Elder King Real quick, can you email me Jena´s writing address (not MTC
address) the most embarrassing thing happened to me the other day, and i
am just used to tell her embarrassing stuff haha. P.s. I have a letter
coming for you in the mail. It should be there in about a month.
Mom can you send me the writing address to our grandparents? I want
to write them too, Also i would love it if you could send me sheet music
(in an actual letter) of legit arrangements of church songs, that are
super beautiful on the piano and would push me to learn harder yet still
super beautiful songs
Dad so your entire email i totally understand exactly what your talking about hahaha
Ok
story time yesterday i was in sacrament meeting and the branch
president president was announcing the program for the day, when he said
Elder Crockett is going to give us a 10 min talk, and then looked at me
and winked. And i thought to myself ¨¨Is that really how he is going to
ask me to give a talk this week? He should know i´m already teaching
the gospel doctrines class and making a special appearance in the
primary to teach them too.¨´
So i go up there and i have no idea was i
was going to talk about, but i was one of the main benefactors of the
program so i couldn´t just bear my testimony and sit down. But then i
realized, oh i´ve always been good at just talking religiously for a
while, it will be the exact same as before. So i go up there and i start
telling a story from my past lif, which apparently my entire life has
been a giant parable because i can take any random part of it and turn
it religious haha but i was talking and i got to a point in the story
about 4 mins where i was quoting something that someone told me once,
when i realized that i actually had to translate what they said to me
into spanish. ANd so i paused for a second and apologized and said
´´Sorry, i just realized that no one used to talk to me in spanish
before so i need to translate something in my head real quick´´ They all
laughed, and then i quoted them and continued on giving my talk. And it
turned out great, lots of people came up to me and said they loved in.
But i didn´t really think about what just happened at all until i was
about to teach my class, i was talking to one of the new sister
missionaries (2 of them are super Gringas, i´ll have to write a letter
home about them) (they are incredible thought) But one of them says to
me (in english) ´´Elder Crockett, how long did it take you to be
understand everything, and be able to speak spanish well´´ and i sat
there and thought about it for a second then said ´´I honestly do not
know, i just woke up this morning and was fluent hahaha´´ Which is
straight up falso, just so you all know i can not understand everyone, i
can say everything that i want to, and can think in spanish without any
problem, or effort. But Chileans talk so fast hahaha. I can understand
all of the Latino missionaries though, because a bunch of them are from
like México, and Central America, and those countries there speak
really slowly and clearly, so it´s super easy to understand them.
But
anyways i also taught the Principios del Evangelio class, and did a
bunch of stuff in the Primary after that. Which that was super fun, the
teacher was so glad i came in when i did. It was super funny/sad her
eyes where all red and bloodshot, and she was all like ´´Elder Crockett,
thank you so much for coming. I think it would be fantastic if you
could get them to learn anything´´ hahaha ANd i had so much fun with
them. I helped them work on one of the articles of faith, and he talked
about the Joseph Smith story. And it was great. And the primary lady
said that she would just love it if i could come back and help more
often, but to be completely honest i´ll probably end up teaching in
priesthood soon enough too hahaha. It´s just like i´m a part of the quorum anyway.
I even have a home teaching companion named Hermano
Benjamin. I´ve talked about him before. He was the humble old man that i
talked about once who didn´t know there was a living profeta today.
Great guy he is probably one of the most faithful members i have ever
met. But the more time i spend home teaching with him the more i realize
that the missionaries should have taught him so much more than they did
when they baptized him haha Well i need to go now. But i love you all!
keep me posted!
Monday, April 29, 2013
Monday, April 22, 2013
La Semana de Super Servicio a las Hermanas
So before i start my emails i want to ask for a couple of Favors. Truman can you look up a Cody Dance on facebook. He´s from Rexburg Idaho i believe, and will you ask him for his address so i can write him. I also would live the writing addresses to Kyle Brown, and to Nick Hawkes, because i don´t know if his address is different than it was for this past semester
Mom you are incredible, you have no idea how many times
you have been a strength to me throughout my life. And even with me
thousands of miles you are the only person who i hear from really at all
haha
Side note before i tell you about my adventures i want to say thank you
for whoever it is that is praying for me, because oh my goodness it
works hahaha please continue.
I´ll explain that more in my letter home. (it´s what i call my samuel the lamenite story. Just to get you
excited for it. It may be about a month or two before you actually get
it haha.
This week i found myself in Futrono again attending the
baptism, of a women names Cecilia, I met her when i was on my
intercambio in Futrono a couple of weeks ago. And when i met her she was
just about to get married the next day, and was super stressed out
because she was not ready with the decorations and stuff, and my
District leader thought he was being funny and told her that I was an
expert at decorating stuff, and that i have alot of experience with it.
