February 4 - 18, 2015

February 4th

So, as you all might know now, Elder Fernelius se fue...

Since the last time met, I didn't have time the last week, nor do I have very much time now. However...

Thursday was pretty good. We talked to our investigator with a baptismal date, only to find out that she was moving out... So that kind of killed her from our investigator list. We've been working a ton with a list that I printed out from the Ward List and Rescate so we can find more people that haven't been going to church and to use it to find more people that we can teach. So we've mainly been using that to contact.

Friday we contacted all day... Not a single lesson. We were supposed to go with the Bishop to see David's mom in Pinaflor, however the bishop didn't tell David's mom that we were coming and she got super mad at us for not letting her know. So we didn't go.

Sunday, we got with Ignacio and David and talked about a Youth camp that was going to happen Tuesday, so we could get permission from their parents to go. We talked to both of their parents, got the permission, and now they are at the camp right now!

Monday the only lesson that we had was David, he invited us to breakfast. However that was the only lesson because the night before we got sudden phone calls telling us that we had interviews with the president the following day. Those were really, really long interviews...

Tuesday, we talked to Liliana, a person that was once a member of our church but denied her baptism and took lessons of the Bible from the Jehovah's Witnesses. We're giving her the lessons again, and she has told us about her desires to be baptised again. I just need to confirm if her records are still in MLS to make sure if she needs to be baptised again or not...

Today, we went to say good bye to a missionary that goes home in less than a week. That was cool, he told us about his experiences and how much he's grown on the mission... I really hope that I can be as proud of my mission as he was.

Well, that's about it, a lot of contacting and trying to find news.

February 11th

Thursday, we finally found out that Liliana is still a member! So now all we have to do is just get her to church... We also contacted a really cool menos activa that hasn't gone to church for a while named Ivonne, let's see how she goes...

Friday a lot of contacting and divisions with Elder Jackson and Elder Soulier. Jackson came here, and we had a lot of fun. We finally got a hold of Ignacio's mom, she accepted a return appointment, so we're going to start giving her the discussions! Woot woot! 

Saturday we met a native Mapuche! His name is Fabian, and he's a menos activo. Really likes animals, has an entire pond in his backyard dedicated to just turtles. Cool guy, we're going to visit him again at the end of this week. 

Sunday we did a TON of contacting again... Vacations have been destroying our numbers...

Monday we had a full day, however a lot of people bailed out on us. Good news is, we went pizza shopping with a young man in our ward named Matias. We had a pizza competition in our ward Tuesday.

Tuesday, PIZZA! AND BACON! Bacon here is unbelievably expensive... It was about 4 mil (like 8 bucks) for a pack of bacon with 4 slices. totally worth it though!!

That's about it today. Found out that my second comp, Elder Prada is going home next month... He's going to finish his mission with only 18 months in the feild due to back problems... I'm going to miss that kid. 

Anyways, that's all folks! 

Joshua and Elder Aguero

February 18

So!

Thursday, WE HAD ROOT BEER FLOATS. It was delicious... Then we had a cita with a recent convert named Birmania, we talked about the blessings of the temple because she's going to be able to go soon! And a ton of contacts again...

Friday, we had David, who's one of our recent converts, we talked to him about enrolling in seminary, because classes here for that should start up pretty soon. We also had once (it's like a dinner, but a lot smaller because the biggest meal of the day is lunch) and we had a long discussion about the 12 tribes of Israel (something that I still can't really understand)

Saturday we talked with the Cisternas, a menos activa family that we are teaching (and they came Sunday!) that have a ton of ethuziasm (destroyed that word) to come back to church.

Sunday, CHURCH! The Cisternas, Liliana (less active), and Macarena went to church! And on the way back from Maca's house for lunch we ran into a call/delivery sushi place! Then a lot of contacting occurred...

Monday, we talked with Ignacio. he's been having some family problems recently, but we are working with him. Then we had a Family home Evening with a member, with the goal to get Hno Parra to start his home teaching visits (no one does it here...)

Yesterday, we talked with Liliana again. She loved church and the talks, we just need to keep her coming.

Other than that, this week has been full of walking and contacting. Lots of work to do, not much time to do it.

Emails from January 2015

January 15

Last week, we had a baptism, divs with our District leader, had lunch with a menos activo that has the entire bible memorized, went to church, I confirmed David into the church, destroyed a really cool pen that I bought last week during P-day, and learned how to convince a Testigo de Jehova that the Book of Mormon is true. In other words, nothing really happened last week. 

