus Christ is an alien... so we're working on that. But other than that, he's great! :D

I still have yet to get my package from the office. I'm not really sure what’s going on there. >:(

so, I should be getting my memory card sent out TODAY, :) we have to stop by the post office so I'm going to pick up a small flat rate box to send some stuff home that I've been meaning to send. INCLUDING THE MEMORY CARD, which will be sent off in the box that I will be getting today I will send home the memory card. There. Nice and redundant for all of us to be redundant. And stuff. so Yea. I'll get the memory card sent off. ;)

but yes... I suppose because I've put a bit more substance into this email I've run out of time... so I'm going to have to bust a move. buuut, at least I have some pictures right? That’s what counts. :)

so yes.

I love you more than I love almost sending the memory card. ;) :P Naw, I love you more than I love biking around on a broken pedal. :3

~Elder Bryan (Brandon)

wait... what?

Wed, Feb 16, 2011

What do you mean I didn't send you my email? :P I sent you TWO last week! :P the first one was a reply to your email, and then the second one was a completely independent email. So I dunno know what you be talkin' bout, yo, but I guess I'll just toss last weeks into this one as a forward. geeze. :P

So yes, singles awareness day was fairly uneventful :-/ no mail. Just a ridiculously, early get up time. Blah! Even more tired! But, more recently I've been sleeping better. theres one interesting thing that I've noticed so far. In all of my experiments to figure out what’s going on and how I can make my kidney complain less, there’s something that I noticed WILL work: if I work out a lot right before I go to bed, it doesn't hurt in the night. And maybe even for the next couple days. quite thought provoking, eh? I'm not sure why, but it works. And it has to be right before I go to sleep. It can't be like during the day or in the morning or anything, cause I've been riding my bike a very large amount during the day and that doesn't make any difference. it must be right at the end of the day. :-/ so... I dunno. But I’m glad that I was able to inspire the Laurels to realize the truth about this day. Everyone just knows who's single on that day. :( *sigh* oh wells I suppose.

So, for Ecuador. Ha, ha, ha, you're funny. :P NO, I didn't want to go there just because Stephanie would be around there. Gosh. I just wanted to do it cause it would be fun and I mean, what a great thing it would be to just be able to go and help those little orphan children. :3 did you see them? They’re so cute! Plus, South America! :D and cool Amazon trip! and cheap shopping ;) ha, ha, ha, but really. I've always kinda wanted to just do some service like that. I dunno, I've just felt this draw forever to like, go volunteer at Pioneer Valley, or at Clair Bridge or something. But I never really got the chance. so now that I'm slightly less mentally tired than I was before the mission, and dying just a little bit less, I wanna be able to go and do something. It was weird though. When Elder Hargadon was telling me about it I just felt this draw, like I was being sucked in to it. But alas, you are right... I have WAY too many decisions that I have to make when I get home. BLAH! no more easy life. do you think that you would be able to figure out if Pierce credits are transferable to LDSBC? Also, if I were to stay, where do you think I would be able to get a job at? Any of the places that I suggested, or someplace new? :-/ I DO know that I'll be able to know what to do and stuff, but I wanna know what YOU think. or I could just go to Roberto-Venn? ;) Or Summit school in Canada, eh?

So, training! :D woo! I'm gonna have to say, I'm pretty lucky with my son. I got off easy, I think. He’s pretty good at understanding and speaking Spanish already (both his parents served Spanish speaking missions) and he's not suffering from greenie-pride-itus. He knows the doctrine pretty well. So basically it's just the whole being a greenie and not knowing what to do thing that he's working on. Fortunately he catches on quick. Alrighty. So, we HAVE divided up the area actually. We now have Alta Visat, Villa Flores and that area all the way to Coto Laurel, which is basically its own little pueblito. :) So, this last week, now that we've been talking with the bishop to get the goal of 125 people in church, things are going up! :D we went from 63 two weeks ago, to 73 this last week! WOO! Obispo Feito is a beast. He’s super willing to work with the missionaries and get things working. Plus we have some amazing members here that all want to make things go. We actually just got a new ward mission leader this last week. His name is Raphael Rivera. He is very up and at 'em. :D he's an Ex-Marine, so he's very thorough and systematic. Perfect. But I've got some high hopes. Super good. Yes.

