12/18

Hey I'm alive. No time to write today. Zone P-day in Gran Canaria. Skype on Christmas should be good. Let me know a time and well see if we can sort it out. Love ya sorry this is short.

Because this is all I received today, I'll post some other pictures he's emailed home that I haven't shared here yet.

Christmas Lights

"Those Christmas lights, light up the street; light up the fire that's in me. Then all my troubles will be gone. Oh, Christmas lights, keep shining on."

Coldplay put it best in their song. Christmas time is upon us. They turned on all of the lights here in Los Llanos about a week ago and we've been listening to all our favorite Christmas tunes nonstop (special s/o to my mom for all the music). This is easily one of my favorite times of year. We also out here serving others as a part of the Light the World initiative. If you don't know what that is, check it out on Mormon.org. It's super legit.

This week has been brilliant. Javier made a big leap forward a few days ago. As I've mentioned before, he's always told us he wants to wait to be baptized when he moves to Tenerife, so we've been teaching him the lessons and preparing him for it then. But the other day we went over and that changed. We were going to read a certain chapter in the Book of Mormon with him, but Elder Lowder and I both felt pretty strongly that we should read in Mosiah 18 instead and talk about baptism again. I think it clicked for him that it's something that shouldn't be delayed because of his circumstances and he accepted a baptismal date for the 30th of this month at the end of the lesson. We hope we can get everything together by then!

We've also been getting everything together for the group's Christmas party here this Friday. It's been a bit of a bananza trying to figure everything out since my companion and I have never planned something like this before. I'm confident that it's gonna be a great time though. We're gonna have a talent show, so we gotta figure something out for that. It'll be legendary no doubt.

I'll be sure to let you all know how everything goes down with the party and such. All that and more, coming up next week. Love you guys!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner

Pictures:

1+2+3. Views

4. Empanadas with the Guasinave fam

Greek Tragedy

I'm honestly too lazy to be creative today and think of a song that works with this week, so I just went with one of my favorite songs: Greek Tragedy, by The Wombats. This week has been great, though. With Elder Lowder's arrival, we've decided to try and change the way we do things around here a little bit. 

Our mission president has said that by the time he finishes his mission in August, he wants a member to be leading the group here. We've been praying to be able to find someone that can fulfill that. It looks most likely that we'll have to find someone to teach and baptize that can be the group leader. With that in mind, we're trying to delegate more of our leadership responsibilities to the members so we can have more time to do actual missionary work and find the people we need to. As I mentioned a couple weeks back, we've been passing by all the members on the records here that are inactive in the church and seeing if there's any potential there. We hope to have some luck in the weeks that come. 

ISLAND LIFE:

It's officially December and I'm still wearing short-sleeved shirts every day. More fun facts about the little island I'm on coming up. A member who was living in Madrid before moved back here this last week, and has promised to take us to all of the places we should see on our P-days. You guys can expect many more pictures in the weeks to come. The Canary Islands are huge for banana exports, and from what I've heard, La Palma is number one for banana production. We went on a hike today over by a national park here called La Caldera (the cauldron). It's a valley/canyon sort of area and was formed many many years ago after a huge earthquake caused a massive chunk of the mountain to slide into the sea. As opposed to most of the last couple of months I've been here, the air has been super clear this past week, so we've been able to see neighboring islands, El Hierro, La Gomera, and Tenerife, nearly every day.

That's all for this week. Hope you all have a better idea of what's going down here now. I fell like I haven't done the greatest job at explaining it. Have a brilliant week everyone!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner

FOTOS:

1. From Tenerife last week (others are on the phone - I'll send them in a seperate email)

2. Hike from today

3. La Caldera de Tubierente

4. A rare raven which is only found here (so I'm told)

Vertigo

Sweet Buddha's belly there's a lot going on here guys! Lemme see if I can gather my thoughts. It's been a week full of travel, goodbyes, and hellos.

