So you are in Texas?!!!

Email sent Monday 2 Aug 2010

Hola familia!

Wow it has been a crazy week. I guess I'll just start at the begining. (Melinda has never flown before. She called from Dallas and said that the descent made her fell sick, but as soon as she got off the plane, she was OK.) The plane ride from Dallas to McAllen. Ah! It was not good for me. Well, the begining was fine, but then we ran into thunder storms. We started our decent into McAllen, but then the pilot said that because of the clouds we would have to come back up and fly around for about 9 minutes. Decents make me sick to my stomach. So then he went back up, and then we flew around for like 45 more minutes, going up and down and making a big figure 8 around the border of mexico, we even crossed the rio grande into Mexico and went out over the gulf coast. The clouds were beautiful and I really wanted to look at them more but I couldn't because it was just making me so sick. I had to try to just stare straight ahead so I didn't lose it. But don't worry, I didn't lose it...just almost. But as soon as we hit the ground the feeling went away and I was fine. But then the second we stepped off the plane of course the wave of humidity hits. We felt all sticky and wet, you know, weird humidityness. And it was raining! love the rain, so I was glad then didn't just drop me straight off into 100 degree weather. So taht was good.

Seriously the clouds here are so cool! I can't even describe them. Maybe the veiw from the sky for the first time in my life changed my perspective, but also, I've never seen skies like this in Utah. It is really pretty. And McAllen isn't anything like I expected it to be. It is actually pretty. There are lots of palm trees and green stuff. It's not just dessert. It really is nice. So anyway, the trayners (Mission president and wife) picked us up at the airport and took us all to the church and then to their house where we all ate an awesome dinner and then did some stuff and then the sisters stayed the night there. It was great. But then the next day, after they fed us all breakfast, one by one he called us into his office and assigned us our areas and companions. My companion was actually at the house helping prepare the food. Her name is Sister Smith. And our area is Mission East, which is the city of McAllen, but in the Mission zone. Confusing, but ya, we are very close to the mission home and the mission office. And we live in an apartment with two other sisters that serve in the area next to ours.

Ok so let's see. That very day, Tuesday, we went to work. The first thing we did was go knock doors. My first contact was a man named Jesus. Funny huh?! I thought so. My fist lesson was also that day, half in English half in Spanish, with our investigator Filip. And my first meal with a family was at the Herrera's, an old Spanish member couple...and guess what we ate?! COW TONGUE! Oh my gosh. Way to drop me into the wierd foods. I ate cow tongue. And I could not understand a word that they were saying...except the work "lengua de res" so ya. It actually wasn't that bad, but I would never eat it normally. Ah!\

Ok so let's see, what do we do. Tocamos muchas puertas-We knock a lot of doors. All the time. It is hot and wwell we have a car, so we drive to a spot and "parkear" (I love the Tex-mex down here) and then walk around and knock and talk to anyone and everyone who is outside. And sometimes it randomly starts raining. It's great.

The Sanchez family: they are a recent convert family of about a month. THey are so amazing! This weekend the mom, dad and the oldest daughter is going up to the temple (like 4 hours away) to do baptisms. THey are awesome. When we had a lesson this week we asked the youngest daughter to pray. It was so cute. In her prayer she said, "Thank you for the mess we made." It was awesome!

Church: We cover two wards, one Spanish at 9 and then our English starts at 11 in the same building. Yesterday rigth before english ward started, they asked me to lead the music in sacrament and teach the gospel principles class. Welcome to the mission I guess. Prepare a lesson on the spot. Ya that was fun. :)

Spanish is hard. I can understand the missionaries who speak it, but the people...not so much. It is really hard. But it will get better.

Yes I got the bike. It has one flat tire. But we'll fix it maybe. But I don't think I'll need it here at all. We are never over our miles.

I love you and I'll try to send a letter. Again here we only have 30 minutes of email time.

Love,

Sister Petersen