anyways. IVE GOT GOOD NEWS!!!!!! :D so we went back to Yauco this last Saturday, right? And we get inside the apartment. lo and behold, there’s a package sitting on the floor right next to the window. (Our neighbor squeezes things through our little open window next to the door.) It’s from the Dorado family! :D it is now safely in my possession. Turns out they had a family emergency and had to stay over on the east coast till like two weeks ago or so. So, that's what happened there. but everything’s good now, it sounds like. Especially now that I have a FREAKIN SWEET ORNAMENT! Oh man, that thing is awesome! :D I love it. :3

Aw, no more suburban... now how are we supposed to take ridiculous amounts of people places? or home from mutual? Do we have to walk to church now? ...*sigh* now everythings gonna fall apart! we don't even have the Trailblazer either! AH! the end of the world is coming! AH! 2012! AH!

OH! update on la familia Ruiz-Rivera. so, we stopped by for our appointment on Friday, right? this time, they didn't have the entire family gathered together... :-/ after a little bit of talking, it seems like Nestor's wife maybe talked to him, cause his attitude seemed a bit different this time. but, we talked about the importance of knowing if this was the only true church or not, and how if our message is true, then it's the only way to "be saved". (Sorry, we ran into some Pentecostals yesterday. I just wanted to use that phrase) so we left them with the challenge to read and pray more firmly to find out if this message is true. We’re going to bring Raph with us to the next appointment on Friday so I'll give an update on that.

*old chinese man* one MORE thing, so that ridiculously early schedule? well, it's preparation for the "flooding of Ponce" where everyone outside of the city (Juana Diaz, Guayanilla, etc...) comes in to work in our areas. I worked with Elder Pezo from Peru yesterday (He's Elder Crawleys companion normally. from Juana Diaz) and so everyone comes in the night before, gets ready to get up super early, and then we all attack Ponce for a day. But it's sounding like things are gonna happen two days a week and yesterday was just a pilot day.

well... I guess I took a bit too long messing with Elder Radmall's picture... so I think I might have to send that to you, just so you can see what I was doing... it's kinda small though.

but, I love you more than I love trying to figure out my kidney mystery.

~Elder Bryan (Brandon)

FOTOS!

1) oh sí. (chevere means cool in puerto Rico) found that when we got lost looking for a referral the other day. it was in an old folks home parking lot. Those old people really know how to party! :D

2) Elduh Radmawl

aw poo, I forgot!

Wed, Feb 09, 2011

I wanted to think about the job/school situation too...

now...

possible jobs for when I get back, right?

~Exchange student program
       -July-

~Moochies
       -the fair in September-
       -anytime-

~Macy's
      - would they re hire me? would I want to work there again?
      -and if so, for how long?

and whatever else is available... like, if I decide to just work on credits in Washington, I imagine that I would be able to work at Warmoth.. if I stayed there for a while.

but I'm still not sure if I want to start school September or winter quarter... If I start later I can work longer... or go to Ecuador. :3 but if I start sooner, that's just a little bit sooner that I can switch over to BYU...

what are your thoughts on it?

I love you!!!! :D

~Brandon

Re: sun, glorious sun

Wed, Feb 02, 2011
by the way: HAPPY BIRTHDAY! (old lady :P)

woo hoo! so yes, last week’s email, just to clear up confusions was in reference to what is now currently THREE weeks ago, which would otherwise be known as two weeks... wait... is that two weeks from today? ...mm... I'm not really sure about that... eeehh... well, I think that it's two weeks back now. Yes. Because I missed two weeks ago... and then I was writing about it last week... so that should be two weeks. yes. I go with that.

