16 de Diciembre 2013
Eyooo. one week more till i
talk to you all! im psyched. i hit my 8 months in chile mark, but i think
it was before last week. anyways, flip the time is passing rapidly! tooo
much!!!! AGHH.
ok. this week...where
do i even begin! so much happened. Well, for greatness, we had
intercambios with the hermanas in illapel. that was fun. they have bikes!
lucky dogs. so we went biking for exercises that morning. and oh man have i not
ridden a bike 9 months. those hills killed. i must NOT bike to horsetooth first
thing when i get home. also, one of the matrimonio couples in illapel was
making big city style potatoes with seasoning salt that their family sent them.
oh my gosh it was amazing.
our investigator
alfredo came to church again yesterday! he is so awesome! we taught him
the restoration and he wants to be baptized! of course after we teach him the
rest, but alfredo is a stud. i think i mentioned he isnt married and is
living with his woman, but we told him in order to be baptized he has to get
married first. so yeah! thats what we are working for. one thing
weve noticed about him is that he is very punctual and would be a great
leader...he keeps the commitments as well, so thats a plus!
Its kind of rural
where i am at. we live in a valley surrounded by moutnains and all the
heat sinks down into our valley. salamanca is the town, but outside of
salamanca is all field and stuff for miles until you hit illapel. its
kind of an exile in a way because youre far away from everybody. at the zone
conference, people said, " oh youre in salamanca! ive heard thats like the
punishment of the mission!" but as a joke...hahahaha. but good thing
we love salamanca!
a little bit about la
serena...it was a 5 hour bus ride, but a little bit longer because we had to
pick up the other missionaries. la serena is gorgoues! it was great to
see the coast and the palm trees. i would totally love to serve there
someday. it flipping amazing!
ok. ZONE
CONFERENCE!!!!! it was the bomb! the only thing was, we were told we were
going to leave that morning from salamanca, but they changed it to the day
before. we stayed the night in illapel, so we left the night before, got
maybe 3 hours of sleep, then woke up at 3 to be in los vilos, the coast, at 6
for the bus. so fun right? lol. well we made it there and it was a big
bus of missionaries from our zone illapel y the other, ovalle. got to see
some of my old friends! dang what an adventure that was. we sang
christmas songs on the way there and everything. then the conference! yes.
totally wicked awesome as well, but short. presidente kahnlein told us about
the goals for next year and all-we are going to read the book of mormon 4 times
next year! and he gave us a book of mormon and all to do so. that should be
cool. elder svec gave a great talk too, as well as his wife. i have to be
honest, i was trying so hard to stay awake, i have to look in my notebook again
to know everything...haha.
so much fun though! i
got to see our old district leader, an elder from my mtc district, and a few
others that i know. we are in the north though, so i dont know quite as many as
the south, but it was one heck of a time!
on the way back???
well that was an adventure in itself. we had to wait for 3 hours because a
truck full of grapes tipped over and there was crazy traffic. the good thing
was, nobody was hurt, and they gave us some boxes of free grapes. and we sang a
bunch of songs on the bus. hurrah for israel! it was so fun.
until we had the bus
to return to salmaanca, which is the most curvy road of my LIFE! i felt so
sick. it was the worst! my companion and i both were trying to hard to survive
that trip...hahahaha. but hey! we lived. we got back at 12 that
day.
and back to work on
satudray!
one day this week, my
companion and i had appointments back to back in different parts of town.
we asked to borrow bikes from some members. my companion doesnt
know how to ride a bike, so she tried to hunt down some rollerblades.
which she did! lol. i was smiling the whole time during this..hahaha then
we saw that one of the rollerblades was broken. shoot. hermana bravos looks at
me and says,"hermana. i cant ride these. we have to go double on the
bike." it took me two times to get what she was saying. i had in my mind a
napoleon dynamite sort of deal where we would have a rope or something with me
on the bike and her on the rollerblades. thought wrong, us BOTH on the
bike. so we did. and we made it to our appointment! and something got
caught in the tire and we had to fix it. oh my goodness i have never laughed so
hard in my life at this experience! riding through dusty salamanca and
chalinga on a bike with two sister missionaries. bahaha im still cracking
up to this day. the worst was that we crashed. my companion had her legs on one
side and ji stopped on the other. ka-bam! but only once in the beginning.
ohhhahaahahahahahahahahaha.
it felt so dang good to be on a bike again i have to say!!
on a more serious
note...
in the conference, one
of the asistents told me that alejandro, my convert from recreo, passed away.
he was in the hospital before i left and things werent too good,
but still was something that put me in a bit of shock. to say something
about alejandro, alejandro was a great example of perseverence for me, for my
ward, and for anybody that knew him. he went to church for a year, always
with a smile on his face, making the silly jokes that he makes, until he could
finally get married and baptized. even if i wasnt the missionary that
found him, i still saw change in him and it was amazing. i wont forget
alejandro ever. i love him, hes like my grandpa that man, and i know he
is at peace on the other side.
wellt hat really sums
it up for this week! we have transfers tomorrow...and hermana bravo and i dont
want to leave! one transfer more!!! but we shall see.
well, talk to you all
in a week and 2 days.
con amor,
hermana emily hanks