So this week, to start it all off, President came to our house! He had to talk to Elder Dawson about some medical problems that he has been having. And while he was there, he decided to do an inspection of the house... Brilliant idea! We failed, without mercy. Because it is the oldest house in the mission (about 40 or so years), it has a history of missionaries just destroying it, therefore it is probably the worst looking house on the planet. That was fun

This week we've started out our lessons really well, so far we are rocking about 10 lessons in 3 days! 

On Tuesday we got with David and showed him the hour version of the Joseph Smith movie, that turned out really well. He understood what the purpose of Joseph Smith better and why the church is true. 

Yesterday we didnt have pday, not really anyways. Because the house was old and a disaster, Pres took away our ability to do any activities. We went and bought things, then back to the house to clean.

Other than that, not much happened. 

January 21

So this week has been rather intersting... A lot of drama, but other than that a good week. 

Thursday we had a couple of lessons with David and Maca, both were great. Maca's mom has had some issues recently because of a surgery that she had. Her liver had a massive tumor on it and they took the entire thing right out. She recovered a lot quicker than everyone thought she would, so they let her go home about a week earlier than excepted, which was really nice for the family. 

Friday we went with Cata to get her endowment done! And better news yet, her mom went with her! (One of our recent reactivation). It was a really cool experience. However... EVEN BETTER NEWS TO COME! I SAW DAVID ALLEN IN THE MTC! Dude... I miss that kid. He's going to the Chile Santiago West mission (where all of the rich people live haha)

Saturday we worked our behinds off (well, my comp did). I went to the marriage of David Diaz in Nocedal while my comp stayed in the sector visiting people. I did divs with the other Elder in our sector, Elder Figueroa. It was a really cool wedding, got to see a lot of people that I knew, and arm wrestled Nicco a couple of times (yes jacob, I am practicing!)

Sunday, we had the highest assistance we have ever had since I've been here. That was pretty cool. We finally ended the week good with 20 lessons and 7 divisions.

Monday nothing much happened. We ended up doing a lot of contacting and finding people

Tuesday I gifted David a Triple with the Book of Mormon, D and C and Pearl of Great Price. I lost to David in an arm wrestle so I had to give him a freaking tie... That was great. (It was a tie from a Fardo so I really dont care about it)

Today we went to the Costanera in Provedencia. That was cool, we found a coupon for Burger King and took advantage on that. We bought so much food for so cheap... Loved it. 

I'll send photos next week, this computer has some virus issues and i dont want to risk it.

January 28

don't have time this week, but changes happened... I got a new comp, Elder Aguero from Peru! He's a very good kid, and we'll see how he turns out. So far he's pretty cool, I'll keep you updated. 

I'll get you guys updated next week, I literally have no time.

Feliz Navidad and a Nuevo Año!

That title was lame. Ain't going to lie.

Painting a school
for a service project.

Anyways, this was a rather uneventful week lesson wise. Everyone had plans for the holidays, and all of the people we did try visiting had family or someone over so we really didn´t get in. At all.

So I talked with my Family on the 24th (fantastic!) and after that we visited the Cisterna´s family for a Christmas Eve dinner. We had really good roast beef with mashed potatoes. They wanted to make sure that we were well fed for the holidays, so they cooked us up something. Love that family!

Thursday, I had already opened my presents on the 23rd so I could say thanks to my family in person for the awesome star trek shirt and missionary supplies that they sent me, so there wasn´t anything under the Christmas tree  However... Christmas dinner... Holy fetch it was amazing! We got together with the Mancilla family (Maca for anyone that remembers) and had Pollo Relleno (Refilled Chicken, I have no idea what it could be in English, they basically filled Chicken with an assortment of meats and other goodies and baked it.) It was absolutely fantastic! Maca taught me how to do Helado Frito (Fried Ice cream)... That stuff is amazing...

The chapel´s sprinkler system broke
 coming home from the service project.
(Saturday, forgot to put that in the letter)

Friday was kind of slow. Lot of walking around, a ton of time trying to find citas. We did get a chance to get into Cata´s house and talk to her dad, who is less active right now. I´ve been getting to know him rather well and I can definitely say that he is really cool. We got into a couple of really cool conversations about planes and engineering topics. I still wonder why he isn´t active... But we are working with him on that.

Saturday was slow again. We only got into one house, but it was mostly just looking for people to teach.

