AJ's email from 9/24/12

Just a quick note about AJ's younger brother Nathan. His mission papers were submitted to Salt Lake a week ago so we are checking our mailbox every day! Watch for another blog this week if we get Nate's call. Exciting Times!! 

      trunky papers are what every missionary gets with about 5 months left in the mission. it asks things like your parents names, your ward and bishop, and where you will be flying into. its called trunky cuz it makes you think about your "trunks" or luggage, which makes you think about home and your family and all that. i got those papers this week. i just felt wierd too cuz it was what made me finally realize how little time i have left really. these next 5 months will fly by.

       tuesday was the chilean independence day so our ward had a big party. there was lots of food, lots of people, lots of dancing, and a lot of fun. presidnt gave us, the missionaries, 4 hours to be there and enjoy everything. i realized though that i had to have one 18th to fully enjoy this one. cuz this time i understood better everything that was going on. we started with eating and the meat was great. i ended up eating so much meat and salad that i couldnt walk for an hour or so. then after they played some games like sack race and tug o war. elder nilsen and i did the sack race. then after that they did the dances and some others sang. i loved being there and its sad it'll probably be my last time ever doing that.

          wednesday we did divisions so i went to the sector of amengual with elder enamorado. i had fun cuz it was like being back in republica again with him. we get along pretty well. friday was a long day cuz we had to wake-up an hour early to go to a zone conference in maipu that started at 8. we got taught by elder esteban resek, an area seventy from argentina. he talked to us a lot aout working through the members and knowing the members situations better to help our investigators. but he also talked about how we have to help them share the gospel more with their friends so that they give us references. thats how it works in the states now and they have tons of success. they dont do contacts, they just ask members for references. whereas here for us the standard of excelence is 140 contacts a week cuz we dont get any references. but we have to build up the members so that one day missionaries in chile wont have to do contacts.

         friday night we went to see miriam, juan, and their daughter tiare, the ones we found last sunday. they are absolutely amazing! they had read what we left and had tons of questions for us to understand everything better. and miriam said the prayer again this time at the beginning and it was amazing. she says better prayers than lots of members that i have met. its crazy but i like it. so we answered all their questions and then taught about the plan of salvation and everything went better than we had hoped and then at the very end we invited them to church and they committed very firmly to going. which they did do and stayed the whole time yesterday. and it was great how our ward just took them in and made them all feel welcome.

         saturday we found a good family also, mostly the son who is 23 but the mom was there too. in his doorway we talked about how god has a plan for him and he told us about how he has been having a hard time lately cuz lot of things have happened to him. and that he will be going to washington soon to work cuz he has a cousin or something there. but we got into his house and talked to him more and he told us that he didnt know why he let us in cuz last time he let religious people in, they robbed him. but that he felt different with us. and it was good talking to him and he was really interested in what we have to share with him and how it can help his life. so we will go back there on thursday.

         yesterday was a crazy day too cuz we had so much to do. we had 27 contacts left to make our goal for the week. and to put that into perspective, 20 contacts is having a good day working a full 7 hours. and we got to around 730 with only 3 contacts on the day. so i just thought there was no way we would make it. but we just started talking to EVERYONE in the street. then at 9 we had a cita that was a good lesson but we still needed 5 more contacts. we got out of that house at 1015 and had to be in the house at 1030. so i told elder nilsen it was a good run and we were close but we just didnt make it. but he refused to go inside unless we made our goal. so we found 5 more people to contact and somehow made our goal for the week. it was crazy but i felt good about doing it.

         the only sad thing from yesterday is that someone in our retention (the people who have been baptized in the last 2 years) had been sick. about 9 months ago he had a stroke before being baptized and he is about 70 years old. and last night we found out that he had had another stroke and was in critical condition last night in the hospital. so we are gonna see if we can go by there tonight and give him a blessing or something. but i hope that he gets better.

          i hope everything is going well for everyone and that everyone is doing well. have a good week

Elder  AJ Mlazgar

BE GOOD OR BE GOOD AT IT

Alma 32:21     2 Nephi 26:8

AJ's email from 09/17/2012

AJ and E. Nilsen

     this has been a good week for me. getting back into a sector where we have some success and having a comp that helps and that i can have fun with is gonna help me. so im sure youre all wondering where im at after changes last week. i got sent to a zone in maipu called cinco de abril. its in the northern part of maipu. and my sector is called pajaritos. its a sector of just pure houses and houses and more houses which is nice cuz its my first sector like that. my comp is actually someone that i mentioned a couple weeks ago. hes the one that will be flying back to arizona with me cuz his parents are in the tucson mission. his name is elder nilsen. we´ve had fun this first week together and i can tell that he is gonna help me be better. another thing, just for those who dont know. im now zone leader. and that means that im in charge of other missionaries and making sure that they are doing what they should. the mission is divided into sectors, with a companionship of 2 missionaries in each sector. then you have 3 or 4 companionships in a district, 2 or 3 districts in a zone. and there are 12 zones in the mission. so we have 16 missionaries in our zone and me and my comp have to make sure that they are working hard and everything is alright.

