The Spirit of God like a fire is burning!

Dear Everyone,

This week we have just been on fire. We have been contacting referrals from members, we have been teaching tons of people, just running to and from visits. We´ve been super busy but in a good way. Camila is getting baptized this Saturday and she asked me to baptized her! Well, the only thing standing in the way is she wants a definite answer about the Book of Mormon. She loves the book and can´t put it down and it makes her feel peace and very good inside , but she wants God to specifically tell her if it´s true or not. That´s alright though. I have a feeling it´s coming soon. We have a lot of good things happening here in Sabadell and I´m really excited for this next week. Today we went to Barcelona with the Hermanas (sister missionaries) along with a recent convert of theirs and a random atheist guy who decided to come along. It was fun. I got to see this huge street market that´s super famous and also this huge statue to Christopher Columbus situated in the very port which he landed in on his return from the New World. Then we ate at Hard Rock Cafe. It´s a little pricy but the food was great, and it was a fun atmosphere. Well, I´ll see you all soon.

Love Élder Coleman

The benefits of being a missionary--skipping lines!

Dear Everyone,

Today we went to the Sagrada Familia. A huge and very famous cathedral in Barcelona. It was the coolest thing ever because it´s a little pricy and there´s a huge wait to get in. But my companion had heard that we could go to the information booth and present ourselves as a religious group and get in for free. So we did that and after a few people telling us no we couldn´t, this one guy took us in and not only did we get in for free, but we skipped the whole line. If we had just bought tickets, we would have had to wait 6 hours before we could go in. It is really cool architecture, all done by Gaudí who is pretty famous as an architect. Also this week, we have been working with an amazing young woman who has read up to Jacob in just a week and a half. We´re hoping that she can get baptized before I leave. Her name is Camila. She´s super intelligent and very spiritual. We´re just waiting for her to get an answer. She asks every day. Well, that´s about it for this week. I´ll see you guys soon.

Élder Coleman

Short, sweet, to the point.

Dear Everyone,

Today I went to Barcelona and just looked around. That´s what we did for preparation day today. It´s a very touristy city. Here in Sabadell we have been having success. We met this girl who is great. She read all the way up to 2 Nephi 2. It´s super great. She couldn´t come to church because of her mom, but we´re working on it. I don´t have a ton of time, so I have to leave it there. Until next week!

Elder Coleman

Super, super, super!

Dear Everyone,
This week has been hot and difficult. It´s rough going to a new area and knowing you only have 5 weeks left and then you´re leaving. Also here in Sabadell we do a lot of  traveling on buses and a lot of walking. It´s great here though. I love my companion and the people I have met so far. There are 2 wards here in Sabadell and the church is super far away from everything so that´s a bit of a challenge. We´re working super hard here. We had interviews with the new mission president, he´s super great. I don´t know what else to say, so just have a great week everyone.

Élder Coleman

That's chocolate on the seat of your pants, right? Right?

Dear Everyone,

Well, I can´t believe it. I got transferred. I´m now in Sabadell, which is near Barcelona. I thought I was going to end my mission in Gandía because I only have 1 transfer (6 weeks) left. Well, it looks like I will be spending my last transfer in a brand-new area. My new companion is Elder Ganowsky. He´s from Saint George Utah, even though his name might make him sound Russian. I was really sad to leave Gandía, and some people there were also a bit sad. It totally caught me by surprise. While on the train from Valencia to Barcelona, a missionary offered me chocolate and I took it and kind of put it to the side. Turns out I ended up sitting on it the whole 4 hours up there and my brand new suit pants are terribly stained. I´m sure dry cleaning will fix it though. Right? Our new apartment is really nice and super spacious, especially since there are just 2 of us. I haven´t met the ward yet, but I hope I can come to know and love everyone in 6 weeks. It is super warm here, 36º C. At least it´s not as humid as Gandía though. Well, I´ll keep you all updated.

Love, Élder Coleman

I wonder....