And so after he says taht he starts laughing, and Cecilia looks at me
and asks if i really did. And i said Yes. As a matter of Fact I do. And i
enjoy it quite a bit. (It's true, he was awesome at decorating for Miya's reception.)
And then Elder Rojas stops laughing and thinks i
am kidding. But then watches as i take the lead of designing the stuff,
and the decoration force haha. But she pretty much fell in love with me,
she was so grateful. And so this week Elder Rojas called me and said she
wanted me to be at her Baptism. So i went. And it was super beautiful.
The pictures i attached this week is where it took place, and is where i
will be baptizing people too soon. But my pictures really do no do it
very much justice. I would love it if i had a nicer camera that takes
better quality pictures, but is still small enough that i could have it
in my jacket pocket. Because that white one i have is still broken. P.s.
that´s not me telling you to send me one. I may be able to get my hands
on one haha.
But literally every single day this week sunday included was super full of service. The first day of the week was just me moving houses, and it took all day, and there isn´t much fun things to say about it that i already havent told you. The next 5 days i deep cleaned the Old house for the Hermanas. I dont think i have ever cleaned something so well in my entire life.
I really hope no one tells them how much work i
did for them this week though because i already have a bad enough Snake
problem without having to worry about sister missionaries falling for me
too. But after i cleaned all of their house. I helped with repainting
alot of it. Bringing in and building new furniture. Cleaning up the mess
again just so the house was spotless. And them spending an entire day
cutting firewood for them so they don´t have to worry about cutting
firewood for at least a couple of months, and i´ll come back if they need
any more to cut some more.
But they are arriving here this miércoles, i
can´t remember what day that is in enlish. I think that´s wednesday
hahaha freakin spanish haha. And i arranged an activity in the church
so that all of our investigators, alot of the menos activos, and the
whole branch will be there, so that they can have better start at
getting to work here in Paillaco than i did wheni got here.
And i am
also going to introduce them the the families that i am going to give to
them as references. Because there is alot of families that it is really
hard for me to visit because they don't have a man in the family so i
can only pass by there with a member, and we only have 3 active men in
our branch who lives in Paillaco, and so they can't help me very much.
But i have faith that now that we are getting 3 sister missionaries
here in Paillaco that number will change hahahaha
It´s sad how true
that is. But i am out of time.
I Love you. I look forward to hear from
you again
Monday, April 15, 2013
El Día del cambio de la casa
Ok so today has been training for me to come home and be assigned as
Elder quorum president right away or get married and have to move into
an apartment on the second floor of something hahaha. I knew i was going
to be moving today, so yesterday i went to my new house to make sure
that everything was ready to move in. And the apartment is legit. I
would have no problem living in one just like it when i return to the
States. It´s freaking awesome with wood floors and beautiful walls and awesome
color scheme in my bedroom. It´s legit.
The problem is though, that the person who was building the house for me did not have the time to buy any appliances. So i call Elder Goodman, one of the couple missionaries, and he is in charge of all the living spaces for missionaries, and i tell him this and i ask what he wants me to do. And he sad ¨Just get a truck, and bring the stove you have now, and your refrigerator, and also bring your beds, and well everything else in your house¨ And so that was fun to hear hahahahaha.
So i call a member in my branch to see if i can use his truck, and he said sure, so i was good there. And then i checked the weather forecast for today and it said it was going to be sunny today, so i was happy. This morning i disconnected everything, and unplugged everything. And discovered that i cant disassemble to beds, or any of the dressers, or cupboards that i needed to bring. So i was just going to carry them haha. I then start taking everything outside when i look up in the sky and say outloud ¨Perfect i was hoping that i would get to move in the middle of a rainstorm. I´m not even going to get into how fun that was. Walking through mud and all that fun stuff while carrying stoves and stuff like that hahaha.
To make a long story short eventually i got everything loaded up into a truck and got to my new apartment, and carried the stove and all that fun stuff up to the second floor where i will be living. The only thing i have to do left with the house is arrange everything so it looks all nice haha. (p.s. when i said I was carring the stove and stuff, it was because i was hahaha my companion was taking the blankets and the microwave. NO exaggeration there. I kind of wanted to kill him a couple times. He did help me with the fridge though)
Anyway this past week has been alot like my other ones, how it was been super unexpected and did not take place in Paillaco hahahaha. LAst week i was getting ready for bed and it was almost 11 oclock when my phone goes off. And it´s Elder Balbuena my Zone Leader. And he calls me and says ¨hey Elder Crockett can you take a bus up to Laurel tomorrow. And so of coarse i was down to travel to a different part of Chile. And He told me i was going to be with the other Zone Leader Elder Barker (who i learned is also from Mesa Arizona) And so i was super psyched out for that because i was going to get to talk to someone in English. (p.s. i cant really talk to my companion in English or he gets super distracted and there is no hope of getting him to focus the whole rest of the day).
