Fecha 22 de Junio, 2K
Mi Primera Carta en el Campo Misional (My First Letter from the Mission Field)
Well I finally arrived! After spending the night in the Valencia airport for 9+ hours, I've finally arrived, along with 2 other missionaries I met in Miami, here in Valencia, Venezuela. Even though I haven't had time to shower in 2 days I'm feeling great! I love Venezuela already. It's awesome! The night after the airport Elder Affleck took me and Elder Reed prosteliting after 6. We taught a 1st and added a family! Man, I'm having a blast. President Alvarez is such a great man, but he leaves this week! I'm looking forward to meeting our new President, though.
There are a ton of people around here! Always walking up and down the streets, through traffic, across the freeway, in the busses and taxis, everywhere. Everyone is really friendly, too. The streets are just about as big as a 4 lane highway in CA but there's about a 3 foot wide divider in the middle, and the streets have no lanes, so cars are zig-zagging every whichway all the time. To cross the street you just find an open spot and run. It's rad! [Mom's note: doesn't sound rad to me, sounds dangerous!!]
The first night they fed us arrepas, which are kind of like meat pies filled with either cheese, beans, chicken or beef. They also gave us Malta, which around here is the equivalent to root beer. I've been told that once you've acquired a taste for it, it's really tasty but to me it tastes like liquified Grape-nuts. It kind of looks like rootbeer though, a little thicker. I sleep on a mattress covered in plastic on the ground on a little padded pad thing. Covers around here are non-existent - it maintains about a 70-85 degree temp all day. You can be in a really rich area on one side of the street and cross a river across the street and be in a place that's dirt poor. But in the city there are lots of tall building and trees, too. Everything's green. It's beautiful. Well, I need to go. I love you all!
Elder Onken