Welp, I can see the ocean...

Hello all! Happy Wednesday morning to you all. I have made it to my new area safe and sound. Here is a hint or two: It took 7 hours on a train to get here and I can see the ocean. Want to know more? It is just above Portugal. Alright, It´s Vigo!!! I am now serving in the area of Vigo. The next question: Who is my companion? Welp, I don´t want to give away BOTH pieces of good news at once, so you can either skip the rest of the letter and read at the bottom, or you can be patient and wait through the whole letter, cause I´m saving it for last :)

So, the last week. It has gone by pretty fast. Wednesday I don´t really remember a ton happening, and Thursday was kind of boring. We had our weekly planning, but since Elder Gardner and I knew that our area was getting closed, we had nothing to plan for. So we just gave our investigators to Elder Ketchum and Elder Driggs, who both knew them all already anyways. Then we just watched them plan hahaha. Friday was a good day. We taught a few lessons and whatnot. Then Saturday morning we found out about transfers. We had a correlation meeting at 9:00 in the morning, everybody else found out at 9:30, and then I found out at like 10:15 haha. Lame. The Elder with the assistants found out that much longer after everybody else. I wasn´t too torn up about it though. I was super excited to be going up on the beach! Not that there is really a beach like you would imagine. And even if there was, I wouldn´t be allowed to go there. Sunday was a day of saying good bye to people from Barrio 2. I didn´t really get to know people there tooo super well, but there was about 4 people that I wanted to say goodbye to and I got to say goodbye to them all. One was Gino, the ward mission leader. He´s legit. Next was Gorki and Gloria. They´re recent converts and they´re super stoked about the work. Gorki is going to be like a general authority when he learns who they are hahaha. Another was Riqui. He is a RM that served in Utah. He speaks perfect English. He is a ward missionary now. And then Kati and Marco, another recent convert family. Marco was actually a less active (he didn´t even know, I don´t think) that the assistants re-activated and then his wife was baptised, and then their two daughters are the Javiera and Francisca baptism from my first transfer. Anyways, they gave me a book-map of Spain when they found out I was shipping off to Vigo. How kind of them. Sunday night was the pack-fest and good bye party. Apparently there are like 15 different tie ceremonies. Who´da thunk? Monday was the day of travel. We all (everybody that was being transferred and their companions) showed up at the Stake Center at 10:30. Most of the people took off around 11:00 but our train was at 2:20, so we didn´t leave until 1. Just hung out in the stake center. Elder Mcgrath is going up north too, and him and I have become pretty good friends in our short times together haha so we just hung out together. Then we hopped on a 7 hour train! It went by fast. I wrote a couple of letters and got to send those off when I got to Vigo. Oh, by the way, my address in Vigo is:

Elder Tanton Jeppson
Rúa Arzobispo Xelmirez 3, 4
36203 Vigo Galicia
España

Letters are great to this address, but packages are still best at the mission office, I believe. You can send them here I think, but it´s a little riskier (I just have to go pick them up from the nearest correos office). It does take like a long time for the office to get packages up here to the North though. I do know we have a Zone conference around the 23rd of March, so I will get any office packages that day. After that, I have no idea. So if it´s urgent, you could send it right to me. I´ll let anybody make the decision for themselves on that.

Here´s a great story though. The office missionary that printed off my ticket printed it off twice thinking it was two different tickets, and so he gave it to me, and a different elder too. Well, the other elder went through the gate before me, and then I got owned and they denied me. Anyways, after a little bit of spanish upset-ness at me, I figured out what they were saying and asked if I could just buy another ticket. They told me that I could, but on the train. So they let me through, all was well. Eventually, some guy on the train asked me for my money. Well, I don´t have 50 euros left on my mission card, so I figured I would just use my card from home. Lo and behold, they don´t accept cards on the train. So he tells me that I have to pay or else they´re going to kick me off in Ourense, which is not quite Vigo. Well, I ask him how long we´ll be stopped there. 12 minutes. So I had to book it off the train, find an ATM, and get the money in Ourense. It´s ok though, I got it done eventually. Made it to Vigo safe and sound. Now I live in Vigo. We have 4 in our piso, and it´s bigger than the one we just had 6 in. It´s a lot nicer piso, but the water heater is not as good...:/ Life is just never perfect is it? ;) I live with Elder Soliz, Elder Hoskins, and Elder.......(My companion). It´s already some good times. It´s definitely a ton different than living with the Assistants though. That´s good and bad. Nonetheless, I couldn´t live with them forever, eh? So Vigo is a lot like San Francisco, without the first thing everybody thinks of when they think of San Francisco....The trolley. That thing is called a trolley, right? Anyways. It´s right here on a bay of the ocean. It´s crazy to me that I have seen like sandy beaches and the ocean today already. Life is too rough! The people here are more Spanish. There is also a different language spoken here. Gallego, or Galego. Not sure which way it´s spelled. But all the signs have Spanish and that language. And all of the street names are in Gal(l)ego. Rúa means calle, which means street. Just in case anybody caught that in my address up there.