AJ, Camela & E. Alcaraz

        so monday night i finished saying bye to people. first we went to camila, our investigator. she was sad that i was leaving but she understood and knows why since she has been investigating for almost 3 years now. the best part was that i had her write in my book where everyone writes and after i read what she put. it was special because she said she was grateful that i came on the mission and that she thinks she found her testimony in that really strong lesson we had a couple weeks ago. and that she wants to get baptized, maybe not right away but soon. after that we had a small noche de hogar for my other good bye. it was with paul (our ward mission leader) and his wife, 2 girls named yaris and valentina that are cousins, and then daniela. we just had a short message and then played games and talked the whole time. i had fun and im gonna miss those 5 most from the ward. saying bye to daniela was especially tough cuz weve gotten really close these last couple months and ive helped her witha  lot. and so im gonnna be worried now that im not there to help her. i just hope she keeps progressing and doing what she should.

AJ playing Jenga...or whatever they call it in Chile

          tuesday was just more about getting to know the sector. and is was only half the day cuz around 6, president sent us a text saying we needed to be in thge house before dark cuz it was that day where the youth go out and cause trouble and its dangerous. our sector was alright pretty much but its cause we are so close to one of the worst parts of santiago called villa francia.

          wednesday was a little more of working and getting into everything. going out in the morning and working, doing contacts and everything. we had our meeting with the ward mission leader in the church that night too so i met several people from the ward. we have a decent sized ward here cuz the average attendance is around 150 and the building is normal sized too. so thats a nice change after being in parque subercaseaux

AJ and Spiderman

          thursday and friday were good days too cuz we found a couple new good families. on thursday we found a family who is the dad, mom, and daughter. (segundo, louisa, and delicia) they were good and interested and on saturday we went back to teach them the first lesson and the daughter had read the pamphlet that we left and everyone payed attention and was involved. that was good. and on sunday segundo and delicia came to church which is one of the first times that i have found news and then them come to church that first week. it was exciting to see that.

          then finally on sunday i met the whole ward and the bishop and everyone. our bishop seems really good and like he knows how to work which isnt very common down here so thats nice. sunday night was really good though. we found another family that seem like some of the best ever. the mom, miriam, isnt very religious but she had a lot of questions and was really interested in everything. and at the end she was excited to say the prayer and said one of the best first prayers that i have ever heard in the mision. it was incredible. and her husband, juan, is pretty good too cuz he had even more questions than she did. so im excited to start working with them and i hope that they start progressing quickly.          basically thats it for this week. im happy to be in a good sector again where we can have success and have fun and work hard. i think that it will be a good way to end the mission, assuming that i should end here. i hope that everyone is doing well. take care

E.Alcaraz, Paul, AJ

Daniela playing Jenga

Yaris, Valentina, Paul & Yessenia

 Saying goodbye at the Noce de Hogar

Yessenia, Yaris & Valentina w/AJ

AJ's email from 9/10/12 & 9/3/12

That's right AJ...ran TOWARD the gunshots! Its a miracle there aren't more incidents involving missionarires. Those guardian angels sure have their hands full!! 
  