FIRST OFF

I'd like to dedicate this email to my cousin, Hermana Penner who is officially done with her mission today. I chose the song "Vertigo," by U2 after she reminded me the other day of a jam session we had in the basement of my old house back in Utah. Good times. I'll be honest, it's still weird to me that we both were called to serve in the Madrid mission. Even after over a year since I received my mission call. Regardless, I'm glad things worked out the way they did. She's definitely made a big difference for me here. Good luck out there in the real world, cuh 🤙

Last Tuesday we went over to Tenerife for intercambios. We got the chance to see the southern, less-green side of the island in a city called Los Cristianos. It was so packed with tourists to the point that I really didn't know whether to speak to people in Spanish or English. I was with Elder Smith and Elder Meeks for the day while my companion went with Elder Stulen, who's from Norway. We gave him a proper American experience by making deep fried Oreos.

On Saturday we got transfer notifications. We found out Elder Jones is headed back to Madrid to be companions with my old comp, Elder Waters. We woke up really early this morning to fly to Tenerife once again (for the third time in 4 weeks) so he could catch his flight back to the peninsula. I'm currently with the Elders of La Laguna spending P-day with them. My new companion arrives tomorrow morning. His name is Elder Lowder and he's from Minnesota/Idaho. I don't know too much about him, but the small amount that I have heard has been good. 

That's all for this week. Excited to keep working here in the islands. It's been a blast so far and I can't wait to see what's to come! Vale chikis, me voy. 

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

Pictures:

1. I don't have time to write captions deal with it

Am I Alive?

It's Monday! It's been a crazy week that's flown by (as always). Can't wait to let you guys know all about it. We had a member of the Stake High Counsel, Nenad, visit our little group yesterday. When church started, there were only 8 people present including us. Many people came in late, but it's a bit disappointing. We have a weekly attendence of around 20-25 members and we've been trying to improve that since I got here. We decided this past week that we're going to focus more on finding a new group leader that's a member. Nenad also asked us to go through the member list here and get in contact with all of the less-actives and see if they're interested in returning to church, so we'll be busy the next few weeks doing that.

This last week, we FINALLY got the chance to go up to the north-eastern part of the island to visit an investigator named Mateo. He's been super busy with soccer lately, so it took a while for me to meet him. He's such a sick kid. He's from Colombia and is basically golden aside from the fact that he can never get to church (which often times is the case). He lives 3 hours away by bus on weekends since the schedule is different, so to go to church on Sunday, he has to spend 6 hours total travelling. He invited us to go over to that part of the island later today to go on a hike with him, which is why this is going out a little earlier than usual. The area where he lives is absolutely stunning. I've been told it's a lot like Hawaii although I've never personally been. We're excited for it.

I chose my subject line today because of the talk that Nenad gave in sacrament meeting. He based it off a talk given by Elder Hallstrom a few years back which addressed the difference between being active in the church and active in the gospel. As members, we can go to church every Sunday which is good, but if we're not doing the things we need to do during the other 6 days of the week, we're missing out on so many blessings. It's the simple things during the week like reading our scriptures and having daily prayers that are much more important that we often think. It honestly took me until my time here in the mission to fully realize that. It reminded me of the song by TEAM which goes, "Am I alive, or just breathing?" I want to invite you all the look at yourselves and ask the same question. Are you alive and active in the gospel by doing all you can and setting an example to others? Or are you just breathing by simply going to church every Sunday? The difference in blessings between the two options is outstanding.

I think that wraps up this week. The next few days are going to be fun. We're going to Tenerife again to do intercambios (exchanges) with the missionaries in the southern part. We usually don't get the chance to go on intercambios here since it's hard to get plane/boat tickets, so I'm way pumped. It's the last week of the transfer and it's almost certain that one of us will be leaving in a week, so we're making it count. ¡Que tengáis una buena semana! 

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇮🇨 🇪🇸

Fotos:

1. From a short hike we did last Monday

2. Return of the piso-find hat from Toledo

3. Letting you guys know where the ocean is

Tenerife Sea

Hey guys! It's been a minute. Sorry I didn't get a weekly update out last week. It was a pretty crazy day since we went to Tenerife, a neighboring island, and had P-day with the rest of missionaries here in the islands. I can now say I know what Ed Sheeran had in mind when he wrote the song "Tenerife Sea." We went on a hike with some light rain with a guide who taught us about the natives to the islands, the Guanche. I won't lie, the hike we went on reminded me a lot of Northern California. After the hike, we went to a Guachinche, a restuarant where they make authentic Canarian food which was superb. Super cool day. We had zone conference the day after which is always great as well. 

