Email: Week#11 in Paraguay

Hi,

Things are pretty awesome as normally. We were able to visit a lot of people last week. There is a fireside where a 70 will come and speak, so we are visiting all the families trying to get them to come out to it this Thursday. Also, this week is the last full week before changes. The changes are on the 7th of May. It is pretty assured that my companion will leave, but we never know for sure. He has 4.5 months in Piquete Cue and another 4.5 months in the area right next to it. He also has 7.5 months in another area super close. He served his whole mission in the same stake! So he is pretty tired of this area and wants a change, so he has asked the President about it a few times.

We don't have ipads or anything like that or facebook in Paraguay. Neither do we use the websites, because like no one has computers or anything like that anyway. With Guarani, I am just learning a little bit, it is hard because it is nothing like Spanish, but I am focusing on just the Spanish now. But I learn Guarani everyonce in a while.

So something awesome that happened this week was that we went to the temple on Tuesday! We went out as a zone and then we also had a testimony meeting as a zone. It was super awesome because both President and Hermana McMullin after told me that they thought my SPanish was really good. But the temple was super awesome, and I really enjoyed it as always. Then, we went off inviting everyone out to the fireside this week. To enter the fireside, every member has to bring with them an inactive for investigator. So we had to work to make sure everyone would go and invite someone. Something cool that happened this week was that we got a new reference to teach a family. They are super inactive, but they have a child who needs to be baptized, so the ward gave us that reference, so we are going to visit them this Wednesday to see and meet them. Ah, so also this Sunday Dionicio (the guy who we baptized a while ago) recieved the priesthood! It was really cool, we had taught him about it a few days before, so it was super awesome. Also, I was talking with someone in the ward and when I told him that I only have 2 months in Paraguay, he was super surprised! He thought I had a lot more time haha, so a lot of people thought that because I can speak and understand a lot better than most gringos. I still have my troubles because the Paraguayans speech is harder to understand than most. Yesterday, we saw a movie with a family for a family home evening night with them. We watched the best two years. It is a missionary movie and it is super funny. I really liked it.

I just  say time has gone pretty fast! I am now finishing 4 months now that May is about to start. It is crazy to me that I already have two changes out here in Paraguay! Well that is all, chao for now!

Love,

Elder Crandall

Email: Week#10 in Paraguay

Hi,

So first off they celebrate Easter a bit differently. As I said last week, they celebrate it during the week, but put the most emphasis on Friday, Good Friday is what it is called there. They don't do anything for Sunday. So this week, we just eat Chipa, chipa, and more chipa during the week... so I had a lot haha. We always have lunch appointments, and sometimes we don't eat dinner till around 9 at night. That is how it always is in South American countries.

People never say I am tall because I think they are used to Americans being super tall, but yeah, I am taller than just about everybody haha. Americans are just a lot taller than the people in South America. In the CCM, we took a picture with everyone and we lined up shortest to tallest. It was all Americans in the front haha. So when we have baptisms, they day of, we usually just say, ok you can do this or this. We usually just switch off, though. I heard that there are some missionaries who will fight over who gets to baptize who...

Hmm... so for an update. We left Elder Fernandez at the mission office last Monday. But, we found out the next day that his surgery was pushed off a week because they brought in some bad parts for the surgery. So now he is super bored waiting in the office for a week until his surgery tomorrow. But now that he was gone, we were able to work a lot more last week. 

We haven't been able to visit Mari Paredes yet, she has been gone the last couple times we went to her house. And we also visited Miño family for Jessica again, and we are having a bit difficulty getting her totally ready, but we are trying to get it done. Also, we have the 2 new investigators that came over to church randomly one day, and we have taught them once, but we still need to get working. Ah, something pretty funny, we went over to a lunch appointment on Saturday, and this family knows that I want to go into the computer field later, so they asked me to help them with their computer problem, so I spent sometime with it (it is super easy, but with people that know nothing about computers here haha). So now another member also asked me on Sunday to help them too haha.

So we had a really fun activity on Friday to celebrate the week. So this day, there are no buses and almost all the stores are closed. So we originally planned to go the river in the morning to watch the sunrise and then hang out in the church all day, BUT it rained... A LOT. The rain was so bad and the thunder was the loudest I have ever heard it. Correa told me that it was the worst storm he has ever seen in his time at Paraguay. So we had to wait until around 11am to wait for the rain to stop. But we all joined together at the church and we hung out together as a ward, since no one had work or school or anything. It was pretty fun, we had one member, who is a chef, make a super nice meal. We also cleaned the church too, but it was super fun to hang out with them all this day. So most of the other missionaries just stayed at home and did nothing for this day, because it is kinda hard to work on a day like this (like easter).

