August 11, 2014

Dear Fambam,

I can´t believe that we are at 19 weeks left. WHAT? I´m to the point where people are asking me what type of baby food I will give my kids and if I plan to study or work or date or whatnot. I am kinda just like...¨Stop speaking to me. I am a missionary robot. Always have been. Always will be. This is real life.¨ In all honesty though, now that the language isn´t really a problem and I have learned which stray dogs sleep with one eye open to sneak attack, time is flying by. There are no worries, just a lot of work to do and little time to do it.

Thank you for your letters, pictures, and prayers. The support I receive from all ya´all kinsfolk really makes me happy!

Monday.

Why Hermana V..... makes me laugh:

Hermana V...... was my facebook friend pre-mission, so we have always had a special friendship. Now we live together and both have Argentine companions.

Well, Hermana V..... has this great personality. It´s like…the opposite of peppy…but she isn´t a grump or anything…just a very chill person. She was having a rough few days, EVERYTHING was getting lost right when she would need it. It was easier for her to laugh than cry because it was just beyond belief. Well, Pday she woke up the happiest camper that I have ever seen. She was singing hymns and smiling and I thought she was drugged…but, I was happy that she was happy. In the afternoon we were able to find her tennis shoe that she had lost for a week, so we decided to go running. She was telling me just HOW happy she felt, peppier tan I ever thought she could be, whilst running. Mid sentence of joyful exclamation I hear PLOP and look over to see bird poop all over her face. HAHHAHA. Then she went back to being unpeppy Hermana V...... I felt so bad, but it was just so ironic. That´s why I love her. The end.

TUESDAY.

Today we learned about family history work in Zone Class. It is not a fully functioning thing here in the wards of Chile, but they are starting to put more emphasis on it.

I was thinking about how even Jesus Christ participated in work for those who had died. His atonement is eternal. We are able to offer the blessings of baptism, the gift of the holy ghost, and eternal families all because those that are in the spirit world are able to repent. Even those that had received all the saving ordinances in this life can still repent in the spirit world and continue progressing. President Wright shared with me in an interview Doctrine and Covenants section 138 verses 31-32 to respond to my question about how if those who had already made covenants in this life and broken them and died without repenting can still progress or not. It mentions that even those who received the gospel but died in their sins will have the opportunity to repent. So, what does this mean for us? It means that we need to repent now so that we don´t carry the burden of sin unnecessarily into the next life…but it also means that, at least for me, those who we know weren´t perfect in this life and have died before us STILL have the wonderful opportunity to repent and receive eternal life.

God´s plan is full of hope!

Thursday.

Well the last two days have been depressing. Somehow, and I cant imagine HOW with all the public transportation and handshaking we do, I caught a virus. Snot, headache, sore throat, the whole shabang. We were house confined seeing as how all of our investigators are either elderly or have babies. I pretty much just died in bed. Hermana D..... and I did a million practices for teaching and played games relating to the scriptures. Oh, the life. We were so excited to get out and leave today in the sun!

We had a lesson with the sandwich lady, and her husband had just returned from his work. He was REALLY surprised to see us there.

Here is the other half of this really cool story. So, they have been inactive for a lot of years. He is now working turns, which means he is in town 5 days of rest and then leaves and Works 10 days straight. Well, recently he had been thinking about church and how he wants his kids there. He has talked to the elders a few times that work in the area where he stays for work. His wife did NOT know this, and in the meantime was having the same feelings and started talking to us. Now they tell us they will all be at church Sunday! I am hoping and praying that they come. Their kids accepted a baptismal date and we are going to be working with them a lot.

Friday.

Today a drunk man said ¨Hola mada¨instead of ¨hola dama.¨haha. I love our profound conversations with the local drunks.

Saturday.

It is officially official. I will have to be rich enough to hire a chef for a few reasons.

Here´s why:

If it were up to me, we would live off of chocolate and cookies.

I am really good at making chicken…when it is brought to us precooked.

According to my companion, Hermana L.... and I are banned from using the microwave. I don´t know why…something about ¨not wanting to burn the house down¨… Come on! Two mini microwave fires in one week is not going to kill us… plus, who knew butter wrappers had metal in them. not I! I plead the fifth. Oh, wait, I´m in Chile.

That´s all.

Today we did service and now I have little sticks in my hands. Give me a second, I don´t remember what that is called…umm…splinters?! We helped Marcia kill a nest full of man eating spiders and re landscaped her whole yard. The funny thing is that I only remember signing up to cut grass. Maybe my Spanish isn´t as good as I thought it was…but that´s ok! It was fun to be outside doing good manual labor.

Another service opportunity I had this week was to curl my companions hair. The bad news is that I somehow burned a spot on my arm and it is forever going to be a mark that doesn´t get tan L lame. The universo hates me.

Something positive and more spiritual is that on our long walks with no sign of human life I am now doing scripture flashcards. They have already proven helpful and I am learning so much. I feel blessed to have parents that taught me the importance of scripture study. Even if it was just 5 minutes before school plowing through the profound words of Isaiah, I´m grateful that we did it. I am also grateful that mom always had a scripture verse written on poster board and stuck to the fridge.I was telling my companion how tricky that was of mom the other day…sneeeaky mom! Everyone goes to the fridge at least 10 times a day.

Sunday.

Our investigators used their agency badly today. lame. BUT Hermana M....., the wife of our branch president, brought an investigator that is the son of a less active member. Even when all doesn´t go according to OUR plan, we know that it is the Lord´s work. He always blesses us.

HAVE a GREAT WEEK!

Love,

Hermana Van Cott