Elizabeth's Baptism

Hey everyone in the blogosphere,

This week really has not been the most productive of weeks in every aspect, because we were focusing on one of our investigators Elizabeth Merchan. This week she did end up getting baptized though, but it was a pain. We went over to her house Monday night to get permission from her older sister who did not want to give it. Her sister is 23 and she is 15. Her solution was that we let her call her dad who lives in the states that they call once or twice a month, but other than that Elizabeth has never met him. We decided to come back Tuesday so she could call, but the dad did not answer. The same thing happened Wednesday and Thursday. On Friday she got a hold of him but right before she got the answer the line cut out. We still planned on the baptism for Saturday, just hoping she could get a hold of him in the morning. She did, he said yes and everything ended up working out, but it was a very stressful week. Today we had a fun time with Profaizer and Fa´asa and walked up a hill. it actually had a real cool view of the city, but man it tired us out. The best part about today is it hailed on us...hard and the hail stones were the size of  peas pretty much and it hurt. But that is today and this week, sorry it is not much, but other than that it was pretty much some contacting and not much more.

I love you all and look forward to next week,

Elder Jesse William McCammon

  Mirador De Turi which said it’s the best view of the City

 Elizabeth's Baptism Day

 On their hike up to Mirador de Turi

Ok so this USU shirt used to fit snuggly around my boys middle...now there is plenty of room on each side!!!  He's wasting away!!!

Full week of Teaching

This week has been a fun week of lessons. we have had to do pretty much no contacting for the past week we have just had strait up appointments. It is great the only big let down is that we have two people who can be baptized this Saturday, but one, Cesar, still wants to postpone until the 22 of June, but elder Christensen and I think that we can get him moved up to the 8th of June. The other, Elizabeth Merchan, wants to be baptized this weekend and all we need to do is go get permission from her sister tonight and we will be having another baptism in Barrio Tarqui this week. I am so excited! It always seems like there is so much time that passes in between baptisms it is ridiculous, but this week has been great. We keep having investigators that keep showing up to church and that we can start teaching. We just had two more show up this week so we have more lessons coming our way. We are doing good and the success is coming along pretty darned good.

I will have a longer one next week I just don't have my agenda in the cyber this week or I would go more in depth. I love you bunches mom, beat dad in golf!

love your favorite elder,

Elder Jesse William McCammon

The family that we made cake for on mothers day

 Lunch we had one day because our Mamitas daughters husband works for a sea food place.
We had fish ceviche, fried squid, fried fish, and fried shrimp.

Elder Christensen eating a mini fried octopus that was in our food tray

Our talk on Sunday was nice with Jesse, we didn't talk a long time his call was only 50 min and he said he had to go.  Its amazing how fast that time went, its also nice to hear his voice. He talked we talked but didn't say much of anything I don't think.  His health seems to be fine, we'll keep praying that he's healed so he won't be sent home though!!!  Here is his letter from Monday.

Funny story to start.
Monday- we had a fun p-day and hung out with some other missionaries and had some tacos that we made with them. After we had a visit with two of our investigators Ana and Elizabeth Merchan. Elizabeth wants to hear the message, but her sister Ana is too indecisive to say yes. So we committed them to pray and we would come back on Friday and talk to them about how their prayers went. as we were leaving we saw a car that had driven up on a rising barrier that separates two lanes and there were like ten people trying to push it down, because the tires were not touching. It just needed the lords help to get it off, because once we got there it came right down.

Tuesday- Started off today with a district meeting which went the same as almost all the others, "how many baptisms do you have over the next four weeks." Then we went and talked to a friend of Elizabeth who lives in the ward to see if she could help the process of wanting to hear the missionaries. She said that the last time she talked to Elizabeth she was really excited to be talking with the missionaries again, but was worried that her sister would not let her. We ended up setting up an appointment in the friends house for Friday  Then we went and had some dinner with one of the members who comes with us to visits.

Wednesday-Today we got chewed out by our zone leaders because we had low numbers last week along with four other sectors. then we went to visits that we had set up, we got stood up on a couple of them. The one we expected to be the best was with an old investigator who had a date for baptism, but it was hard to find times to teach, but her schedule is a little more free so we had a visit with her and it lasted almost 5 minutes because she had to go, but we did commit her to church.

Thursday- Today we ended up going on splits with the zone leaders. I went to their sector and they came to mine, because one of them wanted to help put some baptism dates in our sector. Not much happened when i was in their sector just a lot of proselyting  they did end up putting a date with the person they wanted. It turns out that he was a catholic missionary, but he loves the church alot, so that is pretty cool.