REWIND:

Since I didn't get an email out last week, we had a fun time on Halloween. Apparently the thing to do here if your a 12 year old is dress up in black with a mask and then go around throwing eggs at people. We had a couple thrown our way, but we managed to get home clean. Halloween is a pretty recently adopted holiday, so it's not nearly as hyped here. Since Thanksgiving isn't a holiday here, Christmas music is now in full swing. No shame at all.

The last couple weeks have absolutely flown. Only two weeks left of the transfer now. We met with Javier a couple days back. He told us that he wants to be baptized in January. We're not sure if he'll still be here in La Palma or if he'll be moving to Tenerife, but we're happy that we finally got a commitment for baptism. We also talked to Sulay, Wendy's mother, this week. She told us she really likes the church, but doesn't see why she needs to do certain things since she's older. We'll be meeting with her next week to clear up her doubts. 

I'm having a brilliant time here as always. Hope this made up for not sending on out the week before. I've got plenty of pictures in case that isn't the case. Have a great week everyone!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner

Pictures:

1-3. THE HIKE

4. Guachinche restaurant afterward

Fam

I wrote this earlier but haven't had internet all day. Gonna skip the weekly update this week sorry. We went on a hike and learned about the history of the natives here. We ate some super good Canarian food afterward. Anyway, sorry. I'll send another email with pictures from today in a sec

Hey just shooting this out now in case I don't have time later. We're in Tenerife with the rest of the zone for P Day. We're gonna go on a hike soon which should be awesome. Hopefully I get some decent pictures. Zone conference tomorrow as well.

It's been a good week. Honestly, sometimes I feel weird not having a lot to report with missionary work in my updates, but a lot of what we do in La Palma is focused on strengthening members. There was a lot of crazy stuff going on before I got here, but a few people have moved away, so the worst of it is gone. We've got a couple of friends that are progressing, but it's so hard to meet with them since they live on the other side of the island. We're gonna try and start using Skype or Facebook messenger to have lessons. Hopefully they're ok with it hahaha.

How are things back home? Braden turns 17 tomorrow right? Does he still sound like he's 10? Also tell him he's super quick, but he's gotta run quicker to be able to beat me when I get back. Can't really think of anything else to write tbh. I'll try and get another email out later 🤘

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

Fotos

Chasing Ghosts

Since today is Halloween and all, I thought I'd get into the spirit and go for a song with a bit of a spooky theme. "Chasing Ghosts" by Against the Current accomplishes that pretty well (See also Chasing Ghosts by EDEN). A bit disappointingly, Halloween isn't nearly as big of a deal here as it is back in the States, but it doesn't matter too much since we can't dress up anyways. 

Not a whole lot has changed with our investigators since the last time I wrote. The bishop a week or two ago asked us to go through a list of all the members and figure out who still lives here, so we've been working on that lately. While in the process of doing that the other day, we ran into a member who we didn't have any records of. She had been living here for almost two years and was looking for the church, but couldn't find it since we meet in a hotel. She told us she's going out of town soon, but we hope to see her in the near future.

ABOUT LA PALMA:

Can't remember what I've already said, but here goes nothing. We live on the dryer, west side of the island where it doesn't rain as much. Most of the clouds here stop once they reach the mountain range in the middle of the island. It's pretty small, so when we went to the 2nd highest point about a month ago, we could see the ocean on both sides of us. We have to travel a lot, but it only takes about an hour in guagua (a Spanish word for bus that's only used here [pronounced: waw-waw]) to get to where we live (Los Llanos) to the other side of the island (Santa Cruz). Thoughout the coasts there are sand beaches and it's nearly always a nice 75 degrees. 

That's all I've got for now lads. We're going to Tenerife next Monday for P-day with the rest of the zone and then zone conference the day after. Until then! Have a great week!

P.S.  He replied back and clarified that they don't celebrate Halloween on the 30th there, he just was thinking "this week" but typed "today" instead.  

