Alex's gourmet brownies

Hello everyone!

Well not a whole lot happened this week but ill fill you in on some of the details.

So on Tuesday we had english classes again, my favorite part of the week always, anyways so 2 new women probably in their 20's came this week. They have been taking english classes once a week for 3 years at an academy so they knew how to speak pretty well they just wanted to learn pronunciation since their teacher here is Spanish so she can't teach them properly. Anyway, so we split up into two classes Elder Maldonado taught all the beginner english learners and I just practiced talking with the two women. It was awesome about 10 minutes into the conversation they started asking all kinds of questions about the church and missions. They were amazed by all the sacrifices we make to come on missions and they asked why I wanted to serve a mission. I was able to bear my testimony in english to them. The spirit was super strong and afterward one of them said "I want to believe in something that strongly". It was soo amazing today since we are in Cartagena for P-day I am getting some english pamphlets to go along with the spanish ones we have back at the piso so they can practice english and learn about the church at the same time! We'll see how it goes!! 

Wednesday was a holiday here in Spain so we had a party at the church and everyone brought food. I made brownies for it and everyone was freaking out over them and asking for the recipe. It was so funny, we have since made 6 more batches lol anyways it was hilarious because at the party they were dancing and playing the most inappropriate english music ever like rap songs that had tons of swear words and the bishop and all the ward members are just dancing because they have no idea what the words mean. haha It was hilarious I was the only one there who had any idea 😂

Okay what more, on Thursday we had a zone meeting. The meeting itself was great but we had to wake up two and a half hours earlier than usual to catch the bus to get to it so that kind of killed my energy for the rest of the week.

Church here is so different than back home, for example yesterday during sacrament meeting the bishop goes up to the stand and asks everyone to sing feliz cumpleaños (happy birthday) for the stake president. So in the middle of sacrament meeting we all stand up and sing while he videos us with his phone hahahaha it was so weird but funny. Everyone there didn't think anything of it. 😂 

Well nothing much more is happening here we have mostly been working really hard to help our recent convert Antonio stop smoking again, he is really struggling and keeps trying to come up with different excuses why he should be exempt from the word of wisdom haha 

Anyways so if y'all could pray for him that would be awesome!! 

Love you all sooooooooo much!!!! 

Elder Childers 😘

More Mazarron pictures

Mazarron church, skyline, laundry room, missionary training group, city life, goodbye to hometown friend Elder Stephenson at the train station

First week in Mazarron

So wow this week has been crazy!! We left the CCM at 5 to go to the train station. At the station we split up from the Barcelona group, it was sad to say bye to Elder Stephenson. Having him at the CCM was like bringing a little piece of home with me. Anyway, so we rode the bullet train for a couple of hours to Malaga. When we arrived, president and the APs (assistants to the president) were waiting for us. We locked up our bags and left them in the station for the night. We all headed to the church

from there. I was surprised when it was just like a little thing on the first floor of an apartment building haha it was weird. So there we received our iPads had interviews with president then where assigned our trainers. Not going to lie when my trainer first walked in I was like uh oh because his hair was died and he was wearing a tuxedo vest with a pocket watch which are all against the mission

rules. Haha anyways he is from Quetzaltenango, Guatemala!!!!!!!!! How crazy is that haha the exact city Victoria just got called to haha when I found out I freaked out lol. So after we ate dinner we went to stay with some missionaries in Malaga for the night, their apartment was so disgusting I almost died haha I'm scared to get a messy companion lucky Elder Maldonado is pretty clean. So next morning take a 9 hour bus ride to Mazarron. Our area is a tiny little town. We are the only missionaries here and the next nearest ones are about 45 minutes away. Since almost everyone here works in the fields the city is like a ghost town during the day anyways because of the culture here in Spain our schedule is different than most missions. I wake up at 7:30, exercise shower and study until about 9 when my comp usually wakes up. (haha, like I said he struggles a little bit with the rules but we are working on it) Then we make breakfast do comp study, some language study and then we go out and usually visit some recent converts who own a store and contact anyone we see in the

street. We return to the piso at 2 and do studies/make lunch until 5, this is the medio dia/ siesta time where everyone here takes naps, after that we go visit recent converts members or investigators if any

are available. On Tuesdays and Thursday's we teach English

classes. Oh my gosh so funny story to tell haha, so on Thursday we were teaching an English class in the church. The church, by the way, is an old bar haha and we live on the second floor. There are only 20 members so it's not even considered a branch, it's

called an extension. Church is only 2 hours long. First Sunday

school/young women's then sacrament meeting. There are no young men and almost

all of them are from Central/ South America. Anyways back to the story, so we are teaching the English class and we were showing themhow say their birthdays so we looked up the word month in the dictionary and I started to read the example then about half way

through I realized what it was saying and I just burst out laughing! haha Here's what it said--   "No quiere ir a nadar porque está con el mes.  — She doesn't want to go swimming because she has her period."

