Oct 18th, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

It has been another great week here in Uruguay and love having so many things to do and being so busy. I have fallen in love with being busy and all that stuff so this new assignment helps. I am in charge of all the missionaries cards, medical expenditures, reimbursements for missionaries, all the cell phones of the mission, and more but those are the heftiest. I have never been so busy in my life, and we still do our best to get out and proselyte which is crazy. Having a thousand things in your head at one time, has given me so many head aches but I love it. I have never been so tired in my life. Plus we wake up early to run to the church and play basketball every morning so I am a zombie now.

Even though it is a blast being here, it is hard, because it is like having a job almost. Trying to maintain the spirituality of a missionary when we barely can go out to work and testify of the gospel is hard. My spirituality is draining but the other offices workers are incredible, plus we are with President and the APs a lot so we all keep each other sane and spiritual. It is crazy how much President trusts us though, that is for sure. Working on computers all day every day with internet access and having a car and permission to go to which ever area and even leave mission boundaries is crazy. Uruguay is split into two missions and one of the banks we use is in the other mission and it is just so strange still to have so many worldly things now, but still being responsible. In a couple months I will be able to drive around and that is crazy. It is all so crazy but I am so excited. The Lord and President really love and trust us which is so comforting. 

I will update you guys on all the disasters and crazy things that happen, but right now, I don't have enough time. Sadly. You wouldn't believe the kind of things that happen, and we know it all. But once I have a camera I will definitely send tons of pictures and show you downtown Montevideo versus the country. it is insane. Super beautiful, and nice in the city. I realized I am a city person out here which is funny. Still haven't left the capital and won't for 14 months of my 24 month mission. And it could even be longer! Crazy stuff.

I feel so blessed with this opportunity and absolutely love it. 

Hope you guys have a great week and I will write again next week.

Elder Moss

Oct 11, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

Since the last time you all heard, lots of things have happened. 

I ended up not becoming a district leader because it was an error in the system but had a great change anyways. I absolutely loved the North Stake and it was a pleasure to be in Ferrocarril, Norte.

This change I have been changed to once again the city of Montevideo. Of the 13 zones in my mission, 3 are actually in Montevideo and now I have been in all three. I am now in the Stake, East and it´s great. I have been assigned as a Financier of the mission and have many responsibilities with that so it is awesome. I have a lot more power than I thought I would as a financier and it is kind of scary but awesome. I have to be very careful with all the tithing donations we receive here for the missionaries but this mission is very interesting. It is apparently one of the most expensive missions in the world and uses a lot more money than I would have thought. It is actually quite incredible. I wish I could tell you guys but I don´t feel that would be appropriate hahahaha. Either way, it is awesome and I am really living the good life. From our apartment complex we see the ocean and always have a very nice ocean breeze as the heat comes. If you want you can look up malvin in Montevideo uruguay, that is were I am. 

Something funny is that we drive around with the APs all the time and one is from California and drives like a maniac. It is awesome though. No speed limits, windy beach roads, and narrow streets makes it very very interesting. Especially with the quantity of buses here. The neighborhood is extremely rich so not too much success regarding the work but we barely have time for that. I still have not been able to work yet. We have sooo many responsibilities we have to fulfill and sadly don't have nearly as much time to visit people. It really is a difference and is hard. Teaching and proselyting is awesome and tiring but this is just tiring. Very very long days of office things. We don´t have language study anymore, and no dinner or lunch time. We just get lunch and come back and work more. Buuuut, we do have awesome lunches because we have Burger King, McDonalds, Subway etc which is awesome. We are in the super rich part of Uruguay so we have many many American things which is cool. Not as exciting as I thought it would be but still great.

Either way, it is awesome being here and crazy to think I will be here for 6 months, for sure. It will be hard but awesome. Many benefits and a few negatives but it will be great. Love you all and hope all is well. Hope you enjoyed conference as much as I did. Some very incredible talks given. Can´t wait to start driving the mission cars and go to appropriate places of the beach(They have a problem here with modesty) at appropriate times haha. No swimming though sadly. Oh well.Take care!

Love,

Elder Moss

September 1, 2014

pictures August 2014

August 26th, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

So another week has passed and a lot has happened. My awesome crazy companion is heading out and I am staying here in Montevideo still. I have yet to be outside the city but I am sure that will happen soon. 

I also happened to recieve a interesting call with the changes and I have become District Leader out here in The North Zone of Montevideo with less than 7 months in the mission... I am kind of terrified but pretty dang excited. I plan on being the best district leader ever but we will see how that goes. I feel pretty unprepared but I think it will be great. I didn´t sleep well because of that and I am still on edge a bit but I am sure everything will be fine.

The weird part is that my junior companion has more time than me in the mission and he is from Peru so we will see how that goes. My trainer was from Peru and was good so we will see how this goes. 

Yesterday we had a ward activity and somehow they have the money to rent a mechanical bull and so I did that yesterday. Lots of soccer, basketball, Volleyball, and Mechanical bull hahaha. The best part was some youth from the ward came and this one less active guy came and took over the music and started doing his weird dance in the corner for forever. I honestly couldn´t keep from laughing. But then the rest of the ward started doing it to his weird techno music. These people are all so different but it is pretty awesome. Basically shame doesn´t exist here and I am not exhadurating. I know I spelled that wrong. 

But other than that I can´t remember the other crazy things that happened. I just know that they happen and I will remember in the next life. 

Love you guys, hope all is well and let me know how things are going. Take care!

Elder Moss

pictures August 2014

August 11, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

On the Uruguay front all is well. My house is still way fun and way weird. I left our house for my birthday to go celebrate with my district leader because he is the best and some member in his ward wanted to give me Pizza and cake so we went and it was awesome. Super deleicious and fun. Butttt, when I returned in the morning my companion had a fight with someone else in the house and the other guy punched my companion and that just goes to show what happens when I am not around. My house is nuts. Ward is still way good, area rich so we get betters lunches instead of noddles and tomato paste everyday. My eating healthy went down the tube and I eat terriblly. Today I made empanadas for breakfast. It was really good. The Germany candy was delicious and is almost gone... Oh well. I eat things called Alfajors like everyday and they are absolutely awful for you and I have gained weight but whatever. No girls for 18 months! What up!

My zone leaders are awesome and really inspiring but kind of nuts too. They have a meeting once a month with all the bishops and the stake president each month and we have a problem here trying to get baptisms to happen as fast as we can and the zone leaders weren´t happy. Bishops usually delay baptisms to make sure these people will continue to go to church and our Zone leader told them that they are with the Devil with trying to not let the baptisms happen. Our bishop loves us and told us about that and then we all laughed and had a great time about that. 

Saw some guy juggling on a slack line which was really cool. These people will do anything for money here. Trust me. Anything. Someone got killed a little while ago for 2.5 dollars. Kind of crazy and I always have the sketchy areas. Don´t know why. Some other missionary got hit in the head with a slingshot with a rock so I should count my blessings that hasn´t happened yet haha.

There are more stories but I already forgot them. Oh well. Love you guys. Just let me know what you want to hear about. Take care.

Elder Moss