Cow Hoof

Hello everyone! Hope everyones enjoying and living up the summer of 2012! Sounds like your all having a blast! Hows the olympics? hows the US doing? Its crazy how big the oympics and world cup and all that stuff is here. so yesterday we were studying and apperently there was a olympic soccer game going on. idk who was playing ecuador or someone big becuse whoever it was they scored and the whole place went completly nuts. Every bus car moto was honkin horns people screamin. it was nuts and sweet but weird becuase we cant participate in it. Well things are going much better than last week. haha. now that its over. i think. i hope. i can tell ya i got my first bug. i wont say to much but its all part of the experience right. i just hope its a long time before i get hit again. but sounds like thats not to likily. Anyway yesterday was sweet. we actually had investigadors come to church. I was so happy. The people are so receptive here and willing to listen but the problem is acting and progressing. it is so hard to get them to do anything. They love listening but not doing. Anyway it made sunday which is surprisingly the hardest day for me (i blame it on having to wear suits sundays and having two wards of sitting without airconditioning or nada). But yesterday was great! Two of our investigadors came and they are both progressing. I really think we might have somthing. NEither of them are married :( as always. So babtizing is still far but they want to. Please pray for them. Please pray for these great people to have the desire to act. I know they can do it! I couldnt believe it when one of them went up and bared his testimony saying he loves the church and what it represents and wants to live it. There are great great people here. I know god is preparign them. I just have to do my job and help teach and lead them to the gospel. BUt I could realize use your help with through prayer. So whats new, oh ya, i had my first hoof of a cow! that was crazy! I dont think i need to say anything else. i ate cow hoof. haha. Anyway, i love this gospel! You know, the mission is very schedualed and at times you just want to jump our of your chair or whatever and just run around and scream and do somthing different but its all good! haha, i am learning so much! And one thing i will never get sick of is the oppertunity i have every day to share my testimony. The language is slow, but i am slowing developing and stronger testimony is spanish and i love sharing it. If thats all i can do for two years then so be it. haha. I know this gospel is true. I can see its power everyday! WEll i love you all so much! Dont you dare change while im gone! 
Love always, Elder Jacobsen 

Luz is Back!

Hey! Hope everyones doing great! I think some of the fams in hawaii. lucky ducks! I dont know if your there but i know its somtime around this time. Hope you are all having great summers! Enjoy it! Enjoy family! Theres nothing greater than family and love ones! Well we got the luz (electricity) back! haha. Finally! It wasnt to pretty here for almost a week. Its amazign how i went from always expecting hot showers in home and then i was humbled with just cold showers and now ive been humbled and just gratful to have a shower. haha. The bucket and bowl with dirty water wasnt to fun after the 2nd time. haha. But its all good. A growing experience. So with electricity back everyones goin nuts on olympics. Its so cool how the whole world is into it. It tortures me not being able to watch it. so keep me updated. expecially on the US.haha. im ecuadorian for a couple but american for life! Gotta represent! haha.Well not much to say this week. Lets just say ive been out of service for a little while. Wont say much more than that but i will say i am so thankfull for the wonderful blessing of the priesthood and the power of God through prayer and his love and his power. Through god, everything is possible. We just have to always be talking to him! And be worthy to talk to him. Well i love you all so much! Probly have more next week. Things are good. Got some great investigadors. Nothins gone through yet but were hoping to really make some progress this week. This sector is young and we really want to get things going. God bless all of you. I really hope you all know how much i love you! 
Elder Jacobsen 