Friday- Weekly planning and we actual had stuff to plan because we had some names this week. After we went to Noelias house to teach Elizabeth and she almost accepted a date but wanted to talk to her sister first. After they both decided to come to a lesson that we had with a recent convert so they could invite her to an activity in the church. so we got to teach Elizabeth a little bit more. After we proselyted for a little bit then went to Elizabeth's house to talk to her sister Ana, but nobody was there, so we just proselyted on the way home.

Saturday- Today we had a late lunch so we did not get out for a while.
when we did we pretty much just proselyted until 8 when we went back to the house of Elizabeth and Ana and they were there this time. We ended up getting permission from Ana for Elizabeth to be taught and baptized but she does not want anything in her life right now.

Sunday- We had six investigators in church today, four of which we did not expect so we set up appointments with them for this next week. Then had lunch with some gringos from Canada that are in our ward.
Called our families and then helped the member that comes with us cook a cake for his mother.

That is the week of Elder McCammon in Cuenca


He finally sent me pictures of his apartment...this one seems a lot nicer than the last one, although it still looks like there isn't an oven.

Doorbells, mics and electric fences...oh my!!

Dear Family

P-Day. Today we had lunch with some other missionaries in our district. After we went to this church which is like the biggest and oldest church in Cuenca. It was really cool. Only one room though and it was giant. I attached a picture of the outside, the front on the inside. The other picture is of a modern art museum we went to today as well. The picture i sent is of a fork and spoon made out of forks and spoons. So far today has been pretty good. Now to recap the week... This week has not been the funnest week at all. This week has been straight ringing doorbells and talking to microphones. In this entire week we rang over 500 doorbells. The upside was that by Saturday we started to actually find people and we have names in our agendas again. Then last night we finally put two more baptismal dates for May 25th. Hopefully we start having more baptisms in the up and coming weeks. But I love Cuenca. The mountains everywhere are beautiful it is a nice type of weather here and not overpowering heat like Guayaquil. The hardest part about Cuenca is that everyone here is Catholic, and not Catholic like my parents attend church Catholic, but real Catholic. So we work hard here, but without references the mission here is really hard. Here is my funny story... So as we were contacting this week we ring the doorbell on the house. We had heard people in the house so we thought maybe they just did not hear the doorbell, so we rang it again. The next thing we knew the electric fence had been turned on and started to buzz. Somebody was terrified enough of the missionaries to turn on the electric fence... or they wanted to scare us off, but it just made me chuckle. With mothers day i do not know yet, for some reason it is believed that it is a better idea for us to know Saturday and call you for all of two minutes to coordinate a time. I do not know where that logic comes from, but whatever. This week has been a great week for me and Elder Christensen to talk though, due to the lack of teaching, but we are pretty good friends.

I also lied last week about the picture of the city, that is Cuenca not Guayaquil.

That is the week of Elder McCammon in the Frio ciudad of Cuenca. I ended up getting a cold so i did end up having to buy a sweater. I actually liked the cold, but i do not think that my body did.

 So I found this on google and added it so you could see the whole church.

 The rest of these were taken by Jesse.

I love and miss all of you, but until next week love Elder McCammon

New Casa for Jesse

Well its official Jesse is in a new place...Cuenca (Kwanka) Ecuador...Google it the pictures look really beautiful!!!

Hey, This week has been great. Tuesday morning and Monday night I got to pack and get ready to go to Cuenca, Ecuador. It is cold and windy all the time. There are mountains everywhere as well. It is also like a mini-America down here. Our Bishop is from the states as well as a few other families. Elder Christensen has said he has had to give blessings to people in English here and had to give a few lessons in English  The water here is clean and the city here is clean. Our district leader here is from Tremonton, Utah. His name is Matthew Profaizer. My zone here is pretty darned awesome. The only problem is everybody down here is Catholic. So investigators here are mostly by references. The cool part is I found when i got here that we had 3 baptisms for that Saturday. Our sectors down here are huge too. We have to ride buses almost everywhere. The good thing is we do not have as many meetings here. We have 2 to 3 so it is not that bad. The only problem is that after our baptisms, we now have no investigators. We are goin' a contacting!
From here on these are answers to the questions I asked him...
My companions name is Elder Christensen and he is from Provo. Our apartment it is huge, like twice the size of our other house. we have a kitchen, a huge living room, a bathroom with hot water, (no hot water in the apartment in Guayaquil, must of been murder for a kid who showers for 20min!!!). a bedroom and a study room. The kitchen is the same size as the other house. and same with the living room. the bedroom and study room are both about the same size if not bigger than the room in our other house. There are 7 wards and 2 branches. Americans choose to move down here because it is beautiful and a lot cheaper to live here than in the states. There is not too many members, but there still are some. No i did not have hot water before. It sucked!  It took four hours to get here from Guayaquil, and transferred three other missionaries here with me, so no I didn't have to travel alone. (I asked if it was cold enough for a coat) sweater during the day and evenings, mostly during the evenings. I also saw a zumba class this morning during our run. (apparently he runs...his new comp must be a runner!) it is about the same wind wise as Idaho Falls.

