Short on time:(

Hey guys, apparently Mav didn't have much time to write today but here's what he had to say...

Hey everyone! 

I hope that you are all doing great! This week the emails are going to be kind of short because we had some ktrouble finding a place to do email today so sorry about that! I will write more next week!

This week was really good! I got my driver's license finally! Almost hit a suicidal family of pigs with the car, and watched a dog give birth which was super gross. It was definitely a really weird week haha. But here we are all just getting really excited and trying to get ready for the visit from Neil l anderson this Saturday. It is going to be awesome to get to meet an apostle and listen to him come and just speak to us! I am really looking forward to it! 

Also I sent my SD card home today so hopefully that gets there with no problems! Sorry that this is so short this week! I hope you all have a great week and that I get more time next week to get to tell you more about what is going on haha. Well have a great week! Love you and miss you all,

Love,

Elder Searle

Another week

Here's the email we got today!

Hey everyone!

How is everybody doing? It sounds like it is pretty cold out in Utah right now. It is not cold here haha. It is still hot and sunny just like always!

This week was pretty good! We had a really good baptismal service on Saturday. The girl that got baptized is named Kiara and she is 14. She reminds me a lot of Brooklyn, they are kind of similar in personalities. It was a really cool experience and she was super excited so it was awesome. Another cool thing that happened this week was that we rode our bikes for a couple of miles with a giant group of cyclists that were riding around the whole island of Puerto Rico in two days. I don't really know why or anything, but when this whole big group of hundreds of people passed through the town where we work, we just jumped right in with them and rode until they stopped to take a break at the beach. It was pretty fun!

My birthday was good here. The hamburger that I went and ate was absolutely delicious. It was like a half a pound of meat with these things called amarillos on it. Amarillos are some kind of like fried banana that are really sweet and really good. It was probably the best hamburger that I have ever had in my life!

Other than that it was just a pretty normal week, not too much out of the ordinary going on right now. It is crazy that January is almost over, it went by really fast! That is also crazy that Anthony is already about to leave! I am sure that he will do great!

Well I love and miss you all! I hope that you have a great week! Talk to you soon.

Love,

Elder Searle

He sounds happy:)

This is the email we got today...I think he sounds really good!

Hey everyone!

I hope that you all are doing great! Sounds like it is pretty cold in Utah right now! I bet that is a whole bunch of fun haha. It is a little bit warmer here. That is definitely one of the advantages of being on a little tropical island haha.

This week was pretty good. I got to play basketball a few times with some kids at a park and that was pretty cool haha. I really like teaching them because we always get to play basketball after! So today is another Holiday here, and then next week will be Martin Luther King Jr day so another holiday. It is kind of a pain because all of the libraries are always shut down on our P-Days!! Puerto rico just has way too many holidays. But the computer I am using right now won't let me upload photos, so there won't be any photos this week.

This week I met a couple of people who are pretty cool. There is a couple that just moved to Puerto Rico, are super rich, and don't speak Spanish at all. He is from Boston and she is from Jamaica. They are both pretty old and really nice! I also met another rich guy who lives on the beach named Raul. He has a beach house, Rolex, bmw Z4 and only dresses in Ralph Lauren clothes. He is definitely the classiest person that I have seen here haha.

Not really too much happened this week that was super exciting. I saw the beach almost every day so that was pretty sweet though haha. The ocean here is beautiful, I definitely want to come back someday after my mission so that I can actually go to the beach haha.

Well I hope that you all are doing well and that you all have a great week. Enjoy the cold and the snow!!! I love you and miss you all,

love,

Elder Searle

1st week in Arroyo

hey everyone!

I hope that you are all doing really well and had a great week! i had a really good first week in my new area.

The new area is called Arroyo. It is a pretty small town, it doesn't even have a McDonald's (which is really really weird for Puerto Rico) and the ward that I am serving in is actually a branch. Yesterday there were about 32 people in Sacrament Meeting, so that is a little bit weird, but it was also a pretty cool experience too.

The area is right by the beach, well actually it is right by the ocean but there isn't really like a nice sandy beach in the area, which is great. Because it is really pretty but there also aren't any tourists that come there. It is really cool. It actually feels like a different country because the whole vibe of the town is just like old school carribbean island stuff, and my last area was pretty much just like a really dirty poorly planned city in the United States haha. So this area is definitely a lot cooler!

There are a lot of really nice people here too! People have already given us a ton of food, and most of them are just people we visit. Everyone is very generous with what they have here.

We have been teaching a couple people who want to be baptized, one is a man in his 50s who is a retired army veteran who has a lot of drinking problems that he wants to take care of. He is a little bit crazy, and he looks really crazy, but he is also a really nice guy. He lives right on the beach and we teach him on his deck thing that just hangs over the ocean. It is absolutely beautiful! The other person is a 19 year old kid named Alex. He doesn't really have any kind of religious knowledge or anything, he just really likes missionaries and says that he wants to be a missionary so he wants to join the church. He is really cool and really nice too.

the only thing that is kind of bad about the area is how far away we live. It is a pretty long bike ride and it is always pretty windy here, but it is pretty flat the whole way so it really isn't too bad at all. It also doesn't rain near as much here. It is a lot sunnier, so that is pretty tiring, but it is nice to not get rained on every day haha.

Well that is pretty much how my week was. We had another ward christmas party because the people here celebrate Christmas and the Day of the Kings, which is what latin america celebrates instead of Christmas, so today is another holiday haha, but it is ok because the Christmas food here is delicious and the party was a lot of fun!

