September 13, 2010

Dear Family,
This week was pretty crazy. It went by sooooo fast. On Thursday we were in Otavalo. That was a really cool experience. The stake where we had a fireside at only speaks quichua (that´s a native language. It was really cool. Most of them speak spanish too so they understood us. They have a very interesting dress as well. The stake president had a blue poncho over his white shirt. The women all had the same neclace and pretty much all of them had the same shirts on too. I didn't take any pictures. I totally forgot because it was so interesting to see them all like that. Don't worry though. I'll be going back next month so I'll be seeing them again. There was a different spirit there with that people. It was really cool. I kept imagining different Book Of Mormon stories while I was looking at the scenery on the way there. It was really fun to do. I really felt like I was there. otavalo is a very sacred place to me. I liked it a lot.
As you all know I went to Coca as well. That was a really neat experience. I definitely took a ton of picture. I put a few of them on here so I hope you get them. It was really humid and hot there. I liked it a lot. I missed being in the heat. I've been in Quito for the last 8 months. It was so cool being there with that branch. When President Sloan was first starting his mission he opened that branch. At that time there were about 40-50 people that attended every week. When we went this last weekend there were 80 people there, not including the visitors. It was a really cool experience. This branch is really strong. They only meet in a house that was donated to the church. President Sloan is now talking about building a chapel there because the branch is growing so fast. It was a humbling experience to be there with those people. They don't have the church like we do. They just meet in a house, but they all have great faith and they're all living the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It was such an amazing experience that I had.
This week we also had a really cool experience in our own sector. There is a lady here that has gone to church 3 times now. She's not a member and we went to visit her for a 2nd time. The first time we had left her with a reading assignment in 3 Nephi 27, the gospel of Jesus Christ. When we got there she started explaining what she learned. She had her Book of Mormon more marked up than I do. She really analized it and she felt that it was all true. She had even written in the margin 1. Faith 2. Repentance 3. Holy Ghost (she was out of order :) ) It was amazing. We invited her to be baptized. She was so surprised and said, "I can do that in your church?" We told her yes and invited her to prepare for her baptism. She committed herself (we hadn´t asked her yet) to be prepared for September 25th. It was a really cool experience. She is more than a golden investigator. That was an amazing experience.
In the mission now we have 2 new standards. The first is that we have to invite our investigators to be baptized in every single lesson. The second is that we have to baptize at the very least 2 people every week. It´s a really high norm, but we know that we can do it. We are really starting to see miracles in our mission. We set another new record. We had 195 baptisms in the month of August. It was awesome!!! I love this work.
Well I love all of you guys so much. Thank you for everything that you do for me.








Love,
Élder Hakes








P.S.
This Saturday I´m going to be in Ambato so I´ll probably write you next Monday again :)