Dear Everyone,

This week has been incredibly hot. Well the heat is in the mid 30s, so it's nothing exaggerated, but the humidity just makes you sweat all the time. When we're sleeping, when we're studying, even more when we're out on the street. The worst for me is the collar of my shirt. But we've been door knocking in spite of it all and this week we found a middle aged man named Juan who let us in while we were knocking doors and let us teach him. He accepted a Book of Mormon and when we went back he said that he'd been reading it and it was helping him in his life. This week was also the last week of President and Sister Pace in Spain. On the 30th, President and Sister Dayton will come to replace them. Yesterday and Saturday was our stake conference and it was really good. It was a little bit stressful trying to get rides organized for everyone to Valencia. It was great though. Even our recent convert brought her friend and she seemed to like it. There's a fair amount of recent converts who love to invite people to things and I wonder why the people who've been members their whole lives don't seem to do it as much. I love you all, hope you have a great week.

Love Élder Coleman 

 (Since Preston didn't tell me what this photo was, I'm going to make one up)  This beautiful pool and view is from the backyard of the Prince of Spain.  He's only the 4th child, so not very high in the line of inheritance.  So it's not a palace, but nice all the same.

Yo quiero Taco Bell!

Boredom becomes a blessing!

Dear Everyone,
This week we had a fairly good week. On Tuesday we took a recent
convert out with us to go knock doors. She enjoyed accompanying us but
got a little bit bored and decided to call up her friend to meet with
us right then. It was great. Her friend was actually super interested
and we're going to meet with her again this week because she finishes
school. This week we also said goodbye to a girl who is going on her
mission to Malaga and leaves tomorrow. It's interesting. I've been
here since January in Gandia and I've seen people make a lot of
changes in their lives. So far I've seen two of our YSA here start
their mission papers, get their calls and leave on their missions. It
keeps getting hotter and hotter here and the humidity just keeps
getting worse. How everyone here survives it is by going to the beach
frequently. I love Gandia though. The people here are the best. This
week we have stake conference in Valencia on Saturday and Sunday, and
I'm excited for it.

Adios to the current Mission Presidente!

Dear Everyone,

This week we're going to Valencia for preparation day. President and

Sister Pace are ending their missionary service and going home at the

end of this month. We're getting together as a zone in Valencia and

signing a flag as a gift for the Paces. This week in Gandia we've been

knocking doors. We found a Romanian lady who didn't speak any Spanish

and she was about to shut the door on us when my companion pulled out

a pass along card with a picture of Jesus on it and our number on the

back. She saw the picture and got super excited. She started going off

in Romanian and somehow I understood a fair amount of what she was

saying. We're going to go back later this week, after she has a knee

surgery, with a member who is Romanian and has her mission call. The

other day we also had a very Catholic woman sing to us in a door. She

was probably one of the nicest people I've met in a long time. It's

getting pretty warm here but the thing that kills is the high

humidity. We're having a lot of fun though.

IPads, bloody hands, and a party in the parking lot!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been interesting. We got our iPads this week. They really can't do much right now though. Apparently in the future they will roll out Facebook but as of right now, it's just for teaching and studying. It's useful because we can just go to the church to email instead of a cyber cafe. Also we can share Mormon Messages with people in lessons and our bags weigh a lot less without our whole set of scriptures. I still prefer studying with the paper scriptures though. The other day we had one of the most interesting days of my mission. We started out the day doing planning all morning while people from our apartment's insurance switched out our bathtub which had been leaking. When we could leave, we visited a less active who I had never met. He answered the door in his stained underwear and had slicked over, very greasy, hair. He also had very very large swollen legs that were proportionally impossible and very scabbed over.  We sat down and asked a few things about how he joined the church and then we started to read the Book of Mormon with him. As we were reading, he began to pick at his legs and blood just trickles down his leg. When we got up to leave, I didn't want to shake his blood stained hands but was kind of forced to. We both ran straight to the church and washed ourselves thoroughly. Afterwards there was a young woman in the ward who was setting up a party for a friend who was leaving to her country. We had a lesson with a recent convert and when we came out, there were tons of adolescent kids dancing in the parking lot with a DJ and a laser show and everything. Also just outside the parking lot there were a whole bunch of kids just smoking. We called the bishop and he told us to give the key to the 15 year old young woman, who was the only member there, and that she'd lock up and give us the key the next day. It was a weird day.

