Week 1 in Gijon!

Hola from Gijon,
I love it here. Gijon is a beautiful place. It is right on the coast, so we have the ocean. It is kind of like Capri, only a little less tourist-y. It is very green and there are so many hills. I live in the city in a little piso (apartment). It is great, very small, but great. We have a bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom, and washer. We don’t have a dishwasher or a dryer, but that’s fine. My companion is Sister Zitting. She is 22 and is from Tennessee. I love her, she is great and helps me so much. She is a lot like me and has great taste in music. I can’t wait to spend the next six weeks or so with her.

The train ride was interesting. There were two other sisters with me on the train, all getting off at different stops...I was the last one. We had to watch very carefully where the stops were because they only give you 2 minutes to get off. It was about a 5 hour train ride and I was alone for the last hour and a half...weirdest feeling ever. Luckily I made it at around midnight.

After that it was right to work. in Gijon there is one tiny branch. They have a really hard time with retaining members. A lot of them are inactive. So we teach a lot of menos activos (less active) and recent converts. They really need some strong families right now. We are also teaching some investigators. We are teaching this family Ricardo and Gema that are so ready to get baptized. Unfortunately they aren’t married. That is really common in Spain.

It is really expensive and hard to get married so people just don’t. Once they get married they can get baptized. I really hope they can work in out soon, their children are so excited about the gospel.

Yesterday Sister Zitting and I decided to go tracting. That is a little different with apartments. We press the buttons until someone lets us in and then knock on doors. We met one man named Constintine. We are coming back to teach him on Wednesday. Maybe he will be a new investigator.

Sunday was interesting. Sister Zitting and I are in charge of playing the piano for sacrament. So I did it this week. Before we had a branch council meeting. And then I was informed that I was to give a 5 minute testimony....it was probably about 1 minute long in very bad Spanish. Everyone said Muy Bien Hermana (very good Sister), but you need to do some practicing. And then we had a class for new investigators and relief society. Relief Society is so funny. We were talking about joseph Fielding Smith and then the conversation spun out of control and everyone was having this really heated discussion about plural marriage. This sister behind us was trying so hard to change the subject, she kept standing up and saying "is this important to my salvation, no." Finally it got under control, which was good because a woman walked in about five minutes later who hadn’t been to church in 8 years and just felt like she needed to come today. Good day to be late to church. We then went to the presidents apartment with Frank, a recent converso (convert) who is living at a homeless shelter, he has been having a hard time so we teach him a lot. All the sisters were there in the kitchen gossiping about the branch. They are so funny and all of them love you to death. They kiss us and feed us, it’s great. It was a really good day.

Sound like everyone is doing great. Bennett looks so big. I sure miss everyone. I hope you all are doing well. I haven’t gotten the packages yet. But they said packages get stuck in customs a lot. They said to be very vague about its contents and to not put the price over 60 dollars. Eventually it might catch up to me. I have received letters from people in the ward. Tell them all thank you for me, I love hearing from them.

There are a pretty good amount of senior couples here and I love it. They are all so funny and really nice to the Hermanas. Most of them are serving in Madrid.

Everything is great here and I can’t wait to tell you more. I will let you know if I need something, but so far I am doing great, and can’t complain. I feel so different and responsible, I am learning a lot here. I am loving being in the field and I love teaching the people here. I don’t know much but I am learning and improving each day. Rosetta stone helped, I know a lot of words, it is just conjugating and forming sentences that is hard. I love you guys and can’t wait to hear from you.

Love Hermana Brumble

Ps. Oh, I forgot, I am also teaching a little girl how to play the piano. Wish me luck!