The Field

Hello!

This is a little difficult to type since I'm not used to Spanish keyboards yet. It's telling me that I'm spelling everything wrong. I'll get better with time though. Sunday night was long and uncomfortable and sleepless. We finally arrived in Rica and were able to leave the San Jose airport by about noon on Monday. The mission president, his family, and the AP's were there to greet us. We loaded our stuff into a bus which then took us to the temple. I was just gaping out the window the whole ride. It was in San Jose central, which is the most city-ish area I've seen so far. The thing is, it's so beautiful. I think the best way to explain how different it looks from US cities is that they've built their civilization into nature rather than on top of it. There can be skyscrapers on your left with a huge green valley and Lion King trees on your right. Everything was just so cool and new to me that day especially. Still is though.

We hurried and took pictures in front of the temple before it started pouring. It rained super hard for hours every day for about my first four days, but it hasn't lately. I think the main season is over. After that, we headed to the mission president's house for lunch and interviews. His wife made us gallo pinto, the most widely traditional Rican dish (which I ironically haven't had again since then), and we just sat around chatting for awhile. Eventually we went to the mission office to do some paperwork. Eric Cherrington was one of the people in charge of that. I was totally surprised when he walked in the room! We talked for a bit, and they brought us some sub sandwiches for dinner. Turns out there was a miscommunication about the address. The fastest way to get any letters (and I think packages? not sure) to me is at this address:

Elder Jacob Hampton
Mision San Jose Costa Rica
Apartado Postal 249-2010
San Jose, Costa Rica

We stayed in the mission home that night, which I thought was gross at the time, but I had no idea what was ahead. The next morning we had breakfast at the president's house before heading to changes (transfer) meeting. Everyone goes crazy at changes meeting. I saw Gus Fernandez there.They prepare a power point that reveals the pictures of new companionships slowly, one missionary at a time. Unfortunately, we only got to see who was going to train, but not who they were going to train. The trainers stayed behind after the meeting and we went to KFC for lunch, then to another meeting where after about two hours we finally got our companion assignments.

My companion's name is Elder Baca. He's from Las Vegas. He loves theater/anything with a story in general, so we get along pretty well. He's been out for 14 months and I'm the first missionary he's trained. He also unexpectedly became district leader a couple nights ago, so he's got a lot of new stuff he's doing all at once. That first night, we took a taxi to our apartment in our area called Vizcaya. The driving here is CRAZY. Lanes and speed limits are only relative, and pedestrians definitely don't have the right of way. Everyone accelerates so fast, only slamming their brakes when they have to, and pass each other within centimeters all the time. They're pro at it though. I've yet to see any evidence of even minor accidents.

Our apartment is pretty disgusting. I'm usually not one to go out of my way to clean things, I just prefer to live in a way that doesn't get things too dirty. I think I'm going to try to get some hardcore scrubbing going today though. It kind of reminds me of the condition in which we usually find the houses Dad buys before we fix them up. I'm dealing with it though. I've kind of managed to lower my desired living conditions. I'm much happier when we're out and about though. I just feel cleaner. That night Elder Baca just took me to get to know some members. We had three dinners that night, but I managed to avoid the second one by politely explaining how full I was. I can say pretty much whatever I want to, but I can only understand what people are saying here about 60% of the time. It's just completely different than talking with gringos. So that night we met a big extended family that all lives in on our street and pretty much run the ward, our cook, and the bishop (who is a drummer and loves Paramore!).

You might be wandering what I mean by "our cook." There are members that we pay each month to help us out with food and laundry. We get four meals a week from our cook, and our laundry lady does all our laundry every week. That's just how it is in this mission. I love it though. I love our cook, she's the sweetest, funniest lady, and always makes us play Domino's with her after we eat. I've never eaten a meal in our apartment. Almost every person we visit doesn't let us leave without feeding us pretty much a full meal. We don't eat breakfast because we just go get fed all day. I already know what I'm going to miss most about this culture. THE DRINKS. With meals, people always give us whatever fruit drink they can concoct right there. It's so delicious, because they just throw actual fruit and sugar and water into a blender instead of a bunch of artificial stuff.

All of our appointments fell through the next day, so we just visited more members. I didn't get to meet a real investigator till Thursday. We decided to just tract one house because we could see kids inside, and the mother is interested in our message. She couldn't come to church, but we're going back on Wednesday to teach her. I feel like I could tell you so much about all of our (as of last night) 6 progressing investigators, but I'll save that stuff for the future since this e-mail is already so long. There was a ward activity with food and stuff on Saturday. I felt awkward because the only things to do were play soccer or talk to people, both of which end with people getting frustrated with me, haha. So I just played with lots of little kids, and it was fun. That night, we visited some members who hadn't been to church for a few weeks. It turned out to be because of the dad's work schedule. He works for all kinds of companies as a programmer, and he showed us all about this amazing tablet by this company called Asus. Did you know that by the time I get home, there will be phones on the market with hologram keyboards and menus that can project onto desks or even into the air like in Iron Man? I can't wait. That family ordered us a pizza.

It's weird. There's so much diversity here. After learning about future technology and having a very American Saturday night, we walked out onto the main road of our area to be approached by several different people begging us for money. As for our neighborhood, it's one of the most ghetto in our area. I like it though, it's fun times. I just love everyone I meet. Everyone. People are so amazing here. Everyone has unique, incredible spiritual gifts, members and nonmembers alike. Walmart is the closest I've come to home. I'm in it right now for the first time. It's pretty different than the US. It's like a mall. There are a bunch of different other stores inside it, like this internet service place, or a shoe store, and a food court.

Sunday was my favorite day so far. I was super nervous about the possibility of speaking, and talking to everyone, but I didn't have to speak, and everyone was so excited to talk to me! Word travels so far in this ward. I think I mentioned to one person during the week that I used to work at a pizza place, and already on Sunday, the Relief Society president asked me if I could do a demonstration on how to make pizza. I might if I can learn how to make dough by hand haha. I hope I've given a decent summary of my experience so far! It'll be easier to give more details in the weeks to come. I'm going to send an e-mail with three pictures. On is me with the mission president and his wife outside the temple. One is me and Elder Baca in our room. The other is me standing outside our apartment. You'll notice that all the houses are lined by a metal grate fence thing. Those are as standard as a front door here. Lots of interesting little things like that I'll explain later on. Love everyone and miss you all!

--Elder Hampton

The mission president, his wife, and Jake outside the Costa Rica temple

Jake and his first companion in the field, Elder Baca

On the streets of Rica--one of those buildings is his apartment...we're just not sure which one.