AJ's email from 3/26/2012

     well this week had several things that have been different. ill just start with the coolest. we had 2 earthquakes over the last 3 days. saturday morning i woke up at 4 in the morning because of the first one. and with us having our bedroom on the second floor of our house and then i sleep on the top bunk, lets just say that my bed was moving around a lot. but it was pretty cool cuz it was a side to side movement. but that one was a 5.3. then sunday night we were in the house of hermana aida when there was another earthquake. at first it started out slow so we just stayed still but then it kept getting stronger and stronger and it felt weird so we had to leave the house to be sure. it felt a lot different than any other earthquake that ive felt. it was more like a swirling movement. afterward we found out that in the epicenter it was a 7.2 and here in the santiago area it was a 5.8. but they told us that thats how it felt 2 years ago when they had the huge one but this wasnt as strong. so thats why we had to leave the house just in case it got worse. but i enjoyed it the whole time and elder vilar and i were joking around the whole time. it was fun although lots of people got scared.

      tuesday we had our interviews with president king. and i think it was the best that i felt in an interview with him since ive been here. we talked about a lot of things, especially with the changes in el monte. so basically i already knew was what going on. the only thing that he didnt tell me is who my new companion is. but what he decided to do in the end is put elders here. and so he split elder vilar and i up, one in each sector, with a new companion. and before telling me who was going to which sector, he asked me what i thought. and so i told him that elder vilar and i had talked about that before and that we thought it would be better that i stayed in the city part of el monte and that elder vilar goes to lo chacon in the campo part. and then he told me thats how he felt it should be too and that he was glad that we were all on the same page. then at the end i explained the whole situation with javiera and that we wanted to get her baptized as soon as possible and that it would be the easiest way to take care of everything. and so president approved for elder mcbride to come interview her so that she could get baptized this week. so then wednesday he came and interviewed her and everything turned out well. after that the only thing left for us to figure out with the baptism was what she was going to wear. the only tunic that the ward has is for someone 8 years old. so we had to look for one. we asked our ward mission leader if he knew where we could find one and he told us that there are several in the closet of the church but that we had to find our own way to get into it cuz they had lost the keys several months ago. so thursday night we went with one of the members to the church to break into the closet. and it was so funny cuz basically we had to break the door off to get in. but the whole time we just said whats better, that we have to pay for a new door or not have a baptism. eventually we got it open and got one of the tunics out for sunday.

       then sunday we had the baptism after church was over. it went really well for putting it all together in about 5 days. it showed me too how good of a branch this is here. the people are all pretty good and i feel lucky that so far into my mission ive always been in good wards. but everything turned out good. i had to lead the music for the hymnns so that was my part. after getting baptized, javiera gave her testimony and during it, she started to cry a little. it was kinda touching to see.

       the other thing that happened this week is that we had to get the new pension ready for elder vilar in lo chacon. we werent ever able to find a place to live big enough for all 4 us of so we have to split up. so friday we went with the elders from the office to see where its at and to see how the pension is. we found out when we got there that the new pension is the smallest in the entire mission. it has 2 rooms of about 10´ by 15´, one to sleep in and the other to study. and then they have a small kitchen and the bathroom is in a corner of one of the rooms. its so small and im actually glad that im staying in the old pension cuz i dont know if i could handle being in that small house. but im definitely gonna make fun of elder vilar and his companion.

E. Mlazgar and E. Sanchez

      so changes were a little different this change. normally the change meeting happens on tuesday but this time president did it monday. so i already have my new companion. his name is elder sanchez and he is from cinaloa, mexico. its already been a cool day laughing with him and elder vilar cuz we have all been together basically all day. and elder sanchez and elder vilar were in the same group in the mtc so they already know each other and so we are gonna have a lot of fun together in the branch. the only thing is elder vilar´s comp is very strict and doesnt really know how to have fun. so we´ll just have to work on that. but i know im gonna enjoy my time with elder sanchez.

       that everything from this week. just ready to start a new change and start out with a new comp. hopefully we´ll have as much success as i was having with vilar, and more would be better. but i hope that everyone has a good week. take care

