I'm not exactly learning Creole. I don't really need to.  Just kinda want to sometimes. I am watching what I eat, as it goes into my mouth.. ahha   Sister Ellsworth's b-day was last week so I had some cake. Then they asked if we wanted to bring home a bunch and I said I wanted to but I shouldn't, so I didn't!
Then at this really cool training meeting, we had two guys in charge of cool things talk to us. One guy, Bro. Watson, he's in charge of prosyliting and he wrote up the PMG. Then the other guy is in charge of church media, so he puts together and watches over mormon.org and all those ads and such.  But we had a lunch and there was cake, so I ate some of that. I wish there was more, it was so good.   Also, for some reason we were looking thru wedding books with the sisters.. that sounds worse than it really was.  We were at someone's house and the sisters were looking thru them and I was glancing over some times.  And I said that I want my wedding cake to be your chocolate zucchini cake. That's super good.  Like I'd have the tower cake for show, then have a 9x13 pan of that.  But Sister Pagán said I could have that be the tower cake. haha that's cool. It's hard not to eat a lot . I guess I could still eat a lot but not so much junk food.  

I was thinking for my b-day or Easters I want some "hi chews".  I found a ton at Payson Market... or that new store idk what it's called anymore. The melon ones are the best.  But I like all of them but the apple.  That means don't send apple!  thanks..   and maybe some... idk send a cool pic of the dogs.   and I need some money,  if that's ok.  You can either send it or put it onto my card. Either way is good.

There's so much information I have and want to share it with you guys but it's so much and all over the place, sometimes I wish I could put my memory on a disk and send it home.  Fun stuff happens all the time.  Like one day we were sitting in our car waiting for someone in a parking lot, and a guy comes over to the car and says something like: " I have a black belt, do you know how someone my age could get one?  Because I went to Florida where you take a written test."  hahaha  That was random..  but cool.  New York is full of funny people.  And Jews.   Lots and lots of Jews.   haha it's cool seeing them cuz there are none in Utah.  On Saturday they walk to church and they are everywhere.
   
I should send some more pics.

Anyways..  people i'm teaching...  stacey, vicki, dorothie, guirlande, marie-ange, they are all girls and all haitian.  everyone we talk to is haitian. i think i'm gonna marry a haitian.  the food is amazing, and so far that's all I can think of... haha..  stacey is close to bapt. but she needs to be loving to her family. dorothie is close but needs to learn more. vicki we just started with, her bro, handel is a less active. guirlande is married to a member and we actually talked with them last night and she is more ready to be bapt. so we set a date, 4-28, so hopefully she'll go through with it this time.  marie-ange is coming to church, but it's hard to talk with her. she's dating a member. she has the cutest kids ever that are just super crazy and nuts.  but they're kids.   i need to take a pic of them.  micheal doesn't have his cool hair anymore. it's shaved.

We also talk to some more less actives and/or recent converts. mathew is a rc, who is going to the temple this week, and we're going along.  then the jean family: melissa and andreville are recently married as well that she was bapt in dec. he's been a member all his life. or just most of it.  they are awesome.   valerie is not really less active anymore. she's fun and cool.
 most less actives are that way cuz they can't get to church. or just weren't ready to be bapt.  like handel, he's cool and all, but has a lot of problems with WOW and chastity.  so idk why he was baptized when he was.  but that was about 5 years ago...

The blessings have been pouring out on us lately.  we've been trying to be as obedient as much as possible and when we are, we see the blessings.  like it's crazy. I'll have to write them down later when I'm not pressed for time.  But I can't think of much else to say besides I'm poor but I still get fed,  and that's good.

Elder Campbell says that the last week of the month (when we have the least amount of money on our cards) is the best.  He's relying on DAs for food. and amazingly we get fed all the time!  Like I am all out of money on my mission card.  And we didn't have a da last night, but we decided to go to this kid's house and so we called his mom and she said she didn't know where he was.  So we went out and looked for him. Turns out he was like 3 houses down at  a parking lot playing bball with his cousin. So Campbell played with him and beat him. haha  Then we went back to the house and this kid, Helaman, his mom made us some good food.  It was pupusas with rice and beef.  thems good.

A few days ago we didn't have a da but the other sisters did, but we knew we'd get food eventually.  and turns out we ate at 3 different houses!  and then it hurt to move I ate so much.  idk about Easters dinner yet.  But I'm sure something will happen.