No Luz

Hey everyone! Well im glad we found a cyber shack with electricity. The past 3 days weve been living sin luz! Which is electricy. It went from almost camping to literraly camping. haha. we use candles at night. Aparrently this happens quite abit. either the area isnt paying for it so they turn it off or its just a common power outage. it was the first and they tried to turn it back on and it exploded so they try to fix it tomorrow. For now no fridge, no light, no fans, no shower, no toilet, you name it. haha. its getting a little nasty. but i wont go into detail. i just hope i dont get sick. ive been talking to a bunch of elders and 4 out of the six gringos ive talked to got sick the first week and were in the hospital. and all them have been in the hospital at least once. so im glad ive passed the first week curse and im doing everything i can to stay heathly. thats i mission in itself. haha. So people cant find this place and i think i found out why. haha. its not legal. apprently the people just came here in built there little houses and when the government tried to kick em out they fought with machetis. The government just gave in but its not techinically a city. but im in the guayaquil pascuales area. its northwest of guayaquil gauyaquil. you might be able to find a place called bastion. its next to that. just a huge area of dirt green and hogares de cristo. Well, the langauge is the language. what to see other than im learning patience. im picking things up but i still cant understand them. everythings blended and ss are droped and everything is abreviated. when i ask them to slow down or speeak for simple they try for like 30 seconds and then back to normal. its not the funnest not being able to communicate and its got to me a little bit but i just remind myself that its all worth it and its going to come. God called me here for a reason. And im just going to work my hardest and let him do what he wants with me. im his for 2 years and im trusting him. Well i tried added some flavor to the food. i took thre warm milk, bannas, oreos, and mixed it up and had the elers try it. haha. it was not a normal milkshake but it wasnt to bad. and they loved it. No matter how many bannansas or water i drink its not enough. haha. ive woken up almost everynight this past week or so with cramps inmy legs. i walk like a 1000 miles eeryday and sweat 10x more than what i drink so ya. cramps is the result. hopfully my body just gets use to it. Well i have tons i can say but no time. The work is great! It is a lot but so great! WE have some great investigators. The people love the gospel here! Its great! I love feeling the spirit as we teach and see the light grow in the eyes. All we need is for them to get married and go to church. haha. Hey, i love you all so much. Everyday i realize more and more how lucky i am and how great i had it. I have the best family and friends in the world. I love you so much and miss you! 
Elder Jacobsen 

I Hate Cats

Hey everyone I might have to cut this one short because we are timed here and only have 30 min and when we came to email they started the clock and my latino forgot his email so we had to go back and get it and they won’t restart our time so sorry. But no worries. Its all good! So this week was a much different proselyting experience! We went to a new area pretty much downtown Lima area or closer to the city. Which means no mountains. Which was a nice change. Anyway we’re sitting in the chapel waiting to get our assignments and assigned a member and there’s this one member thats just jumpin around touching all the Americans and keeps saying “Snickers”. And I’m like as long as we don’t get him. Who gets him. Ya we do. Our teacher from the mtc took me over before we left and straight up told me that he is crazy and that we need to be careful. haha, I was like oh great! Anyway, this guy has no idea where anything is on our direction sheet and we waste like an hr and a half just walking and getting nowhere. I finally tried to say in spanish that it might be best if we just try teaching people because obviously the direction thing isn’t working. They didn’t really understand me but followed me as I went and tried talking to this older man. We ended up having a great talk and he said he loved Christ and thinks that our church is great and wants to hear more.I gave him a Book of Mormon. I forgot to get his name and address so I’m bummed about that and dont want to forget that again! Well lets just say I hate cats! There are hundreds of nasty cats roaming around and our member decides he wants to catch and pick up this crazy one! He brings it over grabs my arm and tries to have me hold it. Even if missionaries were allowed to I still wouldn’t have touched this thing. I kept saying no but he kept pulling me towards him and he didn’t get it so I finally grabbed his arm and ripped it off and said no puedo. I felt bad for being so harsh but I am not about to get some disease. Anyway, that was a little adrenaline boost but the real one was walking under this bridge tunnel thing. We were walking through and all the sudden like 10 dogs from each side come running in barking like crazy. These were mean looking dogs and for the first time on the mission I was actually scared scared. I kid you not, these dogs acted like they wanted to kill us. They were all around us but thanks to our crazy member he raised his hands and ran at them screaming and kicking them. It was nuts! haha. At that moment I loved him, because I booked it as fast as I could out of the tunnel! Well, its been a good week. Its crazy to think that this will be the last time I get to email from the mtc! Im gonna be in ECUADOR next week! I can’t believe it! My spanish has improved but when I go out on saturdays I get a reality check that I literally don’t know anything! So it wont be too big of a shock. Well sunday they picked two missionaries to give talks in sacrament meeting. The last 5 weeks they have always been latinos. And you guessed it, I would be the first gringo to speak. They call you to come up and just give a talk without preparation and when they called my name everyone was shocked because a gringo was going to talk. haha, it was funny. But I wont lie, I am grateful for the opportunity. I really needed practice and it was nice to just speak simple words from my heart! Thats all i can do because i dont know spanish but i have learned that simple words can be some of the most powerful! I prayed for help and god definitely blessed me with the spirit to be comfortable and speak. It was awesome! All the latinos shook my hand afterwards and said they understand. It keeps boosting me up because i realize i dont need to understand or speak spanish yet as long as i can share my testimony and share the gospel. I love the spirit. I got a letter this week from my best friend and she talked about the importance of having the spirit always. I really appreciated it because it is so true. The spirit is probably the most important thing here. It is actually! Without God and the spirit none of this would be possible. I am so thankful for God’s love and comfort and knowing that he is with us wherever we go. One of my favorite parts of lessons and starting of the restoration principle in preach my gospel is that God is our loving father in heaven and he loves us. It is so true.! This gospel is amazing! I’m so grateful to get to share it! One more week and its game time! Wish me luck! I love you all so much!