AJ's email 3/19/2012

 alright first things first, there is a surprise from this week, a huge one. and that is...we might be having a baptism this week. its a crazy story. so wednesday night we didnt have much to do. and we got a little hungry so we decided to go by a lady that works in front of the only store in el monte selling montinos (basically just hot dogs wrapped in bread, sometimes they have cheese in them too) she is a less active member that contacted us a couple weeks ago and wants to come back to church and so we are helping her remember a lot of stuff cuz its been a long time since she has come to church. and then she has a daughter that we are teaching. but all that has nothing to do with the baptism, just the fact that we were hungry. so we bought the montinos and thought of somewhere to go to eat them. and i remembered that seminary started here this week and so the church is going to be open every night. so we went to the church to eat. while we were there, the ward secretary was there doing some work with the ward records. so elder vilar asked him whats going on and if there is anything new like we always do, but this time he said yes. apparently he was going through the records and noticed that a girl named javiera that just turned 12 and entered into young womens, doesnt actually exist in the church system as being baptized. and so they sent a request to salt lake asking for her record. salt lake answered on wednesday saying that she was never baptized. so he showed that to us and asked what needs to be done. so then this whole week has been us talking with the assistants of the mission to see how fast we  can baptize her. cuz without presidents permission, she would have to go to church 3 straight weeks and get taught all the lessons like any other investigator. but tomorrow we have our interviews with president king and so we are going to ask his permission to baptize her this week. cuz she doesnt need us to teach her anything, she has been going to church for the last 12 years and already knows the answers to the baptismal interview questions. hopefully everything works out. and after all the work that we have done here, it would be a gift from heaven to have a baptism now the last week of the change.

Yikes...I need to shave! 

         thats the biggest news from this week. saturday we did service in the morning with the ward. we had to cut the trees so that they arent so big, but i dont know why, we just did it. and at the same time we had to scrape the layer of plastic off of the field. i dont know how to describe it much better than that. its just like some plastic stuff they put on top of the concrete so that its not so slippery and so that the paint stays. but we did that so that they can come and redo it and then paint new lines on there. it was a lot of fun hanging out with them and laughing the whole time. and then at the end we had a bbq. so anytime we can have fun and eat, its a good time.

         thursday we had a good lesson with joel and veronica. they are really starting to open up a lot more to us. really the whole family is. we are good friends with the 4 kids too. but this week was good because of what veronica told us. before she has always said that she doesnt want to go to church yet cuz she wants to put their life in order first and get everything straightened out that needs to be done. but this week, she told us that her and joel were talking about it. and she asked him if he´d like to go to church and he said something like sure why not. so i was glad to see that they are progressing pretty well. hopefully they will come to church this week. we are gonna do everything we can to get them there.

          thats just about everything from this week. well really there is a little more but im so tired from playing soccer this morning that i dont feel like writing it all cuz its a lot of the same stuff. but this week should be really interesting with everything going on with javiera and figuring out the whole situation. i hope that everyone is doing well. take care

AJ email 3/12/2012

another good week in the mission, and also another one that passed by way fast. i honestly dont know where the time is starting to go. but it was a little different than normal from some things that we had to do this week. also this week was the week for the elders quorem to come out with us. and that was alright although like with everything else, they dont have as much enthusiasm to do anything as the youth or the relief society.

        wednesday was a good day. we had hermano soto come out with us to a couple of citas that we had. he is a man that really sets an example for a lot of other people in my opinion. him and his family are a part of our home teaching assignment that we have. and everytime we are around him, elder vilar and i end up walking away saying "that man is just pure love". he is kinda sick with something but i dont know what, but it seems like everytime we are with him, he is more worried about us and how we are doing and says that it doesnt matter how he is cuz he´ll be fine. he is always smiling and is just amazing. its showed me a little of how i want to be with others also. so on sunday when we asked who was gonna come out with us this week, he was the first one to offer to come. and then when i asked what time he is available, he just said whenever we want and for as long as we need him. and thats better than just about anyone here. cuz normally people offer an hour or 2 but an entire day on bike when its hot outside, it just shows that he is willing to serve in whatever way he can. but he came with us to our new investigator veronica. she seems to be really good. she asked us a question at the beginning about how do we know that our priesthood holders really have that authority. and so it was perfect cuz it lead us straight into the restoration. and then at the end she accepted an invitation to be baptized, although a little hesitantly.

           thursday morning we got a call from elder mcbride and got a surprise. he told us that the next morning elder vilar had to go into santiago the next day to do some stuff for his visa cuz the last time he did it, something went wrong and so they had to fix something. and so that night we had to be in talagante to do divisions with elder mcbride and elder west cuz elder west had to do his stuff too. so thursday night they went to maipu and i stayed with elder mcbride. but the weird part is that the next day, all of the leaders had a meeting in santiago with presdent king. so at 830 in the morning, all the leaders from the zone got together to go and so i had to switch comps again. so for half the day on friday i was with elder merino from peru. and im not gonna lie it was pretty funny walking around with him cuz he is tiny. he is a little shorter than my shoulder level. and then around 4 elder vilar got back and we went back to our sector to work. but it was weird having 3 different companions in the same day and also being in 3 different pensions.

         saturday we had a noche de hogar with ursula (my convert from melipilla) and her family. it was really good cuz there were about 15 people there in total and about half arent members. and i had to give the little lesson which of course i didnt plan for. but its ok cuz being missionaries, we always have something that we can talk about and make it decent. so i decided to talk about the family and how important it is. cuz with so many non members, i knew that they might think that i was only gonna talk about the church and try and convince them and all that. cuz thats all anyone thinks that we do. so i wanted it to be interesting for them while still trying to inculde something as missionaries. and i figured families would be best. and it turned out really well. at the end it turned out being like a big family council for them to work some things out and i think that we gained their confidence a lot more. and it was fun for me cuz i got to hang out with all of them again and it reminded me of my first few months in melipilla.

