Another week down in Mexico

Hey guys,

Thanks for all the emails this week. Opening my email and seeing a bunch is always a good feeling. I really appreciate all the love and support.

Well an update on the camera situation; I was searching through my bags for my charger, and I realized that I left it in the house in Huehuecalco. So my camera is dead, and I can't charge it. I'm searching here for a charger, but the problem is that it's one of these special chargers for Cannon cameras, and finding a licensed dealer of Cannon products in Mexico... well let's just say it's nearly impossible. So if I find one I'll buy it. If not, Elder Ramirez will bring it to transfers in four weeks :(

So yeah that's a downer, but it's all good.

This week was great. The highlight of the week was that we got to go to the temple on Saturday with my ward here. We brought investigators, and took them to the visitors' center here. I also got to go inside the temple and do a session, and they have a ton of stores and distribution centers in the temple here, so I bought scriptures cases for my scriptures, and a copy of the book "Teachings of the Prophets: Ezra Taft Benson" in Spanish, because it's my favorite. It has a chapter on leadership and a chapter on pride that you guys should all read. It's crazy good.

Getting to the temple was a bit of an adventure. We live in a different state here in Cuautla, and probably are an hour and a half away from Mexico City. The whole ward goes in a big bus, and we were going to go in it too, but Elder Avalos got mad at our bishopric so we decided to take public transportation, which was super crazy, fun, and an experience I probably won't forget for a while. We took a bus called a "combi" (basically a converted slab version of a Mercedes sprinter) for an hour into downtown, but its route doesn't pass by the temple. So then we had to take the metro (CDMX´s Subway/Monorail combo) for twenty minutes, got off, and took another combi all the way to the temple. It was super fun exploring the city. The city itself is amazing. You can't really explain it. It's literally 30 million or so people living on top of an ancient lake in a volcanic basin. Cement houses and huts and roads stretch literally as far as the eye can see, covering the volcanoes like a giant carpet. The traffic is a combination of New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area, multiplied by ten. And the people are amazing. Extremely nice, kind, talkative, and friendly. But holy cow it's crowded. Just millions and millions and millions of people, literally. To be honest, the city itself is pretty safe. You just have to know where to be. It has its rich neighborhoods and ghettos, just like any other city. Obviously, we stayed in safe areas.

On Wednesday, we had the world mission transmission, which is basically a transmission that the mission department of the church does every January. They announce changes, and teach us during the video. This year, they changed everything drastically. They changed the numbers that we take, count, report, and yeah. They eliminated almost everything. We will no longer visit less active members, members, or recent converts. We will no longer count the number of lessons we had, or references. And we aren't counting contacts either. These changes are really great actually. Obviously we still have to contact and have lessons, but we're not going to focus on the numbers. We're going to focus only on baptizing, and doing things with the right intention. The church should see a dramatic increase in baptisms this year. They also changed the schedule too. We are now doing all the planning in the morning, we don't do weekly planning in the morning, and we leave at 10 everyday. We do language study and companionship study during the day. It's crazy.

Well, that was my week. Other than that, it was a pretty normal week. Well apart from this cold that I had. It really nailed me on Tuesday. I was pretty sick all day Tuesday and Wednesday, but it passed quickly. I feel great right now, 100 %.

I miss you guys so much. I love you. I pray about you all.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

Cuautla

Hey guys,

Well this week has been super interesting. I guess maybe the best thing is that my comp is really good. He has about the same time in the mission as me (one cycle more) but he has a ton of desire to work. His first three companions didn't share that same desire, and he didn't have very much authority, so now that he has the reins, he's working like a bat out of heck. We're contacting at a blistering pace, and working super hard. He's from the north end of Mexico, near Laredo, Texas. Lives thirty minutes from the border. So he's super familiar with Texas, especially Houston. He doesn't know any English, which is great because it's really accelerating my Spanish. I came to the area a lot like how i first came to Huehuecalco; without investigators, work, or anything. But we're building this area from the ground up, and we have a few baptismal dates for this cycle, so we'll see how that goes.