Well I'll talk to you all next week. Love you

Elder Coleman

New companion, helpful members, and the case of the missing gumball machine.

Dear Everyone,

I got a new companion. His name is Elder Stratton, he is from Orem Utah and he is really really tall. He is 2 metres tall. He´s really good at golf and has a huge family. So far we haven´t met with a lot of people from the ward yet, so he´s still a little lost. We´re working on knocking doors in our area to find new people to teach. So this week, a member of the ward who had been serving in the Spain Málaga mission just finished his mission and came home this week. He is super keen on helping us all the time. Also speaking of members helping us, we were in a lesson and I got 2 missed calls from Gloria, the wife of recently-baptized Antonio who live out in Ontinyent. Seeing as she doesn´t have a lot of minutes with which to call, I figured it was an emergency and called her right back after the lesson finished. Turns out it wasn´t an emergency, she was just super excited because she had given a Book of Mormon to a friend. When we met with them this Saturday, she said she has always just kind of slid by whenever people talk about missionary work. She said she had always gone to church, to activities, on temple trips, and had done everything she was "supposed to do" in the Church, but she had never felt so happy as when she began to share the Gospel with first her husband and now her friends. Next thing we know, we´re going to have a branch out there. Well, maybe a while down the road. I´m really excited to be here in Gandía with Elder Stratton. Oh, something amusing. We were talking with people in the streets the other day and we see 2 homelss-looking guys come down the street with a gumball machine, you know, the kind that is common in the front of stores. Next thing we know, an undercover police officer comes running around the corner and begins to detain them, even though they were putting up a fuss. It´s not something you see all the time. Well, I love you all.

Élder Coleman

The work and the weather: Hot, hot, hot!

Dear Everyone,

My companion, Elder Bartschi went home yesterday. I´m still here in Gandía. My new companion is Elder Stratton. I´ve never met him, but I´ve seen him and he´s really tall. Also, I know he´s from Utah. We´re going up to Valencia today to go pick him up. We´re working a lot here with the youth and young single adults and we´re constantly finding people to bring to teach. All the young people here are really involved in missionary work, always inviting and introducing their friends to us. The other day we had a BBQ with the young men and women in the ward and they invited about 10 people in total. We reinvited them again to come play basketball with us the next day and a few showed up. Now one is progessing towards baptism. It´s so much more effective when members invite their friends. It´s super warm here in Gandía, but the work is just taking off. I think next week we´re going to organize a big hike for investigators and recent converts. It should be fun. Well that´s it for this week.

Élder Coleman 

What's hot and cold and busy all over?

Dear Everyone,

This week we had a baptism! Erika got baptized Saturday at 10am in freezing cold water. I thought I was going to die when I got into the water. She is probably one of the biggest miracle stories that I´ve seen in my mission. Just how she changed so drastically was shocking for me. Also Antonio and Gloria, the man who just got baptized a few weeks ago and his wife, are doing missionary work in their isolated town. They have the vision that one day they can have a branch there. My companion is a little sad because this is his last week in the mission. It´s not very likely that they change me from Gandía because someone needs to stay and show someone else the area, but you never know. I hope to stay and work with the friends of our converts. For example, Erika has been inviting friends to church and activities. It was super hot this last week. For example, at one point on Thursday is was so hot that the wind felt like someone was blowing a heater in your face. I heard from members that it got up to 47º C. Thankfully it´s cooled down a little bit.

Élder Coleman

More than one miracle....