It's kinda snowing today. The sky is grey and it's cold again.  The weather yesterday was awesome. we went for a little Sunday drive with the sisters' investigator in her fancy Lexus and we listened to Genesis and other good stuff.   And we went to her house and played with her dogs, she has 4 but we mostly played with the pit bull.  Her (the dog) name is Brandy, she's super fun and playful.  I love dogs. We also went back to this other house that they have 9 bull mastiffs!  And the smallest one is ginormous! They're heads are just huge.  And the biggest one is like a horse, his name is Aires. Rightfully named too methinks.

We're going to the temple again this week with a RC for his first time doing baptisms. I can't go when he gets endowed but that's ok. I can only go there with my own converts.  But at least I'm going again. It's super fun.

I think that's all. so ttyl.
  Love- Elder Peck

I can't think of much I'd want for my birthday or Easters, but I think I just want some money. I've started to slowly eat less sugar and crap. I go crazy with junk food here. so I'm trying to not. And because it was birthday month, both me and Campbell are poor. So we're gonna have to live off the DA's. Not like we eat at home anyway. It's mostly breakfast. For Sis. Blosil's b-day we went to ihop, and for Sis. Ellsworth's we made cupcakes for her. So that's fun. We now are trying not to spend too much. But small things add up.

we'll go to the library to email, so I'll finish up there.

OK the library was closed so we're back at the church.

So we hit another car yesterday. haha I'm cursed. I was backing Campbell up and he gunned it into the car parked on the other side of the road.... :( So then we told the guy, and he let us off cuz it wasn't that bad. and he said it's happened before.. hehe.. So then because we were let off easy on that one, we were almost hit 6 other times after that in the same day! God is just making sure we can still drive.. man it was crazy.

So I plugged my camera in the cvs and printed out some pics. I should have double printed them, cuz I was going to send them all to you, and keep the same. But I guess I still have them. I'll send them today I think. Then I plugged my thumb drive in and it wouldn't work. So at the church I just formatted it. Even though I lost ALL my stuff, at least I can use it. Cuz I think that not being able to see my pics is the same as not even having them at all. so ya.

I'll send my sd card home as well and you can copy all the pics and send it back with the same pics on it. please and thanks.

I guess that's it. I got not much else to say. Oh, I sent a letter earlier this week. I was going to send it sooner, but because we don't have a normal mail box I held on to it for a while. So lemme know when you get it. And then I'll send this one with the pics in it today.

Elder L. Tom. Perry is coming to Plainview in a few weeks and most of the mission is invited to see him. Elder Rasband is also going to be there. so there! beat that!

• Elder Peck NY

March 12, 2013

Nothing goes on here, it's pretty boring, just kidding.

It's fun and we have fun adventures a lot. Last night for dinner we picked some stuff up from a members house, but we didn't eat it. Instead we went to McDonald's and Wendy's and got some poop food. It was fun but not good for us. haha.  

So something weird is that my whole body itches. Like I need to warsh my blankets and sheets, but also maybe get some anti-itch creme cuz it itches so bad!  All over.  I don't have any visible rashes or something, but I kinda have some little red marks that could be bites of sorts. ... idk.  And when I itch they bleed.  So I have blood on one of my shirts..        And right now my chest and lower back are killin me.   Also when I wake up in the morning, for the past few days, I've been super sweaty.  Like I think I might itch so much I sweat and stuff.  Then also it's not cool. like it's weird. I don't like it.

Idk why all these weird problems started happening all around the same time.  We have some troubles; like our keys have gone missing.  They have been gone for about a week or two.  And we've looked everywhere more than once.  We might think that they are somewhere easy, just that we don't normally look there, so we can't find them.

