General Conference

 

This is the street where Nate lives in the Alberdi Ward

 

 

Nate's First Apartment

 

 

¡Hola familia y amigos! Well haha what a crazy General Conference!!!

Ok here we go. So first of all I just want to say that its Conferencia General in Spanish so that was fun, and we got to watch conference in Spanish so that made it even more fun, and then the Profeta totally just changed the world with one annoucment.  Let's just say that the entire first session of conference all of the missionaries were going crazy. It was fun haha. But ya who knows how many thoughts went through my mind at that point and then we had how many talks about missionary work after that annoucement. Haha ya I think the Lord wants more missionaries. The best part was the press conference after the first session, it was in English so we could understand it, but to quote Elder Holland, "I'm on the edge of giddy!" Haha ya I'm right there with him. He couldn't even talk he was so excited, and then he said that there were only 15 people in the world that knew about this announcement. I wanted to see the MTC presidents face so bad. People all over the world getting shocked by the news. Oh how much fun that must have been for the Prophet to announce that. Ya well here is my little input for those people who are now trying to decide what to do about a mission. The Lord is calling. A mission is by far the hardest thing I have ever done; by far the most draining spiritually and physically;  by far the most emotionally and suspenseful thing, but by the farthest of the far, the most rewarding and best decision I have made in my life so far. If you have doubts or if you want to go at all, my advice, reread the conference talks, and then make a descision. If you choose to go on a mission you won't regret it I can promise you that.

Ya so what else happened this week. Let's see, we went on divisions this week with some members because we had way too many people to visit! Yay, but that meant that I had to teach people. Ya I discovered this week at our zone conference that I can actually do stuff and teach people. So ya it was a fun little experience. I taught a guy in the middle of the sidewalk because he said he didn't believe in God, and by the end he admitted that he believed in God, and that he knew that there was something special about our religion. So I felt pretty good about being able to help him realize the existence of God.

So it has been raining the past couple of days and when it rains here it rains nonstop for a couple days and then nothing, so people used the rain as an excuse not to go to conference. Ya that didn't make me very happy, but I got to wear my boots! Too bad it was my first time wearing them and they gave me blisters.  The exciting news, I got kissed by a guy on the cheek, and when I didn't kiss him back he got offended so then I got another kiss and had to kiss him back. It was a fun little adventure, but other than that pretty much the same old stuff happened. Ya and Oscar, he is one of those people that you can't read how he is feeling which is really frustrating!!! Ya but that's ok he is getting baptised si o si, we just are still trying to figure out if we need to move his baptism date or not.  If we move it the chances of me not being here for it are extremely high which is fome (Spanish Chilean slang word). But ya changes are early this cambio because Elder Bednar is coming to talk to our mission so that will be fun! Ya pretty much everyone everywhere is freaking out about the new annoucement with the changed ages, and we are starting to see the effect of it now with all of the new letters we are getting asking if there is room for more missionaries in our ward. Haha oh this is going to be fun. Glad I'm out of the MTC!

Missions are awesome! I recommend it to anyone that is thinking about serving!

Guess that's all for now, love you and miss you all lots and lots!

The Lord Blesses Us For Our Work

 

Missionaries in the Huelen Stake

Hola familia y amigos!!!

 

Goodness where to begin... this week was crazy! So ya I went to the hospital to get a rabies shot, wasted all of my p-day last week trying to figure out what was going on, but that night I almost cried. We got back and went out to teach Oscar, our progressing investigator that is awesome and has a cool mustache, and he said that he was super busy and had a ton of work, but we could talk to his son. We  taught his son a lesson, and let me tell you this kid is very interesting to teach. He says he is Catholic, but he doesn't believe in the church. So pretty much he is his own contradicting religion, but we taught him and at the end of lesson Oscar prayed and said that pretty much he knew this church is true. It was amazing. Then as we were walking away he said, "ya I´ll walk you to the corner".  As we were walking he told us that he didn't really have any work he just wanted us to teach his son. Ya my love for this guy is huge, he is awesome.