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

1. La isla bonita 

2. This member was really proud of his card tower and told me I had to send it home

Every Teardrop is a Waterfall

Fantastic week deserves an equally fantastic song. One of my favorites by Coldplay, in fact. Part of the song goes, "Maybe I'm in the black, maybe I'm on my knees, maybe I'm in the gap between the two trapeezes." I think often times we all can feel the same way. As long as we can keep our faith and "turn outward" to help others as Elder Bednar says, everything will turn out fine even though it may not seem so at first. Since we're in charge of the youth program here, we had a hiking activity and went to a waterfall here called La Cascada de Colores on Saturday. It was more of just a trickle of water, but super cool nonetheless. Pictures to come.

Awesome week with the members here and investigators. Yesterday, we had a visit from a member of the bishopric from Tenerife since the group here is a part of the ward there. The stake patriarch also visited. They both spoke on Sunday (The first time that I didn't have to speak or conduct in sacrament meeting since I got here 🙃), and afterward, we went and visited members with them. Both great guys and super Canarian. The relationships between members here has improved since I've arrived which is really satisfying. With the work, we had a lesson with the investigator Wendy and her mother that I mentioned last week. It turns out her mother isn't a member and is going to be staying here. Great news, especially considering the fact that we were told that she was almost baptized last time she visited a few years back. I still haven't met Wendy's husband, but we're really hoping he'll be supportive of his wife or even be open to listening to our message.

The work is moving along here. Really excited for what we have to work with now. One of these days I'll actually explain a little bit more about the island itself and the culture. Maybe next week. Love you guys! ¡Os deseo una buena semana!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

Fotos:

1. The start of the hike

2, 3. En camino

4, 5. The end

6. Another sweet view in Santa Cruz

Remain

Transfers have come and gone and both my companion and I survived. We're both staying here for another six weeks. Mutemath's song Remain is the song of the week. I'm definitely glad to be staying. We've made some great progress this week. Also I'm pretty sure La Palma is one of the only places in the world where you can see a pine tree, a cactus, and a palm tree all growing right next to eachother naturally.

This week we had a lesson with the person that was a reference from a member that I mentioned last week and it went incredibly. We felt the spirit strongly as we went over prayer and reading the scriptures. She shared a couple of experiences that she's had with prayer. She came to church yesterday too! She mentioned to her friend that's a member that she can definitely see herself becoming a member in the future. We're really excited to work with her more as well as the rest of her family. Her mother is also moving here from Venezuela this week.

Things have settled down a little bit here. Running the group is still crazy. Not sure that will ever change. Elder Jones and I found out at 11:00 Saturday night that we had to give talks in church the next day since members of the bishopric coming from Tenerife couldn't make it. All in a weeks work. We're getting things moving on the missionary work side and helping members as much as we can along the way. Hope you all enjoy your week!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner

Just one picture this week:

1. El Teide, Tenerife - Highest point in Spain on the flight back from Gran Canaria (picture doesn't do the view justice imo)

Army of One

I guess technically my companion and I are an army of two here, but you get the idea. It's just he and I out here seemingly against the world. Coldplay highlights that well in their song off the album A Head Full Of Dreams. Sometimes it seems everything is against us here to be quite honest, but every roadblock we hit is designed to help us in some way even if we don't see it at first. If there's one thing I've learned here, it's that we go through trials to help us grow.

ALRIGHT THIS WEEK. On Tuesday we had Zone Conference so we flew to Gran Canaria to meet with all the other missionaries here in the Canary Islands. It was almost all preparation for the smartphones and Facebook which we are now using in our proselyting! It's already helped us even more than I imagined. I'm now in contact with a few old investigators as well as a few converts. It's really nice to be able to check in and see how they're doing. In addition, we keep in contact with everyone we work with here so much easier with WhatsApp. Can't wait to see what other blessings these new improvements bring.

This week we went by Javier. We've decided to try and help him see that baptism and the church is something that can really help him in his life. He accepts everything else we teach to him, but when we talk about baptism he's unsure and just wants to wait until his life is stable. He's a great guy. He jokes a lot about converting me to be a Real Madrid fan as well. I always tell him I'm City til I die though. 

