It's HOT

It's hot here!

I really think I'm in the hottest place in the world!  It has been super hot this week and it does not help that everybody here lives under tin roofs and it's like sitting in an oven when we go into people's houses!  haha  But that's just the life here!

This last week was pretty awesome!  We were walking on the outskirts of the city trying to do some tracting and we found an awesome family!  This dad was moving dirt to his backyard with his wife and kids. (The oldest kid was 15 years old).  We saw them moving dirt and we asked them if we could help them and they just laughed at us because they thought we were just joking, but finally they let us help them and it was dope!  We helped the dad for a good hour and then they invited us into their house and made us dinner!  It was awesome!  After we ate, we taught them Leccion 1 and it was an awesome leccion!  We invited them to church and for baptizm right then and they said no!  Such a bummer!  But it was so awesome to meet them and get a chance to help someone who needed help. Just finally getting a little dirty and helping a very humble family for a little bit to feel the Love Of Christ!  We are going back this week to try and break the ice and get to know them some more. 

We finally got people to church!  Not sure why, but here in Ecuador people love God but hate church!  It really makes no sense!  But we got some families to go to church on Sunday and it was great! This branch is awesome with members who are super nice and awesome with the investigators!  Not too much else happened.  I did spend 2 days with Elder McKeighan doing some splits!  The BIG AP came down and we worked together for a couple days and it was awesome! 

Think it might rain today or this week!  My companion and I are dipping tomorrow to a place called Piñas that's like 2 hours away to work with the Elders there.  It's in the mountains!  Haha we are really just going to get out of the heat!  haha  This week was fast here...every week is fast here!  

Sorry to hear about grandpa!  Go to the temple!  That always helps!  He will be fine.  

Todo esta bien

Elder Hoole

MILAGROS

JACOB 1:19

When I get home, I will be eating encebollado with orange juice, 

patacones, fresh lime juice, hot sauce, and pan de sal rolls!!!

  I love it and I want the world of Utah to eat it!

The best soup ever

 Some sweet shoes I found here!

 A little home in Ecuador

 A member drew this for me!

Arenillas!  A town in Ecuador!

Sunday dinner in Ecuador!

SANTA ROSA

Well, this week was very interesting with lots of up and downs! 

First off, we had to go see the missionaries who are living in Huaquillas (the border of Peru).  It was like a good 1 hour on the bus and it was pretty dope!  I got to see Peru and try some yummy Peru food!  But man was it hot there and here!  So so hot here!

Also this week Presidente Moreno came down for like a week to check up on us and the District.  Santa Rosa isn't a stake yet so Presidente is always coming down to check up on things because he's in charge of the Church here. While he was here we had a little zone conference with just the District Leaders and Zone Leaders here in Santa Rosa and it was awesome!  We talked about how we can complete our goals and get more investigators to church! Great little meeting.

On Friday, I went to Arenillas to do some splits with the Elder there and that place is pretty cool!  It's one of the sectors where you get to baptize in the rivers!  Right now that's our goal as a Zone - to have a morning of baptisms in the river in the coming weeks...we just gotta find some people to teach!

Well Saturday, we were just walking in our sector and I got a call from one of our investigatores who got baptized 3 weeks ago and his niece 2 weeks ago. He called me and was super mad and said he wasn't going to pay his tithing anymore and that he was still Catholic and that we shouldn't pass by anymore....I was legit out of words.  It sucked!!  haha!  My companion and I hit him with Alma 5 and some scriptures in D and C.  We were not happy and he was so mean to us...we just saved this guy and now he and his family just dropped us!  But yeah I guess it happens sometimes!  Other than that this week was really good!  Just gotta find more people and work better with those members!  We also found a really yummy pizza place!

Elder Hoole "donny"

 Love the gangsters

 

Thank you for visiting Ecuador

Welcome to Ecuador!

Santa Rosa!

Well new year, new area! 

Well when I got called to Santa Rosa, I thought it would be a poorer area and I was really expecting that my new area was going to be just like Guayaquil, with scary stuff going on all around and a lot of garbage, but man it's like I'm in a whole new country!  My new area is in the middle of banana farms and rivers and it's so awesome!  The bus ride I went on was through banana fields!  Everybody lives in real houses and some even have swimming pools!  It's hot here, that's for sure, but not as hot as it was in my last area and it's even cold at night!  Our house is pretty dope but we have a LOT of mosquitoes.  I'm close to Peru and I might have to get someone to get new luggage for me there because everything is way cheaper!  

The people here are great!  Santa Rosa is still just a District, so I'm in a Branch and this Branch is so Strong!! There are 200 or more people in church every week.  Everybody does their callings! The Branch President is such a homie!  The rumor is that in February, it will become a stake!  I hope so!  All is well right now!  hahah  I think this last week was the first time I've ever prayed for the mission to go by slow because man, this week was SO fast!

I'm the Zone Leader here and we share this branch with 2 sister missionaries. All the other missionaries in the Zone live 30 minutes to 2 hours from us so we have to travel a ton!  It's kind of tough, but it should be an adventure! So far, it's pretty fun here!