Well I hope that you all have a great week! Love you and miss you

love

Elder Searle

New Area

This is the email we got from Mav today:)

Hey everyone,

I don't have a whole lot of time to write emails this week. I got transferred today from my area in Toa Baja. Now I am going to be working in an area called Arroyo with Elder Arteaga. He is from Bolivia. So the beginning of our area is about 7 miles away and we don't have a car, so this is definitely a big biking area haha. It is also really weird because this side of the island is a lot more brown and a lot less green and tropical looking. but the good news is that there are a lot less hills so it shouldn't be too hard riding the bike all the time haha. 

I was kind of bummed out to be transferred because I was supposed to baptize someone this Saturday, and I was really starting to make a lot of friends with the people in my old area. But hopefully this new one will be even better! Something else that is different about it is that we have to eat out like every day because the house is too far away to go back and make lunch. I don't know how I feel about that yet but we will see how it goes haha.

Well I hope that you all have a great week and a very Happy New Year!

Thank you all for all of the great Christmas gifts and cards and everything. I got a ton of stuff from a lot of people and it was awesome so thank you all! I love and miss you all! have a great week!

love,

Elder Searle

YAY for Skype

Skype is my new favorite thing in the whole world.  We were able to Skype with Maveric for about 40 minutes on Christmas Day.  It was such a blessing to be able to see him and talk to him.  He looks really good and actually seems happy.  He was pretty emotional though in a few parts of our conversation with him.  I think he is very homesick!! So, that was really hard. It kinda broke my heart.  But, overall, I think he is doing okay.  He is starting to enjoy things a little more and I am happy about that. Oh gosh,  I can't even tell you how good it was to see his face.  I have missed him so much and it was awesome to see him.  I feel very blessed to have the technology that we do.  I also feel blessed that people are kind enough to let him borrow their computers and allow us the privilege of seeing him.  Seeing him was so much better than just talking to him. What a fabulous day we had!!!  cant wait until Mothers day:). Well, thanks again for all your love and support...it is truly appreciated!!

The power of fasting and prayer...

Okay once again it has been too long since I updated this blog.  There have been some ups and downs, some highs and lows for Elder Searle.  He went through a difficult time a couple weeks ago.  He was just struggling with a few things and it was difficult to not be able to help him through it.  I mentioned this to Brother Trussell and I would like to share with you what his response was.  He invited the Young Men, their parents and leaders, and the Bishopric over to his home.  As that group of 30 or so amazing men sat in his home they prayed for my son.  I can only imagine what that room must have looked like and felt like.  The spirit there must have been so strong.  As they gathered together Brother Trussell explained that there are times when we all need a little extra encouragement and support.  At this time Elder Searle was in need of that.  They began a 24 hour fast that night in hopes that Maveric would find some comfort and some strength to deal with the things he was struggling with.  There were no details given as to what he needed or what his worries were.  I did not even tell Brother Trussell what exactly was going on.  I just casually mentioned that Maveric was having a hard time.  I was so touched by the overwhelming love and support that these fine young men showed that night.  I will forever be thankful for this act of kindness.  Maveric will probably never know the events that took place that night.  But, I testify to you all that he felt the love that was being offered.  Since then there have been some events that have helped him so much.  He has had a different outlook on things and has been able to find a way through some difficult things.  He has been lifted up by the spirit and I credit this to the inspiration of Brother Trussell and his inclination to follow it.  I can bear testimony that the spirit comforted me in a way that I so desperately needed.  I was at a loss as to what to do for my son.  I knew that he needed comfort that I could not give him and I was comforted to know that he would recieve it through the faith of these young men. Thank you!!

I am happy to say that, as of today, things seem to be going well for Maveric.  He sent an email today that seemed encouraging.  I will include it below.  Thank you all for your continuing love and suppport.  It does not go unnoticed!!!

Hey everyone!

How is everybody doing? I hope well! I hope that you all had a great week! Sounds like things are a blast in good old Utah!

Haha things here are pretty much the same. I haven't noticed a difference at all in the supposed changes of the weather for winter haha it all feels the same to me. The only difference is that there are Christmas decorations everywhere! People here love Christmas! they start celebrating it the day after Thanksgiving, and they tell me that they finish usually around the 9th of January. Puerto Rican's love to party haha. They have so many holidays here it is nuts!

This week I did a lot of bike riding. We ride bikes everyday now because we don't have a car to use at all anymore so that is a lot of fun haha. I don't really get tired riding the bikes anymore usually, I just feel bad when we show up to people's houses all super sweaty and everything, but it isn't too bad. It hasn't been too rainy the last week (only like 4 days of the 7). There really hasn't been a whole lot new and exciting happening this week though. My Spanish is still getting a lot better everyday. I pretty much can talk with just about anyone now. I am sure I still don't sound all that intelligent when I speak Spanish, but they always know what I am trying to say haha.

I got the Christmas Calendar from Aunt Tina and that was awesome! Thank you for that! Everyone here is getting excited for Christmas, including me! We are having a Christmas Conference on the 17th and 18th, and I have no idea what that means and nobody know what we are doing, but it means we get kind of a day off at least haha so we are all excited for that. I am sure that I will have some good stories to tell you all about that in a few weeks.

Well I hope you all have a great week! I love you and miss you all. Talk to you soon!

love,

Elder Searle