Dear Everyone,

This week we´re having a miracle baptism. There´s been this girl that we´ve been working with for a while. When she first came to church, she was interested but didn´t want to change anything. She loved parties and the wild life. Everyone who knew her said she wasn´t going to change. When she started keeping small commitments like reading the Book of Mormon and praying, she really felt something which gave her the push to give up her bad habits and has really flipped her life around. But believe me, it was not an easy process. We´ve been at it since February. At one point she said she would be baptized in a river, but the mission president said no to that. Finally this week she said that she wants to be baptized this Saturday and doesn´t even care that it´s not going to be in a river. She did request that the water be ice cold, so I guess we´ll have to honour that request since I feel bad saying no to the river. Besides that, our week´s been pretty quiet. The iPad conference in Barcelona was not what I expected it to be at all. First of all, they don´t have the iPads yet. They´ll give them to us as soon as they get them in the mail. The just gave us training on the iPads. But they also talked about becoming different missionaries and the kind of people that we want to be in the future. They mentioned that specifically with electronic devices that many of us before the mission would spend hours and hours sucked into devices and not really accomplish anything. He mentioned that when we get the iPads, but also after our missions, that we should have a clear purpose everytime we pick up an electronic device, and that if we don´t have a clear purpose, then we should put it down until we have one. I found it really enlightening even though it´s very likely that I won´t get an iPad seeing as I´m going home soon.

Well, Love you all

Élder Coleman

How do you say iPads in Spanish?

Dear Everyone,

This week I don´t really have any time at all. We are going to Barcelona today. The whole mission is going to a special conferece. That means we need to cut our preparation day short in order to catch the train to Valencia and then another train to Barcelona, thus the rush. In this conference, the area presidency will be there and the purpose is to train us to use iPads. They offically approved the 3 missions in Spain as the first Spanish-speaking missions in the world to use iPads. We won´t be getting them today, but they will be given out as soon as they arrive in the mail. I´m sure this conference is going to be exciting, but I´m not too happy about losing 2 whole days to travel all the way up to Barcelona and back. I´ll try to take pictures for you all.

Love, Élder Coleman

Happiness is....seeing other people achieve their happiness!

Dear Everyone,

On Saturday we had a baptism! Antonio was baptized and it was a challenge to make it happen, but we did it. He and his wife live 40 minutes away in car and to get someone to drive us is a hassel. We ended up calling the entire ward the day before because the bishop told us he´d figure everything out and didn´t end up finding anyone. We finally got a British couple who had just moved into the ward to lend us a hand and pick Antonio and Gloria up for their baptism. Antonio has an impediment where one leg is shorter than the other and he doesn´t have much control of the shorter leg, so both me and my companion had to be in the font to help him. Gloria was so happy for her husband and now they have the goal to go the temple and be sealed in as soon as they can. This week as I kind of mentioned before, a British couple moved into the ward with plans to retire here. We spent a few hours helping them move their things and got invited over to eat with them on Wednesday. It´s completely different teaching and associating with people who speak English. They seem super excited to help us out even though they don´t know the language.

Elder Coleman

Another baptism coming up!

Dear Everyone,

We went out to visit Antonio and Gloria this week and Antonio is going to be baptized this week! He was a little confused at first when we invited him a while ago, but it´s because he thought he had to wait a year to be baptized. When he found out it was just the beginning, he got super excited and now he´s going to be baptized this Saturday. Both of them are very excited. Also, we´ve been helping a British couple that moved into the ward to unload all their stuff and then get it organized in their house. I didn´t know how many people in our ward speak English until they came and started talking to everyone. So far, we´re still doing the same thing every day. We just go and knock doors all day trying to find more people to teach. It isn´t the most interesting thing in the world, but I enjoy talking to the people. But basically, this week has been pretty uninteresting, besides the fact that it´s roasting hot. Next week I´ll write a lot more and send pictures of our baptism.