The area is crazy. By crazy, I mean crazy. Cuautla is pretty different from Huehuecalco. It's in a completely different state in Mexico (the state of Morelos), it's a 7,000 foot difference in elevation (thanks dad for the info), and it's a blazing heat. It's not Texas hot, but it's pretty hot and dry. And working all day in church clothes really amplifies everything. Our area is the largest area in the entire mission. We have a pretty sizable chunk of the city Cuautla, and then we also have 7 separate towns out in the country. To go to the farthest town, you have to take a bus for an hour and a half. Literally an hour and a half. You climb almost right to the base of Popo, so you gain several thousand feet in elevation. You pass through 3 different ecosystems on the way. The only place like it is Hawaii- if Hawaii had 18,000 foot tall volcanoes. Crazy. Everything here is so fascinating. It just makes me so grateful for all the chances I've had to travel and experience different cultures. Here, they speak Spanish, and a native dialect that I don't know, don't understand, and probably won't have the time to learn. It's incredibly cool. Really really cool. The difference between here and Amecameca is only an hour, but it's literally stepping into a different world. It's incredible. Our ward is huge. Well, huge for Mexico. The regular attendance is almost 200 people. Way different than the 30 people in Huehuecalco. Everything is just massive here, and there is no shortage of work.

Cuautla is super nice. The city itself is actually considerably nice and fancy. It has Walmart, and Domino's and Little Caeser's, tons of fancy movie theatres, malls, etc. 

From the internet

Plaza Fuerte de Galeana, Cuautla, Morelos, Mex. from the internet

It's nice. So I hope to buy a new cable next p-day. Sorry I didn't do it today, I had no time. We've been cleaning the house and buying stuff and preparing.

Speaking of the house, it's pretty interesting. We live in easily the biggest apartment complex I have ever seen. It has well over 100 buildings, so there's probably more than 300 individual apartments here. It's crazy. All the buildings are old, and made of brick. The buildings just stretch in every direction, as far as the eye can see. It reminds me of an old college campus. Brick dorms, tons of common spaces and parks, shops, parking lots. It's like a college, if the college decided to fire the maintenance staff. There is trash everywhere, almost everything is broken, all the plants are super overgrown, and there's tons of graffiti. But I love it. It's really awesome.

The other bit of news is that today so far is probably the sickest day I've had in the mission. I've been hit by a gnarly head cold and sore throat, and my body aches. I must've been disobedient some day this week or something hahaha. But it's really nothing, and should clear off by tomorrow.

Well that's all for this week. Expect a bunch of photos next week of everything.

I miss you all like crazy, thank you for your emails and support. Please keep it coming.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

Transfers Week

Hey everyone,

Well this email terminates the best week I've had in my mission statistically, spiritually, and emotionally. We found lots of new people, broke out of the rut, contacted, but probably most importantly, we taught with power and authority. The Spirit was so strong at times, I thought that my shirt was on fire. It was a truly incredible week.

Which brings me to transfers. Typically after your training, you stay in your area for one cycle or more. But God has another plan for me; He's sending me to a new area, new district, new region, new climate, everything. I'm headed to a new place for me, called Cuautla. Apparently it's super hot (30-35 Celsius) which doesn't really compare to Texas, but should be interesting for walking all day. I don't know any of the details yet, except that transfers are tomorrow morning, and I'm headed to a zone called Moroni. I'm extremely excited, yet also extremely sad. It's tough to leave this area right now, because we have lots of success, lots of investigators, lots of everything. I had to say good bye to some of the best people I've ever met, including my converts. Earlier in this cycle, one of the daughters of the memebers who we work a lot with told me in her broken speaking that she wanted me to baptize her when she turned 8. She's only five. And her cousin, who is 6, told me the same thing as well. Children really are innocent and alive in Christ, and it was extremely heartbreaking saying goodbye to this family, knowing I might not ever see them again.