Ya later that night our next lesson failed and so we did contacts back and forth the same street, when we got a phone call from Sebastian's dad, (recent convert Sebastian) saying that his wife needs a blessing. Good thing the street we were on was his street and we were no joke 30 seconds from his door. So we gave her a blessing and everyone was crying including us because ya I love this family too. But the Lord put us where he wanted us to be. He really does know everyone's needs and he is taking care of us.

Next, we pushed a bus!!! Haha it was so funny! We were walking away after lunch and suddenly there is a guy waving us down. Turns out he needed help, so we helped him push his bus. Ya it was fun. We also pushed another car out of the street too.

So Thursday I woke up with a fever of 100.7, a massive headache, sore throat, and a cough. I took some drugs and went to the doctor for my second shot. The problem was we didn't know where it was so it took a while to get there but it was fun. Ya so I have been getting over being sick, and getting rabies shots. It's been a fun week haha, but the Lord has blessed us for our work, and we have had a lot of sucess this week! 27 lessons with 150 contacts. That's a lot. One of the blessings was being able to get to all of our lessons one day. We made a random stop for Oscar, and it ends up he had gone searching for more stuff about us, he found the mormon.org website and had been reading testimonies, and then he had gone to youtube to watch the restoration movie, but his computer froze so he wasn't able to finish it. Ya we didn't ask him to do any of that. So we had a good lesson with him and answered a lot of questions. But that made us late for our other lessons. Just turns out that our next lesson had read the pamphlet that we gave her, and she loved it and wanted a Book of Mormon to start reading... ha ok. After that we went to our next lesson and they cancelled! Ah how rude... so we some other investigators to see if they were home, and they were! Like they got home 2 mins ago! Haha ya where and when we are supposed to be I'm telling you. So we had a good lesson with them. When we got home for the night we had a very long thank you prayer.

Ya the other day my companion was robbed. some guy stole his pen it was so funny! Oh ya and the father that I baptised, Hermano Quispe, ya his work got robbed, and so while he was attacking the guy with a shotgun another robber hit him on the head and he had to get stiches and everything.  It was scary, but he is ok, and getting hit with a gun is better than getting shot right?

Well that's all for this week, love you and miss you tons!!!

Rabies?

Hola Familia y amigos

Ya not much time so here we go!

This week we celebrated Independence Day of Chile! Woo! We had a ward activity on Monday with a lot of dancing and food and just having a good time. They invited a group to come dance from not the church and the girls were practically not wearing pants. Like pretty much their skirt came down to... well ya pretty much they weren't wearing a skirt haha. But that took up almost all of our p-day which kind of sucked.

Ya so for this Independence Day stuff pretty much all of Chile shuts down.   There were no cars or people in the streets, and if they were, they were drunk so that was pretty fun, dancing and talking to drunk people, and ya we were invited to several drunk parties, and ate a lot of empanadas. It was really hard to teach our investigators at this time because most of them were out of town or partying and didn't want to hear from us, so we taught our recent converts the lessons again.

Then the highlight of the week, well 2 things really. Oscar came to church and loved it!!! Oscar is an investigator that we have been working with for a while. He has a baptism date, and we are working away. He came to church and loved it and can't wait to come next week too!!! Haha we didn't even have to invite him; it was awesome!  The second thing... I went to the hospital today! Woo!!! Haha ya don't freak out, it was nothing. On Friday I got bit by a dog.  It randomly attacked me out of nowhere and it barely broke the skin where it bit, but because it was a wild dog and we couldn't watch it for 10 days to see if it got sick, I had to go to the hospital to get it checked out and to start getting rabies vaccinations. It's a series of 5 shots over a 4 week period. It doesn't hurt, and really it's just a precaution. I'm fine don't worry. Well my p-day was taken up with my trip to the hospital so I will write more next week.

 

(Of course Mom researched the rabies shots and found out that the long needles into the stomach 21 days in a row and very painful was a thing of the past (1970s to be exact).  They now use this vaccine to prevent rabies in veterinarians, their staff, animal control people, etc.  It really isn't a big deal and he should be protected for about a year against another bite.  It is a good precaution to take though because rabies is 100% fatal if you get it.)

Things are going awesome, I am doing great, and love my new companion. Love you and miss you all!

