Oh my dearest family,
I made the realization that this might be the last time you hear from me before I call on Christmas! Yes, there is a Monday pday before Christmas, but there is a good chance I'm assuming that the libraries will be closed. Elder Ingram and I are planning on calling our families sometime after 6pm. Not because its our last priority, but just because we don't want to be distracted for the rest of the day thinking about our wonderful families when we are supposed to be giving Christmas messages (which we are assuming would happen if we called in the morning or early afternoon). So there is the update on that.
I have received my Christmas packages! Thank you my wonderful family! All of us in the apartment have received our Christmas packages from home and we have them sitting around our wonderful little Christmas tree. And there they will sit until very early on Christmas morning when we will have to get up before 6:30 so we will have time to open up our presents before we have to begin our preparations for our missionary day.
Speaking of Christmas coming, it is an awesome tool to use when talking to people. We have a bunch of appointments set up this week with people who probably wouldn't have been interested in our missionary purpose had we not had the invitation/question, "Do you think we could come share a message with you and your family about the true meaning of Christmas?" People are just so much more happy to talk to us when we start out by talking with them about Christmas. It's wonderful. This week is our finding week. And by that I mean, this week, we are looking to find more than we have found in any other week. Our goal for the week is to find and give our Christmas message to 10 new families that we have never spoken with before. It might sound easy, but this is a huge goal for Elder Ingram and I. Especially considering that our weekly record up until now has only been 2 new families found and taught. But we are changing that this week. We want to use the warm and welcoming atmosphere of Christmas to the fullest.
Another thing we want to use to the fullest is this whole concept of the END OF THE WORLD. I have a goal to use it in at least one street contact before the end of the week. But its gonna a take a special person for this one to be effective... and I'm hoping we can find that special someone. Mostly I have this goal because I think it would be a way more fun way to start the conversation than, "Hey, we are missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day saints." Besides, people usually start spacing out right when they hear the word missionary... so why not grab their attention with something a little more interesting than missionaries: Como el Fin del Mundo. I'm hoping I get to use this End of the World contact method in English. After all, it would be way more fun in English since I wouldn't have to use a planned out "El Fin Del Mundo" practiced script. But, in the event that the person I meet who needs to hear about the end of the world(rather than Christmas) speaks Spanish, I will be using my language study time tomorrow to come up with my "El Fin Del Mundo" script. Should be fun ;)
So since Elder Ingram is the District Leader, he has to go on exchanges with the rest of the missionaries in our District. He goes to their areas with them for the day and evaluates their effectiveness as missionaries. When he goes to their area, he has to send one of the missionaries to our area to come do missionary work with me for the day. And this means, that even in my lack of knowledge, I am the most knowledgeable missionary of my area (the people we teach, where they live, etc.) for that day. Basically, for these days, I'm in charge. And let me tell you, this is one sure way to find out what I need to improve on the most. I have already had two of these days where Elder Ingram leaves me for the day. And while its a little nerve racking knowing that my companion is following me around for the day rather than me following my trainer around, its way fun! And like I said, it definitely illuminates the things I need to improve on the most. So it's a super exciting/thrilling/whatever you wanna call it way to evaluate myself and make new goals to improve my effectiveness as a missionary. After all, It's not like I'm gonna get to follow Elder Ingram around for the rest of my mission, so I might as well figure it out now, rather than get shocked into that realization later.
So exchanges are pretty fun, but my favorite exchange so far was when the Zone Leaders came to our area to evaluate Elder Ingram. Why was this my favorite? Because it meant that I got to go to the Zone Leader area with one of the Zone Leaders for the day. It was awesome. Our Zone Leaders are absolute studs. I learned a lot from my day with Elder Crossely. He is just an awesome missionary. But the biggest reason I loved this exchange was it helped me realize how far I have come in my Spanish. We would go to people's houses, people I had never met, and I was able to understand what they were talking about without receiving any background information about the family. It was a cool realization for me to be reminded that while I'm not fluent yet, I have indeed come a long way as far as my understanding goes. So that was really cool, but throughout my exchange with Elder Crossely, I also made some other realizations, talents that Elder Crossely has as a missionary which I want to gain as well. The biggest one I want to work on is the importance of teaching with simple clarity. In truth, and this was surprising to me, Elder Crossely's Spanish was not a ton more advanced than my own. He has just developed the ability to communicate very clearly and effectively. I want to be able to teach like Elder Crossley. I learned a bunch of other things throughout my day with a Zone Leader, but I sadly don't have any more time to email anymore.
I probably won't be sending a hand written letter home this week again. But I will be sending a Christmas package home for the family. :) Maybe if I have extra time I will add in a short hand written letter to the package. But we will see.
Love you my family.
I'm excited to talk to you and hear your voices next week!
Your Son/Brother,
Elder Ostler
