May 27, 2013 - Gibraltar

Hola all! 

So I only have about 20 minutes to write this. We are waiting for a bus to go back home from Gibralter so I don´t have time to read anybody´s emails. I´m sorry, but I will have to read them next week :(

This week was great. We did a lot. Zone conference was in Sevilla on Tuesday and Wednesday. We learned a lot. President stressed how we need to help people be born again spiritually. That baptism isn´t enough. I liked that because he wasn´t focusing on baptisms like so many do but that we need to help them be actually converted. 

After zone conference, I went to Dos Hermanas to do splits. I was with Hermana Petru and we did that from Wednesday to Thursday. I loved it. I actually learned an incredible amount from her. More about how to approach people in the street and to get on their level. It was great. They have an investigator who is from America doing something for the military here so we taught him in English. Holy cow it was so weird to teach in English. It was actually pretty hard! But it was great.On Sunday one of the women in the Relief Society made brownies. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. So good.

This week will be the first week without Hermana Stark. I am very sad about this, but it will be good to focus on one area. We´ll see!

It´s odd not to be running a lot at this time of year. I think it´s because for the last two years I have been training for a marathon and now Ï´m not! I miss it a lot.

Lastly, we went to Gibralter today! Holy smokes, it was so stinking fun. It is absolutely beautiful there. I couldn´t believe it! And we could see Africa from the mountain. The monkeys were so cool. They would just jump right on you. Haha, as you can imagine, they loved my hair. They would come on me and just play with my hair. One started eating it. It was so awesome. I have pictures but I won´t be able to send them today. Next week. It was great though. Definitely quite the adventure.

Alright, well I´m sorry I can´t go into more detail this week. Got to go catch the bus! I´ll put up pics next week.

Thanks all! Love you!

Hermana Kunz

May 20, 2013 - San Fernando and Cadiz, Espana

Hola todos!

Well another week out in the field! And today marks my two month mark. Pretty crazy! This week was great.

Hermana Stark´s companion got her visa so she will be coming on Wednesday. I am suuuuuper sad about this because I absolutely love Hermana Stark. For those of you who know these people, she is the exact mix of Shaylee Foley and Erin Alred. So obviously I love her. I was so happy to get this experience with her and learn from her. I will miss her a lot. And Cadiz. Cadiz was an awesome place to serve. I will definitely be visiting. It has a lot of cats. Cats are everywhere here. They don´t have homes but people feed them all the time. It´s pretty funny.

Speaking of Erin, I heard she got her call! Chile hear she comes! Holy cow she is going to knock the peoples' socks off. That´s so awesome.

So let´s see. I think I remember mentioning our investigator in Cadiz, Antonio. He has had the smoking problem. Well Heavenly Father really likes to makes jokes with me because coming out here, I was terrified of teaching the law of chastity, and with Antonio, we have had to teach it 3 TIMES!!!! Whew! We´re hoping he understands. When he went to church though, he started crying from the Spirit and got a blessing to help with his smoking. Hermana Stark said he came out beaming.

We have an investigator in San Fernando named Manolo. He is the son of a less active member, Antonio. The last 2 lessons, Antonio´s brother, Miguel has been coming as well who is not a member. So we have been teaching the two of them. Well, Miguel is an interesting guy. He doesn´t have any teeth left and he says, ¨Hombre, claro¨ to literally every single thing we say. That is a way of saying, of course. But when I say everything we say, I mean everything we say. I haven´t heard him say a single other sentence. So we got through the Plan of Salvation and I invited them to be baptized and sure enough, good old Miguel, ¨Hombre, claro!¨ I couldn´t help myself. I had to start laughing. I´m not totally sure if he was serious about it so we have to get it straightened up next time. Then Antonio, Miguel, and Manolo started fighting about whether you get baptized in the mornings or in the evenings. Us Hermanas got completely lost at that point. We were all laughing and wondering if this was all really happening. That was my first experience inviting someone to be baptized. Pretty great.