Oh, also, I was walking out of a house and the hall way was dark and I hit my head on the low (well low for me) hanging light fixture thing and now I have a little bump on my head... :(  
Anyway, it was a slow week, but now that it's over it went by fast.
I really have nothing to say. But yeah I didn't have time yesterday to email much.

 see ya . Love--


Editor's note:  A video of the parade Elder Peck was in can be found at the mission blog: newyorksouthmission.blogspot.com

March 4, 2013

The town of Far Rockaway invited the Mormon Helping Hands to be in their Saint Patrick's Day Parade this last Saturday. So everyone in the mission plus a few extra all went down there in our pross, and put the yellow vest over that, and walked what seemed like forever, because it was cold, my feet hurt, and we stood around forever just waiting for it to start. But it was so awesome when we started moving, cuz there were so many people on the sides of the road just cheering and crying and saying thank you and yelling out "Utah!" and "Joseph Smith!" Funny drunk people. But seeing those people tear up with joy and other things got me crying a bit. It was so cool to see how welcomed we were, and loved and stuff. I could see ahead of us that there was the rest of the parade and no one was really cheering or clapping until we walked up and they went crazy! There was even a group of young Jewish kids who a lot of missionaries took their pictures with. They were just standing there and some of us went over and stood with them and it was fun. It was the best day yet.

Then afterward we were walking back and there was a guy who invited us into his house for food. and the house was kinda packed with older people, like your age group.. hehe.. But in the back they had a bunch of great food. He said he had some corned beef and that's when I didn't hear anything else cuz I went straight for that. I grabbed some bread and like 6 slices of beef. Oh man it was super duper tasty. And there was beer at that party, of course, so I wondered how much of that food was prepared with it. But there's nothing wrong with cooking with alcohol. But it was amazing anyway.

I took a ton of pictures, but when I find out how to send them to you,,, you'll get a ton of stuff. What I should do is just send the card home. and you can copy all the pictures, cuz I like having them on there still. Or maybe if it'll work at cvs I could print out some pics. then I could just send them. and not a memory card... idk .. I'll think about it.

Anyway, I have so much fun here. Everyday is an adventure. New York is awesome. We went to Target the other day and there was a van that was parked in the middle of the aisle , not even close to a stall. ahah. Oh and we went to Red Lobster the other day as a district and I got those coconut fried shrimp, oh man that was good. Thanks mom for showing me them.

The people here are awesome. Just super unique and funny. I thought I wouldn't like the people cuz of their hard shell, but that's only a facade, once you get past that, they are awesome. Like this girl, a LA who doesn't trust people very well, Valerie, she's super cool, funny and nice. And she makes custom light sabers for fun! And she speaks like 7 different languages and can sing a song in at least 20. I asked her why, and she said cuz she has no life. haha she's fun to talk with and I opened up to her better than anyone so far that I've met. cuz she's just that awesome! She loves how weird and awkward I am.

Oh and guess what.... we had 9, yes 9. count them.. NINE investigators at church yesterday!!!! 9!! I didn't know most of them but Campbell does. That's why I'm grateful he's here, to find the people who Jean Baptiste never talked to cuz they weren't Haitian or that he didn't already know. . So I'm glad he's gone and we are talking to so many more people! Like with him we only had like 3 people. Did you hear how many we have now? 9! I love that difference.. Campbell is a great guy. love him tons. makes life fun.

Anyway. there ya go. Love ya'll. The more I serve the more I realize how much I do love people, even though it might not look like it. but yeah. I do. sometimes.. haha. I'll have to find some more time to read Brian's blog. He's got more to say than you guys do, no offense. Haha

Till next week - Elder Peck NY

P.S. Ok, I think I'll use a card reader for my pictures, and I did get the money back, and we're going thrifting today, so I can waste it all on awesome random finds. I got a handful of awesome ties so far. If I can send pics, I'll send one of them. I'm wearing one now. The texture is so cool. I have an awesome story to tell, so I'll send it in one email to both of you in a sec.

Oh, also, some lady that idk if I told you about. She was supposed to die like last month, but got some blessings and stayed a veggie for a while. Well we went to the hospital and I gave her a blessing that she wouldn't be in pain soon. So I pretty much told her to die... again. Again, like I already gave her a blessing and said the same thing. So she finally really died on Saturday night. Elder Campbell said he'd never seen someone so close to death before. Ya, she looked dead. The machines were keeping her alive.. barely.

Oh, more thing. Haitian food is amazing! Imma gonna hafta learn it, so I can make it back home.

Wow, that's cool! crazy how people from our ward are going to the same missions!

There's a kid here that came in last transfer who I went to school with. Also another kid who's been here for a while who I also went to school with. And some other kids from Spanish Fork. And of course a ton from Utah. The last transfer was pretty much all from Utah.