Élder Coleman

Um, time warp! Forgot to post this!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been interesting. Elder Stolk, one of my best friends on the mission just ended his mission yesterday. I´m still here in Gandía and I feel like I´m going to be for a while. Yesterday I went on the longest hike of my life with a member because we thought we could meet a few of his friends that are in this hiking club. We had some good discussions, but the hike lasted 5 hours and was mostly vertical. Also we went out to Ontinyent again to teach Antonio and Gloria. We had a less active take us out there. He is probably the craziest man I´ve ever met. Also he kept falling asleep at the wheel so I had to try to get him to talk everytime he´d nod off. As a ward activity we tried to do something I´d done before. We invited everyone to come watch the Work and the Glory in the church on Sunday afternoon and it was a hit. They all got into it and so we´re going to watch the next one next week. Well I don´t have a lot of time. I would love to write more but it´ll have to be next week. Love you all.

Élder Coleman

Practice makes pancakes!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been all about parties. There have been processions around the whole town for Semana Santa which means "Holy Week". They celebrate the whole week leading up to Christ´s death and resurrection. To be honest some of the processions are kind of dark and a little scary. I´m pretty sure they all do it because of tradition because everyone we stop says they don´t believe in God. Well, a fair amount. Diego, our Uruguayan friend didn´t come to General Conference so he´s not getting baptized on the 11th, but he´s super great and he still wants to make the step. We had interviews this week with President Pace and they were the best interviews I´d had ever. Other than that, it´s been kind of a weird week. Our area is a little bit dead so we´ve been knocking all the doors in the whole area. We made a plan to knock all the streets, every single door. I loved General Conference because I got an answer to the questions I had, specifically what we were going to do with our area. I know we will see miracles. Also a side note for this week. I made pancakes for a member and an investigator and they came out not too bad. There was definitely room for improvement though. I´m attaching pictures of the baptisms that happened on the 28th.

A high of 39 degrees Celsius--wait, that's a fever!

Dear Everyone,

I´m already kicking myself for not bringing my camera to the place where I email. This week has been one of the best. It started out really terrible though. I had the worst sore throat in the world and a fever of 39º. I tried to sleep it off, but I couldn´t even sleep because every time I got close, I swallowed and woke myself up. I got fed up and called the office and told them I thought it was strep throat, so they told me to get myself to Valencia as soon as possible. I dragged my poor companion all the way to the hospital in Valencia, which is an hour and a half train ride plus a 20 minute metro ride plus walking a fair amount in the pouring rain to get to this hospital. I ended up sitting in the emergency room for a while feeling awful. I looked up and saw on the TV the news was talking about a plane that crashed in France and I figured I don´t have it that bad. When they finally looked at me, they said it was pharyngitis which is the family of diseases that includes strep throat. They prescribed antibiotics and on our way home, even though it was super super late, I made my companion stop at a 24 hour pharmacy and we got my antibiotics. I took them that night and boom! the next morning I was perfectly fine. This Saturday had to be one of the best days ever. We had 3 baptisms here and also Diego, our Uruguayan investigator came to the baptism, as well as Antonio and Gloria, the couple that live in Ontinyent where she´s a member and he isn´t. It took a lot of planning to get them there, but they came! Antonio and Gloria also came to church the next day. They were so excited and so grateful. Diego is already going around telling people he´s getting baptized on the 11th. We´re trying to plan so Antonio can get baptized on the 18th. The only thing that worries me is transfers (changes) are coming up on the 14th of April and I might be going. I really want to stay here now that things are really going well. Well that´s all for this week. ¡Os deseo felices pascuas y una feliz semana santa! Recordad que Jesucristo es la razón por la que celebramos estas fechas. Os quiero! I´ll send photos for sure next time.

Élder Coleman

Sore Throat Sunday?