Here I am, onto the new companion. His name is Elder Quevedo, and he is a native from Ecuador! Yay. He lived in Barcelona for the last 8 years though. In fact, he took mission prep with Elder Tuesta. So mom, if you see Elder Tuesta again, tell him hi from both of us, haha. What a small world, eh? I was really surprised when I found that out. How cool, right? I am so glad I got a native! He´s like a big teddy bear hahaha he would probably kill me if he knew I said that about him. He speaks practically no english. He knows enough that I recognize words he says, usually. The real problem is that I still don´t know how to say a lot of stuff in Spanish. That gives us a little bit of a language barrier, but we´ll get through it. I am going to learn Spanish like a champion now. Or so I hope. I really do struggle to understand him a lot. He is very soft spoken. He says he has a dry throat right now. I´ll see if I can get him to speak up or if I can get my spanish mind to speed up haha. That´s all I really have about that. How lucky am I?

Welp, That´s all for this week really. Thank you Krista, Doug, Trey, and Krew for the pictures you drew me! I am going to hang them up in my study area and tell everybody that my nephews fight as fiercely as Ammon! I can´t see the pictures in your blog emails though Krista, I am not sure why...
Mom, I sent you a little mini package thing today. There are a couple of letters in there that I would love if you could forward them to everybody. I figured it would be cheaper to send them to you and then have you slap a cheaper US stamp on them than the .80 euros it costs from here. Thank you. I think you´ll like it. If you could also please get me Riley Hazeldine´s address, Kyle Becker´s address (in Montana, I think), and the addresses to the Mission homes in Des Moines Iowa mission, and Rancagua Chile mission. That´d be fantastic. Thanks!
Dad, Thank you for the line of authority and 4 generation pedigree chart. It´s exactly what I needed. I just need the husband from Grandma Vinson. So mom, that´s your job! I love you both.

Thank you all for your support! It really helps me. Letters, prayers, emails, jokes, sayings (especially Melissa´s), everything. Thank you all. I love you all. It is 6:30 here, time to go teach!

Love,
Elder Jeppson

P.S. My first lesson in Vigo was with Ana Belen. She was all torn up that Elder Holub left. She has a baptism date and wanted him to baptize her. I mostly wrote this part so that someday if I get to read these letters again I will remember that lesson. haha I forgot to write about it in my journal. Ohhhhh Ana Belen....

A donde me mandes iré, Señor

¡Hola! ¿Comó estáis? I´m livin´ the Spanish life. It´s a pity that we aren´t allowed to use the vosotros form with investigators though. It´s a form of Spanish that is only used in Spain and the scriptures really. I absolutely love how it sounds, but it is used for more formal relations and ustedes has more respect. In case anybody wanted a little glimpse into my opinion of the vosotros. Hermana Meikle better read this eventually.