So Laurel is a town on the outskirts of Valdivía and has a beautiful view of a super long Lake. And also has big gorgeous hills in the distance covered in trees alot like Paillace has. I loved it there. And there is really only one story i want to share from my adventures in Laurel. It was at the end of the day. The streets where flooded, at it was raining hard enough with enough wind that i couldn´t use an umbrella or else it would have been blown away. In fact that happened to ELder Barker haha. And there was one investigator that we were talking about in a meeting that i wanted to swing by. Elder Barker wasn´t expecting them to be home because they are almost always gone but we did anyway. And it turn out that they were home and it was incredible.
There was a partial member family. And there was a 17 year old daughter with a boy friend who was 18 years old who didn´t live there but spent more time there then he did at his own home so they saw him as part of the family. And as i was getting to know the boy i was amazed at how similar his situation is (religiously) as mine was a couple of years ago. As he was expressing his beliefs he said some of the EXACT same things i said like 4 maybe 5 years ago (except in Spanish haha) After talking to him for more than an hour he was committed to read the book of Mormón and go to church, and we even set a baptism date for him. I have never seen someone more willing then him to find out the truth (Maybe Elder Barker is just an awesome missionary hahaha) I´ll have to keep up to date with his progress so i can see how he turn out. If he is as much like me and he comes across to be, i am pretty excited for him.
You know here in Chile i have never had to do harder things in my life. I have never felt so alone at times, i have never felt so much pain in my heart, and i´ve never had to work so hard to see such little results. But i don´t know if i´ve ever been this happy in all my life. And random fact for you i have learned to actually smile on command instead of my cheesy fake smile hahaha Love you all. I look forward to hearing from all of you. P.s. I got your package while i was in Laurel Thank you so much!!! Love you P.P.S I attached some photos they may work. I look alot whiter than i actually am. Apparently i tan super good. I even get the opportunity to laugh at myself every morning when i fool in the mirror when i see my awesome missionary neck tan line hahahaha
The problem is though, that the person who was building the house for me did not have the time to buy any appliances. So i call Elder Goodman, one of the couple missionaries, and he is in charge of all the living spaces for missionaries, and i tell him this and i ask what he wants me to do. And he sad ¨Just get a truck, and bring the stove you have now, and your refrigerator, and also bring your beds, and well everything else in your house¨ And so that was fun to hear hahahahaha.
So i call a member in my branch to see if i can use his truck, and he said sure, so i was good there. And then i checked the weather forecast for today and it said it was going to be sunny today, so i was happy. This morning i disconnected everything, and unplugged everything. And discovered that i cant disassemble to beds, or any of the dressers, or cupboards that i needed to bring. So i was just going to carry them haha. I then start taking everything outside when i look up in the sky and say outloud ¨Perfect i was hoping that i would get to move in the middle of a rainstorm. I´m not even going to get into how fun that was. Walking through mud and all that fun stuff while carrying stoves and stuff like that hahaha.
To make a long story short eventually i got everything loaded up into a truck and got to my new apartment, and carried the stove and all that fun stuff up to the second floor where i will be living. The only thing i have to do left with the house is arrange everything so it looks all nice haha. (p.s. when i said I was carring the stove and stuff, it was because i was hahaha my companion was taking the blankets and the microwave. NO exaggeration there. I kind of wanted to kill him a couple times. He did help me with the fridge though)
Anyway this past week has been alot like my other ones, how it was been super unexpected and did not take place in Paillaco hahahaha. LAst week i was getting ready for bed and it was almost 11 oclock when my phone goes off. And it´s Elder Balbuena my Zone Leader. And he calls me and says ¨hey Elder Crockett can you take a bus up to Laurel tomorrow. And so of coarse i was down to travel to a different part of Chile. And He told me i was going to be with the other Zone Leader Elder Barker (who i learned is also from Mesa Arizona) And so i was super psyched out for that because i was going to get to talk to someone in English. (p.s. i cant really talk to my companion in English or he gets super distracted and there is no hope of getting him to focus the whole rest of the day).
So Laurel is a town on the outskirts of Valdivía and has a beautiful view of a super long Lake. And also has big gorgeous hills in the distance covered in trees alot like Paillace has. I loved it there. And there is really only one story i want to share from my adventures in Laurel. It was at the end of the day. The streets where flooded, at it was raining hard enough with enough wind that i couldn´t use an umbrella or else it would have been blown away. In fact that happened to ELder Barker haha. And there was one investigator that we were talking about in a meeting that i wanted to swing by. Elder Barker wasn´t expecting them to be home because they are almost always gone but we did anyway. And it turn out that they were home and it was incredible.