Sunday is our last Sunday where church starts at 11, and we are going to be switching over to the 9 o clock schedule next week... that´s going to be a lot of fun getting up even earlier...

Monday, my comp bought himself some really, really cool new year gifts. There is a store here that sells packs of Rubik Cubes, and my comp bought a pack of a 2x2, a 3x3, a 4x4, and a 5x5 rubiks cube... Dude, that was amazing! They are Shin sho (I think that´s what they were called) competition cubes, and a lot better than the original 3x3 by Rubik's. That was the highlight of that day, the rest of it we spent looking for people, again.

 My comp got into a paint fight while
painting another house. (Tuesday)

Tuesday, fireworks! Only listening to them... We had to be inside when they started to fire those off... That was kind of sad, but the explosions sounded amazing!

Anyways, love you all! Cya in 12!

Elder Faber

So, my comp got engaged.

So we got new agendas! (Finally) and I left my old one in the house... so let´s see how well I remember the week

First of all we have had plenty of service. We helped a guy named Rafa give gifts to over 600 kids at an activity that he organized, by himself, with his own money. And this activity was not cheap. He hired the police and the fire station to come over and give kids rides and let them wear official helmets and such like that! I was in charge of keeping the juice container refilled. Luckily it wasn´t that hot, and it rained during the middle of the activity as well... But we had a really good turn out, and a lot of happy kids.

Then we had another service project... We went to a school that specializes with kids with Down Syndrome, so they needed help getting everything set up, and keeping the peace with the toys and Santa lause. I helped set up the sound system (well, tried before the guy they hired came and took over. He was surprised that I was plugging everything in the right places) and then we helped pass out gifts for each one of the kids. It was a really cool activity. And we got a photo with Santa! 

I also learned how to make Pan de Pascua. that stuff... It´s gross unless if it is made perfectly (which I have seen someone do once in my entire mission). It´s Chilean (mejor dicho, South American) Christmas bread that is basically fruit cake. While we were making it, I met a return missionary who just got back from Brazil and completely forgot Spanish. Pure Portuguese. She could understand Spanish, but could not speak it if her life depended on it. Luckily Spanish and Portuguese are so close together I could understand(ish) and have a conversation.

David and Ignacio got their baptismal interviews, and they both passed with beautiful and amazing colors! They are both set and ready to go for the 4th of January, and Ignacio has asked me to baptise him! Those two were seriously prepared. The Lord does give people miracles, even in Condell.

We had a ward activity last night, the youth put together a dinner activity for the entire ward, and they put me in charge of making the ensalada (it would be salad in English, however the way they do it here is ENTIRELY different than how we do it in the states. Here salad is lettuce drowned in oil and lemons...). That was dumb, because I ended up cutting my finger pretty bad with this strange leaf maker blade thingy... That was fun.

Now to explain the subject line. My comp got a really large, really perfumed package from his girlfriend yesterday. we opened it up, and it was filled with chocolate and a small black box. We opened the small black box, and we found two rings with a note that said "Will you marry me?". He already had a promise ring that he gave her, but these rings were a completely different story. Pure titanium with a small diamond with an engraving that says "I love only you" and "I love you". Dude, that happened... All of us in the house basically died. I still make fun of him for it.

Love you guys a lot! Sorry I can´t remember what days all of this happened, but that´s about it!

Elder Faber

On Christmas Eve we were able to Skype with Joshua.  It was an amazing experience to have as a family.  My thanks to the member who let Joshua use her laptop!

Cambios!

December 17 email ~



Guess what? Im still in Condell! But Fernelius thinks for not much longer...

Omar's Baptism

Anyways, fun week. Even after the accident with my knee last week, I've been going about a little sick... I've been heavily medicated the past couple of days to work, but still happy! Aint no reason on earth to be depressed!

Thursday we had a really fun Family Home Evening with the Sevedra family. They are kind of half active half inactive, so we've been working to keep them on the "active" side. But we had a fun baptism lesson, because Elder Figueroa worked in Chemistry before the mission, so he gave us some chemicals so we can show what baptism does to us. It was pretty fun. then I made French toast for everyone! (yes, i did cook)

Friday, we spent most of the day in the Temple. Recently, the temple has been doing a christmas concert, so if we have an investigator or a menos activo we can go with them, so we brought the cousin of a member that's an investigator. It was an interesting concert... Kind of. However, I managed to find Elder Prada! that was an emotional encounter. I almost cried. Miss that kid.