Anyways... Another week down. Wow. They go so fast. Days are weeks and weeks are days. Greg was right. First things first: I am not serving in Toledo. In fact, the city isn´t even an open area. We just went there for the one P-day in fact. But that would be great if it opened in my 2 year adventure here. We shall see I suppose. I´m still in Barrio 2. I will be moving to a new area this weekend though. Monday, in fact. The transfers are this weekend. We find out on Saturday where we go, have Sunday as our last day, and then Monday it´s off to a new wonderland of stubborn Spaniards. I will have a real companion! I have had 3 companions pretty much now. Elder Gardner and I are together half the time as greenies, and then I spent 2 weeks with Elder Driggs and now 2 weeks with Elder Ketchum. What a crazy first transfer. It´ll be nice to have one solid companion. I hope he´s a native. I love the native-speaking missionaries. Whenever we have missionary get togethers, like at the mission house or at zone conference, I always just talk to them and try and speak Spanish. It´s great. My Spanish would improve sooo much if I got a native companion. I´m very happy with my Spanish though. I can follow pretty much most of conversations now and speaking is coming along sure as ever. Occasionally I´ll come across people with crazy accents and it´s game over for me, but I´m sure I´ll continue to get better.
So as for things that have happened the last week, I´m not really sure. They have all just blended into one big week for me at this point. So I´ll just give a recap on this ward/area since I will be leaving it this week. This ward, Barrio 2, is part of the Madrid East stake. There are only two stakes in my mission, Madrid East and Madrid West. The rest of the mission, including the Canary Islands, are divided into 3 or 4 districts. The East stake is more legit than the West, leadership and organization wise (from what I have heard). Barrio 2 is one of like 8 barrios (wards) that are in Main Madrid, then there are some wards in areas on the outskirts of Madrid. I personally believe I will be staying in Madrid area again after I leave Barrio 2. We shall see. There are about 100 members that attend church every week. The bishop is from Columbia. He is legit, but is not super pumped up on missionary work. It´s alright. Our Ward Mission Leader is Gino. He´s from Peru. He is super legit. Over half of our ward are South Americans. I would dare say 75% even. But that might be false. I don´t really know what else to tell you. I have done pretty much all my contacting on Calle Alcalá. Those of you who love GoogleMaps stalking me, between the Plaza de Toros and where Alcalá meets up with a highway in the West. I have walked that street for a lot of hours in the past 4 or 5 weeks. The only other thing I can really think to talk about in the last week is Zone Conference we had yesterday. The 3 zones of our mission that are located in Madrid area all got together and had a Zone Conference at the stake center. It was fantastic. President Watkins spoke to us, then the Assistants, which are my companions, so that made it cooler, and then Hermana Watkins. Then we split up into zones and Elder Jackson and Elder Middleton, our zone leaders, gave us some training on how to be great missionaries. It was really good. Then we ate (for free, wahoo) in the temple cafeteria, and had like a little social (and watched a movie (like 20 minutes long)! How strange...) for missionaries in the Stake center for like an hour. It was really uplifting and helped me learn some things I need to improve and work on in the coming weeks. Other than that we just contacted and taught lessons. Although, one lesson with Fausto (one of the assistants investigators) was really cool. He has been looking for an answer and even fasted with us a couple weeks ago. Towards the end of a lesson we all knelt down and each of us prayed for Fausto. It was really spiritual. Yup.

Oh, Happy Valentine´s day. In Spain it´s called ¨The day of Love and Friendship¨ hahaha. I thought that was funny. I got my package. Thank you so much! I think that bag should be fine. I will let you know if it isn´t. I think it should though. Thank you for all the great things! Pocket-Dictionary: perfect. Food: Perfect. CD´s: Haven´t listened to yet, but seem to be perfect. Muchas Gracias. Sounds like everything is going great back home. I´m glad everything went well with Tim, minus Boston farts and maybe Lily was trying to get revenge on Tim for the dastardly deed of October 9th? I am a little jealous that I wasn´t able to Tepanyaki´s it up with ya´ll, but I´d honestly rather be here, so.... I like getting your blogs Krista, Trey and Krew are gonna be rocking missionaries after FHE´s like Ammon´s? That´s all I really have. Thank you for all the mail this week, even 2 letters from Kylie. Woot. Could someone tell her thank you in advance for the package too? Thanks. Oh, and P.S. on this section. Today we went and visited an Egyptian temple earlier that was moved stone for stone from Egypt to Madrid. Templo de Debot. That was pretty cool. and Free! wahoo...

This church is true. I can feel that truth multiple times throughout the week. What a blessing it is that we have this gospel in our lives! Don´t forget to share it with everyone. Our responsibility is to invite others, not how they will react. Love you all! Thank you for all your support, prayers, and help.

