More conferences

This week we had the rest of the multi zone conferences. They were awesome but we kind of did them by muscle memory because we were all focused on the big activity on Monday. 

On wednesday we got together with Carla to go over the last couple of things before her baptism and she couldn't help but to break down. There are a lot of things that are happening with her, most of which would be inappropriate to say but she was just about to give up. Actually, she had a terrible long night because of how stressed she was then in the morning she was laying in bed and told herself that she was going to stop visiting with us. She said she was just about to decided to do it when I called her and convinced her to get together with us. She came and we had an awesome lesson. Now she says that she's positive that she is getting baptized next saturday. It's crazy how everything works out. I feel like I have no idea what I'm doing but almost as if it were magic, everything comes together. That's just the mission

Everything else this week has just been preparations for the activity. We got all the buses contracted, the shirts made and paid for, the food bought, the DVDs made, we built signs out of wood (that was actually pretty fun) and got everyone organized into teams. The rest of today will be spent getting all the last little things done.

Plot Twist

To be able to make this big mission activity happen we had to drive down to the site and plan out the things we can do with the resources we have, we had to contract 8 buses coming from 4 different cities so that 250 people can get to the middle of nowhere, and do endless nit picky planning but in the end, it turns out that we probably can't do the activity where we wanted to do it. So this week we are going to start over.

Besides that, we have been pretty focused on helping Carla get baptized. She is to the point that she says "I already know I am going to do it on the 24th, I´m just terrified what my parents are going to do to me when it happens." Unfortunately, it´s most likely that she is kicked out of her house and cut off, at least from her parents. She is hoping that they don't find out until after she moves to Louisiana but we all know that the adversary doesn't work like that. 

I think that is all that happened this week, Lets see.. I haggled a Colombian into making a bunch of DVDs for 200 dollars instead of the 400 he wanted. we had an old woman cuss us out in english and the moral of her rampage was that "ice cream cones are a gay food"(that isn´t exaggerated). I have a sinus infection. 

Alright, now that's everything

My Mission Year

Well, there it was, my only full year in the mission. This is how it ended:

2014

On monday we went out to look for people to teach with the little time we had left in the day. We went to work in the rich part of town again, mostly because the houses are so giant that, it makes it interesting. But with just 2 hours we found 5 families. That's not exaggerating. We got into the houses of 5 different families. I have no idea how it happened. But I can't complain.

I can't remember what happened on tuesday, just getting work done then teaching some people.

On wednesday we had a ton to do in the office but at exactly 8:30, when we were allowed time to celebrate, we turned off our computers, took off our shoes and played soccer in the mini cultural hall thing we have in the office. After a half an hour, we were all exuasted and I had ripped my pants so we stopped and made classic chilean "choripanes" which are like mini hotdogs.

After finishing everything at the office we went home and waited till midnight to try to see the firework show in Concepción. Last time I looked at my watch, we had five minutes till twelve but all of a sudden

2015

we heard the boom of the fireworks. We quickly ran up to the top floor of the apartment building and watched them go off as we reminisced on 2014 and made the classic goals for 2015. Then some of us went to sleep and some stayed up telling stories.

The next day we had a zone activity. We all got together in San Pedro and had a classic summer day. Tacos and orchata made by the mexican sisters in the zone complete with soccer, volleyball, frisby, ping pong and blazing sun. By 3 we were all exhausted and way too sunburned so we just layed in the shade and talked instead. At 5 everyone went back to there houses and suffered the consequences of not using sunscreen. My arms are litteraly tuning blue from the burn. I kind of have to accept that I will get cancer now.

On friday we didn't have much time to work in the office but we had some awesome lessons in San Pedro. The girl that talked to us last week in the rich part of town, Carla, is now committed to be baptized on the 24th of January. She said that she is commited to do it but she is afraid that her parents will cut her off as their child if she gets baptized. When they found her book of mormon, they cut her off economically so it wouldn't surprise her if they would do something even more irrational if she joined the church. Today we are all fasting, Carla included, that when it comes time to tell them, her parents will soften their hearts. If you could, it would be a big help if you all could give a little time in your prayers so help her out. 

Today we traveled down to Traiguén to check out the site for the big mission activity. It was just as hot as usual. At one moment, we were driving though the country and there were endless wheat fields so we stopped and ran through them and took pictures. I will be sending those today. On the way home we had a free style contest to EFY music and we finally got Elder Medina, the Ecuadorian to do it in spanish. It was a good time.