August 11

MAISIE ARRIVED IN MERIDA MEXICO!!!!

ahhh bienvenidos mis amigos!

well so much to say about so much. haha. first, i love mexico!! it is everything i imagined it to be yet so different at the same time. especially the heat, i had no idea what was ahead for me. it literally feels like im in a hot steamy dishwasher 24/7. the humidity is real. i will start from the beginning.

the plane ride over here was awesome! so so so pretty. we arrived at like 8ish right when the sun was setting and the sky was a burning red pink color. the sunsets here are amazing and so beautiful. everything here is beautiful. especially the vegetation, it is like living in a jungle! and basically that is what i am doing. i am in an area called Kanasin. its on the outskirts of Merida. its a pretty calm town. the people live in cement houses and are very poor. but so nice! the ward im serving in has 6 missionaries because its so big!

My compañera is from Mexico city, so.... I am being forced to learn the language. hahah.i absolutley love her! her name is Hma. Martinez and she reminds me so so much of jacee! its been so comforting. during our interview pres. garcia asked me what i wanted in a comp and i told him someone who is hardworking, loving, has a passion for the work and who can help me catch on to the vision of the mission- i got everything i asked for. i have been so impressed by her and her positive attitude. she is so patient with me and it has been so fun with her! she is what gets me through the discouraging times. its been fun to because as she teaches me spanish i teach her english. she actually knows a lot and has such a desire to learn so i havent had too much of a problem talking with her. its been good for me too because i talk in complete spanish. if i would have had an american i know that i would have just talked in English, so its been good. its pretty hard too.. the first day here we had our interviews with the mision pres. and his assistants gave us the deets of the mission and i was feeling pretty confident because i could understand everything. thats because they were being nice... the people here speak sooo fast! even my comp here sometimes can{t understand because they have a yucatan accent. its nuts and kinda frustrating at times because i feel helpess. something that jacob said to me has been ringing in my ears about how it is more important how we make others feel than anything we could ever say. and that is what i{m striving to do. i have gotten used to the weird looks i recieve when walking down the streets. hahah i kinda enjoy being the minority. we were walking home yesterday and a little girl ran up to me and said something (which i didnt understand because the kids speak lots faster than the adults) so after i asked my comp and the little girl told me i looked like a barbie. haha it was cute.

The members here are very strong. me and my comp knew nothing about the area when we first started. we had no cell phone, no records of where members lived, basially no information about anything. we both opened this area, there havent been sister missionaries here for about 10 years, so we are both going in blinded. there are 2 other sets of missionaries, elders, serving in this ward as well. so we cover three different areas. there are lots of inactive members as well. thats mostly who weve been trying to target to work with. we met the bishops wife the second day we were here. the bishop is working on the temple in tux right now and is going to be returning in a week or so. she is awesome!! she is a RM as well and has been going to the lessons with us with one of our investigators named tania. tania is awesome. she has a 2 year old little boy who is CRAZY!! he reminds me a lot of Ty when he was a little boy - full of energy. haha. so in the lessons is basically become my job to be the babysitter and keep him entertained. she came to church with us yesterday and me and hma martinez were running around the capilla trying to get him to go to primary. he wouldnt. so basically we didnt really attend sunday school or relief society because we were in and out with him hahah. it was funny because earlier that week me and martinez were talking and saying how much we loved kids and how many we wanted. i told her i wanted 5 and then after that i told her that maybe i will only have one and see how it goes. hahahah it was funny. but i was really happy to do it and tania really enjoyed church so it was awesome. also paulio (the little boy) loves us now and always wantes to play with us so thats been good! 

The members feed us really well. weve had lots of people sign up to feed us or just while we are teaching lessons will buy us food or give us things. i only eat lunch usually and maybe a banana in the morning and night because they feed ya so much! and all i want is water all the time. haha. i dont think i have to worry about gaining weight because you just sweat everything off. the people here are so kind and so happy with what they have. it is so humbling. this is exactly what i needed in my life. this has honestly been the hardest week of my life. full of ups and downs, doubts and fears, but when it all boils down to it, it comes to the Savior. this is why i am here. i may not be able to understand everything that is being said but it is crazy at how strong my desire is to help them understand. basically all i do in lessons is testify. testify testify testify. and i am happy to do that because i want them to know the same things that i know. one of the other boys from the MTC, elder bahr is in my district and ward here and that has been such a comfort. he is such a nice kid and so happy all the time. its nice to see him to speak english with him and to know that we are both struggling together. you forget that other people feel this way or have felt this way before, but the most comforting thing is praying and using the atonement. my savior knows how i feel and for that i am so grateful. i could not do this without him. i love the work and i love learning. even though i don{t feel like my spanish is improving, today during our zone conference during practices sister manning (shes been out for like 8 months) was saying dont even fret because i speak well. hahah oh goll. i am just waiting for the day i wake up fluent. :) 

well. i love you all so very much! i loved seeing jacob. it was the best thing ever.. so glad i had that opportunity. dont worry about me because im doing great and loving it, even the hard times. ive had such wonderful parents who taught me how to  work hard and how to love the lord and those two things are carrying me through this. I LOVE YOU ALL. keep praying and keep reading your scriptures!! also thanks for all the love and support! yall are great.

con amor,

hermana hobbs