This past week we had a bautismo with the Sisters! They had taught 2 people who were baptized and we had 1 investigator baptized!  My companion, Elder Barnett, the Branch President and I baptized them and it was awesome!  Great way to start off the week in the new sector!  But man now we have nobody to teach..... kinda blows and I'm stressed, We Starting From the Bottom. Should be fun to see who we can find and teach!  All in all, all is well for me!  Tomorrow my companion and I have to get up at 4am to travel on a bus back to Guayaquil for a Zone Leader training.  I hope we get there in time to watch the announcement from President Nelson on tv!

Elder Hoole

 With the sisters, my companion and our Branch President

We travel around the city in these.  They're called MOTOS.

The view from inside a MOTO when you are riding in it.

Landscape

Santa Rosa!

Crossing over using one of the many water pipes

He was pretty camouflaged.

At our baptism last week!

Before the baptism

Selfie - kind of blurry

One part of my new area

Seafood ceviche!  Yum!

Leaving to Santa Rosa!

CAMBIOS!

Well after being here in this ward since the beginning of September, I was just told that I will be leaving!!! NOOOO!!!!  I'm so sad because this has probably been my favorite area so far in the mission! Super sad to leave these people, but I know that they are in good hands! 

My new sector is called Santa Rosa.  It's on the border of Peru!  It's a pretty big area!  It's surrounded by banana fields and lots of seafood!  It's going to be a huge change but it should be awesome!  My new companion is named Elder Barnett from Ogden Utah; we have been out here the same time in the mission and were in the same MTC class! Haha so that's pretty cool!

Well, this last week here in this ward there were some big changes!  A lot of the new converts we have here just were called into leadership positions!! I'm so happy for them!  It's great to see how the gospel pushes people to be better everyday!  I have seen so many changes in great people here that have made them even better people! The work here in Guayaquil is going well! 

Also, shout out to Ann Hoole (mommy) and Madi Hoole (Sister in-law) for their BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK!!! 

Elder Hoole

@maxhoole   ;)

La Segunda Navidad! ~ Christmas Email

La Segunda Navidad!

Well, this week was crazy fast with a lot of stuff! First off, we had our activity for Light The World and it was so awesome!  We were expecting more people, but it was a fun time!  It was a little devotional and some members came up and gave some really good talks about Christ and the activity Light The World and then after the activity everybody received a balloon and with the balloon they had a card and they were supposed to write a scripture or something on it and then the balloon was to float away with the card so that somebody else in Ecuador could feel the Light Of Christ! And it was awesome! 

After this activity, we had our NOCHE BLANCA!  And yes, that also was awesome because as a Zone we had 13 Bautismos and it was awesome!  A ton of ward members came and it was just super powerful and you could really feel the spirit!  It was awesome!  We as a ward had 5 bautismos and a kid that just got baptized like 4 months ago gave a talk during the baptism because his parents were getting baptized (Familia Cabrera) and it was so awesome for him to share his testimony in front of his parents and everyone there! Then after that I got the great opportunity to skype the fam!!! 1 MORE!  Always great to see those guys! 

So yeah, over all it was a Merry Christmas!  Thanks for the love and support!  Hope all is well!

Part of a Christmas dinner we had! 

Our Light the World banner for the Stake activity

We had a balloon arch

Christmas lights

Everyone getting ready to light the world!

A family at church

Getting ready to let off our balloons

A few of our baptisms

Getting ready for our White Christmas - so many people chose to be baptized!

Skyping with my family!

A Christmas gift from one of the elders!  

Another pair of shoes!  Yay!

Our stake activity went well!

Feliz Año Nuevo

Feliz Año Nuevo

Well this week was one for the books! Lately we have been working a ton with those new converts. It is frustrating to have baptisms and then watch people go inactive. So this week we really made sure that every person who has been recently baptized knows why it is important to read the Book of Mormon and go to church, and I think we did a really good job. 

We had a great church session yesterday and our Stake President came and gave 2 great talks about the church and how tithing is here to help, not to take away and that was great for our investigadores to hear!  He focused on: 1) Pay your tithing; 2) Pay your fast offering; and 3) save your money.  I learned a lot!  Really enjoyed church! 

This last week we also had to go up to the north part of Guayaquil and our Stake President drove us around in his car and showed us some cool things in this city.  That was awesome to see some other parts of the city for a little bit and just have a little adventure haha!  But while we were driving around he got a bad flat tire and we had to change it in the middle of the street where people were selling Monigotes (new year tradition here in Guayaquil) so right there he taught us how to change a tire in less than 5 minutes and it was awesome! haha  I really learned a lot from that guy this week!  But yeah, all is good!  We need to find some more people to teach though!  I feel like this week will be a good week. Since it was a holiday, I took a good nap today!  It felt great!  So last night here in Ecuador it was crazy for the new year! The people here make these things called Monigotes. They are like people-looking dolls made out of paper, and then they burn them down by sticking gas and bombs on them, and so it was crazy last night!  I was just sleeping and then at 12 o'clock midnight it sounded like WW3 was going down in Guayaquil Ecuador!!!   haha IT WAS AWESOME!!!!  You gotta google or YouTube it!  Monigotes! 

So yeah that's about it from this week! Think I'm going to have transfers this upcoming week and I'm super sad about that! I hope I don't!  I like this ward a lot! 

Elder Hoole

Write me! lol 

maxwell.hoole@myldsmail.net

Enjoy these photos of Monigotes (large dolls) - they are paper-mache and come in every size!