Yeah, then Sunday was also pretty good. We had a HUGE attendance today because it was Ward Conference. We had 111 people, which is way higher than usual average of 70. We visited a lot of people yesterday. We first had lunch where after we got some more references to teach of less actives, then we visited the Del Puerto family to get some visits set up with their family members to teach because they seem super awesome. We also are going to have a karaoke soon, so we were also telling everyone about that, so that should be super fun haha. Then, we visited the Cano family and talked with them for a bit and then went to the Gonsalez family and shared some Chipa with them and talked to them a bit. After, we went on home and rested. It was a super awesome week, but I can´t wait for this one to come. So there is a big chance that my companion leaves in the next change in two weeks, because he has 9 months in the same spot and another 4 months which is all in the same stake. So most likely my comp and I have 2 weeks left to do some good here. Well, that seems to be all, we have good things planned to get working this week!

Love, Elder Crandall

Email: Week#9 in Paraguay

Hello,

This was a pretty good week. We have not been able to go out and do as much as we good like because we have to do things for Elder Fernandez before his surgery, we found out last Tuesday that we would have to wait another week, so he is having his surgery tomorrow.

So about the baptism, we weren't able to visit Yessica or Mari Paredes, so we just had the baptism for Dionicio on Saturday, but it was pretty awesome. What was crazy was that yesterday, I was able to confirm him a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. So it was not only my first time doing it, but in Spanish too! So that was super fun haha.  But it was a really good thing to learn how to do. So now we are for sure going to visit Jessica and Hermana Mari this week to get the baptisms ready, because we definitely don't want to be wasting any more time.

Also, I was able to go on divisions again this week on Friday, so the Zone leader, Elder Vidal, went with Correa to do the baptismal interviews. So I went with his companion, Elder Ballard. We went out to visit a few families. So it is crazy here in Paraguay because like every person that sees me talks about how celestial my eyes are and that they must be fake. But like everyone compliments me on them haha. That happened a lot that day. With Elder Ballard, we shared with a few families the first lesson and a thought.

So I learned that for 'easter' here, they celebrate the whole week of Christ's life. I think it is called Pascual Week. So they make Chipa with their families to celebrate it, which really makes no sense because they make CHipa everyday haha. But we eat pretty good from the members. We have a lot of lunch appointments that we scheduled when we got in Piquete Cue with the Relief Society president. We eat almost everyday except for lunch with a member except mondays and tuesdays. On Mondays, it is Pday and we usually go out to eat. I am going to go to Pizza Hut again. And on Tuesdays we have our zone/district meeting, so we are out somewhere else and then we usually eat with all the missionaries together.

Yeah, we get to skype out on Mother's Day. It will be at least for an hour, probably longer if my companion is ok with it too.

The Argentina temple is super awesome. I really love it, but they have a small place you can walk up by stairs, no more, but that is where the spire with the angel moroni. Yeah, so not that much to report on this week, but we have big plans this week to get working! Ah, so this thursday I will have exactly 20 months left haha!

Love, 

Elder Crandall

Email: Week#8 in Paraguay

Hi,

So I just finished General Conference and it was pretty awesome. We actually were able to watch them in English, but I chose to watch 3 sessions in Spanish. So our stake center is about a 45 minute bus ride in total to get there! But it was pretty awesome as always. The only complaint I have about watching it in Spanish is that I would always miss the voices I became so accustomed to! But I was able to get out the main message in all the talks. It was really neat, but always hard to pick a favorite one. 

I saw the blog post, that was cool they made alfajores. There are a couple different kinds too, but yeah, I think they are really good and that was nice of Sister Halliday to make them! 

Ah, I also have been forgetting to say in the emails but I already got my package! I was super happy and my companion was impressed because it was in a pretty good sized box haha. But it was really awesome. Everyone was asking me what was inside it haha.

Yeah, I am glad I stayed in Piquete Cue because I really like the area and the people. The ward is super awesome and I liked that I stayed. We will be in that house for just 4 weeks now. Elder Fernandez will have surgery tomorrow on his knee.  The house is super nice, it just has the front room with a table, the kitchen, the bathroom is pretty good sized, and there are two rooms to sleep in. We haven't been making any other foods lately, this last week has been pretty tranquil.

