Dear family,

I am doing well and I am really happy here in Tilda. We have a lot of investigators, and the members keep giving us more references. We set a goal of 10 references this week, so we are working with the members a lot to receive them. We have our first baptism here, Marcelino, the 18th of October. It is the son of a member, and he is really happy with his decision. He doesn't talk much, I assume because he is a young man, and we are sister missionaries, but he always is happy when we come to teach. He went to three sessions of general conference, and made his mom buy him a suit so he could go to church. We are also teaching his sister and their grandmother. If we can, we want to baptize the sister and another youth the same day.

General conference was great. The ZL's told us we could only go if we brought investigators, so we worked really hard to get them there. Later they told us we could go anyway. Sunday morning I got to watch in English, which was better because you get to hear the actual voice of the speaker, and their exact words. Plus everyone didn't look at me when I sang the songs in English. Those who speak Spanish taped their talks earlier in Spanish and played it instead of being translated. Elder Gavarret, who spoke Sunday afternoon, is an area authority for Peru. In the last zone conference, he picked me out of the audience to give a talk. We also had zone conference this past week. It was good, but the best part was that after we got to go to Papa John's. Wow, food tastes so much better when you haven't had it for a long time. Even my companion liked the pizza, and she doesn't like much American food. Don't worry about the weight I lost, because I think I'm gaining it back here. I ate 5 pieces, which I thought was good, but the skinny elder next to me ate 9.

Last p'day we went to Plazavea, the Wal'mart of Peru. It was exciting because they had some American food like macaroni and cheese, snickers, and peanut butter. Expensive though. My companion I think was a little shocked that I would buy a jar of peanut butter for 15 soles.

We get to go to the temple this week, and we are having p'day that day. The zone is going to the zoo. But we still got to do email today.

I got some real mail today, which made me really happy. But nothing from my family.

So you want to know about my companion. She is very short and she is from Chiclayo, Peru. She likes ceviche. Her dad got baptized when she was 3 or 4, so she has pretty much been a member her whole life, which is rare in Peru. She has 2 older sisters and a younger brother.

I've had some fun experiences lately. There is a guy who must live in our area who came up to me shouting bad English phrases. I told him I spoke Spanish, but he continued with the terrible English. He told me he sings religious mariachi songs for birthdays, 15 anos, weddings and such, and then he gave me a mini concert there in the street. He gave me his card and we went on our way. I've seen him twice since then, but he hasn't sung to me lately.

Thanks for your love and support.

Love,
Sarah
Ps. how is BYU doing?