Saturday we had a conference as a mission. We did service in the morning, met up in the chapel, and we watched Princess Bride as a mission! That was hilarious. Then the Pres gave us as Christmas presents book marks with real leaves from the Sacred Grove in New York! Im not going to forget that gift.

Sunday we went back to the temple with David. Met up with some of the Elders in my old zones. That was pretty cool too.

Monday we finished up all the lessons with David. He's progressed a lot, and now wants Elder Fernelius to baptise him.

Tuesday, I finally met some new people that my comp was teaching but we never managed to find. There's a really cool investigator that had a baptismal date that has a lot of war stories. Other than that, did a lot of contacting.

Today we went shopping! And that's about it. I couldn't play soccer because of my knee, so I read the book of mormon the entire time.

Love you guys lots!
Cya in 13!

Elder Faber

Joshua and his mission "dad" Elder Nichols - who leaves for home in a couple of weeks.

Joshua's looking forward to opening his
Christmas package. :)

Fun Week!

December 10 email ~

Santiago Temple

So, this week was super busy, and super crazy. Let me explain

Thursday we went to the temple. That was super fun, they had too many priesthood holders to do ordinations and baptisms that Elder Cascante and I were permitted to do a session! That was really cool, I went in and got some answers to questions that I had. The temple is a really, really fun place to get revelation, relaxation, and lots of answers.

Friday made me change my opinion about everything about what a mother is. To keep their identities secret for right now, we had a cita with a couple of less actives, and about half way through the lesson the mother broke down and started to cry. It surprised us at first, then we found out why. Her kids (except for a couple of beautiful exceptions) only go to her for money. They rarely ever let her see her grand kids, and they have just been abusing her emotionally for a really long time. We shared some scriptures about the atonement, but it really changed my perspective about how I want to treat my parents as they get older. Parents spend more than half their lives raising kids, developing bonds, and love them with all their hearts. Even when we make mistakes they will love us more than we can imagine. I think it would be a good idea to return the favor. Here´s a special shout out to my parents! Love you guys a lot!

Saturday we did a thing called a ¨cosechón¨ where other missionaries from your zone swarm your sector and do contacts. They did that to our sector this week, and I got paired with my Zone Leader Elder Kimbal. It was really fun, we did a lot of contacts with El es la Dadiva (he is the gift). We got a couple of good references and we´ve got a couple of citas set.

Sunday was fun. We have a menos activo Hno Flores that basically has the Bible and the Book of Mormon memorized. We have no idea why he is inactive, but he gives fantastic lessons. We talked about the Priesthood, and why it was necessary that Jesus was baptized, and how Jesus got the Priesthood from God even though he was from the Lineage of Juda and wasn´t supposed to get it. He also taught me an interesting quote that I liked, it goes ¨No tenga miedo a dudar, porque la duda es la puerta para exploración¨ (Don´t be afraid to doubt, because doubt is the door to exploration)

Monday we started out the week really good. We had David, who told us that he received a super cool answer to his prayer about baptism. He told us that when he prayed in the morning to know if he needed to be baptized, he was completely filled with the Spirit. He said that it was one of the most happiest, awesome experiences in his life. Love that kid. He´s set for his date on the 5 of Jan. We also had lunch with the Bradfords (from Mapleton) and that was a lot of fun, because my comp and Elder Figueroa at the same time screamed at them that I was super good with computers. So what ended up happening is that we got a ride over to the office so I could fix some printers... That was fun.

Tuesday we helped out our other fetcha Ignacio, because he had some doubts about going to church. He doesn´t want to get baptized, move, and get lazy and not go to church because David isn´t there. Good reasons, because we did explain to him what happens after baptism and the importance of going to church. We managed to help him with his doubts, and he learned all ten commandments in less than 10 minutes (that was super cool).

Today... Well, our pday is super short today because of a conference that we will have on Saturday. To say the least, we played soccer. A lot of it. It was super fun until I screwed up my knee. Don´t worry (Mom! Cough cough) because I can still move it.

Other than that, still healthy, haven´t been shot, and still going strong!

Love you guys!

Elder Faber

Joshua and Elder Fernelius at a Chinese Restaurant.

Sooo.....

December 3rd email~

Its hot... Really hot...

This week it got up 95....

I miss snow, really, really bad.

But! It was an alright week!