It's a Great Week in the Alberdi Ward!

 

View from Alberdi apartment window

 

 

Is that pollution or fog?  Probably both!

 

 

A 40 cm hot dog?  Did you eat the whole thing?  Almost!

 

 

 

¡Hola todos las personas que leer el blog de mi, gracias por todo, y por querer a saber sobre mi vida!

Ok here we go!

¡¡¡¡¡ I HAVE A NEW COMPANION !!!!! Ya I'm companions with Elder Nicoll from Arizona. He is way awesome! Ya pretty much the exact opposite of my last companion so we get along great haha. He is super nice, and constructive about how he tells me stuff instead of being destructive so that's a nice change. I actually feel like a missionary now, and we are keeping all of the rules, so we are having a lot of success! Ya it's pretty amazing, that and he helped clean the apartment so things are great!  He is crazy about being excited to help people and talk to them, which helps me, and the people want to talk to us because we are so energenic. There is this thing called contacts, where we go and just contact people.  We go and talk to them, well ya we were doing contacts in the street, and then next thing I know my companion wasn't next to me, but he was talking to someone else across the street, ya kinda freaked a little, and then realized that I could do it. I knew what I needed to say, and for the most part how to say it. It was awesome.

 

 

Other crazy stuff. This week we saw miracles, almost everyday. But first, when there is a soccer game on, and Chile scores a goal, you know almost instantly, because everywhere we were when they scored got really loud and crazy. It was fun. Other crazy stuff, a lady stole Elder Nicoll`s Book of Mormon, it was way funny. She took it from his hand and then everytime we asked for it back she said "what book"? Then we asked her if she was ok and she said she was sick and just got back from the hospital, so we then asked her if she was on pain meds, ya she was haha that explains it.

We were called 2 interesting things this week. One guy said that I was an angel sent from heaven to preach and to help people, he then wouldn't let go of my hand and at that point I just started to ignore him because he was saying how I was sent from God. Made me feel good. Then the other a guy said that we were prophets, ya we tried to explain what a prophet was and he wouldn't have it. We were prophets and that's that.

 

One day we contacted this lady and she said we had 5 minutes, so we started talking.  We asked if we could start with a prayer and then explained the steps of prayer. We started to say blessings that we could see in her life, and that's when she started crying. It was true, and she realized how blessed she is. so we will be teaching her later. Then we went upstairs to a family and their baby was sick so we explained a little about the resurrection and then said that we had the authority to give a blessing.  They accepted, and I had to bless the oil in Spanish, ya first time doing that, and in spanish.

 

What else. One night my companion killed the electricity in our apartment, and so we had to go ask the people to fix it.  We were without lights for about an hour it was fun haha. Oh ya! Tomorrow is Chile's Independence Day, so there are drunk people everywhere. Ya yesterday one came up behind us and brushed our butts with his coat, and when we turned around he was like "dance with me" and started dancing. When we shook his hand to leave he wouldn't let go of me and he just started dancing.  Haha I can officially say that I danced with a drunk guy.

Ya but this week was amazing we had 190 contacts, 17 new investigators, and we got the zone norma which means we made the goal for all of the stuff we have to do.  So we get a party thing. Ya I know cool. But right now everything is closed for the Independence Day so I am writing this in the Family History part of our church building, there is a ward party outside this, and ya that's pretty much it.

 

The Quiespe family that we baptised a few weeks ago are doing great.  They got the Aaronic Priesthood last week and are preparing for the Melchizedek Priesthood in a few weeks.  The father only needs an interview and Josba passed the sacrament yesterday.  The ward is great here, they try to help. There are some families that are awesome with helping the new families, and we actually have a lot a very active youth in our ward.

I figured out today that I can email whoever I want from back home so ya email me people!  I may not respond every week but I will read it and try to reply as soon as I can.  ( If you are interested in Nate's email address send your request to LaurieAlder@comcast.net and I will respond to you.)

Love you all and miss you tons!!!

