Letter dated 26Nov2012

Dear Family, Happy-Week-After-Thanksgiving! How are you all doing? I´m doing- FANTASTIC! We had a fantastic week and I believe that I´m going to be looking at several more weeks like this one in the future. In regards to Thanksgiving, I was blessed to be fed by a wonderful member from the USA who lives here with his family and they prepared an awesome meal for us on Thursday night! I have reason to believe it´s because you had the Elders over for dinner at home last week that we were blessed with this treat, so thank you! I forgot how good biscuits were and I actually ate a ton without stuffing myself. I usually always feel like I´m about to pass out when I eat Thanksgiving dinner, so I was good this time. Our baptism went swimmingly (literally) well and it was a great feeling for me to get back in the water personally ^_^! The service was fantastic and so many members showed up, it was fantastic. I´ll try to get photos from my companion and send them soon. We were disappointed to not see Nicol come to church for her confirmation yesterday, but we´ll be visiting them and going over just how important it is to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. She´s great and I´m sure the family had something come up that was just unexpected, but we´ll be working hard nevertheless to get her to church this week. We are also incredibly excited to have two more baptisms this Saturday! They are two great girls, Yurimar from Venezuela and Carolina from Ecuador, and they are telling everyone about their baptism. The are really just honestly and sincerely excited for baptism! That would have to be the greatest miracle I saw last week. We had visited the girls two times and both times we asked them about how they felt about baptism and about the church as a whole. They had been taught by Elders a few months ago but then felt that they needed more time to develop their testimonies. In our second lesson with them we asked them once again how they felt about baptism, showing them the video of Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist, and we shared some great scriptures about baptism. We gave them a few seconds to think about it and they both said, individually, ´´Me gustaría´´ (which translates to ´´I would like that´´). As soon as they both said that we both just got huge smiles on our faces (well, they were already there, but they got bigger, that´s for sure!) and we started planning for their baptism. We suggested having it on the 8th of December but they both said ´´Do we really have to wait that long?´´ It kind of caught me off guard, but I knew that they had been taught everything before, had been coming to church regularly, and knew that it would be a blessing in their lives to take this step, so the sooner the better, right! They´ll be baptized on the 1st of December and we´re going to be working with the Ward a whole lot to bring the service together, which should be a great one. I´m so happy to be here on my mission! I've been keeping up the promptness of getting up on time as well. [Missionaries wake up at 6:30 AM.] We had some interesting days because we hardly had time to get to our apartment so we went throughout some of the days with little to no food, then we had our fast for the mission, but overall, we survived and we´re still operating at full capacity! Elder Wiggins is a great guy and we´re really working hard together to get our companionship unity down. We´re open with our feelings and if one of us does something that bothers the other, we tell each other and work on fixing it. I easily see many more blessing here in Terrassasaurus while we´re together and I´m positive that we´ll both see plenty throughout the rest of our missions. He has so much great energy that drives a great personality which I appreciate so very much. I´m excited for the rest of our time together. I´m thankful to have such a wonderful family and I hope that you all love me equally! I´m thankful for all of our opportunities we have in our lives and the blessings that we can receive when we are faithful and obedient. Muchas gracias por su amor y consuelo en mi vida y por todo de mis experiencias! Os quiero mas que puedo decir! Es un montón, a decir lo menos! Élder Xander Weston Schindler P.S. Here´s my new address! Élder Alexander Weston Schindler c/ d´egara 164 Nº 1,1 08225 Terrassa España If you send me anything, I would appreciate a dradle very much ;). But I don´t really want to buy a new camera. If Joseph doesn´t use his camera anymore and if it still works, I´d be down to having that one. If not, then I´ll just borrow my companion´s cameras for the next year. A cheap substitute camera would be nice, but I´d rather get other things, you know what I mean? Also, I see myself staying in Terrassa for a while now, so unless it changes in the future, send stuff (letters and packages) here and tell people via Facebook as well. Thanks! P.P.S. We have to go back, Kate. [Weston's random quote from Lost!]

