Todos Somos Monos

Hey everyone!  Another week already!


Ok... actually I feel like a lot happened this week, so buckle up.  We'll see how long this email is.


First of all, imagine this... a Mexican missionary goes to the States for his mission.  He goes to a Mexican restaurant in his first area, wanting a little comfort food to remind of home.  He sees on the menu "Quesadilla".  As he is preparing his freshly learned English to order his food, he remembers that, in English, we pronounce certain letters differently.  He studies the menu carefully, until he confidantly stands in front of the expecting American employee, and orders a "Qu-e-saw-dil-a", carefully saying it the most American way he knows how.  Imagine the reaction of the american employee!  This mexican missionary couldn't even pronounce a spanish word right!  Imagine the mexican missionary and how foolish he feels!


I think y'all know where I'm going with this... that happens to me A LOT.  But its so weird.  They pronounce half the American names or brands the same, and the other half completely different.  I can never win.  It's okay though, my Spanish is improving tremendously.  I understand almost everyone and can have a full conversation, without someone realizing I didn't speak Spanish 3 months ago.  It's actually really cool to not put so much effort into talking. 


Still, there are some parts of spanish that are really hard.  I misunderstand people a lot more often.  For example, something my comp like to say while teaching our friends is "Todos somos humanos"  meaning "we are all human".  We make mistakes.  The only problem is I never heard the word "humanos".  The h is completely silent, so I just thought he was saying "manos".  But that doesn't make any sense because that means "we are all hands".  I determined that he might be saying "monos".  And I, thinking that "mono" probably meant "man", was prepared to say "todos somos monos" in our next lesson.  Luckily, I never actually said it.  I found out before too long that he was saying "humanos".  And it's a good thing, because "todos somos monos" means "we are all monkeys"!! 


This past week, I've seen the hand of God in my life more than ever before.  I honestly can't say I had realized how much God cares about me on a daily basis.  I can't count the times this week alone that I've seen little miracles.  After an especially hard day the day before, we left a lesson and I told my comp I was randomly craving popcorn.  We were headed to the store, so we looked for popcorn everywhere, but couldn't find it.  We left popcornless to our next lesson.  Half way though, the mom got up and went to the kitchen.  The next thing I heard was popping!  She made us popcorn, and she didn't know I was craving it!  Whether it's finding our friends in random places, or someone giving us random food I was just craving, God has been helping me through every moment this week.  Which has been awesome because I had a few tough moments.  I feel like that's been the big focus for me this week.  God truly cares about every little thing we go through.


At one point this week,  I was praying.  I was about to ask God to bless me with help for something, but I stopped myself and thought "It's not fair to ask Him for that.  God has blessed so much.  I'm not going to burden him with something so trivial."  But we are never burdens to God!  He loves us!  We can pray to Him for ANYTHING, and He loves when He can help us with it.  That doesn't mean you have to pray about which can of beans to buy in the store, but it does means that if something matters to us, it matters to God.  If something barely matters to us, it still matters to God and He would love to bless us!


Well, I could write more, but I gotta go and you're probably tired of reading.  Love y'all!


Élder Blacker


Missing In N Out
My $2.50 ice cream
Zone conference 




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