Hello!! I'm in Bolivia! Things are good. I arrived Wednesday morning, President Calderón and his wife came to pick us up as well as the assistants. We went to a Mexican restaurant for lunch, haha, but it was a lot different than the Mexican food I have ever had. My companion was Hermana Castro from Perú. I say was because they had to separate us and put us in trios the next day, so now I am with Hna Huaynate from Peru and Hna Randall from Logan, UT who arrived 3 weeks before me so Hna Huaynate is training 2 sisters! But on Saturday Hna Castro is coming to our area to be my companion and so there will be 4 sisters for our area. Our area is La Cañada. It's not pronounced like the country north of the USA. I like it. We have a lot of members that want to help and give referrals and we have a really good pensionista (cooks for us), she is ok if we don't want to eat everything. The first night I stayed with hna Castro at a hotel in El Centro, they gave me time to rest after the flight which was nice. We were on american airways the whole way. For dinner we went to the mission home, they live on the 11th-12th floor of an apartment building (penthouse)- it's very nice. The next morning was training, we got our debit cards, they told us how to fill out paperwork, etc. Also we had to go all around getting stuff done for my visa. The visa that I got was just for 30 days so now they are working on the one for longer time. So we had to go to a bunch of places to sign stuff and get our fingerprints taken. I got my fingerprints taken like in 4 differnet places. Also we had to give a blood sample.
Our apartment is nice. Most places here rent out room by room so we have 2 rooms, one with a little kitchen!! And that is where our desks are and the other is where we sleep-have our dresers. We are on the 2nd floor so it's pretty private and we have a patio that connects the 2 rooms and our bathroom, which is private, and the thing where we wash our clothes. It's pretty nice. When Hna. Castro comes we are going to live on the 1st floor but we will have the same kind of accomodations but the owner of hte house might give us an oven!! Which would be great so we can make brownies. All the Bolivianos are obsessed with brownies. We don't have a phone right now so we have to use payphones which is kind of annoying but we manage. My companions were moved to where we are a couple of weeks ago so they're still getting settled in.
Santa Cruz is really interesting. I haven't really seen much but it seems like a lot of people come here from other cities in the country, so there is a variety. It's super hot here! We carry water everywhere. On a street by our house they sell used clothing from america, it's quite funny, i bought a purse there, it's too hot to carry a backpack, in my opinion, plus all i really need is my BoM and water. Most of the streets are dirt and full of garbage. Our area is between the 4th and 5th rings, not really sure if it is north, south, or whatever but am here!
We had a baptism Saturday! It was a little 9 yr old girl named Gabriela. Her family is less active. Although I didn't have much to do with it it was cool to have a baptism my first week. It was very nice, we panicked a little before because the church was having plumbing problems but the water stayed in the font long enough to baptize her haha.
I will send pictures NEXT WEEK! I keep forgetting my usb but i will remember this week.
Most of the missionaries here are from Bolivia, Peru, and Argentina. They just recently started letting Americans come here so there are afew that have been here 8 months or so and the rest of the americans came in the last 2 or 3 changes. Everyone is nice though and its not too hard to get used to the accents people have.
I now have 45 minutes to use the computer every week. But I also have to email Pres. Calderón during that time. I am in an internet cafe and the internet is slow.
You can send dear elders, send me one and we can see how long it takes.
I can only email PARENTS, BROTHERS, SISTERS, and GRANDPARENTS. No other missionaries, friends, aunt-uncles etc. just fyi.
I love you all! have a good week!
love, Hermana Tibbitts
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