Warning: Prepare for a picture fest!
Stillwater Oklahoma is the home of the OSU Cowboys: a ride into town and you think that they celebrate Halloween all year round. However, don't be fooled. They are very proud of their orange and black colors. If you haven't figured it out yet, Oklahoma is about football and Stillwater is home to another great football team. I had the privilege to serve there for a period of 3 transfers (19 weeks): One ward, two areas, and two languages. At first, I struggled. My companion was from Puerto Rico and I hated taking driving directions in Spanish. It took me about a week to figure out that "derecho" meant "forward" and that "derecha" meant "right". It was a difficult start and somewhat a slap to the face at first. I mean, my first area there (Spanish) we had 40 people to teach and 13 of them committed to baptism when I got there. There was so much to do and nothing was organized (at least by my OCD standards). Eventually we dropped a ton to focus more on the "golden" investigators. Often we would drop 8 one day and pick up a bunch the next day. It was the only area that I ever had where people would pray for us to find and I would dread the stress that that answered prayer would give. We were thankful for the work. It kept us from tracting and if we ever really wanted to tract we would have to schedule that two weeks ahead of time but we would normally have to cancel on that plan to fit in emergency appointments and such.
Pictures from part 1 in "Stilly"
This was my first view of Stillwater pretty much. The area had a ton of trailer parks there and this happened to be in one of them.
My companion was thrilled when we ran into some people from her beloved home of Puerto Rico. They let us talk to them and gave us some of Puerto Rico's version of tamales. My companion called them "pasteles" which is completely different from Mexican "pasteles". It is basically a meat thing rapped in banana leaf. It was new to me and pretty good.
As missionaries, we don't get to go home for holidays. There is no such thing as a weekend or a vacation. It's a 24/7 job. It is what we eat, drink, and breathe. We only call home twice a year, but we do get to write home once a week. Often, members and nonmembers would take pity and reach out to us. They wanted to make sure that we had some holiday tradition to make the time easier. In this case, a couple in the ward invited us over for Christmas Eve. We sang songs, ate food, and played a Christmas game. We really enjoyed that!
On New Years Eve a family that we were teaching knew that I have a deep love for Mexican pozole and so they made it for us. That has to be one of my favorite meals of all time and I had the opportunity to eat it multiple times. It is a very time-consuming dish to make and when made authentically it takes hours to prepare and to cook. The love and the sacrifice that our friends in Oklahoma gave us to feed us (not just talking about this meal but all meals in general) is something that I will always be thankful for.
The best New Years present ever! My second trainer who had gone home months previously came back to visit! I got to spend a short time with her and she came to sports on New Years day.
This is a meal from a restaurant. It is my least favorite meal of all Hispanic foods. I did not know that beforehand, however. It is called "7 Mares". It is basically 7 types of seafood in a soup. It has squid, crab, shrimp, baby octopus, and tons of other stuff. Either I am not really into seafood (before this I thought I was) or it was just not a good dish.
Yes, that is our house that we lived in. Yes, that is me holding a puppy that my Sister Training Leaders (the sisters who shared the house with us) let into the place. Yes, that is me holding the white handbook (rule book for missionaries) to page 46 where it says "Do not keep pets of any kind".
A big part of being a missionary is eating. A big part of being a missionary in Oklahoma is eating out. Here, our district and the Assistants to the President are eating at Bad Brads. Most of us got what is called "Dirty Fries" which is basically cheesey fries with a type of meat (I got mine with hot links) and a special barbecue sauce.
My favorite restaurant in Oklahoma is Fuzzy's Tacos. I got introduced to it in Norman and once I found out that Stilly had one too, I had to convince my fellow missionaries to go. On this occasion, my companion and I went on a day that one of the people we were teaching was working. I ordered one of their specialty nachos and it came out to me tripple-sized. He really appreciated that we came to support him. I really enjoyed eating this but I definitely could not eat it all at one sitting.
Oklahoma is the fast food capitol in the world and Sonic is a big thing there. There is one on nearly every corner. Oklahoma invented the place. Sonic is pretty much the thing for missionaries in the summer--half-price shakes after 8 and slushies of a zillion flavors with discounts during "Happy Hour". The best! (It is also the cure to heat exhaustion which you will face if you ride your bike during the 105 degree weather and 90% humidity).
The members were amazing to me. Here, I am sitting with one of the members who I got to see often. She always fed me something. She knew my second favorite Mexican dish--chicken mole (Mole-lay) and I had it often at her place. She also knew that I really enjoyed caffeine (yes, Mormons can drink caffeine--don't talk religious politics to me). They made a game of making sure they had "coka" for me every time I was around. There would be a giant red box of "coka" by the fridge or they would bring a huge cooler of it to church events.
"Pan Dulce" is a Mexican bread with frosting on it. This type of "pan dulce" was different. It was huge and covered with a thick layer of butter and sugar. It was quite good!
Everybody has to try on a sombrero at some time in their lives!!!