     this weeks email is gonna be kinda short due to the fact that i have changes and have to pack all my stuff. i wasnt expecting it really but at the same time im not entirely surprised cuz i knew that either one of us could go. the good thing though is that im moving up to zone leader. president king called me saturday night to tell me  that so im gonna have even more responsibility and even less time lol but i know that ill be able to handle it and that it will be good for me so that i can keep getting better. it`ll also be nice cuz my companion will be a zone leader also so ill have someone that i can teach with and rely on to help with everything instead of having to make sure everything gets done on my own. its gonna be nice. the only thing im worried about is where am im gonna go. im pretty sure that every single zone has changes in the zone leaders so i could end up anywhere. although im not gonna lie i wouldnt mind  going to the coast and finishing the mission there.
      the other interesting things from the week now. monday, we were walking home to the pension late at night. and from about a block away from where it was happening, we heard people yelling, "they`re robbing, they`re robbing" so obviously being 20 year olds, we hurried up to see if we could see what was going on. we got to the corner of the street and as soon as we did, we heard a car screach as someone hit the gas peddle of a car. so we stood there and watched as they drove off. about 3 seconds after they had started, we heard gun shots. so we hid behind the corner, and overall we heard about 5 gun shots. it was pretty intense. so we just stayed where we were for a few minutes til things died down. and all that happened in the richer and nicer part of our sector.
        wednesday we had the assistants in the district meeting and that  was fun cuz ive always gotten along well with elder merchan. its weird that he is going home today though, along with about another 20 missionaries. and after the meeting i did divisions with elder martinez and had a fun day with him. he is pretty funny.
       other than that though it was just a normal week. im nervous and excited for changes tomorrow but i know that it will be something good for me and that really i probably needed it to start over again and get a little more energy heading into the last few months of the mission. i hope that everyone is doing well. take care


Last week's email from 9/03/12
     its never fun being sick in the mission cuz you dont have anyone to take care of you but yourself really. at least while i was in el monte i had hna aida to help me out a little. but the end of this week, being sick with a runny nose, a fever, and a sore throat just made it not great. i just hope that what im taking will work quickly and the weather will stop being so bipolar so that i can recover quickly.
       on monday last week we went to visit  family that the wife has been a member her whole life and the guy got baptized about a year ago. they havent gone to church in the whole time that ive been here. and from what we had heard from the ward it was just cuz she is pregnant and has a hard time getting up in the morning with that. but while we were talking to them, they told us more of the real reason why they havent been going. she admitted that a part of it is cuz of the pregnancy, but more its cuz they just dont have any friends in the ward. and so we shared about the importance of taking the sacrament but apparently they just dont understand very well cuz they didnt come again.
     tuesday we taught camila and the whole lesson was just us helping her make a list of the reasons of why she knows the church is true and the things that she doubts. that way we knew what we needed to help her with more. and i think that it helped us a lot cuz in our lesson with her on thursday, we taught the restoration and i could tell that she really felt the spirit cuz i felt it too. i felt bad afterword cuz i didnt let elder alcaraz talk too much but it was a decision i made at the time cuz i felt like i had made a connection with her and that i could help her out and i think it worked out alright. cuz in our lesson on thursday, she cried a little a couple times.
    also tuesday night we got into another house of a inactive family. really we were only able to share with the lady but it was good cuz she talked to us about all the problems she has been having with her mom and some other things. so we shared a little about the atonement and how it helps  with everything that we need. and that through the gospel we can find the comfort that we need with everything. and we shared a little scripture about that and she said that it really helped and that she feels like now is the time when she and her family should probably come back to church. and then during the last prayer that she said, she cried a little. but it was the first time that in the mission where i have been with an inactive member and they say that they want to come back to church in the first visit and i feel like they really mean it. that was good.
     thursday was kinda a hard day for us, other than the lesson with camila. cuz daniela told us that she probably wont get baptized, at least not for a long long time. cuz she said that she feels good in the church and she has made some friends there and its nice, but being involved in a church and reading scriptures and saying prayers just isnt her thing and so she doesnt want to be committed to it by getting baptized. so that kinda hurt but i dont want to give up on her just because of that so we are gonna keep working with her and see if we can get her to understand the things that she would be missing by making that choice. hopefully we can help her see that.
      friday we had to go back to do something with elder alcaraz´s id card cuz when they gave it to him, they had spelled his middle name wrong. so we had to wake up early to go into the office and take care of that. i dont know how often that happens in the mission but i dont think very often from how the guy in the government building reacted when we explained the situation.         saturday we had a really funny activity in departamental where we did a little show thing. i played batman and elder alcaraz was robin. but its about a book that talks about happiness, help, and god (referring to the book of mormon) and its the last one on earth. and all these superheroes/people fight each other for it, killing each other off one by one to have the book. it was pretty funny and im glad that i could be a part of it.
       then sunday the time changed here  so we got one less hour of sleep. and i dont think that helped with me being sick. and so sunday was kinda tough cuz its the day when i felt worse this whole week so we werent able to do much. today im feeling a little better than yesterday although i still just want to sleep but we have a couple of citas tonight that we have to go to so i cant just go to bed. also today we went to fly kites as a zone and it was a good day to do it cuz its pretty windy but it didnt work out to well cuz only 2 people were able to get them off the ground. but at least it was funny to watch. i hope that everyone is doing well. take care