Friday July 15th, 2016

Hey guys!

     The day after I emailed you last week, we got a ton of rain! The roads were literally rivers! It rained so hard! One of our teachers, Hermano Ortiz, had a soccer game during our gym time, so we went and watched it. We cheered super loud only if he touched the ball, even if it was a bad hit. It was hilarious! The other day during the night we heard automatic gunfire and then lots of sirens! It was intense! 

     I have met four other missionaries from Idaho. Elder Ballard, in my district is from Idaho Falls, Hermana Alder, also in my district from Emmett Idaho, another Elder from Nampa, and another Elder from Blackfoot. On Tuesday we got 190 new missionaries! So we all helped them figure out where they were supposed to be, and carried their luggage for them. Because of the influx of missionaries, we got another district. We've always had 7A, 7B (us), and 7C, and now we have a 7D.

     The Spirit is super strong here wherever you go! It's awesome! On Sunday during Priesthood our Branch President talked about how we need to enfocar (focus) the work, and not the hermanas. Then at the devotional there was a talk on Celestial Marriage. It was so funny! This week we have to go Solo Español. It's helped a ton! I know quite a few words, but I have a hard time using proper grammar. When we speak in English we get points on the board. And for every point we have to do a pushup. We do the pushups every three days. I had hurt my elbow doing dips at the gym, so I couldn't use both arms. So I asked how many points one-arm pushups count for, and I got told five. So I did 20 one-arm pushups! It was awesome! A couple nights ago during class, the power went out for a couple minutes.

     A few days ago my tooth was hurting, so I looked at it in the mirror, and found that there was a cavity, which sucked because I hate going to the dentist in the U.S., let alone in Mexico. So I said a prayer asking Heavenly Father if there was any way he could heal the cavity so I wouldn't have to go to the dentist. I went to bed, woke up, no cavity! Prayer is powerful! 

     We started getting up at 5:45 in the morning to go work out, which is tiring, but fun! We have not had any General Authorities visit yet. We were told they don't come here very often. 

     All of my pens from Sportsmans are "blue" ink.  (Editor's Note: Dad wasn't sure his letters were being received so he had Forest use the word Blue in his next letter.)

     The hermana that reminds me of Holly is Hermana Alder. She's the short blond one. We're not sure when we'll get to go to the Temple again. Our investigators are our teachers, Hermano Pavia and Hermano Ortiz. My favorite lesson to teach is God is our loving Heavenly Father/ Prayer. We got asked to make an investigator profile of someone we know well, and then we teach it to someone in our district. Then we do this thing called TRC, which is where you teach people from outside the MTC.  We went to get our temporary residency visas today, and I bought a bottle of coke for 15 pesos! The food here is okay. We put just about everything in a tortilla. Even the mashed potatoes were in a tortilla! It was surprisingly good! We eat a lot of cereal, and a lot of beef. Their lasagna and their hamburgers are not very good, but you're hungry, so you eat them. 

     The traffic here is crazy! Motorcycles will just swerve in between other vehicles! And the roads are super crazy! We drove in one direction in Mexico City for an hour and a half, and was still Mexico City! It was crazy! 

     This one elder who thought he was really tough wanted to have a grip contest. So he grabbed my hand and told me to squeeze as hard as I could, so I did, and I popped his knuckle! I felt kinda bad, but it was awesome because he was bigger than I am!

Love,

Forest