Bikes

Sounds like an exciting week for you guys! We're doing pretty well here, it was "really cold" for one or two nights in a row, meaning it got down to about 55-60°. 😉 It's super good for two reasons though, number one we're on bike and real cold weather would be the worst, and two because apparently it's pretty common for missionaries to feel homesick around Christmas, but it doesn't feel like Christmas time since it isn't even cold enough to be fall by what I'm used to, so that hasn't been a problem. 

I've discovered that riding a bike in the streets of southern California is a very different experience then riding around Richmond. It turns out I'm not very good at riding a bike, Elder Wasden can take corners a lot sharper and faster than I can and my legs haven't stopped being sore since I got into this area. I'm confident that by the time I leave here I'm either going to be really good at this bicycle riding thing or I'm going to crash pretty badly. Hopefully the first one. ;) 

Another thing I've learned here is that there is more than one kind of valve that can be found on bike tires. The tires that are on my bike have a valve I had never seen before, so when I got a flat on Wednesday we ended up walking to all of our appointments for the day because neither of us had any clue how to pump up my tire. When we got home I was finally able to figure it out, which was good because none of the stores we tried walking to sold inner tubes that we're the right size for my bike. 

On Friday we were able to help this member from our ward sort his collection of National Geographic magazines. He has every single issue from every single month since 1904, that's 113 years of National Geographic! It's pretty crazy. After that we were able to go to the live nativity performance,  and it was super cool. I should've got some pictures, but we we're too busy talking to people so I didn't. After The performance everyone went inside of the church and they had all kinds of Nativity sets from all over the world displayed, it was super cool. Again, I probably should've taken pictures but didn't. 

On Sunday we heard from someone who just got back from his mission in Taiwan. He gave a good talk, although he spoke so fast it was kind of hard to follow. A few times he'd tell a joke that was actually pretty funny, but by the time my mind processed it he was halfway through the next sentence and it was too late to laugh at it. He shared some cool stories though. :) After church we were able to go caroling as a district in the Brea Hills area, and it was a super cool experience. There was one man who started crying while we were singing and he said we made his whole Christmas. It's amazing to see how much of an impact something super small can make on people sometimes. 

That's mostly it! We have quite a few teaching appointments lined up for this week, but all of the ones we had this last week fell through so we haven't taught much so far. I'm excited about the people we've been talking to though, it's a really great area! And also transfer calls were last night and we didn't get told to move, so Elder Wasden and I are staying for the time being. Hopefully I'll be able to stay a whole transfer this time! 😉

I love you all!

- Elder Clark