Dear Everyone,

So I´ve been sick. On Saturday, I was starting to feel a little bit under the weather and then I just woke up on Sunday with a fever of 103 and the sorest throat in the world. I´ll tell you right now, that´s probably the worst combo, because when you have a fever you just want to sleep but then every time you swallow, you wake yourself up because of the pain. It sucked. I´m doing better today, but I´m still super out of it. This week we had a fair amount of success. We´re working with this guy named Diego who is really interested. Also, we got a referral of someone who was looking to meet with us a little while ago. We went to out to visit her a few weeks ago, I don´t remember if I wrote about it or not. But basically the wife is a member from Mexico who moved to a tiny town in Spain. The husband´s not a member but wants to be. We went to visit them for the 2nd time on Saturday after already talking to the bishop about their situation and everything and they agreed to make the sacrifice to take a 3 hour train ride, stay overnight at a member´s house, go to church on Sunday, and then go back on another 3 hour train ride. Their faith really impressed me. I´m really glad the fallas (the big party here in the community of Valencia) are over. They were really cool though. We got to see a few of them burn and they are super impressive. I´ll send pictures.

Élder Coleman 

Fallas and fireworks!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been a continuous party. It´s the week of Fallas and it´s crazy. There are everywhere, all the time, kids of all ages lighting firecrackers and throwing them all over the place. There are large figures all over the streets that people have spent a lot of time making throughout the year. They all have some sort of political significance. They all get burned however on the 19th. It´s part of the tradition. As for the work here in Gandía, it´s been slow this week. We did find a really great guy named Diego, who is excited to be baptized on the 28th of this month. He´s from Uruguay and he´s already good friends with all the young single adults in the ward. He loves learning and we´re really excited for him. Today we´re going to Valencia to greet a missionary from Gandía returning from his mission in Athens Greece. He´s going to be a huge strength to the ward.

What do you do when you're stuck inside? Watch movies, of course!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been kind of slow. Elder Carter has been violently ill all week and we all took turns staying inside so that we could get  to visits in both areas. So I spent a fair amount of time inside with Elder Carter. I watched Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration a couple times and the DVD they made with all the Bible videos on it. We were going to help a lady cut down a palm tree, but that got put off until next week. Today we are going to visit with a woman who is really interested in learning about us, she keeps asking us to come over. I´m excited to see how it goes. Today we are going with a few members to a mountain to hike it and eat food, picnic style afterwards. It should be fun.

Elder Coleman

Pop goes the missionary, fireworks, eardrums!

Dear Everyone,

Today has been crazy. I´m currently in Valencia. My companion Elder Arriarán finished his mission and is on his way home. We have eaten so much in this past week, saying goodbye to people, I thought I was going to die. My new companion Elder Bartschi gets here tonight (that´s why I´m in Valencia, to pick him up). The crazy thing is, he only has one transfer (6 weeks) left, so I´m going to be finishing off 2 missionaries in a row. The last time was stressful enough, but I´ll survive. I already kind of know him; he´s from Arizona and he´s super interesting so I won´t be bored this transfer. While we were in Valencia this morning dropping off our old companions, Elder Stolk and I got pulled into a crowd of hundreds of people. There was a large police barricade and everything. Then fireworks started going off, but they were so loud I thought I was going to go deaf. It was so loud you could feel each blast on your face. It´s all part of this huge celebration here in the Valencian community called "fallas" (pronounced kind of like figh-yas). There are other things they do on other days. In a couple weeks, there are a bunch of bull fights and I´m going to see if we can go to one. In all the community, including Gandía, there is a large parade of very detailed, well made floats that get set on fire at midnight. We´ll see if we can get some members to video it for us. 

Love, Élder Coleman

No Really, I Couldn't Eat Another Bite!

Dear Everyone,

This week we didn´t eat in our apartment even once. My companion is going home. He´s finished his 2 years as of next Monday and we have been meeting with all the members for lunch, saying goodbye and all that. I love getting to know all the members and their stories. For example, there is a member here from Holland who married a woman from Bolivia and they have a daughter who just got married and is living in the US. That´s what I love about the mission, everyone has their stories. This week we got a referral from the office for a woman who lived in a far away little town. We called her and turns out she´s a member from Mexico and is married to man who is not a member (not quite sure where he´s from but I don´t think Spanish is his first language). She wanted us to go teach him because she had been teaching him out of the Gospel Principles book for the 2 years they have been married and she said she has been praying every day that the missionaries could visit them so that her and her husband can acheive their goal of being sealed together in the temple one day. The problem is she lives far away in a place called Ontinyent and doesn´t have any money to get to church. Also, even though she pertains to our ward, it seems the closest ward is in Alcoi, which belongs to a whole different mission. I hope to be able to help these people, but I am super grateful to be able to answer this faithful woman´s prayers. Well, that´s pretty much all that I can think of that happened this week. I love you all.