So the baptisms are actually are THIS Saturday because of general conference. We are having the baptisms for Dionicio Ortiz and Jessica Miño. Dionicio's baptism was super awesome to hear about because for a year he didn't want to get baptized, at first not even hear the missionaries. Now, just this last Sunday, he told us he wanted to get baptized. It is super awesome to hear things like that and see the difference we made in someone's life that the Lord could open his heart. We also want to have the baptism for a 9-year old the same day, we just need to go over and teach him. But this week has been super quiet because we have been going to the doctor and doing stuff for Elder Fernandez before his surgery. 

So on Thursday I went on splits with another Elder, but he only had 6 weeks in Paraguay longer than I had and he did not know Spanish very well. So I lead the whole day and made all the decisions on everything on what to do. I had to lead the lessons and everything and find all the houses. I was a bit afraid at first, but it actually turned out really well. The Lord really does bless those with the gift of tongues. I was a bit nervous I wouldn't understand, but the Lord helped me use my talent to understand once I started talking. I was super glad that I was able to have conversations with them and teach without any problems. It is great to know that he will always bless me once I put in an effort and do my part. I loved that day because we were able to visit an inactive that we haven't seen for a while and she told us that she wanted to come back to church now!

It actually barely ever rains, like once every few weeks. That is actually a lot compared to how it was before I came. But when it rains it is super crazy, that is why everyone always talks about it. And yup! I found my camera cord, it was hiding under some things on my companion's desk, which I saw right away after I got home at night.

Ah, so something I have been needing to say, but forgot is that I have a nickname on the mission already that everyone calls me. It is el mago (the magician or wizard). It is funny because some people have a hard time pronouncing my name, so they just call me mago instead. But a lot of the members and the missionaries call me that haha. It came from Crandalfo the picture that I showed you guys earlier.

Well, hope everything is good at home. I can't believe that I have more than 4 months out on the mission! Time flies when you have fun...

Love,

Elder Crandall

Alfajores!

Our awesome neighbor decided to make Alfajores one day and bought us some. Ryan tells us that he really loves eating these so it was neat to try them. We have been wanting to make these for a while so when our neighbor bought us these, we were very happy! 

The middle has caramel and the outsides of the cookie are covered in powdered sugar.

*               *                  *

If you would like to make these for yourself, here is a recipe I found from: 

http://www.chow.com/recipes/28373-alfajores

Alfajores are soft, delicate cookies from South America made, surprisingly, with cornstarch. The cornstarch gives the dough a smooth, satiny texture that makes it a dream to work with and produces a tender, crumbly cookie. Creamy Dulce de Lecheholds the cookies together. If you’re feeling ambitious, you can take these to the next level by rolling the edges of the finished cookies in flaked coconut or covering them in chocolate.

Special equipment: A plain or fluted 2-inch round cutter is needed to portion out the dough.

This recipe was featured as part of our Argentine Grilling menu.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup cornstarch
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, plus more as needed
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick), at room temperature
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar
• 2 large egg yolks
• 1 tablespoon pisco or brandy
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup Dulce de Leche, at room temperature
• Powdered sugar, for dusting

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Place the cornstarch, measured flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl and whisk briefly to combine; set aside.
2. Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed, stopping the mixer to scrape down the sides of the bowl once with a rubber spatula, until the mixture is light in color and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg yolks, pisco or brandy, and vanilla and mix until incorporated, about 30 seconds. Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl. On low speed, gradually add the reserved flour mixture and mix until just incorporated with no visible white pockets, about 30 seconds.
3. Turn the dough out onto a piece of plastic wrap, shape it into a smooth disk, and wrap it tightly. Place in the refrigerator until firm, at least 1 hour.
4. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 350°F and arrange a rack in the middle. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
5. Remove the dough from the refrigerator, unwrap it, and place it on a lightly floured work surface. Lightly flour the top of the dough. Roll to 1/4-inch thickness (the dough will crack but can be easily patched back together). Stamp out 24 rounds using a plain or fluted 2-inch round cutter, rerolling the dough as necessary until all of it is gone.
6. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheets, 12 per sheet and at least 1/2 inch apart. Bake 1 sheet at a time until the cookies are firm and pale golden on the bottom, about 12 to 14 minutes. (The cookies will remain pale on top.) Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
7. Flip half of the cookies upside down and gently spread about 2 teaspoons of the dulce de leche on each. Place a second cookie on top and gently press to create a sandwich. Dust generously with powdered sugar before serving.

New Picture from Elder Crandall

Elder Crandall lost his camera cord so he couldn't send us the pictures he had yesterday. Today he emailed me this picture and said, "I got one picture for now." 

What a fun surprise. We love getting pictures of Elder Crandall!