Hola Familia,

I hope all is going well with you. Everything is great here in Guatemala. Things are really warming up here and Im sweating tons. I dont think I have ever smelt so bad in my life. But we got water back in our house so we can take real showers again instead of bucket baths. This week was pretty good. We have been working pretty hard and we thought that we were making some progress with some families but once Sunday came around we didn´t have anyone in church. It was pretty frustrating. We have been finding a lot of people and have been teaching a lot of lessons but we have been dropping a lot of people too because no one is progressing. We have one wedding and baptism planned for the 29 of January and they are pretty positive but have not been to church in the past two weeks because either the mom or the baby was sick. We went out again for our weekly trip to the trochas. We spent most of the day walking which was kind of fun because we got to see some nice landscape but we didn´t teach very many lessons. We were out there too late and we missed the last bus so we called Ezequiel our recent convert to come pick us up. On the way back he was asking if we were going to come back to visit him after our mission. He was telling us all the cool places in Guatemala that he would take us and it sounded way cool. I really hope I have an opportunity to visit Guatemala after the mission. It is such a beautiful country with so much variety. Speaking of variety last monday we went to eat at a "restaurant" and while we were eating we noticed that there were some monkey outside. We went out to investigate and we found three monkeys chained to this playground. I dont know if they were for sale or just on display but it was really random. That experiance kind of defines Guatemala. It is very random. Ive kind of learned not to be too suprised at anything I see. Oh and by the way, that lizard that runs on water, there are tons of them here. I have not seen them run on water yet but they are always running across our roof. But yah other than that there is not that much going on here. We just keep working and working but we are trying to rethink how we are working to see how we can be more effective. Last night we watched the Joseph Smith movie with Ezequiel´s family and his son´s girlfriend who we have been teaching. That is a powerfull movie even in spanish and it is an amazing testimony of Joseph Smith and the work that he did. I have a strong testimony Joseph Smith and that he was a profet of God that restored the Gospel in its fulness. Im am so greatful to be here on a mission helping people recieve all the blessings that come with this Gospel. It really is such a blessing to know that there is a Prophet today that speaks with God. I love you all so much and I am greatful for you. Life is Good. Eternal Life is Better.

Love Elder Thorley