Thursday not much happened. We had a good lesson with David about his baptism (NEXT MONTH!!!) and he told us that he still hasn't received an answer yet about him being ready or not, but we're working with him to help him figure that out.

Friday we taught Maca (Katana lady) and we had a really good discussion about Nephi and when his bow broke. His brothers whined and complained and Nephi stood strong. Then we taught Cata's mom (a member in the ward that speaks English almost perfectly) about Genealogía because she got a calling the last Sunday. I offered to help her out with any computer issues that she might have using the Family Search engine.

Saturday we had a TON of service... A lot of members decided to get a lot of projects done because of a nationwide television program called "Teleton". Everyone basically gets the day off so that way they can watch this program that is funded to help out kids in need. So we painted a house basically. That was fun. My companion painted himself instead of the walls

Sunday was pretty bad in the chapel... Because of Teleton no one came  our attendance dropped from about 60 - 70 to 40 in a week.

Monday we had a fantastic lesson with David about his baptism (again, but this time with a hitch) we taught with the baptismal questions that the bishop asks during the baptismal interview, and when he answered all of the questions... Goodness, that kid is prepared... He answered yes on everything and bore a really strong testimony. I really wish we could baptize this kid earlier.

Tuesday we spent the entire day in the center of Santiago... My comp got his results back from the doctors from the tests they did to figure out why he's in pain. Out of three tests, he tested negative on everything, which is a good/bad thing. Good because he doesn't have a parasite, bacteria, or a worm, but now we don't know why he's been suffering for the past couple of months. While we were out I bought a new scripture case to support my bible better because my bag is tearing the shiz out of that thing  I really can't afford to buy a new one.

TODAY WAS AWESOME. As a zone we went to a zoo! And watched a live water show (I completely forgot what it is called in English) with a penguin and sea lions!!! That was awesome. It really made me wonder how much time it takes to train one of those to do a show. Now I'm here, and its about 93 degrees outside.... I'm a living waterfall, I'll just say that.

Love you all!!!

Elder Faber

So,,,, Not Much Happened.

“El servicio hace que miremos a lo que tenemos a nuestro alrededor, y no hacia nuestro interior. El servicio

nos impulsa a considerar las necesidades de otras personas antes que las nuestras. El servicio justo es la

expresión de la verdadera caridad tal como el Señor lo mostró.”

This week... Well to say the least, much stuff really didn't happen.

I lead the sector on Thursday, and most of our lessons fell through, so we did a lot of contacting. However our appointment with David was really good and we taught him about Thomas S Monson, so he can get an idea on who he is and why the prophet is super important in our days. 

Friday, we were supposed to have a conference with Elder Evans again to talk about the "Pilot Plan" that only 4 missions were doing in South America (Santiago West and South, and two more in Argentina), but it was cancelled when the First Presidency said that the Pilot plan that we were a part of is now going to be applied to every mission in South America, and are going to try to expand it to other countries. Yeah, not much happened there either. 

Saturday, well, no one was answering their doors, and all of our citas fell, so we went to a member's house that is preparing to go to the temple, and to share with her mother (who we just got a calling for this week!) who was inactive at the time. They served us Cinnamon Rolls (almost died of happiness) and then I had another episode of vertigo... That was fun, we couldn't leave for at least an hour until I could get my senses back. Then the phone call to the mission nurse was fun too, she yelled at me for about 15 minutes asking why I didn't call her after the second incident.

Sunday, David went to church! However the rest of the people we were teaching and most of the ward weren't there... I'm afraid if we baptize him he'll be more active than the entire ward... Then during the night, my comp started to have severe stomach pains that kept him up all night. 

Monday we visited the menos activa that threatened me with the Katana. Her name is Macarena (like the song) and we had a good discussion with her about what she's reading in the book of Mormon. AND SHE PROMISED TO COME TO CHURCH SUNDAY!!! Finals ended and she thinks she'll be able to make it this week. 

Tuesday was a nightmare. The pains that Fernelius was feeling finally killed all of his animo. We did intersector divs and my comp and Figueroa went to the hospital until about 4 in the morning... We all woke up tired today.

Wednesday, well, they were having a sell at a store here on all soccer gear, so we decided to try it out. I tried buying some decent field cleats for the large field next to our house, however the guy tried ripping me off by raising the price by 30 bucks... :P Instead of doing that, I went and bought some decent soccer socks for cheap (without getting ripped off)

That's my week! Love you all! 

Elder Faber

Joshua and Elder Cascante