Stillwater Oklahoma is the home of the OSU Cowboys: a ride into town and you think that they celebrate Halloween all year round. However, don't be fooled. They are very proud of their orange and black colors. If you haven't figured it out yet, Oklahoma is about football and Stillwater is home to another great football team. I had the privilege to serve there for a period of 3 transfers (19 weeks): One ward, two areas, and two languages. At first, I struggled. My companion was from Puerto Rico and I hated taking driving directions in Spanish. It took me about a week to figure out that "derecho" meant "forward" and that "derecha" meant "right". It was a difficult start and somewhat a slap to the face at first. I mean, my first area there (Spanish) we had 40 people to teach and 13 of them committed to baptism when I got there. There was so much to do and nothing was organized (at least by my OCD standards). Eventually we dropped a ton to focus more on the "golden" investigators. Often we would drop 8 one day and pick up a bunch the next day. It was the only area that I ever had where people would pray for us to find and I would dread the stress that that answered prayer would give. We were thankful for the work. It kept us from tracting and if we ever really wanted to tract we would have to schedule that two weeks ahead of time but we would normally have to cancel on that plan to fit in emergency appointments and such.
Pictures from part 1 in "Stilly"
This was my first view of Stillwater pretty much. The area had a ton of trailer parks there and this happened to be in one of them.
My companion was thrilled when we ran into some people from her beloved home of Puerto Rico. They let us talk to them and gave us some of Puerto Rico's version of tamales. My companion called them "pasteles" which is completely different from Mexican "pasteles". It is basically a meat thing rapped in banana leaf. It was new to me and pretty good.
As missionaries, we don't get to go home for holidays. There is no such thing as a weekend or a vacation. It's a 24/7 job. It is what we eat, drink, and breathe. We only call home twice a year, but we do get to write home once a week. Often, members and nonmembers would take pity and reach out to us. They wanted to make sure that we had some holiday tradition to make the time easier. In this case, a couple in the ward invited us over for Christmas Eve. We sang songs, ate food, and played a Christmas game. We really enjoyed that!
On New Years Eve a family that we were teaching knew that I have a deep love for Mexican pozole and so they made it for us. That has to be one of my favorite meals of all time and I had the opportunity to eat it multiple times. It is a very time-consuming dish to make and when made authentically it takes hours to prepare and to cook. The love and the sacrifice that our friends in Oklahoma gave us to feed us (not just talking about this meal but all meals in general) is something that I will always be thankful for.
The best New Years present ever! My second trainer who had gone home months previously came back to visit! I got to spend a short time with her and she came to sports on New Years day.
This is a meal from a restaurant. It is my least favorite meal of all Hispanic foods. I did not know that beforehand, however. It is called "7 Mares". It is basically 7 types of seafood in a soup. It has squid, crab, shrimp, baby octopus, and tons of other stuff. Either I am not really into seafood (before this I thought I was) or it was just not a good dish.
Yes, that is our house that we lived in. Yes, that is me holding a puppy that my Sister Training Leaders (the sisters who shared the house with us) let into the place. Yes, that is me holding the white handbook (rule book for missionaries) to page 46 where it says "Do not keep pets of any kind". 
A big part of being a missionary is eating. A big part of being a missionary in Oklahoma is eating out. Here, our district and the Assistants to the President are eating at Bad Brads. Most of us got what is called "Dirty Fries" which is basically cheesey fries with a type of meat (I got mine with hot links) and a special barbecue sauce. 
My favorite restaurant in Oklahoma is Fuzzy's Tacos. I got introduced to it in Norman and once I found out that Stilly had one too, I had to convince my fellow missionaries to go. On this occasion, my companion and I went on a day that one of the people we were teaching was working. I ordered one of their specialty nachos and it came out to me tripple-sized. He really appreciated that we came to support him. I really enjoyed eating this but I definitely could not eat it all at one sitting.
Oklahoma is the fast food capitol in the world and Sonic is a big thing there. There is one on nearly every corner. Oklahoma invented the place. Sonic is pretty much the thing for missionaries in the summer--half-price shakes after 8 and slushies of a zillion flavors with discounts during "Happy Hour". The best! (It is also the cure to heat exhaustion which you will face if you ride your bike during the 105 degree weather and 90% humidity).
The members were amazing to me. Here, I am sitting with one of the members who I got to see often. She always fed me something. She knew my second favorite Mexican dish--chicken mole (Mole-lay) and I had it often at her place. She also knew that I really enjoyed caffeine (yes, Mormons can drink caffeine--don't talk religious politics to me). They made a game of making sure they had "coka" for me every time I was around. There would be a giant red box of "coka" by the fridge or they would bring a huge cooler of it to church events. 
"Pan Dulce" is a Mexican bread with frosting on it. This type of "pan dulce" was different. It was huge and covered with a thick layer of butter and sugar. It was quite good!
Everybody has to try on a sombrero at some time in their lives!!!
Ciao!
(Wait! There is a Part 2!)
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