Love,
Elder Jeppson

Mom-If you could send me my balance of my debit card from back home occasionally, that would be super nice. I don´t use it really ever, but it would be nice to know. Also, if you could get me Riley Hazeldine´s address, thanks! Love you!

Dad-If you could get me that 4-generation chart and line of authority like we talked about on the phone, I would appreciate it. It´s not like of the utmost importance, but I would like to be able to share it with people when it´s appropriate. Thanks!

Krista-Thank you for the recipe´s. I shall be sure to put them to use and enjoy in the deliciousness thereof.

Livin´ the Spanish Life

¡Hola!

Hello all. It´s another glorious Wednesday and you´re all about to wake up in an hour or two (or 5, if you´re like I was) and so good morning all! It´s about 2:30 here. In case anybody out there was wondering. I know you all like to do the little, if it´s this time here, then what time is it in Spain for Tanton? I do it for Utah too. Don´t worry.

This past week has been pretty average. Some ups and downs. As always. Jacobo we have not really been able to teach, because his wife came back from Ecuador (she has been there for like month) and so he had all these plans with her and made it difficult. He is getting a little more flojo lately, so hopefully we don´t run into too many problems with that. Abdiel´s wife told him that he doesn´t need to be baptized and so he won´t talk to us anymore. Good stuff, eh? The members here love to feed us. I had Papa´s a la Juan Caina, which is a peruvian dish, at a members house this past week. That was super good. Then yesterday, some member punk´d me real good. We´re eating, right? and it´s like bread and salad and mashed potatoes and salchicha and cheese. I´m like, alright, cool. Eat until I´m like 75% full, and then she brings out this plate with a dang chicken on it. A little bit below average sized chicken. So we´re like, wow, we have more to eat. Then, she brings out 3 more freaking chickens. There was a whole chicken for each one of us to eat (although they were small-ish). So I´m like, crap, what am I going to do? Well, I did the only thing possible, I ate it. Not quite all of it, but 90% ish. Wow. I don´t think I need to eat again this month. It was ridiculous. For the food advice I´ve been asking from ya´ll it´s pretty much just anything that can be made and eaten in less than an hour. I can get pretty much everything from the grocery store. So that´s not too big of a deal. Thanks!

Ummm, other news from the week, oh! We contacted this 18-year old girl and her mom at like 9:00 Saturday night, invited them to church. They came. Then they came to a family home evening with the Bishop and his family on Monday night. How great, right? They´re from Colombia. They seem pretty promising to me. Sunday was fast sunday. That is a great day. I have learned over the last little while how much easier it is to fast and how much more we are blessed when we fast with a purpose and begin and end it with a prayer. It´s fantastic. So much easier than back when I was a young 12 year old Deacon and Vance had to chew me out for being so upset and a big baby and ¨Just starving¨ haha. I learned a lot from that day. Monday and Tuesday were just regular days. Haven´t had tons of people to teach lately, so we just walk the streets talking to people. The Spanish is coming along. I learn more everyday, and I finally made a language study plan like Preach My Gospel tells us too. That´s helping my vocab a lot. As for listening, I have decided I´m just bad at listening. I can´t blame Spanish for that, although it does make it harder. I´m terrible at it in English too. Kylie is gonna have to wipe a smirk off her face after reading that. I should keep a tally of how often people ask me a question and I give them an answer that doesn´t even make sense cause I heard something else. yahoo! Love it! Así es la vida.

Sounds like everything went well this past week. I´m especially happy to hear about the progress that Natalie is having. So fast too. Krista and Doug went to Disneyland. ¡Que suerte! I´m sure Trey and Krew loved that, and Krista even more so it seems. I think Greg should have taught them the Fast-Pass trick we learned in Disney World. hahaha ohhhh that was good times. I can´t believe that was almost 7 years ago, right? I thought I mentioned this, but I did get Melissa/Tim´s package. Muchas Gracias! I loved it. I´m sorry that Spain costs so much to ship stuff to, it´s ridiculous! I hear I have one coming soon though, so I wouldn´t mind a couple of things tossed in.