whoakay. so yes. STUPHS 4 DIS WEEKSIE! :3

So, now that we are sharing our area with another companionship, we've been trying to figure out how to work the area. And seeing that President didn't really give us any instruction, we just kinda started off from scratch. So, we've been doing tuuoooghns of walking/biking and only a little teenie bit of driving around to get ourselves acquainted with the area and to make ourselves our teaching pool. Which we unfortunately have, as of yet, to get the chance to chlorinate, so we've had to drain the water a few times. Just a few but, we've gotten some pretty clean water in there recently. :) We just found a gentleman by the name of Reynaldo Velez. We had been riding around in this area called La Rambla looking for a less active, and for some reason, even though we had found the street that this particular person lived on, I felt very drawn to just keep going down the street. We continued along for a few streets until we encountered a gentleman talking outside of a house on the corner to an older lady and her daughter. We ride up and start to contact him. We started out by asking if we could share a card with him (the temple card with the questions on the back like what is the purpose to life?) and we asked him if he's ever thought about these questions before. He started to talk about how every religion has their own answers to these questions and went off on another subject for a while, but we got him back on track by asking him if he's ever wondered which answer is the RIGHT answer. God most certainly must have his own answer, right? So we got him talking about that. After a little while the conversation kept drifting off to a point where it seemed as if he wasn't the most open person. He didn't believe in religion, WE create Satan by our own thoughts, and a few other things, but I still really felt the spirit the entire time that we had been talking to him, and from what I could feel at that moment, he was an open mind and a willing spirit. Right then I toned down the conversation a little bit, and took the opportunity to bear my testimony to him that we were true messengers of Jesus Christ and that we had been called as his representatives to bring this message to the world: that the FULLNESS of the Gospel had been restored by God Through a living Prophet. That ALL of the truth could be found in one place and that caught his attention. We both bore testimony that our message was true. After a thoughtful pause he looked at me and said "who is this prophet today?" I told him that it was Thomas S. Monson. I took the chance to tell him about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon being convincing Evidence that he was called as a prophet. He thought a little bit more and I asked him if we could read some of the introduction with him. He carefully took the Book of Mormon that I had in my hands and read silently for a few minutes. "I never knew this." He said. "I've never heard about this" I smiled "that is why we are here." I testified once more that this was true. He told us that he wanted to read this book and we explained a little bit more about how he could know that this message was true through prayer. And now we have a return appointment this Thursday. at six o clock. SWEET! :D

so yeah. And then we also had president show up to district meeting yesterday morning. Just as high on the spirit as usual. :D but now we have some further direction as to our area! WOOT! According to what he said, we're going to be splitting up our area now. Ponce 2A and us, Ponce 2B. But if we need to, we can work together, which is what me and Elder Radmall did just Yesterday. We hitched a ride up to Coto Laurel, so he could show me around this new area and explain to me the situation of some of the members and Less Actives.

So, Elder Blacks a pretty sweet guy a little awkward socially, but that’s ok. ;) Everybody is now and then, right? But he's great. I love him to death and believe you me, we've been getting so much done this past little while that we almost got two foundations last week. :D Blacks a monster! His testimony and Greenie fire is an amazing booster. That just makes it all the more fun to go out and work. :)

So I got our address for the apartment. turns out that we don't have our OWN mailbox, sino, the Dueño told us that we could send stuff to the office downstairs (it's an accounting business) and they would hang on to it for us till we ask for it. so, it's sounding like it should be good to get letters and packages. :) And they are there every day except Sunday till about six. SWEET! So here we go. Are you ready? I've got my address right here! Are you listening? Ok.

Elder Brandon Bryan

Urb. Jardines Fagot

Calle 3 C-21

Ponce, PR 00716

(HA! fagot gardens.)

Anyways, I'm liking this apartment. It’s pretty cool to have two other missionaries in the apartment. Helps out with the monotony and you get to relax a bit more at the end of the day. Plus, I've got myself a pretty nice mattress here: a SERTA! :D woo! Quite nice, not that it makes my back feel any better in fact, it's still being retarded. But it seems like it comes in cycles. Sometimes it'll feel alright, and other times it hurts really bad... so I don't know what to do about it... but yes.

Sooo, I do have to say: waking up and it being sixty-nine degrees outside is RIDICULOUS! It’s so cold. :'( I get out of bed and wish I had a sweatshirt or something. horrible.

I really do think that the mission office ate my package, but now that I have the name, I'm going to send it directly to president. >:( just dropa  few names and things happen. :)

ah! I haven't gotten to make the shirt that me and Elder Lehr designed yet... :-/ but it was based on a few machinae supremacy things :3

I did get to read the email from Austin. gah, that guy's so lucky! I wanna go to Scotland...

and Bryans story is ridiculous. I can't believe somebody would actually do that! LOL, oh my goodness. I had to share that with Elder Radmall (he's sitting right across from me).

but, it's looking like I might have to bust a move... however, I love you much. Quite much. It’s more better than how much Elder Zepeda (Elder Putnam's greenie) loves me. :) That’s quite a bit, just so you know.

~Elder Bryan (Brandon)

fotos:

1) Elder Black and I our second day together! :D

2) my name in the sand at the Guancha, Ponce

3) overlooking the Guancha from this super cool tower thingie

4) sunset over the Guancha

5) alternate sunset foto

:)

I LOVE YOU! :D