Hey everyone!
I hope its not just me, but it seems just like yesterday that I was writing home. Weeks go by too quickly, I never really realized that before. But now that only "weeks" separate us, its dawning on me. We had a good week this week. Some very interesting experiences. The first is by far the funniest. On thursday we did divisions with some missionaries here in the Zone, I went with Elder Zundel. Elder Zundel is from Arizona, I'm sure I have mentioned him before, I have been his zone leader for his entire mission. He got to Otavalo the same week as I did when I became Zone Leader, and he has been in my zones ever since. He is a district leader here in our Zone, and a great friend of mine! So this week on the divisions I went with him. We had some interesting things happen. We ate pizza for dinner in our house. While ordering the pizza a block or so away from the apartment a fight broke out between two group of high school kids on the street corner of the pizza shop. When the fight broke up the two groups went in different directions, the cops showed up only to find one of the groups, when they showed up the started yelling through the megaphone and just started hitting kids in the knees with their bully clubs until they all kneeled down with their hands up. It was crazy! Then friday morning we got ready to leave for the weekly leadership meeting we hold in the stake center. My apartment is on the 3rd story of a house, to get out to the street there is another big gate and door below. As we walked out of the apartment the thought passed through my mind, "the keys", but it passed through my mind as the door closed. So we got locked out of the house. I get a bit irritated that I forgot the keys, but decided well, the neighbor lady has another set, tonight when we get back I will have her open the door for us. So we went down the stairs to the ground level gate, bad news... locked. And the keys were in my apartment. The gate is some 14 feet tall with spikes all across the tops, so no chance in jumping it. So sadly to say we were locked OUT of our apartment and locked IN to the building. We tried desperately to open the windows, door, everything for about half an hour, then lost hopes. None of the neighbors were home to open the door below to let us out, we were trapped. So we called my companion and had him start the meeting without us. We hadn't eaten yet or anything. We ended up staying outside the house for a little over 4 hours....sitting....waiting.... We played "horse", only we had no basketball, we used a balled up bar of laundry soap and a bucket, we also played baseball with a gum wrapper and a broomstick. Ya, and I can say I'm an excellent baseball player with a broomstick. After playing those games I got bored and ended up falling asleep on the washer. In south america basically no one has real washers, so I must explain what a "washer" is here. It is about 3 feet tall and some 6 feet wide with a big opening in the middle to pale out water. there are two slabs on concrete covering it on both sides. So I laied my head on one slab of concrete, my waist was stretched over the opening and my legs across the other slab of concrete. And I in fact slept for about 45 minutes, then it started to rain. So it was a pretty eventful morning for Elder Zundel and I. We finally were saved by a member that works in the Church Offices in Quito, he brought the spare key from the mission offices for us, and hour and 10 minutes drive for him.... oops. haha but it was a funny and unforgettable experience. Today we played soccer with the office missionaries and our zone. It was alot of fun. I want to get into soccer when I get home. I really began to enjoy it. As a mission we had 86 baptisms this weekend so President Sloan to reward us, gave my zone permission to go to a place called "Mindo" its a jungle pueblo here in my sector with alot of touristic sights, waterfalls, exotic birds and animals, etc.
I cant wait for General Conference. I love it so much. I cant wait until I can attend it again. I will be there for next April for sure! We are going to do a big "Stake Open House" all day saturday and sunday to invite people into the conference. We are really excited about it. I will have some pictures to send about it next week. Love you all! Have a great week.
Elder Matthew David Morris