The blog of me: November 8, 2010

Howdy y'all!

Yeah, it is pretty crazy how fast this year is going by. One of the missionaries today actually called me ancient, haha. He was a greenie that just got here two days ago and asked me how much time I had on the mission - 16 months! Pretty crazy stuff, huh? I guess I am one of the older fogies now. Not an old fogie, just an older fogie.

Well, I have been transfered from Los Angeles. Because of some mission-president conference in Santiago that President Swenson has this coming week the new missionaries from the MTC were sent this last weekend and we had cambios on Saturday. I was pretty sure I was going to stay, but President called me on Thursday morning and told me that I'd be going back down south to be a zone leader with an Elder Neira (from Santiago) in the zone of Temuco Cautin. That's right, I'm back in Temuco! Haha. Well, the sector I'm in now, Maquehue 1, is actually in a branch of Temuco called Padre Las Casas. At the moment there are six missionaries in the ward here, two of which are sister missionaries. And now I know why - this sector is HUGE. I'm really enjoying it so far - I've always loved Temuco. Hopefully I'll get to go back and visit some people from Lican Ray soon. Temuco Cautin is quite a change from Los Angeles South, though. LAS is a zone of 6 companionships (12 missionaries) and TC is a zone of 11 companionships (22 missionaries). So there's a lot more work to be done, but I'm really looking forward to it. Elder Hall, my son, is actually in my zone - so I'm pretty excited about that. Elder Laurito is also in the zone, so this is going to be a fun cambio. So far Elder Neira and I get along really well - I've never really had serious companion problems. Call that a blessing, haha.

Cool experience from the other day:

It was a rainy day when I got here on Saturday, so of course that made working so much more fun. At one point we were knocking doors on a street, and this especially nice grandma came out and said she wanted nothing to do with us and slammed the door. Sweet old people, haha. So we walked to the next house, and we turned around to see a young man open up the window to the second floor of the house that we had just knocked. He told us that he was studying at that moment but wanted us to come back during the week to visit him. We set up an appointment for Tuesday, but also said that we'd love him to come to church with us the next day. And he came! His name is Ariel, he's 19 and is studying social work here in Temuco. He loved church and is excited to share with us and attend the salsa and marengue classes that are given in the church every Saturday evening. Welcome to Temuco, Elder Vincent, haha.

Oh yeah, something interesting I found in my studies this last week. I don't have my bible right by me, but I believe it's at the end of the 2nd or 3rd chapter in 1 Samuel. So there's a war, right? And the priest Eli's two sons both die. The messenger comes to tell him, and then what happens? This is the image I had in my head when I read the verses: The fat old priest (it says that he was heavy) Eli was leaning back in his chair, heard the bad news, fell over and cracked his head and died. Then his daughter-in-law comes in the room, sees him and hears about her dead husband and then just plops out a baby. Hahaha, it made me chuckle reading that. Read it, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Hehe.

Alrighty, my time has gotten pretty short. I'm going to try to get some pictures attached - this computer is really slow. Oh yeah! I thought of something else I would like for Christmas! Ghardetto mix! I haven't had that in a LONG time. Hermana Barillas (one of the sister missionaries) also asked that you throw a small bag in for her, haha. Well, that should be it for this week. I love and miss you very much!