There was a partial member family. And there was a 17 year old daughter with a boy friend who was 18 years old who didn´t live there but spent more time there then he did at his own home so they saw him as part of the family. And as i was getting to know the boy i was amazed at how similar his situation is (religiously) as mine was a couple of years ago. As he was expressing his beliefs he said some of the EXACT same things i said like 4 maybe 5 years ago (except in Spanish haha) After talking to him for more than an hour he was committed to read the book of Mormón and go to church, and we even set a baptism date for him. I have never seen someone more willing then him to find out the truth (Maybe Elder Barker is just an awesome missionary hahaha) I´ll have to keep up to date with his progress so i can see how he turn out. If he is as much like me and he comes across to be, i am pretty excited for him.
You know here in Chile i have never had to do harder things in my life. I have never felt so alone at times, i have never felt so much pain in my heart, and i´ve never had to work so hard to see such little results. But i don´t know if i´ve ever been this happy in all my life. And random fact for you i have learned to actually smile on command instead of my cheesy fake smile hahaha Love you all. I look forward to hearing from all of you. P.s. I got your package while i was in Laurel Thank you so much!!! Love you P.P.S I attached some photos they may work. I look alot whiter than i actually am. Apparently i tan super good. I even get the opportunity to laugh at myself every morning when i fool in the mirror when i see my awesome missionary neck tan line hahahaha
Monday, April 8, 2013
La Semana Super Seco HAHAHHAHAHAHA Falso fue super mojado
(The super dry week HAHAHAHA false, was super wet) for those gringos like me that have no idea what that said.
Susie! I was riding a bus to a small village up here in Chile when i heard on the radio one of the songs in spanish that you and me would listen to and sing all the time! It made me so happy!!!! I could not stop talking about you to the other missionaries and the people sitting on the bus with me! And i was gong to tell you this even before i knew that you heard a song on the radio that we would sing all the time!
Jocee I love hearing from you! Did you get that letter i sent you yet? I sent you a letter to your address at BYU I and i´m praying that it gets to you before you leave. I sent it my first P day so it´s been about a month so it should be getting to you any time now if it hasn´t yet. P.s. can i have you home address too so i can still write you when your not at school?
Elder Kind. I have not punched someone in the face my entire time here in Chile. And this needs to change hahahaha Just kidding. Send me your Address in Texas so i can start writing you. I have a ton of freaking crazy stuff i want to tell you! Love you brother. You better not die there in Texas, or i am going to kill you hahahahaha
Mom so turns out i´m not allowed to use that website you sent me but i just borrowed a SD thing from a member in the Branch so i can slowly start uploading my pictures.
Ok on to my adventures from this week. SO this week has been the greatest week of my mission so far. And that was before i watched general Conference. So the week started with me deciding that there was a lot of Changes that needed to happen in Paillaco in order for the work to start moving faster. I´ve refrained from saying this in any of my past emails but it has to do with my story this week so i will tell you.
Before i was sent to Paillaco there was a bunch of Dead Missionaries who really hurt the work here. And When i arrived everyone was either leaving the Church, or had become eternal investigators, so they were at the point where they loved meeting with the missionaries but would refuse to let the missionaries teach them anything, just because they were used to the missionaries only being their friend, and not expecting them to take any real steps of progress. And my companion was telling me that he thinks the president sent me here to Paillaco because my greeny fire could possibly save this town.
So with that background info i decided that it was time to visit all of our eternal investigators and i was going to decide which of them we are going to keep meeting with, and which we are going to drop. And this has been something i have been doing pretty much sense i´ve arrived in Paillaco. Dropping investigators, and re activating members. So after weeks of work i got to the point where i had made a decision on all of the people that the missionaries before me were meeting with except for one. And before i went to visit him i was reviewing his teaching records to see that he has been taught for months and months without ever doing anything to change that. And so naturally my first thought was to drop him, and that was the mind set i had going over to his home. And when i met him I felt the spirit super strong I at this point i didn´t know why yet
Well i got to know him and he told me a story of how he was in a motorcycle accident and it put him in a coma for more than a year, and he was telling me this long miraculous story of his motorcycle accident and his recovery. And I was amazed to how similar it was of my motorcycle accident that i was in a couple of years back. And after I got to know him, i don´t think i have ever felt the spirit so strong in my life telling me that i need to help this man, and that i may be the only person who can.
So to make a long story short I have decided that i am going to continue visiting him and i will continue to do so until he starts progressing. Well after i left his home my companion and i were walking home when my phone starts ringing. And It was my district leader. And he said That it was super last minute but it was really important that the first thing in the morning that i come get on a bus to Futrono in the morning to do an inter cambio with him. So we go home and i pack my bags. And the next morning i get on a bus to Futrono.
