Elder Erik Dalton's Quetzaltenango Mission : Great People, Great Experiences!

We eat at this house every day. Tortillas... Tortillas..... Tortillas.....oh and chicken foot soup!
Great people, great experiences, you couldnt ask for a better life, than the life of a missionary.

My Guatemala family and their house that I eat lunch in every day, made of adobe brick and dirt floors with a fire oven to cook up them tortillas.

Hey, family July 29, 2013

This week was kinda rough, but also another solid semana in Guatemala.

I was super, super sick this week, with all sicknesses compiled into one. I had high fevers, chills, body aches, was dry heaving and throwing up, and had the worst diarrhea I have ever experienced in my entire life, it honestly did not seem real ha-ha. But besides my sickness I am progressing and slowly getting better at Spanish. We didn’t have much success in our area this week. People are completely willing to listen to our messages and really enjoy them , but a lot of them are just not progressing or keeping commitments.... its kinda hard.

We have 2 investigators with legit baptismal dates, and I hope that both of them will feel that this is the right thing for them to do, by august 10th. Also there is a family that is progressing really well, except the dad just had surgery and can’t walk for like a month, and so Ill probably have the chance to baptize that family in a month or so after that.

We went up to these ruins Saturday with some investigators, the ruins were really small, but so cool, we played soccer in the middle of them, it was a really cool experience, because you could imagine that a thousand or so years ago people were doing the same thing, playing some sort of sport in the middle of the pyramids.

Today we drove up to the top of the mountains with all the elders in my zone. I love seeing the other elders and the other gringo’s, because I get a chance to talk some English! I am going on an Exchange on Wednesday with this gringo Elder named Elder Farely from Georgia. I am super excited to have new comp for one day.

I’m super grateful for my companion and for all his patience, and his experience, I have decided if he were some sort of animal, he would be a penguin.

Hey, good news, the zone leaders called when I was sick on Friday, and told me to hang in there because I have 2 packages! So I’m guessing they are the packages from you guys and from grandma! I’m super stoked cause I’m out of granola bars.

Today, when we were in the mountains I saw a bunch of lizards, they are like the lizards you see up in our mountains except way cooler, with bright green and blue colors, super sweet Oh and one more thing, I crossed this river by walking on these poles 15 feet above the river, also I love riding on the top of the buses throughout the mountains, it is super cool, and a Little sketchy, but not too bad.

Tell everybody that I miss them, and was thinking about everyone on the 24th of July how you guys were probably having a lot of fun with your fireworks. Well, I have 2 months in the mish and only 22 left, I guess I better live it up while I can because this is a once in a lifetime experience I will never forget, and a wonderful opportunity for me to serve the Lord with 100 percent of what I’ve got to give, even if that includes eating chicken foot soup, being chased by rabid dogs, and being on the toilet for more than 3 hours. Ha-ha, Gotta love the mission life!

Pictures of awesome kids!

and more awesome kids...

I have grown to love the people of Quilinco. They are like family to me.
My family in Guatemala.

I love talking with the kids up here. I teach them English words
and they in return teach me Spanish.

Me on top of the bus as we drive up the switchbacks in Quilinco... scary for sure, and after reading your letter about that Missionary from Canada, it's even more scary.

Great view from the top fo the bus!

In the mountains of Quilinco, just another p-day in Guatemala.

Random house on the top of the mountain.

These are all of the elders in my zone, minus a few up in the mountains above Quelinco, The people in Quilinco, say that these mountains are solo hills. I guess the mountains just get bigger and bigger, the higher we got the more it reminded me of Utah.

This is the day we hiked up to the ruins and played futbol with our investigators.

It was a lot of fun, and really neat to play in the ruins.

In Guatemala your're siempre enfermo (always sick) haha, so I have gotten used to it. Im pretty sure I have flees or bedbugs cause I have tons of bites.

Me and the peeps at the ruins, chilin on some thousand year old pyramid.

When I told Jonathan ( ten years old) how tall Tanner was he was so surprised that an 11 year could be that tall.

This is a picture of me, my companion, and our one progressing investigtor! He is super great, and wants to serve a misión some day. He has a babtismal fecha para 10 de agusto.