February 7, 2012

What’s up?

So this week was pretty normal, we now have 2 investigators with baptismal dates. We should be having one this Sunday, i hope it works out. 

I finally found cheddar cheese here. It wasn’t easy. My Spanish is getting a lot better, I’m constantly having people tell me. My feet are really sore right now, I’m getting really tired of all the walking that we do. 

So far in this ward we have been getting fed really well. I have heard in March it starts to cool down a little, i sure hope so. I think this month we are having a seventy come speak to our mission. Man i can’t wait for the winter. I’m assuming you forgot to write last night, it’s all good, cause i really don’t have much to write this week. Anyways, let me know what’s up next week.

Love you all,
Elder Allison

Small World

This week my feet really started hurting, it’s because I have been walking around in size 13 shoes and I really need size 14. But other than that I’m fine.

We had our interviews with our mission president this week. We didn’t really do a lot of teaching this week, but this next week we have a lot of appointments, so we will be really busy. President hinted to me that I’m probably gonna be in this ward for a couple more changes.

If you want to know some good scriptures to study, get a copy of Preach My Gospel, it gives a crapload of good scriptures, and they are about all kinds if different gospel subjects.

The last few days it has cooled off here a little, it still is pretty miserable during the day. I can’t wait for the winter.

My Spanish has been improving a lot. Oh, so funny story, we were at this family in my ward’s house, and the mom’s parents were over, and they were talking about when they were baptized 30 something years ago.  They said they were baptized by an elder from California named Gregory Smith, which just happens to be Bishop Smith’s name. They showed me a picture from their baptism, and it was Bishop Smith! Kinda cool huh. 

I love you all so much

Elder Allison

Always short and to the point...

It was so awsome talking to you all too. And yea I’m really looking forward to my 6 month mark. At this point, when i think back about my life at home, it seems so far off. 

This week wasn’t too out of the ordinary. For new years, we got pizza and hung out in our house with the other elders that we live with.

I really hate the heat here. It’s not quite as hot as California, but the sun is a little stronger here.

We haven’t found any new investigators, but we are gonna try and work on that this week.

Once again, pretty much nothing else interesting happened.

I love you all,

Elder Allison

What A Week!

So a lot of crazy stuff happened this week. This whole last week I didn’t knock a single door, and I’m gonna explain why.

So Monday was our p-day, and Tuesday was our mission Christmas activity, which took all day. Wednesday we had zone class and other meetings, and then Thursday changed a lot of stuff.

Every time we have to pick up lunch and bring it back to our apartment, since there are 4 of us, we flip a coin to see who has to do it. Me and my companion lost, so we went to go get it. On the way over we walked by these guys that always yell crap at us and tell us to give them our money, and we just kept walking, because they always leave us alone once we get past them. But that day one of them decided to come follow us and he had what looked like a knife. He kept following us and yelling that he was gonna kill us and our families, he looked really evil too. So we kept walking away but he kept coming after us. When he got really close to us we told him that we would call the cops if he didn’t leave us alone, and he said do it, he said he would kill them too. But once we called them he ran off back to some park.

When the cops showed up we told them what happened, and we got in their car with them to go find the guy. We found him and his buddies in the park and we stayed in the car while the cops talked to them. Since he didn’t have the knife on him at the time, the cops couldn’t do anything, but the one guy saw us in the car and when he started walking away he turned around and mouthed something about killing us the next time he saw us.

After that the cops drove us back to our apartment. After we told President Laycock about what happened he ordered me and my companion out of the sector (ward) until change meeting, which was today. We went back Saturday night to pack, but that was about it.

 All 4 of us thought that we would for sure be staying in Los Presidentes for one more change for Christmas, but President didn’t feel safe with us being there after that, and I didn’t either. So today I got changed all the way to the farthest south stake in our mission. I’m in the Cordillera stake, Cordillera ward, and my new companion is Elder Briscoe. According to him, we have almost 200 people show up to church every week, which is more than twice as big as my old ward. My old companion Elder Buorgeous went to the middle of the mission to train a new elder, and the same with Elder Hilburn.

And yea that was my week.

Also I live in a house now, instead of an apartment.

I love you all,
Elder Allison

Hola

I am doing better this week, work is still really hard though. But I’m pushing forward. We have had quite a few lessons with less active members but other than that not much else. We have stake conference this Sunday, and a member of the 1st quorum of the seventy is going to be there. The elders that I live with are all pretty cool. It cooled down a little bit this week. We have one investigator, but she isn’t really progressing, not sure what to do about her. I keep forgetting to take pictures. I will try and do that this week. Sorry there’s not too much to say, this week was very uneventful. Sorry, I will write more next week and maybe start capitalizing.

Love you all

Elder Allison

Just Another Week...

November 7, 2011

Hey family and anyone else who reads this,

This week was kinda cool, our whole mission got together with the north mission and Elder Cook of the Twelve and Elder Corbridge of the Seventy, who is also the area president came and spoke to us. It was cool because we got to go up and shake their hands. We have stake conference in a couple weeks, and I think elder Zebballos of the Seventy is gonna be there. It’s cool because the temple, church area headquarters, and all the General Authorities for Chile live in our mission. Other than that nothing really cool happened this week. Success doesn't come easy here. I sent a picture of our first baptism. That was on the 30th of October.

Let me know what’s going on back home.

Love you all,

Elder Allison

October 2011

October 3, 2011

So I’m now starting my third week.

It’s pretty awesome, oh and Josh Hilburn isn’t my companion, but he and the elder that he is training both live with me and my trainer, and we all cover the same ward. So my companion, who is one of the zone leaders and another district leader might have to go on splits for a 24 period, which means I might have to go on splits with this elder whose been out for like 8 weeks, still being trained. He is from Nicaragua, I think that is how you spell it, and he doesn’t speak English. So if it does happen I should have a pretty interesting day.

I’m starting to be able to understand bits and pieces of most people, and there are a few people who i can understand pretty well, and i can have a conversation with the bishop here. Mainly because he is Colombian and his pronunciation is way better than anybody else.

I’m sending a few pictures on this email, they are not the greatest, I’ll send better ones next week.

A lot of our appointments fell through this week, but that’s very normal. As a new missionary I have to do a total of 4 hours of study each day, 1 for personal study, 1 for language, and 2 for companionship study. So we usually don’t get out of our apartment till around 1. Also because of the culture here, we get up at 730am and go to bed at 11:30pm, which is an hour behind regular missions. It’s really nice.

Love you all

Elder Allison

October 10, 2011

Hey thanks for all those points on conference, they were really good.

So work here is kinda hard. Our 2 main investigators keep having to postpone appointments, even though we have had such good and spiritual lessons with them. But on the bright side, there is this family that we have been teaching, Yoao and Angelica. They have 2 little girls and we got them to come to church last Sunday, and although the only stayed for sacrament meeting, it was good. They both have admitted that they know the Book of Mormon is true, but they both work and it has been difficult for them to come to church. So me and my companion, Elder McKnight, and Elder Hilburn and his companion have been teaching them together. My companion is from Kansas, and he is going home at the end of this change. He is really good at Spanish.

Just so you know, a change is 6 weeks, and is how long you are with your companion for at a minimum. Every 6 weeks we will get a call on Sunday night from the president’s assistants, and they tell us if we are staying in our ward, or leaving. Then the next day the whole mission meets at a chapel and you find out there who your companion is, if you are getting a new one.