Elder Jacobsen

Pig Tongue

Hola! I hope everyone is doing great! I hear things that are just blowin my mind! Justine married, Chase engaged! everyone moving up in school or graduating!  This is crazy! But im happy that everything seems to be going great back home! Well, got new teachers this past week. One of them who is our night teacher is awesome and we call him papi and our morning teacher teaches us how to never teach! Im sure she is a great lady and i dont want her to sound evil but i straight up had a nightmare about her a few nights ago. She is so mean to us and treats us like 5 year olds. I think we have here to teach us patience so that we cant deal with much more a difficult person on the mission. she will be tough to beat. Its tough to feel the spirit with her so its good practice to learn how to keep the spirit with you when you have so many reasons not to. Anyway enough bout that. Not important. There are 3 Ecuadorians here and 2 of them are Black! I love it it and miss black people so much. And not even being bias, they are by far the coolest latinos here. Haha, so cool! Cant wait to go to ecuador! My companion Elder Quispe is such a nice guy! he couldnt harm a fly. He is a 1 year convert and hardly knows anything! Haha, so funny experience. We knows like no scriptures and asked me for a scripture on faith. I told him Alma 32. Anyway, were teaching a lesson later that night and its great. Im understanding and talking quite a bit. It was about the sacrement and the importance of it and i look at Elder Quispe to see if he wanted to share anything and he hands here the scriptures and i look and its Alma 32. In my head i was like no no no, what are you doing! Our investigador looked up at us like what in the world does this have to do with anything. Quispe looked at me and i realized he wanted me to explain and i just laughed and said faith is really important and continued on with attending chruch and what we were talking about. But after the lesson he was really excited that he used a scripture and i was happy. Hes trying and will be so great throughout the mission! It will be so great to see-talk to all these elders in a couple years and just see how much everyone has grown and this great gospel. I dont know if i mentioned this but i love Elder Holland so much! He is the most inspiration speaker ever. MTC devotionals in general are the greatest! Im determined to go the the mtc after the mish and steel all the recordings. They are some of the best talks i have ever heard in my life. Everytime i hear them i am on a huge spiritual high. I just want to mantain the spiritual high forever but its difficult. I try to remember to remember the spiritual highs when you have the daily lows. It has helped. Well i dont know much more to say. we didnt go proselyting this week because the new group came in... I guess ill finish with the finale of what i unintentionally ate last night. So they gave us the option of carne or this wierd looking meat and what i thought was ham in the middle. I decided to take a break from carne and go with the other thing. As im almost done eating it a latino elder across from me says "te gusta lengua". I like choked and was hoping i didnt hear him right. Becuase lengua is toungue. I asked around and found out that i had just had my first pig toungue. Hahaa! I wasnt horrible to be honest. Well I love you all so much! Thank you for all your love and support!

Elder Jacobsen

She Went!

Big week! So many things that i wish i had time to tell you! started off with an earth quake but nothing to big. Similar to CA ones! All the gringos were going nuts though. It was funny!  Well we went back to Rimac and we found out that Alejandrina went to church! I was so happy! And so was elder Flores! It gives you a boost and helps you realize that we really are here to help people! So i dont know if i told you but when we go in Rimac we have to go with a member. Our member is Edwuardo! He is the best! We went to his sisters house because she has been an inactive for three years and he said he felt the random urge to have us go talk to her. A couple people didnt answer the door so we had time to. Her name was Nadia and she is a single mother but has a boyfriend. Anyway, we went through an awesome lesson with her! I could tell she totally felt the spirit! I asked her if she would please go to church with here brother this past sunday. She said she definitly wants to go and wants to change her life. That she knows its time to trust in god. She bore her testimony and it just got better and better! I looked over at edwuardo and he had nothing but smiles on his face. I got so emotional and realized what was going on. I cant express how cool it is to see the gospel fill others with joy. I miss you all so much. But it is so worth it being a missionary and leaving my family for two years so others can be with their families for eternity. Anyway, edwardo asked if he could stop by his house. we said yes of course and he rushed in side and came out and gave us a tie and cookies. He said how thankful he was and that his sister said she would never go to church again but now she will. It was awesome! Oh so we were in a house teaching and this nice lady brought out a pitcher of water and mixed some juice mix into or somthing. Anyway before i realized i cant drink the water her she gave me a huge glass full and said drink. I couldnt say no. Haha. I was like oh no. My only choice was to pray like crazy that i wouldnt die from it. I might have over reacted because im alive and doing great! Ive just heared some stories! Anyway Elder flores and all the latinos left! It was the hardest part of the mission so far! I never thought i would get so attached in 3 weeks but i truley came to love all those guys! Me and elder flores were saying our last companionship prayer togeather the night before he left and when i finished he just started balling. It was crazy! We hugged for like 5 minutes! Im gonna miss him and all the other latinos! They will be great! Got my new companion last night! Elder Quispe. Dont know him to well but he seems like a nice guy. well today was awesome! Other than waking up. I jump of my bunk into 2 inches of water. One of the new elders messed up a washer and it had been leaking all night. The whole hallway and everything is flooded. But besides that we went on a tour today with president cardon! It was sweet! Saw the city of lima! And we went to a little market and there was a section for jerseys. Me elder magil, randall, and christiansen looked all over for a ecuador jersey but they dont like ecuador over here to much! Haha, there like rivals. we checked one last rack and found some! Stoked! Se we got a peru jersey and ecuador cuz as much as were loving Peru, we gotta represent Ecuador somtimes. haha. Anyway, Im loving it here! The spirit is strong, people are great, work is hard, tons to learn, the gospel is true! Im loving it and hope everyone is doing great back home! starting next week please send anything to my mission home in ecuador. Thanks everyone! Hope to hear from you all soon! I have the best family and friends in the world!