Now before i continue with my story I want to tell you that Every Single Day I am amazed at how beautiful Chile is. It´s literally humbling how beautiful this country is. But when i have never seen a place as beautiful in my Entire life than Futrono. It has huge green rolling hills thorough out the entire City. Giant Snow peaked mountains surrounding one side of the city, and a huge gorgeous lake surrounding the city on the Other side. It is literally everything i pictured Chile would be like It is incredibly beautiful!
But back to my story i go to the house of my district leader where i leave all my bags that i packed and i get to work with Elder Rojas my District Leader. So when i arrive it is starting to sprinkle lightly. Not enough rain to really worry me though. But I feel like i need to get my water proof stuff out f my bag. and wear it. So i do. And i looked like a fool to all the chileans there haha But When i start teaching my first family there in Futrono i hear the rain start to pick up. And after an hour of teaching it´s time to leave because we need to go to another family. And i get out into the street to discover that it rained so much in that last hour that there was literally water up past my ankles. And it was so cold. So cold.
It was super windy too to make it worse. And Our next appointment was a couple of miles away. So for about a half hour I walked through Futrono with water past my ankles, with wind stronger than i have ever experienced in my life. Even with me wearing my water proof clothing I was super wet, and super cold.. It was probably the most miserable circumstances i have yet to encounter in my life. I cant even get over how cold it was (side note; that night i woke up to discover that some of my clothing was literally frozen. Just so you know haha) But when i finally reached the house of the member i was so grateful for the experience i had there.
His grand child just died at the age 18 years old. And i shared the plan of salvation with him and familyshearch.org and the miracles that come from it (because they really do) And how he could do the ordinances for her so when she is on the other side she can have the chance to accept those ordinances. And it was just a super heart warming experience.
Well due to lack of time i am going to skip forward in my story a couple of days. I return to Paillaco with my companion Elder Larsen, and he was driving me Crazy. And the entire couple hours back to Paillaco i don´t even want to talk to him. Well we get to Paillaco and i say a prayer that i will be able to have more patience for him, and be able to come closer to him. And after i said this prayer he got super sick. Super sick. To the point where he didn´t even want to walk. And i don´t know what happened with me! It´s like a switch turned on that made me care about him hahaha. And i take him home and i go super far out of my way to make sure he is comfortable and warm, and all that fun stuff.
And after he got to bed i spent a couple of hours doing the things i needed to do to make sure all my investigators knew that i wouldn´t be coming by today. And i would share a little message with them over the phone and fun stuff like that. Well it was getting late. And i make this incredible dinner for Elder Larsen that i thought would help him feel better. And then as i was cooking i had the thought ¨Wow i am really nice to people when they are sick hahaha. And then i had the though. I wonder if my future wife is ever going to use this against me if i am acting like an idiot some day hahaha. Shoot I´m out of time. And there was a ton more i wanted to talk about. I love you all and i love hearing from you! I´ll get more pictures coming! Love you!
Susie! I was riding a bus to a small village up here in Chile when i heard on the radio one of the songs in spanish that you and me would listen to and sing all the time! It made me so happy!!!! I could not stop talking about you to the other missionaries and the people sitting on the bus with me! And i was gong to tell you this even before i knew that you heard a song on the radio that we would sing all the time!
Jocee I love hearing from you! Did you get that letter i sent you yet? I sent you a letter to your address at BYU I and i´m praying that it gets to you before you leave. I sent it my first P day so it´s been about a month so it should be getting to you any time now if it hasn´t yet. P.s. can i have you home address too so i can still write you when your not at school?
Elder Kind. I have not punched someone in the face my entire time here in Chile. And this needs to change hahahaha Just kidding. Send me your Address in Texas so i can start writing you. I have a ton of freaking crazy stuff i want to tell you! Love you brother. You better not die there in Texas, or i am going to kill you hahahahaha
Mom so turns out i´m not allowed to use that website you sent me but i just borrowed a SD thing from a member in the Branch so i can slowly start uploading my pictures.
Ok on to my adventures from this week. SO this week has been the greatest week of my mission so far. And that was before i watched general Conference. So the week started with me deciding that there was a lot of Changes that needed to happen in Paillaco in order for the work to start moving faster. I´ve refrained from saying this in any of my past emails but it has to do with my story this week so i will tell you.
Before i was sent to Paillaco there was a bunch of Dead Missionaries who really hurt the work here. And When i arrived everyone was either leaving the Church, or had become eternal investigators, so they were at the point where they loved meeting with the missionaries but would refuse to let the missionaries teach them anything, just because they were used to the missionaries only being their friend, and not expecting them to take any real steps of progress. And my companion was telling me that he thinks the president sent me here to Paillaco because my greeny fire could possibly save this town.