Élder Coleman

Spring cleaning....a boat?

Everyone,

This week was a fun week. On Tuesday I translated for a member in the ward who is an indexing family history missionary. I translated a meeting with people from all over Europe and it was super interesting. Indexing is a really interesting thing, and it´s interesting to see all the work put into it. Also this week we cleaned a boat. A member has a really nice sailboat that had beds inside and a small kitchen, some couches and tvs and stuff. We helped him clean it, vacuum out the inside and hose off the outside, but it was a super cool boat. Today we ate something called calçots which are a Catalan dish. It´s roasted green onion dipped in a special sauce made just for it. I really don´t have a lot of time this week, but I´ll tell you more next week. 

Love Elder Coleman

A cold Canadian?

Dear Everyone,

This week we have been all over the place. Gandía continues to be a frozen wasteland. Everyone asks me why I´m not already used to the cold, being from Canada and all, but I always tell them that it´s the humidity that gets me. This week we went to Valencia on Tuesday and Wednesday for a special training. It was good, we learned a lot and we got to watch Meet the Mormons, a great movie that the church made. It was in theatres in the US a little while ago. This week we also had to say goodbye to 2 of our recent converts who moved back to Bolivia to study and find a better life. So this week´s been full of goodbyes and farewell parties in the church. Gandía is a lot smaller than Bilbao and there aren´t very many people in the street so we´ve been working with our recent converts and meeting with their friends. We were working with a guy who was really great. His name is Adrian, but he is in Galicia now and we don´t know when he´s coming back. Today we went with a member to a bar (here they´re more like cafes with a bar in them) and we had a great Spanish meal and played pool and foosball to finish it off. 

Élder Coleman

A baptism, beds, and BBQ!

Dear Everyone, 

This week, we had a baptism! Her name is Zoila (pronouced Thoyla), she is from Spain and she is incredible. She was super prepared, she´d been living with a member and had tons of friends that are members and she already knew a lot about the church. Her conversion story is amazing, she keeled down to pray and before the prayer was over, she had her answer. Her baptism went super well. Today the mission president and his wife brought us beds, because we had been sleeping on mattresses on the ground, so we´re excited for that. Another exciting thing is tomorrow we have a conference that lasts 2 days in Valencia. On Wednesday, they are going to show us Meet the Mormons, a movie that the church came out with a little while ago that I haven´t seen yet, so I´m excited for that. It´s going to be in Spanish, so I wonder if that means we can get a copy of it to show investigators. Today we also went on a hike to the top of a mountain and we could see everything for kilometres. Then we went to a member´s house, had BBQ in their backyard and watched "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" in their home theatre. They have a super super nice house for Spain, with a large yard and a pool, a brick BBQ and nice views. All in all, it´s been a good day. Also, we went to a Herbalife centre a couple days ago (long story, but basically because an investigator roped us into it) and we got health tested. I don´t know what the science is behind it, but they weigh you and do a few calculations to tell you how you are health wise. Turns out that not only am I perfectly healthy in that I have no fat, but I also have enough water in my system, something that the guy said he´s never seen. Everyone always lacks a ton of water he said. It was interesting but then he tried to sell us some smoothies that would help us (me to gain muscle and my companion to lose weight). They´re super pricy so we said no, but it was an interesting experience.

Élder Coleman

Habla Ingles?