Same Area, New Companion

At zone training meeting week of September 3, 2012

(NOT the new companion)

 

Familia y amigos! Hola, Comó esta. estoy super bien, con me compañero nuevo, y con la casa limpo (er), Yeah haha that's all I got sorry. Ya this past week was pretty good. Ya, here we go.

So this week was pretty normal with all of our converts baptized, we spent a lot of time trying to find new people, and we found a few, but we need more! I think this week was the most I have ever walked, but it was good. Also it was the last week that Elder Ariz was going to be in the area, so his motivation to do stuff was kind of nonexistant, but that's ok, we still got things done.

I had an intercambio with Elder Harrison this week, ya that was fun. I have discovered that Saturdays never, ever go according to plan, and this week proved that to be true. So this intercambio with Elder Harrison,  we were going to change at 1, and go to lunch at 2. Well we changed at 12, and then on the bus, going back to the house, lunch called and asked if we could come early, so then I had to try and figure out what stop to get off at, so ya that was an adventure, but I got off at the right one and we went and ate until like 2:15.  Ya usually we eat until like 3 or 3:15, so we had an extra hour more of stuff that we didn't plan, so we just walked around and did contacts, haha that was fun. After that we were supposed to have a lesson at 4, ya for the first time she wasn't there, so now there was another hour of more unplanned walking around trying to find people to contact, all in all it was pretty fun, and the crazy people really like to talk to us haha.

And now for the big news!!!  The first change!!!!!!!!!! My companion Elder Ariz already knew that he was changing, and then he got the call saying that he was going to Los Andes, which is where he wanted to go, so he was beyond incredibly excited, and then the change, Elder Richardson would be leaving to another sector too. Ya he was not very happy about that, and he beat himself up a lot. So we had super excited, and super upset about it in the same room. I tried my best to cheer Elder Richardson up, but there really wasn't much I could do. Ya all of this happened Saturday night, and it just so happened that I got sick this day.

So Sunday was Elder Ariz last day in Alberdi. So we went and said goodbye to all of the converts. Ya this is where the me being sick and him leaving thing didn't work. First for lunch, the family we ate with made 2 gigantic pizzas, and when I say gigantic, I mean the biggest pizzas I have ever seen. Ya well the people here don't know the meaning of a little bit. Ya I almost threw up.  Then we went to some people that he had baptized before I got here, but I have still been teaching them, and they made us lemonade from real lemons, tasty, but didn't help my stomach. Then we went to familia Arrigada, and they gave us pepsi, cake things, and an empanada.  Ya I didn't eat any of that, and was sent home with the empanada in hand. So then we went to familia Quispe, and they had made an entire dinner for us, ya I asked for a little, and still couldn't finish. Then we went to some members that helped us a lot, and we got more food, and ya I almost died. So it was kind of awkward because everyone was crying and saying goodbye, and I was like, "I'm still here" haha so ya it was fun, but it's hard to leave the people that you teach and baptize behind.

Now we come to Monday, Elder Ariz packed all night long, and had 4 suitcases that pretty much each weighed like 75 lbs or so, ya so guess who got to haul all of this up and down the stairs of the apartment, and the metro station. ya it was not fun. But I have a new companion! Woo!!! His name is Elder Nicoll, he´s from Arizona, and he did hurdles, and has done swing dance a little bit so he likes dancing! This is pretty much all I know haha, but we are getting along well, and he is helping me clean the apartment!! Ya I never thought this day would come, but we are going through and cleaning everything! So it should be fun. he is excited to work, and I think we will have a lot of success! So ya thats all I have for now!

Another random fact, the light switches aren't up and down, they are all left and right! Weird I know!

Well love you and miss you all! Have a good week!

My Mission is a Soap Opera?

This week on "The Drama of Nate's Mission", that's right, I'm starting to think that my life is really just a soap opera, and that there is someone filming me and making a ton of money haha.

Let's start from the beginning of the week!

Monday, P Day! Woo everything was fun, we got permission to leave our area, so we went into the city and had some crazy adventures there. Pretty much we just went shopping around, traded our American money to pesos, pretty much we just wandered around and looked at stuff because we were finally out of our area.  It was fun, I got some new music and stuff, and ya pretty much all that happened that day.