So with that background info i decided that it was time to visit all of our eternal investigators and i was going to decide which of them we are going to keep meeting with, and which we are going to drop. And this has been something i have been doing pretty much sense i´ve arrived in Paillaco. Dropping investigators, and re activating members. So after weeks of work i got to the point where i had made a decision on all of the people that the missionaries before me were meeting with except for one. And before i went to visit him i was reviewing his teaching records to see that he has been taught for months and months without ever doing anything to change that. And so naturally my first thought was to drop him, and that was the mind set i had going over to his home. And when i met him I felt the spirit super strong I at this point i didn´t know why yet
Well i got to know him and he told me a story of how he was in a motorcycle accident and it put him in a coma for more than a year, and he was telling me this long miraculous story of his motorcycle accident and his recovery. And I was amazed to how similar it was of my motorcycle accident that i was in a couple of years back. And after I got to know him, i don´t think i have ever felt the spirit so strong in my life telling me that i need to help this man, and that i may be the only person who can.
So to make a long story short I have decided that i am going to continue visiting him and i will continue to do so until he starts progressing. Well after i left his home my companion and i were walking home when my phone starts ringing. And It was my district leader. And he said That it was super last minute but it was really important that the first thing in the morning that i come get on a bus to Futrono in the morning to do an inter cambio with him. So we go home and i pack my bags. And the next morning i get on a bus to Futrono.
Now before i continue with my story I want to tell you that Every Single Day I am amazed at how beautiful Chile is. It´s literally humbling how beautiful this country is. But when i have never seen a place as beautiful in my Entire life than Futrono. It has huge green rolling hills thorough out the entire City. Giant Snow peaked mountains surrounding one side of the city, and a huge gorgeous lake surrounding the city on the Other side. It is literally everything i pictured Chile would be like It is incredibly beautiful!
But back to my story i go to the house of my district leader where i leave all my bags that i packed and i get to work with Elder Rojas my District Leader. So when i arrive it is starting to sprinkle lightly. Not enough rain to really worry me though. But I feel like i need to get my water proof stuff out f my bag. and wear it. So i do. And i looked like a fool to all the chileans there haha But When i start teaching my first family there in Futrono i hear the rain start to pick up. And after an hour of teaching it´s time to leave because we need to go to another family. And i get out into the street to discover that it rained so much in that last hour that there was literally water up past my ankles. And it was so cold. So cold.
It was super windy too to make it worse. And Our next appointment was a couple of miles away. So for about a half hour I walked through Futrono with water past my ankles, with wind stronger than i have ever experienced in my life. Even with me wearing my water proof clothing I was super wet, and super cold.. It was probably the most miserable circumstances i have yet to encounter in my life. I cant even get over how cold it was (side note; that night i woke up to discover that some of my clothing was literally frozen. Just so you know haha) But when i finally reached the house of the member i was so grateful for the experience i had there.
His grand child just died at the age 18 years old. And i shared the plan of salvation with him and familyshearch.org and the miracles that come from it (because they really do) And how he could do the ordinances for her so when she is on the other side she can have the chance to accept those ordinances. And it was just a super heart warming experience.
Well due to lack of time i am going to skip forward in my story a couple of days. I return to Paillaco with my companion Elder Larsen, and he was driving me Crazy. And the entire couple hours back to Paillaco i don´t even want to talk to him. Well we get to Paillaco and i say a prayer that i will be able to have more patience for him, and be able to come closer to him. And after i said this prayer he got super sick. Super sick. To the point where he didn´t even want to walk. And i don´t know what happened with me! It´s like a switch turned on that made me care about him hahaha. And i take him home and i go super far out of my way to make sure he is comfortable and warm, and all that fun stuff.
And after he got to bed i spent a couple of hours doing the things i needed to do to make sure all my investigators knew that i wouldn´t be coming by today. And i would share a little message with them over the phone and fun stuff like that. Well it was getting late. And i make this incredible dinner for Elder Larsen that i thought would help him feel better. And then as i was cooking i had the thought ¨Wow i am really nice to people when they are sick hahaha. And then i had the though. I wonder if my future wife is ever going to use this against me if i am acting like an idiot some day hahaha. Shoot I´m out of time. And there was a ton more i wanted to talk about. I love you all and i love hearing from you! I´ll get more pictures coming! Love you!
