Somos los Jefes de Guacimo

Dear Fambly and Amigos!!!

First to answer your questions mom!

1)      Bank of Costa Rica (BCR) it´s everywhere. My question was, can I withdraw money from my VISA debit card from the Bank of Costa Rica without a fee. The ticos (nickname of Costa Ricans) say I can but they aren´t always correct haha

2)      Yes I´m wearing my retainer every night, mis dientes son perfectos!!!

3)      The sole of one of my shoes is already breaking because of all the rocks here haha, but yes they are holding up well

4)      My athletes foot is long gone! I had triple antibiotic that I put on it, and it cleared up

Well,

Dad the culture here is way different. I´ve noticed that Spanish is a lot more literal, so when I´m joking to people I have to tell them after that I am joking or else they totally believe me. It´s just different getting used to a new type of lifestyle, but I love it down here, I just need to get used to how they do things in their own time and in their own way here. I say own time because Costa Ricans are known for being late to everything!

Haha and it´s totally true! Oh and Dad, everybody here says, ¨Si Dios quiere¨(If God wants it). And  of course he wants it haha, they always say it when we challenge them to come to church. Of course God wants you to come to church haha. Well Spanish is coming along a lot better. I can understand people a lot better now, it´s just difficult because Costa Rican Spanish is a lot different than the Spanish in the rest of the world. They use nicknames for basically everything here, so all the Spanish I learned in High School isn´t helping so much haha, but I´m learning quickly. Also, words that are considered bad words in all the Latin world are perfectly fine here! So if I come home and say a bad word in Spanish it´s because I´m speaking Costa Rican Spanish, not normal Spanish!

Well, General Conference was so incredibly amazing! All the gringo missionaries got to watch conference in English, so yes I watched all of it! I absolutely loved Elder Bednar´s talk on Faith and Conversion, and Elder Bowen´s talk on overcoming the greif of losing a child. It seemed to me that htis conference really focused on 1) the family and 2) conversion.

It is not enough for us to live as members of the church, we need to BE members of the church, and LIVE the principles of the church. It always makes me think, before my mission I lived in the church and had a testimony, but I wasn´t converted. And now it seems like I´m living my testimony and steadily everyday I am becoming more converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s weird to see such a great change, but it is something that all of us in the church need to do. We are especially focusing on conversion here in Costa Rica because before, the mission was focused only on baptisms. It was the 2nd highest baptizing mission in Latino America, but the worst mission in retention of recently baptized members. So now, we are really focusing on converting not just baptizing, and it really is what we should be doing. But yes, I absolutely loved conference, and I cannot wait 6 months for the next.

Gracias for the birthday wishes, I love all of you! Well, I´m glad that Dad is being a stud in Savior of the World! Good for you! And Mom, I´m glad that you decided to join the angel choir, I know that Sundays are your nap days, but it will really be an amazing and spiritually edifying experience.

Well, if you could, tell Zack Sharp that I miss him and that he can email me! And tell Aunt Marcia that I got her letter from a super long time ago and I wrote her back but the letter got destroyed in my backpack because of the rain! Sorry! Oh and transfers are coming up!!!! It´s nerve wracking because most likely I´m going to stay here in Guacimo but it´s going to be different without a trainer!

Well, I love all of you and I´m super excited to hear how well you´re all doing! I know that the Lord will bless you according to your obedience, especially your obedience in helping with the obra missional (mission work). It really is part of our baptismal covenant to help in the Lord´s work here on the earth, so try as hard as you can to fulfill this covenant by helping the missionary work in Anaheim. Love all of you, and wish you the best.

Sincerely,

Elder Taylor