Hola, buenos!
Burbank is super awesome! There are palm trees, GIANT palm trees, EVERYWHERE and it's super pretty! There's also cactuses and fruit trees (the members let us just pick oranges and lemons and guavas right off their trees and take them with us!) and there's building everywhere haha and lots and lots of cars! Also, in our area, we have Nickelodeon (hey, drake & josh was filmed in my proselyting areas!!!) along with Universal Studios and Walt Disney (we saw Frozen characters walking down the street the other day haha) and it's super fun! They also have some really strange fast food places, one is called Pollo Loco (yes Crazy Chicken) and it's all Latino foods in fast food form! Also, yes, I still have hot chocolate in the mornings even though it's always sunny and warm outside over here :) It's weird, but my mission area feels like another little home to me! :) It's pretty fun :)
I had a member meal my first night with an awesome family, the Ramirez Family, I love them so much already! The minute I walked through the door, the youngest daughter started combing through my hair with her fingers shouting at how pretty it was and said I looked like the girl from Brave haha :) I have now gotten that 4 more times! :) It's pretty fun because like no one here has seen such orange hair I guess, so it gets attention haha :) Also, we got to teach a spiritual thought that night for their FHE and so I bore my testimony in Spanish and shared a scripture and the little boy, in the middle of me reading it, is like "wow you sound like a real Mexican! Where are you from?" it was so funny The family was very surprised when I said it was my first day and I had literally just been picked up from the airport that afternoon haha :)
Contacting for me has been the weirdest part of being out in the field! It's just a strange concept to me to talk to all these random people on the street, but it's fun and I'm getting better at it!
All the properties are gated up here, so we wait until someone opens it for us, it's really weird actually but it's so that people's stuff is kept safe or something like that
I saw a guy riding a bike with a boombox, yes a legit double-d battery boombox, with rap music. it kinda made my day.
On second day I accidentally lost my name tag, it had dropped on the sidewalk, but we found it again haha what are the chances?
There's this weird food that is literally corn on the cob, rolled in MAYO, and then topped with chili powder. I have yet to try it but my comp eats it all the time!
There's also a food truck that goes around selling food out of the back, the trucks have a distinct little honking rhythm and then people just run out and buy the stuff. it's fun to see!
Last night we talked to some guys in Spanish (18, 19 ish) at the end of their driveway and while we were talking to them, another one joined us and we got return citas (appointments) with them (two are on Thanksgiving) and we're super excited to teach them! Pretty excited, the discussion will definitely be interesting! Especially when we tell them we have to teach outside because we can't go into houses unless there's other girls there (for some reason, the investigators never understand that rule and the importance of it.
Also, I've had some pretty fun experiences just knocking on doors and getting citas! We have one this week where I'm' going to help them learn English and they're going to help me with my Spanish! Awesome. Also, we meet a lot of Armenians so we learned some phrases in Armenian!
The food I've had here isn't too bad! The first night we had tostada and some veggies and meat and such with chili sauce and that was actually REALLY GOOD (I am very hungry as a missionary haha)! Yesterday we had some soup with potatoes and meat and it was super filling and good too! Desserts are usually fruit and they have some really good homemade guava juice!!! ITS THE BEST!!!! What isn't so cool is cantaloupe juice, it was not the best. In fact, we went to a ward party (and it was tons of fun!) That's where I first tried cantaloupe juice. Then I saw a cup that looked like root beer, but it wasn't, but it was better than the cantaloupe juice and later I found it was a rice juice with a little bit of cinnamon, it was actually really delicious and apparently it takes a few days just to make! They also put chili powder in everything, including potatoes. I'm excited for thanksgiving meal with the member families! We have a lot of people from Guatemala and El Salvador and Mexico, those are just the people I've met! We also teach Sunday School, it's a small ward haha :)
I'm learning so much and I know without a doubt that this is the Church of Jesus Christ and that these true doctrines of Christ were restored through the prophet Joseph Smith and that we still have these correct doctrines today! The book of Mormon is amazing please read it every day! There are so many blessings and so much to learn! Always remember all that the Savior has done for you and remember that He truly understands you and knows how you're feeling and knows how to lift you up again! Also, being a missionary is awesome! :)
Lots of love,
Hermana Day