Feel free to use my money to buy them. G-2 pen ink(like 4 blue and one black), Food items to snack on, like hostess and granola bars and just whatever you can fit after you have put everything else in it. like Macaroni could be good, I dunno. You decide Mother :) Also, if you could find a good shoulder bag that is not too big not too small. Big enough to fit my scriptures and an extra book of mormon. I would say like 12x8 inches maybe? I don´t know. That ogio one is too big for everyday caring around though. Sorry :( Maybe a pocket Spanish-English dictionary? They don´t have them here! It´s like they expect me to know the language when I show up...geez. Any CD´s with legit church music on them. MoTab baby! I already have the ¨Called to Serve¨ one, but other than that it´s free reign. I actually need these yet, but I just thought of it so... That´s all I can really think of. None of this stuff is super important and I don´t care if you can´t get it all, I just had a couple of emails asking me so I thought you´d like to know. Also, I don´t know if I will ever be able to watch DVD´s. I will see what I can do about that though. Thanks for all your love and support. Oh yeah, and just remember that packages are always to mission office, unless I get sent to the Canary Islands (fingers crossed). The ayudantes will pick it up on Monday. Thanks.

The letter you sent to my piso got to me yesterday mom. Tuesday, the 8th. I can´t remember when you sent it, but that means that anything you want me to get that is sent to the piso should be sent by Monday. It´s nice to get letters there and not wait til monday, but both techniques are great. Next week is my last week in Barrio 2. It will be nice to get transferred and know that I will have a lot of time to get to know members and actually be able to get settled in. I´m excited to see where I go. I will find out next Saturday, and then the Monday after I will move there. I have a hunch I will still be in Madrid area. The ayudantes already know. Scoundrels.

Today, for P-day, we went to the temple! Oh how beautiful! I think it is my new favorite temple. Sorry Logan. It is amazing! and I had a very spiritual experience. It is always a great day when you can feel the spirit that strongly. The Lord truly loves his children and I am so grateful for the many, many temples that dot the globe these days. I did it in Spanish. I just figured I ought to respect the culture, ya know? :)

Love,
Elder Tanton Sil Jeppson

Mom, Yes, I have met Elder Knorr. I did not tell him my secret though. I just met him like I met everybody else. Haha, I´m such a creep!

Krista, Let´s start a Nutella club!

Abby, congrats on getting 1st place! Everybody plays PSP here. On the metro especially. You´ll have to bring mine if you come out to pick me up. Have fun playing it for two years you scoundrel.

Greg, I would like to see Kristina´s shaved head and your new Tattoo. Boston was in a gang before I left.

Dad, Good luck on the Lacrosse season. I want awesome updates throughout the season. Just remember, a strong foundation will lead to good things. Take risks. Have fun.

I think that´s all. Stepmom, Brad, I love you both! Tim, travel safe and good luck!

Proof he made it to Spain

Here are a few pictures that have been sent to me from Tanton (Elder Jeppson's) mission president and the MTC president. It is so great that he is there safe with all of those other handsome/darling missonaries with whom he will serve.

The CCM (MTC) President and his wife with the 8 new missionaries that arrived January 15.

Brother & Sister Watkins (the Mission President) with the missionaries.

Elder Jeppson & Elder Gardner, two freshly "green" missionaries put together as a compainionship because they arrived in the middle of a transfer. They do live with two Assistants to the President (AP's), which helps! :)

As he said in his e-mail, he is in Toledo, Spain. I googled it in "maps & images" like he said, if you have not done this you should! It is simply an incredible area. You won't believe your eyes.

Smokin´ two packs a day!

Hello Everyone! I do not have a ton of time to write today, but I will surely see what I can do. First things first, I´m in Toledo! It´s super awesome. Google it. Maps and Images. You´ll think to yourself ¨Wow, Tanton (Elder Jeppson) is lucky to be in Toledo¨ And it´s very true!