I witnessed probably more than five miracles this week. We gave two priesthood blessings. Its been incredible. Elder Ramirez is going to stay in the area, so I'm glad that it will be in incredible hands. This transfer to Cuautla is really interesting. This zone I'm going to is almost completely sisters. The only elders are the two zone leaders, the two district leaders, and their two companions. So it's like 6 elders and 20 sisters. I don't know what's going to happen, but its going to be strange having practically no elders.

Well that's the news for this week. Everyday my Spanish is better, everyday I see the hand of God in my life, and everyday I become more humble, more diligent, and more obedient. I wouldn't trade my mission for anything. Words cant describe its worth to me.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

Time flies hue too fast

Dear Everybody,

Well, another week in Huehuecalco has passed, and it was a very good one.

First I want to personally apologize for not having a ton of time to respond to everybody every week. I read every single email you all send me, and I really appreciate them.

This week was a lot better. The only problem is that we broke the cable for uploading pictures to the computer, so it's another week of no photos. Sorry haha.

The good thing about this week is that we started finding people to teach. It was funny, it really reminded me about goal scorers in the NHL. If you're not really familiar with hockey, the season is extremely long (82 games plus playoffs). The top goalscorers tend to go through hot streaks and cold streaks that mirror a parabolic curve as well. Joe Pavelski, for instance, might have nine games in a row with a goal, and then 11 games without one. The struggle for the top goal scorers in the NHL is to break through the psychological barrier and start scoring goals again. How do they do it? They get back to basics. They start shooting more, start getting pucks in deep, start going to the front of the net, the little fundamentals. That is exactly what this week was like for us. We got back to basics. We really refined everything we did, worked on planning smarter, and flowing the Spirit in everything. Literally everything. The trick now is working like this for two more years. The fruits of our labors surfaced when Saturday we found someone who we could teach. After going almost two weeks with zero investigators, were finding people left and right now.

Well that was my spiritual experience, and all my week in one. The other highlights were I had divisions with other elders in my zone, so I went and spent a day with my friend Elder Peralta. Once again, I apologize for not being able to send photos.

But yeah, that was my week. I also studied in Alma a lot this week, and I highly recommend to everyone to read Alma 5:15-19.

I love you and I miss you all so much.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

Self Conversion

Hey everybody,

Y'all will have to forgive me, but I don't have a lot to report on this week.

To be honest, this week has easily been the most difficult of my mission so far. Ive learned a lot, and one of the most prominent things Ive learned, is that if you're not completely diligent, your missionary work will follow a parabolic curve, with the high point being baptism, and the low point being searching. As you find new people and teach them, you rise, and when you baptize and drop your other investigators who aren't progressing and keeping their commitments, you fall. Just like a parabolic curve.

So as you can probably tell, we are in the searching part of the graph. We wake up every morning, leave the house, and walk for miles and miles, knock a million doors, and contact a million people. We only have one real investigator right now, and he isn't even progressing, so it's hard. My feet just hurt permanently, and my muscles stay sore. We also ran out of gas, so I've been taking freezing cold showers for the past week (which is amplified by the fact that this part of Mexico City is 8,000+ ft in elevation). Its been a tough slog every day.

But the funny thing is that there is something really edifying in really hard work. It has made me a more spiritual person for sure, and its also been a really great humbling experience, and a reminder to always give 100 percent in my mission. when you let up for a bit, you start to fall into the parabolic curve again.

Transfers has been the talk of the mission for the past while now. We have exactly two weeks left in this cycle, and then there will be transfers that Tuesday. Several of the current zone leaders are going home after this cycle, so this next set of transfers is really going to shake up the mission organization. That, and ill be finishing my training, so ill probably have a new companion in two weeks. which is really sad, because I really love Elder Ramirez.

I also was very stupid today, and forgot the cable to my camera to send photos. So sorry, but I don't have any photos :/

But I miss you all, and I think about you guys constantly. You're always in my prayers.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long