😂😂😂😂 oh man it was so funny/embarrassing everyone started dying

laughing.

Okay so I'll just tell you guys all the other random/weird stuff here. haha

First of all the water heater. The first day I woke up exercised then went to take a shower and it was freezing cold, I was like are you kidding me no hot water haha. Turns out there is a water heater but it

is seriously the sketchiest thing ever. There is a burner like a stove top burner thing outside where the water pipe comes into the piso so you hook a propane tank up to the burner then light it with a

match then the flame from the burner heats up the metal pipe the water

runs through so the water gets a little bit warm haha it's nuts! I expected Spain to be a lot nicer than it is. It reminds me of my time in Cambodia. There is trash everywhere and everything has spray paint on it.

The thing that's killing me the most is my germ phobia. It's so bad the first few days I got so sick just trying to eat the food I had to run to the bathroom ton of times, the kitchen and everything is so nasty

there is mold and dirt and stuff everywhere oh man it's bad. Please pray for me to be able to get over the germs. I didn't realize how bad I was until I start trying to live here. I thought we would at least have like hot water to wash the dishes and stuff with. Speaking of the water, it tastes so bad here, the missionaries call it Mal Agua instead of Malaga because the water is so gross haha. That's going to take a little to get used to.

Anyways yeah so today I got a haircut and the guy did it all with a straight up razor blade it was crazy haha we walk in I sit down and he like sprays some stuff on the blade lights it on fire to clean it then holds it against a comb and combs through my hair!! It was scary and crazy but it worked fine. It was an interesting experience but my hair looks fine so I'm happy. Afterward we hiked up to this Christ statue, it was weird because it was covered in spray paint, like everything else here. No one respects anything. It's weird.

Oh one more thing I can read emails any day of the week that we have wifi and two of the families in the extension have it so we usually go check most days, but I can only reply on personal days but yeah send them throughout the week if you want because I love to read them!!

My Spanish is coming along pretty well. I can understand most of what people are saying it's just hard to find the words to reply.

Anyway, thanks for all the emails and prayers!

I look forward to writing again next week!

Love,  ELDER CHILDERS

    We were so happy to welcome your amazing son into our wonderful mission last Tuesday. We can already tell that he is going to be a great missionary! Elder Childers will be serving in Mazarrón with Elder Maldonado. This is a beautiful area and we're sure he is going to come to love it and the people there.

    We love your son and will always want what is best for him. Please let us know if there is anything we can do for you in regards to his welfare. Thanks you so much for sending him here to us.

Presidente and Hermana Andersen

Misión España Málaga 

Off to Mazarrón!

Alex completed his training at the Madrid Missionary Training Center and has left for the Malaga Spain Mission. The first area he will be serving in is the city of Mazarrón. This is a picture with the leaders at the missionary training center.

Wheels Up!

Hey guys!!

Wow, everything has been so crazy here this week. It’s unbelievable that I’ll be in the field in 4 days! I feel like its been forever sometimes, but others I feel like it's only been a week. I’m super stoked to get out into the field but also really really nervous! Please pray that I will get a good trainer!

Other than that nothing much new has happened here. I received both packages on Monday. My district thanks you for the beef jerkey, haha, I gave everyone a couple of pieces. My feet feel 1 million times better with the insoles. Thank you so much!!

Oh yeah, we figured out why the food has been so terrible. Apparently the head cook left on vacation a week before we got here and is returning one day before we leave. Like what in the world is this???? Hahaha, my luck. It’s whatever! I can’t wait to finally cook some of my own food!

We are all just super excited for general conference!! It’s weird here because of the time difference, we will watch the night session the next morning and it will all be off by a half a day.

Oh, one of our teachers is from the coolest city ever.  Look up Cuenca Spain. It’s known for its ¨hanging houses”. They are houses that they build off the side of cliffs. Man! Anyways, its super awesome--look it up.

We just went through the temple again today. Sadly, it was my last time for two years Pretty crazy. I love the temple here so much. It is so beautiful. I’m jealous of the Madrid missionaries--they get to go through every six months.

Thanks for all your letters and prayers.

Elder Alejandro Childers