We did have a great lesson about Jesus Christ and His life though. We talked about how Christ had two purposes to fulfill in life. One was His mission and one was His ministry. His mission was the Atonement. His suffering, death, and resurrection. His ministry was His example he set for all of us, His miracles, and His establishing of the church. It was a great lesson. Spirit was strong. 

We had a district meeting on Friday and all went out to eat after. Hermana Stark and Elder Mora (zone leader) had a cream puff eating contest. They ate 17! I have no clue where Hermana Stark put all of them...she is super tiny. They finally tied cause they couldn´t do anymore. Just thinking about it makes me want to die.

During soccer, the game started getting pretty intense. So I decided to back out of this one because my super awesome skills would only make it worse. Instead, Hermana Jarvis and I set all the Elders´ phone alarms to go off at 5am. Much better use of time. The next day at church they were pretty happy, haha. Our district leader said he knew it was my idea so he is going to give me a hard topic to speak on for zone conference for revenge. Guess I wasn´t thinking that one through. Maybe I shouldn´t have chosen the phones of the two zone leaders and district leader. Haha, oops.

Next week for P-day, we are going Gibraltar to play with the monkeys and look at Africa. Should be great. We are leaving early and getting back late, so I might not make it to email. We´ll see but if I don´t write, that´s why.

This week, we are going to Sevilla for a tri-zone conference, and the President will come speak to us. I´m excited about that. Get some good learning in. I will also be going to the city of Dos Hermanas for two days to do splits. Lots of fun things ahead.

Alright all, thanks for everything! Hope all is well and I love you! Un bezo!

Hermana Kunz

May 13, 2013 - San Fernando and Cadiz, Espana

Hola todos!

Well I hope all you missionary moms had a wonderful Mother´s day talking with your missionaries. I know I loved it. Best thing EVER!

This past week was great. To start things out, I forgot to mention last week that every Saturday, all the missionaries and investigators and members play soccer. It is way cool. Last week I got in for about 5 minutes and almost died. They are all so good! All of them are Spanish. Even the missionaries...we only have 1 American Elder. And one Hermana plays cause she has played for 13 years. It was insane. It was like being in a pro game. They were way intense. So I booked it out of there. But this Saturday...two days ago, I made myself get in there. Let the world know that Hermana Kunz played soccer with the pros haha. I was still awful but I figured I have a year and a half of this so I better learn!

This week, all the new missionaries had to go to President Deere´s house in Malaga. Holy mother of gondor, this place is AMAZING. It is up in the mountains so it looks over all of Malaga and the beach. It is a huge house and it has a nice pool in the back. Unfortunately we couldn´t go in. But it was great. Hermana Deere made us delicious pulled pork and we had a little orientation with the President about how our experience is going and how it can improve. It was great. And it was great to see people from the MTC, especially my old companion.

Church here is great...a little different from church in America. Relief Society is hilarious. If someone didn´t know Spanish, they would think all the women were fighting about something. In reality, they are all just talking and giving their opinions but they all talk really loud and over each other. Then, Sacrament always starts about 20 minutes late and it is like a party in there before. Everyone is talking loud and everything. During Sacrament meeting, kids are running up and down and all over the stage and nobody does anything about it. It makes me laugh every time. So different cause of the culture. It´s great. The woman who directs the music, Carmen, is the best. When she directs, she closes her eyes, puts the book down and waves her arms everywhere with her body. She gets way into it. If someone isn´t singing, she will open her eyes, snap at them, and go back to getting into it. I can never stop laughing. It is the best.

Super sad couple in the ward. They got married 2 weeks ago and the guy came home from his mission 6 months early for the girl. She got cancer when he was on his mission and she only has a couple months left to live. So he came home early so they could get married in the temple. Cool to see how they have an eternal perspective on things. It is exactly the story of A Walk To Remember. They gave a talk yesterday and I just wanted to cry the whole time. It was really sad.