Loving Peru

Hey everyone! I hope everyone is doing well back home! Hope to hear from all of you through mail!  I made it through the first week of the Peru CCM (mtc)! It has been awesome! Where to start! I will probly only be able to say like a tenth of what i want to but oh well. ill start with the food. It is not to bad at all! In fact im really enjoying itd! Definitly different thats for sure! And definitly some things i do not need to try again. and this is only in the mtc. haha. out in the field is going to be a whole new level. Lots of fruit and lots of rice! And then lots of other stuff that i have no idea whats it is called. but its honesty not bad! Some of the worst stuff to eat is the things that is "american" food. i think they try to do it for the americans and it is not what they were trying to make. but its all good! Oh and the coolest thing ever! 845 every night is FRUIT TIME! its awesome! Coolest thing ever. we all run around yelling tiempo de fruit and its great! I am definitly planning on making that a tradition in my life! well lets just say that every north american here has gotten sick! EVERY! more than half have got whats called the double dragon. its when you clean your body out through both ends at the same time if you know what i mean. wont say any more. haha. luckily for me i havnt had that. my stomach has been good to me. but i have had some crazy headaches and a runny and stuffed head all week. Oh and ive already 5 pounds. not good! Soccer is awesome! Got the first goal last thursday for our zone and all the latinos went nuts. Its way competative and way fun! It hit me when i was playing one day that i am in Peru playing soccer. I just looked around and took it in. It was awesome! Oh and humor is not the same here. At all! haha. for example. when you stop them from scoring and say no en mi casa or not in my house they just look at you like what the heck are you saying. but the latinos natives are awesome! I already love them! They are so patient with us and always try to help us! Pretty much every other sentence we say the just laugh at us. They laugh at us probly a thousand times a day for things we say or do. its hilarious. Well the language is the language. It is easy to get down but i just have to tell myself it will come. poco a poco. I pray every night that i will get it. Grammer is starting to make a little more sense. But it is still impossible to understand what there saying (they talk a hundred miles per hour). I get like one word, try to translate it, and by that time theyve said like 20 more. haha. its crazy! But i know god will help me, and some day it will come. Just like the provo mtc, the spirit is way strong here! I love it. In sacrament meeting (fast sunday last sunder here) we couldnt understand nada but when the latinos shared their testimonies you can feel the spirit so strong. You knew that they knew the gospel is true. It doesnt matter what language or if you cant understand the language. They gospel of Jesus Christ will still be true and have the spirit with it wherever you go! I love it! I love this place! Ecuador has high expectations now. haha. There is a lot of rules here. You thought provo was strict, this is even stricter. But all for good reasons. we cant take pictures except on Pdays for a couple hours so that stinks but today is pday and has been awesome. This morning we took a little bus (like 30 people crammed into like a 10 person bus!) haha. and went to the Lima Temple. It was great! Then we were allowed to go do some shoppin near the temple. It was awesome! It was the first bit of freedom! Haha. I wish we didnt have a time limit because i wanted to just go up to people and talk to them about the gospel. I can hardly speak but ive been working on my testimony and cant wait to go share it and share the gospel. And saturday we get to go out! Cant wait! This gospel is so true and so great! If i can feel the love of my father in heaven and the spirit this strong in a language and place i dont understand then this gospel of Christ cannot be denied. I love it! Wish i could talk for another 2 hours but cant. Love you all! God Bless!

Elder Jacobsen