Dear Everyone,

Well Gandía is starting to warm up. When I got here it was freezing, but it´s getting better now. My companion and I get along well enough, although it´s interesting to go all day without speaking any English. The last time I had a Spanish speaking companion was about a year ago, so it´s been a while. A lot of people here think I´m Spanish though when they first meet me. I´m not perfect or anything, but the key to making people think you speak a language perfectly is getting really good at copying the accent. If you have a good accent, it really doesn´t matter if you know a lot of fancy words. Something interesting about Gandía, there is a super famous TV show filmed here called Gandía Shore, it´s based 100% on Jersey Shore and it´s famous throughout all of Spain. Today the bishop and his wife, along with the first counselor and his wife took all 6 of us missionaries to a cool waterfall/natural pool type thing. Afterwards, we all went to some caves where the Arabs hid out during the war between Spain and the Moors (the arabs that had taken over most of Spain). It was super interesting. Well, take care everyone. Until next week.

Love Élder Coleman

Go South, young man, go South!

Dear Everyone,

Well, they transferred me. I´m no longer in Bilbao. Now I´m in Gandía and I´m loving it. It´s the furthest south our mission goes, so everyone told me it was going to be hot, but since I´ve been here it´s been freezing cold. Granted, it´s January still. My companion is Elder Arriarán, he´s from Cochabamba Bolivia. I already knew him from living in the same apartment in Tarragona, and he´s great. The ward here, from what I´ve seen is super good and we have a great relationship with everyone. This transfer, they just put 2 sister missionaries here in Gandía, when before there were only 4 elders. Now there are 6 missionaries, which is great, but they kind of jumped the gun a little bit. The sisters are staying in a hotel because they don´t have an apartment and they also don´t have a phone yet. It´s going to be super hard for them, but also a great opportunity as well. I know we´re doing great. We already have one girl who is going to be baptized at the end of this month. Also if you notice, I´m writing on a Thursday and it´s because I got here Tuesday late at night and all of yesterday was super packed. I barely have enough time to write today, I´m going to have to cut it short. We just have so much stuff to do here and so many lessons that we teach, it´s hard to find room. I´m loving it. Well, next week I´ll tell you how things are here.

Love, Élder Coleman 

Guggenheim-meh?

Dear Everyone,

This week has been pretty normal. Last preparation day we went to the Guggenheim museum, which is a super famous museum here. It was kind of meh. I liked it and all, it was just kind of weird. There was one room that rotated through videos projected on the walls of 5 people about my age just dancing in a white background for like 10 minutes each. Also there was a whole room just painted head to toe with multiple multi-coloured triangles. Modern art sometimes goes right over my head. We´ve been talking with tons of people this week. It´s weird because some days there are lots of people in the streets and some days barely any. We´re just looking for some solid people to teach. This week we were eating at McDonalds because they have gluten-free buns that my companion can eat because he´s celiac. As we were eating our food, a man comes up to us and says in English "I´m not interested in becoming a Mormon, but I sure would love to speak some English". Turns out his name´s Simon and he´s a 30 year old guy from London who knew enough about the Mormons to know that a lot of us are American. He was in Bilbao because he married a Spanish girl from here and was visiting her family. He´s super Catholic which is apparently very strange for a British person. It was an interesting encounter. Other than that, a pretty normal week. There are huge sales in the stores now, so we might got shopping today. Until next week.

cuidaros 

Élder Coleman

The Field Is White, Ready To Harvest!

Dear Everyone,

This week has been great. I don´t think I´ve ever found so many new investigators in one week before in my mission. We had a great New Years with a great Spanish woman who fed us paella. I never get sick of having paella. I thought the party was going to be bigger here for New Years, but there was almost no one out. When you talk to people all the time, you find some interesting people. I talked to a girl who had lived in Toronto for many years and wanted to go back to Canada as soon as she could. I also met a member from Jaén (in the south of Spain) who was up here to visit his girlfriend. He served his mission in the Calgary mission and him and Elder Hardy (my Canadian compatriate here) know a lot of the same people. We´ve talked to some pretty crazy people this week too. Everyone wants to express their opinion about everything and everyone wants to tell you about their problems. That´s pretty much all we´ve done this week though, just talking to people in the streets. Today however, we´re going to the Guggenheim, which is the super famous museum here in Bilbao. 

Élder Coleman