         then yesterday we went out with the branch president all day to visit some people. and that was really good cuz its the first time in my mission that the branch president has done that. but we went out to visit some less active members and then he went with us to one of our citas that turned out to be really good cuz he helped us a lot.          

         so it was a pretty good week. the pictures that i put with this are of our pension just so that you know. its kinda small but it works for just us 2. and its not bad. i hope that everyone is doing well. take care

AJ's email from last week ...03/05/12

this week was absolutely miserable. not for anything that happened really during the week or anything like that but because of the weather. of course the week after i say that the weather is starting to get better, we have the hottest week of the whole summer. it was terrible. everyday this week, it was between 90 and 94 degrees...inside our house. so regardless of how hot it was outside, when you have no where to go to try and cool down even a little, its miserable. but apparently its going to cool back down starting tomorrow and then hopefully it will only get better going into fall. im ready for it to be cold again. ive never really liked the heat.

      tuesday we had divisions so i was with elder mcbride here in el monte. it was weird talking english for a whole day again cuz i havent done that for over 2 months now. and it made me realize that more often i feel more comfortable speaking spanish than i do english. there is still a lot i have to learn about spanish (lots of words) and sometimes my mind goes a little blank about what im trying to say, but i have to think more to talk in english than spanish now. but i had a good time with him. we had a pretty good day with several good lessons. but my favorite was a house blessing that we did with a woman named marilen. we found her knocking doors and she was very interested from the start. she asked us what makes our church different from all the rest and she had several questions that were perfect for us to answer cuz they were things that we wanted to teach anyway. and then at the end as we were walking out, she told us that we surpassed her thoughts and that she wants to learn more. so im hoping for the best with her. the only problem is that she works turns and so her schedule is dificult and it changes from week to week. so as long as we can find time to teach her, it should work out.

     thursday we found out just how small our sector can be sometimes. we took one of the members out with us to go to a cita with joel and veronica. and when we got there, we found out that they already knew each other. dont ask me how but they had seen each other around and had talked a couple times. but they dont live close to each other. and it always helps having one of the members with us cuz they help us answer questions sometimes and help the people see normal people like them that have the same experiences.

     then friday was a really good day. it was a little weird a one point though. we went to a house of an inactive member that just moved here from maipu. and he came by the church one time and asked if we could come by. and he talked to me in english but not very well. i had a very hard time understanding what he was saying. and then he wanted me to talk to him in english but he didnt understand me. so i just got tired of trying so i started talking to him in spanish and then he answered in english. it was weird. then he showed us that he can play the accordian (however you spell that) then at the end, he asked me to say the prayer, but in english. and i havent said a prayer in english out loud in over a year now. it was hard and i had to pause after every 2 or 3 words to think about what i wanted to say next. then after that we had an activity in the church. it was by the primary and it was like a little disney movie night. several of the organizations performed a part of a disney movie and it was fun to watch. the relief society did alice in wonderland. the older primary kids did alvin and the chipmunks. the middle primary kids did lion king. the younger ones did snow white and the seven dwarfs. and then us with the youth and their leaders did shrek. and i was the wolf. so i had to dress up in a night gown with a hat. elder vilar was puss in boots. it was pretty funny though.

       saturday we went to a meeting of the jehovas witnesses so that we could set an appointment with one of the leaders there. that was interesting, seeing everyone looking at us as we walked up to the building and then went in. but it was good cuz its a good guy that we want to teach. him and his family have lived in washington before, in seattle. so they speak english pretty well and like speaking it. but they are here in chile cuz a lot of their family is here and to share their church with others. so i can respect that. but im still hoping that we might be able to change their minds a little.

          then sunday made me really happy. we went out to see the parents of ursula who live in el monte (ursula is one of the people that got baptized in melipilla just after i left and i was pretty close to her family) and i was so happy when we got there and their whole family was there. i never got to say bye to them before cuz of the special changes and so to see them again was amazing. but they have changed after the last 8 months. the 5 boys are all so much bigger and her and her husband are working in different places now. but it was nice to talk to them for a little and then we planned a noche de hogar with everyone on saturday

         with the pictures this week, most of them are from the activity on friday. and then one is of whats called a chorrillana here. its what we eat every monday after playing soccer and its big enough to fill both elder vilar and i both. but today it was especially huge so i had to take a picture. but its so good and its something that i plan on making when i come back. cuz its just my kind of food. french fries with meat and onions on top and then 2 eggs on top of that. its delicious. but anyway i hope that everyone is doing good. chao