Monday, April 1, 2013
La Semana Santa
Ok to answer some quick questions. Yes you can Email me, but i can only
send one email home a month to someone outside of my family so feel free
to email me anything, but more often then not i´ll just reply using
actual letters, because there is a ton of hoops i have to jump through
to email home. But yes you can email me. My email is Hamilton.Crockett@myldsmail.net
Ok part two of my story from last week. My lesson with the family went late, and i was later than i promised i would be back. Being a man on my word though i return to the police station, to find the officer who let me go outside washing all of the cars, and was now without any of his weapons. And so i go and i talk to him, and we start talking, and he didn´t have much time to read the restoration pamphlet. So at this point he still doesn´t know anything about the church. So we start talking to him some more when another police officer walk outside and seeing us, and just starts yelling! And i could not understand anything he said, but the officer who we were just talking to said something to him and he walked away, he then went inside with him, and asked us to come with him. So we are chillin in the police station when Officer Saul, one who let us go, leaves into a room, and comes back about 15 mins later and is no longer in police clothes, and just tells us hey it´s all good we can go. And then officers to take us out to dinner. Now in normal circumstances we should say no. But who knows how much he went through for us so we said sure. And while we were eating dinner I bring up the pamphlet of the restoration that we gave him. And we bust it out and start to talk about it....
More next week hhahaha
So i totally forgot that yesterday was my birthday. In fact one of the members told me about it (the entire town freakin knows everything about me!, even the people i´ve never talked to prior, who are not even members.) But i was in sunday school teaching the Gospel Doctrines class,and i was teaching about the Life of Christ, when one of the sisters in the ward says Elder ClarkKent (no one here knows how to pronounce Crockett, and they all think i look like superman so a bunch of people call me that) (I knew people said that in America all the time but shoot apparently i look like him here too in Chile) Isn´t today your birthday? I stop my lesson for a second to ask what day it was, and she said the 31st. And then i said Yup. It is. But back to my lesson... And i just got back to teaching. And honestly i forgot about my birthday pretty much the rest of the day. I would say that someone cooked me some awesome Chilean birthday meal, but that would be a lie haha The Sister who is paid to prepare me food is stuff in out of town for the holiday, so in her house she left a bunch of raw food, and a note that told me the directions to cool it. So i still got to eat some legit Chilean food, but i had to cook it haha But i was super excited about it because it was the first time i got to cook for myself here in Chile. And i wish i had the time too cook but i dont haha I get home in time to do my planning and eat a bowl of cereal or a piece of bread and then go to bed. Same thing in the mornings.
On top of my normal super busy scheduled this week has just been crazy for me. I had some degree of a meeting every single day this week except for Saturday, and so my teaching numbers where terrible this week because i had to travel all around Chile. I had to go up to Valdivia like 2 times this week for meetings. Once because i was to take my companion to the hospital (story for another time haha) and buy him medication. And i had to go to Osorno once to talk to the Mission President, and oh my goodness i have4 spent more time on buses this week than i think i have walking because of all the cities i´ve had to travel too. One would think that a missionary who is in his first transfer would have less meeting to go to. And talking to other missionaries from different sectors they have no idea why i have so many meetings it doesn´t even make sense.
But one meeting that i was super excited to have this week was one about dividing the sector so we could have the Sister missionaries come to Paillaco. I had a meeting with the APs earlier that day in Valdivia so i drove with them back to Paillaco where we met up with the branch president and our zone leaders. And i showed them the map of Paillaco, and told them where i think the safest area is for the sister missionaries to live and work in, and then the branch president confirmed what isaid and just said it with more details. And So we where all talking about which areas are safest for the Hermanas to live in, when my zone leader asks my companion Elder Larsen ¨How do you feel about living here (points to the area we will be living) because from what i understand it´s not to safest area, and the little gang activity there is in Paillaco all of it is going to be in the secot you will be working¨Then nonchalantly Elder Larson replies Öh it will be fine! I haven´t been robbed sense Elder Crockett has gotten here. The Chileans just haven´t ever seen anyone as big as him before and so no one wants to mess with us. Even the pastors who would yell at us on a regular basis hide when they see us walking down the down the street. This has been the most tranquil time in my mission that i´ve ever had!¨ And so without a second though they said alright cool you get all the dangerous sectors. Hahahaha
Since then i´ve been working a lot more in the area i´m going to be in and it is just going fantastic. In the past missionaries have kind of avoided being up there and stayed in the south end of the city where it is safer, not that it´s dangerous, my personal opinion is i just think they were lazy, but i´ll rant about that another time. But i have found a couple of people who have clearly have been prepared to receive the gospel. There was one man who came up to me. And when i first saw him he was leaning up against a corner or a building around of bunch of people who generally just ask for me for money. Which until just Today i have literally had None. That´s not even an exaggeration. And we aren´t aloud to give money away anyway, but that's beside the point. But he comes up to me and starts talking to me and the first thing he says is ¨I recognize you as a man of Jesus (makes more sense in spanish) and i want to be like you. He then tells me this story about how his wife and all of his children are all dead. And how mad he was at God for letting something so terrible happen to his family. And one day he was in his front yard praying for help when he saw me (And i totally remember this part it was only like a week ago, because i saw him praying so i decided i was going to go talk to him) and he didn´t want to talk to me so he went inside and hid from us. And i went up to his door and knocked but he wouldn´t answer. So after a couple of mins i walked away. And he told me how he watched me walk away out his window, and how terrible he felt. Because he knew he was praying for help. And then saw me come along, and recognized me as a person who claims to teach about Jesus Christ, but then ran away because he knew i was coming to help him. And how he thought that he blew his chance. But then when he saw me again he knew God hadn´t given up on him.