Anyway, I will stop talking of sad things. Everything else is great. We are teaching our investigator Antonio tonight. We set a baptisimal date for him for the 25, but he can´t stop smoking. He is awesome though. He always talks about how strong he can feel the Spirit with us but then when we leave, it goes away. I hope he can stop smoking cause he would make a great adition to the ward.

Alright all, that´s about it for now! Love you all and appreciate all you do! Hope Mother´s Day was awesome and that you are starting your summers out with a kick! Thanks to everyone!

 

Hermana Kunz

May 6, 2013 - San Fernando and Cadiz, Espana

Hola familia!!!

I am here!!! Wow, it is quite crazy to think I am finally in the field. And I am in quite a crazy situation. So I am serving officially in San Fernando with Hermana Jarvis from Oregon. But Hermana Stark is also our companion right now because she is waiting for her companion who is stuck in the USA waiting for her visa. She could get it tomorrow or it could be 3 weeks. We have no clue.This means that we are a trio serving in San Fernando and Cadiz...which is Hermana Stark´s area. Haha, doesn´t happen too often where we have to serve in two areas. So we split up the time and do half and half. It is a 20 minute train ride to get from place to place. The only downfall is that we have to stay in two apartments so it is kind of annoying to be taking clothes back and forth, but hey, I´ll take it. Serving in two areas on my first transfer is awesome! Haha, it must have been from what I said to President Deere. The first day in Malaga, he had interviews with all of us. He asked me at one point during the interview what my mom would say about me if she were here. I said some things and mentioned how she would always tell me that I CAN DO HARD THINGS. Well, he must have taken that to heart, giving me two areas on the first transfer! But it is good. Very good learning experience. The train ride here was good. My wheel to my suitcase broke so that made it a little hard, but other than that, all good!

So first week down. It was a good first week. We don´t have many investigators and the ones we do have are a little difficult. The first appointment we had set, they guy ditched us. Good way to welcome me to missionary life! They just baptized a family here last week so now they don´t have anyone cause they focused all their efforts on them. But that is why we are here! Going to go find people! One awesome thing...we were in Cadiz and my companions said, "Ok Hermana Kunz, it´s all you. Pick a street and pick an apartment and we´ll go." I picked a random street and a random apartment and the guy totally let us in and we set a return appointment. We were laughing so hard after because they told me that NEVER happens.  First time´s a charm I guess!

We teach an English class which I really like doing. Oh, my favorite part is being on the street and saying hi to people. They are not use to it at all and they are always so surprised when I say it. The looks on their faces is the best thing ever.

Let´s see, the one investigator we do have in Cadiz is named Antonio. He is a great guy. We had a family home evening activity with him at a member´s house where we watched The Restoration... the 20 minute one. We talked about it after, and holy cow the Spirit was so strong! It was way awesome. I love it when you can feel the Spirit like that...especially in lessons. Means we are doing something right!

San Fernando and Cadiz are absolutely beautiful. They filmed a James Bond movie in Cadiz so that´s pretty cool. It is an island just of the coast of San Fernando. The old part of Cadiz is the most amazing thing in the world. San Fernando is awesome too. The people here are so warm and welcoming. The streets here are out of this world. So cool!

On May the 4th be with you, we were studying in our apartment when all of a sudden, I hear Star Wars playing in the next room. HOLY SMOKES do you have any idea how much torture this was?! I knew exactly what was going on in the movie and it was just awful. I wanted to watch it so bad. I had to go get my music and blast it so I wouldn´t think about Star Wars. Of course that happened to me!

On Sunday, they asked me to bear my testimony and say the closing prayer. Hope my fear of speaking in front of people goes away! The ward is great though. Everyone was so amazing. I´m excited to serve with them.

This mission has already taught me so much. I´m very excited to be here and serving the Lord! That is all for this week! Thanks so much everyone for everything! You are all great! Love you!

Oh, and sorry if my sentences don´t make sense or if I´m really bad at spelling now. The more I speak Spanish the more I realize how bad my English is getting, haha.

Love,

Hermana Kunz