Amazing Tuesday! so we had district class, and those are always fun, get to go and talk to different people, but that was only the beginning. my companion and I were set on getting all of our contacts done that day, so I suggested that we do more street contacts, than just knocking doors. That's when we just took off. We were talking to everybody, we had a lot of lessons, and it was amazing. We were spiritally on fire and it was awesome. Never been so busy the entire time we have been here!

Wednesday, The fight! Wednesday started out good, we decided that we were going to try the same things and at first we were doing good. We had an amazing lesson with an investigator, and then we had some other things we needed to do and so we were doing that, and everything was fine.  Then we went to talk to the family we baptized that week, and they had gotten on Facebook and were looking at all my dance pictures and asking me questions (about the kinds of dances he knew, etc.).  Then one of them turned music on and so they started wanting me to dance for them, and they started asking more questions. (No he didn't dance for them)  Then as I was ready to try and share a scripture, my companion said that we were leaving. Ok? Ya so we left and he took off in his I'm grumpy walk. So I asked him if he was mad at me, ya probably shouldn't have done that, cause from there on it just exploded, and he came to the conclusion that we just weren't going to talk to each other. Ya well I didn't want that and I hate fighting with people, so when we got back to the apartment we just sat in different rooms.  So when the other elders came in they knew something was up.

Intercambio Thursday! Thursday we were both still mad at each other, and wouldn't even talk to each other, and pretty much didn't even want to be in the same room with each other, so we went on an intercambio with the other companionship (meaning I went with Elder Bell, and Elder Ariz went with Elder Richardson). I don't know what my companion did, but Elder Bell and I talked about it, and calmed me down about it. So that night when Elder Ariz and I planned for the next day, I knew what I was going to do to try and fix things. We planned and then at the end I said the prayer. In that prayer I said how grateful I was for Elder Ariz and how much he has helped me learn and grow (because in reality that is the truth). Elder Ariz really is a great companion, and I have learned a lot from him. So after the prayer, he said that he was sorry too, and that we were just going to act like nothing ever happened because it was stupid and never should have happened.

Everything's Good Friday! On Friday everything was good again, and if anything we are better friends now than we were before. We had a decent rest of the week, and we had a baptism this past Sunday, and Familia Quispe was confirmed, all 5 of them!!! A complete family into the church!!! Ya 7 baptisms in 1 change hardly ever happens during most missionaries mission. So ya I feel pretty good about that, and I am hoping that I can take that and keep on going with it.

The Quispe Family baptized on August 26, 2012

Nate baptized the mother and the father 

 

Sebastian was baptized by his father on September 2, 2012

 

Testimony meetings!
Testimony meetings here are a lot different than they are back home. Pretty much everyone who gets up is not up for more than 5 minutes.  They bear powerful testimonies about the Book of Mormon, Josè Smith, Jesucristo, oraciòn (prayer), Iglesia verdadera (true church) and ya thats it. They get up, bear testimony, and sit down, young and old. No long stories, no thankamonies, they bear true and powerful testimonies! I love it!!!

And now... some random facts!
1. In Spanish they don't have the word random. (ya I know I kinda freaked out about that, how random!)
2. They sell Duracell batteries in packages of 1. That was funny to see. They sell them in bigger packages as well but I've never seen a package of 1
3. Their jelly, ketchup, mayo, shampoo, etc. is all sold in bags. Ya I don't really use that stuff anymore, and they do have some shampoo in bottles.
4. All of their milk is in a box, and not refrigerated. You only have to refrigerate it after you open it, and it's not the boxes with the fancy top, it's just a box.
5. They have a street fair thing every Saturday and Sunday, and that's when you buy all the random crazy cool stuff.

Ya that's all for now, I'll find some more stuff.

¿Que hora es? Daylight savings time haha. so this past Sunday we had day light savings. Ya you would think not that big of a deal, well it took us half an hour to figure out what time it was, and we had to call someone to make sure we were right haha. We had diagrams and drawings and poems and everything to help us, but we still couldn't figure it out. It was ridiculous haha. The problem was we were thinking that it was the same as the US, and it's not. It's the opposite, the seasons are different here, so we are going into spring. Ya it's crazy.