Letter dated 19Nov2012

Dear Family, What an interesting and eventful first week in Terrassa. I know for sure that it´ll be difficult to top it, but hey, I´ll just let you know how the week went! Sadly, we didn't have a baptism this past Saturday.. he´s been in the hospital since Friday and he only has permission to allow family to into visit him. That was an extremely disappointing day when we heard what happened. We´re trying to find out more of the story, but we´re waiting until we can get in touch with him. We do, however, have a baptism for this Saturday which looks like it will be so good. Her two sisters were baptized two weeks ago and the whole family is incredible. They are from Ecuador and have been living here for a few years. They´re fantastic! It was also great to come to another area again and get to meet tons of people. I´m getting so much better at remembering names when I meet the person for the first time. I used to be the worst in the world but I've been getting so used to learning it within the first few moments of saying hello. Church was also a great day. It´s been the biggest chapel I've been in since... well, it´s the biggest I've been in my entire mission! I can´t wait to get to know the ward even better during the upcoming months! But this next part happened during the week... We had been away the entire day on Thursday and when we arrived at our apartment that night I realized something was missing... my camera. Just to point out, you can´t really misplace a camera of my magnitude. I went through ever emotion possible and every possibility of how it was stolen and I´m positive that our neighbors upstairs stole it. The reason for that is because we have a small patio in the back where all the apartments have back windows and people put their clothes to dry and wash and I´m positive that I could climb up into their apartment if I wanted to. Also, I discovered that they stole my tripod with the camera as well as my Pokedex but also... my milk. They came into our apartment and stole my milk! It was fun calling the police and the guy said ´´...hmmm, well, I can´t think of a solution for you..´´ because when we called we couldn't tell who could have done it for sure. I was thinking to myself ´´Well thanks a lot!´´ The thing that helped the most was the fact that I knew I was bringing the camera on my mission with possibilities that something could happen. I've had it for two years and now, I´m mostly sad that I won´t have the same chance to share the rest of my mission stories like I could have been able to. l have the majority of my photos saved so I´ll be sending those hopefully next week. I´m protecting our apartment like a beast right now as well so if anything else is missing, I´m going to make the police come down and search our neighbor's house. But oh well... I still have the photos so look forward to some Inca memories sometime in the future. Happy birthday Daniel! Sounds like you had a great weekend turning 18! I love you all! Did you know that? Élder Xander Weston Schindler

Letter dated 13Nov2012

Dear Family, Yes, it´s true. Today is Tuesday. I´m happy to be the bearer of news! So.. whether or not you put 1 and 1 together, I have been rescued from the island and am currently recuperating in my new area. Where is that you ask? None other than Terrassa (or Terrassasourus as I´ll be calling it from time to time (^_^) ) which is just a city located just north-west of Barcleona. I safely arrived back in Barcelona this morning and to say the least, it feels good to be back, yet it feels different. I haven´t had enough time here yet to say what it is, but it might just be the cold weather (that´s my bet) but now I have one more area that I´ve left behind and I´m truly going to miss ´lil Inca out in the islands. It was an experience and if I can say one thing that I accomplished it was that I got a far better grasp on this language! What a blessing! From what my new companion, Élder Wiggins, keeps telling me is that Terrassa is the best area in the mission! I´m coming in and for the first time I´ll be serving in a ward! It´s been half a day but Élder Wiggins and I will get along just fine during our time here (I´m praying that I´ll never ever say that I´m serving with a companion with whom I DON´T get along!). I recently passed my 10 month mark, coming closer and closer to the end of the slope but I already know that Terrassa is going to become one of my most memorable experiences of my life. Élder Wiggins, with 8 months in the mission, just sounds so excited when he talks about this city and with good reason! The members here, as he says, are fantastic! Not to mention they baptized two people in the area last Saturday and that we have two more fechas (dates for baptism) for the end of this week! Is it alright if I say that I´m stoked?! My last week in Inca was a good send off for me. I shared my testimony in church and had the chance to say good bye to all the good people of the branch. I also had the chance to say bye to Ricardo who should be getting baptized on the 24th and I pray all the best for him in these next couple of weeks. For my very last day in Inca we helped make cookies (about 88-90 of them! :P) for the birthday party of Cielo! I´d send pictures, yet alas, I forgot my pictures in my briefcase in the apartment. Oops, my bad. Also, I´m wanting to see more pictures of all of you, but in the meantime, I enjoyed the ones you shared of Central Park and of Zachary in the Philippines! My companion doesn´t have the address for letters at the moment, so you´ll just have to wait a week to get that. Letters to the mission office are still good, since I´m not incredibly far and it takes just one hour to get there from where we are stationed here in Terrassa. It´s nice! Ahh, I´m happy! Ya feel me! I love you more than words can say, but they´ll have to work for the moment.. :P Élder Xander Weston Schindler P.S. This is for Andrew. I heard you killed at the show this past weekend! I know you did (and I know that you know that you did) and I wish more than anything that I could see your plays! I´ll have to get a hold of recording I suppose in the future. You know, more than anything, this time is incredibly special for you to develop and become who you are meant to become. You rock. What kind of camera did mom get? Does it work for what you want to do? I can´t wait to hear from you! P.P.S. Daniel, I´ll keep my eye out for that missionary. That will be a great awkward moment to say ´´Hey, I know you. That´s right, you were at my Grandpas piano recital when you were waiting for your visa!´´ Haha! Tell me when you get your papers done too, bro! P.P.P.S. We have to go back, Kate. We have to go back to the island!