 This is a picture of Cuenca

the tall American is Bishop Foreman, the other American is my new companion Elder Christensen, the other man is Carlos Garcia, the older woman is Ana Maria Cobos, the other lady is Sarah Panjon.

More Baptisms!

Okay I must say, trying to get info out of Jesse isn't easy and his ability to write really informative letters, well, its something he needs to work on.  So at the end of my letter I asked him a bunch of questions, one sentence answers, really? Can't blame a girl for trying!!!


How are you feeling? Still good? I am feeling the same nothing has really changed with that.
Are you feeling more comfortable with the language? i am feeling more comfortable with the language, yes. Do i know the language...no.
Have you met with the mission president yet?What did he say?(this was out of curiosity because 2 weeks ago they wanted to send him home!) I have talked to him when he did a training and that was just to see if anything has changed. End of that.
Did you teach any new people/families this week? New, old investigator. I have not had a chance to really meet with her, but she ended up moving somewhere else the day of her baptism and just recently moved back into the word. still not baptized. so she is preparing for the 4th of may.
What are some of the way's you've changed or grown? I have lost weight, but i really do not feel like i have changed or grown. I probably have, but i do not feel it. I feel like me.
Have you read anything that particularly touched or moved you? I have really loved reading in the Book of Mormon section of PMG. It really expounds on the need for the book of mormon in our religion as well as in day to day life.
Did you have any special experiences? I have had the experiance of watching three baptisms, testimonies tested and grown from our investigators. I have had the sad experiance of being in a ward where the members love talking to the missionaries, but most could really care less about helping the missionaries. (sad to say but I think this is a problem every where!)
Any new or weird foods? there is always a lot of soup, rice, and banana. If there is something on your plate and you have no clue what it is, it is banana.

Now his letter:

This week was a lot of contacting. We have officially ran out of investigators. Antonio and Saudy are being baptized on the weekend of the 27th. (this is the parents of the boy they baptized last week.) They were officially married on Friday  They did not pass their baptismal interviews. So they have an interview with president this Wednesday and they will be good to go for the 27th. 
The great news is Wendy and Andres Soto Heredero were baptized this weekend and are new members of the church. (see pictures below) This Sunday we also found out that an old investigator of the church who had moved the day of her baptism moved back into the ward. So she just needs to have the lessons retaught and attend church one more time now, and she is good for the 4th of May. Other that that there has been a lot of contacting and asking Members of the church for references. So we have four references we need to check up on and hopefully they all lead to baptism.

I am reading the Book of Mormon, Preach my Gospel, the Bible, and a whole lot of other church books we have in the house. Not only am I reading I am studying. Not only studying, but studying in Spanish!  My knowledge of the church has expanded and I know a lot and I am always looking for more answers. I am reading the appendix of the bible of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Which is questions and answers that are pretty much just bashing on Catholics and verifying their church. What me and my companion have been doing is finding the false doctrine and finding answers to that in case we have questions about it in the future. Like their argument that only 144,000 people will be saved and they have already been chosen, great reason to join their church right? So yes I have grown spiritually. I have changed spiritually, but it has happened to the extent that you do not really notice or feel different. I still feel like the same person and I am still a 19 year old boy.

By the way tonight is night of transfers and I might get changed. Let you know next week I guess. 

I love you so much mom. I am counting every week that i have left on my blog, but only for fun. I love hearing from you.

Love your favorite missionary,

Elder Jesse W. McCammon


You'd think they were being punished!!!  Such serious faces!!!

This is just a video Jesse sent showing the rain!

Easter Parade Video's

Jesse had to break this apart into 3 different videos so he could send it to me. This was on Easter Sunday. There is a catholic church down the street and this was on the street in front of his apartment. Interesting to see how another culture celebrates holiday's.