Well I think that's all for now on this week of "The Drama of Nates Mission" see you again next week!

Baptisms!

Hola familia y amigos!

¿Comó estan? ¡Estoy super bien y yo tuvo 5 bautizmos esta ultimo semanna!

Haha thats all the desire I have to write in Spanish, but that's a little taste of what I know, and it probably is mostly wrong, but you´ll get over it.

Anyway on to my week!!!

 Ok so this week we started out with the sports day! It was crazy fun, and I loved every second of it. The problem was, my companion hurt his foot, and practically couldn't walk, so the rest of that day he limped around and it took forever for us to get anywhere, so we didn't get much done. He wasn't able to go to the store, so we went on splits and didn't have much time so I didn't get to buy some cleaning stuff, but I got paper towels. Then tuesday, his foot was still hurting him like crazy, and he wouldn't let me help him walk or anything so I finally convinced him to call Sister Essig, and ask what she thinks he should do. He called and then handed the phone to me because he doesn't know any of the medical English words.  So I talked with her and she said that he needs to rest it, and wrap it and ice it and stuff so I got him to do that. Then he said that he could still hardly walk so he needed to rest, and it was true he could hardly walk, and I knew it would just get worse if he didn't rest it so I sent him to bed. In all reality I wanted to do the same thing, but this was the first opportunity I had where I would have several hours to do something. Then our 5 PM appointment cancelled so I had even more time. So I cleaned!

I went on a rampage! My first target was the bathroom... that's right I cleaned the entire bathroom with paper towels, and some cleaner stuff that I found under the sink.  I found some gloves so it wasn't as bad, but I cleaned and scrubbed everything;  the sink, the toilet, and I found some scrubber thing for the tub, which had a ring of dirt all the way around it that came off, so it was super gross. But I got it cleaned, then I vacumned the entire apartment as much as I could, and I cleared off and scrubbed down all the countertops, and was almost ready to start scrubbing who knows what else, when my companion came out and said it was time to go. Then we slowly went along.

Then Wednesday was district class and interviews with the mission president, ya we were the last people to get interviewed and didn't leave the chapel until 9 that night, when we had to be home by 10. But the interview was great, and talking with other missionaries was fun.

Then Thursday his foot finally started to feel better, so we went to work. As we were knocking this apartment complex in the sketchy part of our sector, we went up to the doors on the second floor, and right as we were about to knock on the door, this huge dog started to come up the stairs behind us super slowly, and it was growling, and pretty much was ready to kill us. After about 4 minutes of us standing there frozen the dog finally got far enough past us for me to book it down the stairs and my companion was right behind me.  Then as we were walking to a member's house because we needed to calm down, we contacted this guy and he straight up said to us, "Sorry, but  I'm going to go do these drugs now," and walked away. It was the funniest thing I had ever heard.

After that crazy experience, we went to the ward activity.  Actually I  think this was on Friday, I'm not really sure. Anyway, while at the ward activity I shook the bishop's hand for the first time since being here.  It's funny because we watch all of these videos about working with the bishop in study time, and I didn't even know who he was until this week.  Then it got even crazier.  The Relief Society President came up to us and asked if we would help in a skit, ya ok I know hardly any Spanish and you want me to start acting... it was the funniest thing I had ever done. I was pretending to be a kid who was playing video games, and she came over and went off in Spanish and I had no clue what she was saying, but after she was done I just got up and walked over to where the other "kids" were. Ya then I pretty much just walked around having no clue what was happening.

 

Then on Saturday,  we spent most of the day trying to find clothes for the baptism of the Quispe family, a family of 5 and then on Sunday we baptized all of them. I baptized the mother and father of the family, and it was my first time ever baptizing people! and it was in Spanish! Haha it was great I didn't mess up or have to do it again, and the water was only slightly freezing. But we baptized an entire family!!! That doesn't happen very often, and we also now have another baptism for next week! That's 7 baptisms in one change. That's a lot, and probably won't happen again on my mission.

 

Well that pretty much is it! Love you all and miss you tons!! Stay safe and happy!

 

Con amor,

Elder Alder