Great week. It really seemed like a blur. We have transfers next weekend. I think it's likely that both Elder Jones and I will stay another month and a half, but you never know. Until then, guys.

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 

Pictures:

1 & 2. Zone conference

3. We were real proud of our Oreo pie

Island in the Sun

This week's subject line is brought to you by Weezer and my companion, Elder Jones who suggested it. I felt it pretty accurately described my area. Today, we flew to another island in the sun, Gran Canaria, for zone conference tomorrow. Gotta say it's not nearly as lush and cool looking as La Palma. It's a lot more populated too. I lucked out with where I got sent. We'll be receiving our new smartphone at the conference tomorrow and we'll be authorized to use Facebook and WhatsApp in our proselyting as well (pretty sure Instagram is coming later). I'm unbelievably excited for it all.

General Conference was this last weekend! For those that are unfamiliar, General Conference is a worldwide broadcast that the church does twice a year where all the members have the chance to hear from the leaders of the church. It's an amazing opportunity we have to learn how we can improve as people and also how we can help others do so. On of my favorite talks was by Elder Donald L. Hallstrom. He spoke about miracles including the ones that maybe aren't as obvious. He also mentioned that our faith should be firmly centered on the Savior when we have trials and not on wanting to have the pain taken away.  There were several other talks that were also fire (President Uchtdorf, Elder Hollamd, etc.). If you weren't able to watch it last weekend, I strongly suggest you do so asap.

The week itself was the least eventful since I arrived about a month ago. I hit my 9 month mark a few days ago. Our investigators that we have seem to be stalling a little, so we're gonna try our best to get them up and running again this next week. We also started teaching a new family that was a reference from a member. Excited about them.

Mission life is the good life. Soaking up every moment I have to spend in the sun here trying to make it last. Love you all and hope you have an incredible week!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

Pictures:

1. Trying to figure out why that door is there

2. Played a quick game of chess while waiting for our flight

Under Pressure

Alright, here we go. Another good week out here. I went with a classic by Queen this week. I've definitely felt the weight of expectations since arriving here. It's always good to feel a little bit of pressure, though. Without it, we can't grow as people. The change from the peninsula to the islands has been so strange. It's as if I'm in an entirely different mission now. The work is different. The people are different. The language is even a little different. It's all good though. We have to travel around the island a lot to visit members and investigators since we're the only ones here as well.

Ok, I can finally tell you guys a little about the work here. So we're currently working with a couple of people that are great. One is named Rafa. He's the friend of a recent convert. Before we started teaching him, he didn't believe in God, but he's grown so much. He's determined to get an answer to his prayers. The only problem is that he hasn't come to church. We'll be working with him on that this next week. Oh yeah, quick side note - we don't have an actual church building here, so we have church in a hotel bajo. Another friend is Javier. He's super solid and wants to be baptized, but wants to wait until he has a little bit more stability in his life. He's planning on moving to another island, Tenerife. We're not sure when that's going to happen, but we'll keep working with him until then.

Island life is great, honestly. Loving my time that I've been here. Love you all and I hope you all have an above-average week :)

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇪🇸🇮🇨

Pictures:

1. Mirador overlooking Santa Cruz

2. From the hike last week

3. nice

4. that island life tho

Life's Too Short

The song I chose this week by Wild Party has kind of a double meaning. One of them is that I don't have a ton of time today guys, so this will be pretty brief. I've also come to the realization (once again) how short the mission is. These last few weeks here in La Palma have been brilliant, but  stressful at the same time. We haven't had time to sit and rest a minute during the day lately. It really makes the time fly. Crazy that two weeks have already gone by here.

We went and climbed to the top of an old volcano here today and it was pretty sick I'm not gonna lie. I've got a whole bunch of pictures this week. I don't really have time for anything else, but just know I'm doing well and enjoying every moment here. Maybe next week I'll actually be able to tell about how the work itself is going here haha. Love you all!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner

PICTURES:

1 & 2. Second highest point on the island: conquered

3. The companionship

 

4. Santa Cruz de La Palma

5. AFTER 8 MONTHS of being in Spain I finally found my favorite kind of British candy. Monumental moment (feat. soda that's only found here in the Canary Islands)

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