So last week went well. I had some firsts. For example, some sister member called Elder Driggs on Saturday and asked if they could go give her mom a blessing, but they were in a different area doing exchanges, so Elder Gardner and I got to go do it. Elder Gardner did the anointing and I did the sealing. It was great. Especially since neither of us are super awesome at spanish and her name is like a mile long. Pretty sure we both said at least one of her 4 names wrong. And then it was really cool to give her a blessing after that though. She gave a sigh of relief before I had even murdered anything in spanish, so that made me feel good. That was interesting. Good thing Hermano Koller taught us what was up with spanish blessings, eh? So we have been starting anew without any investigators (Elder Gardner and I), I think I told you that last week. But so we have a baptism date already! His name is Jacobo and he is from Ecuador. He is set for March 5th. Lame thing is that transfers will be on the 20 or 21ish of this month so I don´t get to be here for it! It´s ok though. As long as he gets baptised I´m happy. So what happens right now is that about half of the time I am with Elder Driggs and the other half I am with Elder Gardner. You can imagine how us two greenies are out in the world of Spain together! The good news is that we actually found Jacobo and taught him 2 lessons with the just the two of us hahaha Jacobo is obviously very patient :) We also have Abdiel, he works a lot, but we are finding times to teach him at night. He has a lot of questions! We left him the Restoration pamphlet and the next time we visited him he was like ¨Who is God?¨ Who is Joseph Smith¨ ¨What is the Book of Mormon?¨ and we were like these are questions we have answers to! We teach him his first real legit lesson tonight, so we will see how that goes. We taught him once, but it was at his work and he was like nervous and it was sketchy. I was disappointed that not a single person helped me out this last week with quick snack and/or meal ideas! Poor little Elder Jeppson is starving in Spain... That´s a lie. I actually eat a ton. Lots of sandwhiches and I have fallen in love with Nutella. It´s amazing! I eat it on everything! I basically live off of Nutella and banana sandwhiches, Lunch meat sandwhiches, cereal, and milk(that can sit on the shelf for 3 months). Occasionally I make some breakfast burritos. hahahah Mom, if you would like some ideas of stuff to send me, cupcakes from hostess (or any hostess stuff really) is always great. They don´t really have any of that here. I did find Pepperidge farm stuff in a store though. That surprised me. Everything here is way expensive though it seems. Euros are ridiculous! And everybody smokes. I swear I smoke two packs a day just by walking around the streets and contacting people while they´re smoking hahaha I´m gonna get transferred somewhere else and suffer withdrawals from this smoky madrid air! So Elder Reist, he is in my piso as well as my district leader, had his birthday yesterday and we went out to eat at KFC after district meeting haha It was expensive, but worth it. I don´t really plan on eating there again for two years though. It was like 7 euros(or 10 dollars) for anything! Stupid european prices. This past week has gone by really fast, but I can´t really think of anything else to tell everyone! I need to start keeping track of things on a little list to tell ya´ll or something eh? Spanish is improving still. That's good. I can tell more what people are saying now. My ear is becoming a little more tuned into the quick spanish. Now it almost sounds like words instead of one giant sentence that they´re saying to me. wahoo! I got some mail this week. Thank you! I got a letter right to the piso from Kylie even! Guess she was better at looking up zip codes than you were mom ;) and then I got some at the office too. It doesn´t really matter which one you send them to, but the office is definitely less sketchy, and if they show up at the piso after I get moved out then I won´t get them forever! But it´s not something that really matters. There is a new mission blog that Hermana Watkins is running. It´s spainmadridmission.blogspot.com I think. If that´s not it then I´m a liar and I´m sorry. Fernando got baptized on Saturday. That was cool. He is the one that set the date with me on my first lesson ever. He was super ready. I have pictures of all this great stuff, but I don´t know when I´ll get around to sending it all home or attaching it to email. We have hit the magical month of February. So that is cool. Yup. I´m out of stuff to say! Thank you everybody that emailed me and sent letters and all that. I didn´t get any letter writing time last week and this week I don´t think I´ll have tons, but I do appreciate all the support! Even if it takes me a while to write back. Sounds like things went well with Abby in Boise, great job Abs! Love you all. Melissa, I am not sure if the video worked or not. I didn´t have time to try really. There aren´t speakers on this computer either. Will you send it again in another email so I don´t forget next week? Thanks! I´m super excited to see Nat!

This church is true. The BoM has principles for everyday life. Read it. Apply it to your life. It´ll change your life. Love you all!

Elder Tanton Sil Jeppson