I wish i had time to keep writing but i already went over my time. Love you all!
Ok part two of my story from last week. My lesson with the family went late, and i was later than i promised i would be back. Being a man on my word though i return to the police station, to find the officer who let me go outside washing all of the cars, and was now without any of his weapons. And so i go and i talk to him, and we start talking, and he didn´t have much time to read the restoration pamphlet. So at this point he still doesn´t know anything about the church. So we start talking to him some more when another police officer walk outside and seeing us, and just starts yelling! And i could not understand anything he said, but the officer who we were just talking to said something to him and he walked away, he then went inside with him, and asked us to come with him. So we are chillin in the police station when Officer Saul, one who let us go, leaves into a room, and comes back about 15 mins later and is no longer in police clothes, and just tells us hey it´s all good we can go. And then officers to take us out to dinner. Now in normal circumstances we should say no. But who knows how much he went through for us so we said sure. And while we were eating dinner I bring up the pamphlet of the restoration that we gave him. And we bust it out and start to talk about it....
More next week hhahaha
So i totally forgot that yesterday was my birthday. In fact one of the members told me about it (the entire town freakin knows everything about me!, even the people i´ve never talked to prior, who are not even members.) But i was in sunday school teaching the Gospel Doctrines class,and i was teaching about the Life of Christ, when one of the sisters in the ward says Elder ClarkKent (no one here knows how to pronounce Crockett, and they all think i look like superman so a bunch of people call me that) (I knew people said that in America all the time but shoot apparently i look like him here too in Chile) Isn´t today your birthday? I stop my lesson for a second to ask what day it was, and she said the 31st. And then i said Yup. It is. But back to my lesson... And i just got back to teaching. And honestly i forgot about my birthday pretty much the rest of the day. I would say that someone cooked me some awesome Chilean birthday meal, but that would be a lie haha The Sister who is paid to prepare me food is stuff in out of town for the holiday, so in her house she left a bunch of raw food, and a note that told me the directions to cool it. So i still got to eat some legit Chilean food, but i had to cook it haha But i was super excited about it because it was the first time i got to cook for myself here in Chile. And i wish i had the time too cook but i dont haha I get home in time to do my planning and eat a bowl of cereal or a piece of bread and then go to bed. Same thing in the mornings.
On top of my normal super busy scheduled this week has just been crazy for me. I had some degree of a meeting every single day this week except for Saturday, and so my teaching numbers where terrible this week because i had to travel all around Chile. I had to go up to Valdivia like 2 times this week for meetings. Once because i was to take my companion to the hospital (story for another time haha) and buy him medication. And i had to go to Osorno once to talk to the Mission President, and oh my goodness i have4 spent more time on buses this week than i think i have walking because of all the cities i´ve had to travel too. One would think that a missionary who is in his first transfer would have less meeting to go to. And talking to other missionaries from different sectors they have no idea why i have so many meetings it doesn´t even make sense.
But one meeting that i was super excited to have this week was one about dividing the sector so we could have the Sister missionaries come to Paillaco. I had a meeting with the APs earlier that day in Valdivia so i drove with them back to Paillaco where we met up with the branch president and our zone leaders. And i showed them the map of Paillaco, and told them where i think the safest area is for the sister missionaries to live and work in, and then the branch president confirmed what isaid and just said it with more details. And So we where all talking about which areas are safest for the Hermanas to live in, when my zone leader asks my companion Elder Larsen ¨How do you feel about living here (points to the area we will be living) because from what i understand it´s not to safest area, and the little gang activity there is in Paillaco all of it is going to be in the secot you will be working¨Then nonchalantly Elder Larson replies Öh it will be fine! I haven´t been robbed sense Elder Crockett has gotten here. The Chileans just haven´t ever seen anyone as big as him before and so no one wants to mess with us. Even the pastors who would yell at us on a regular basis hide when they see us walking down the down the street. This has been the most tranquil time in my mission that i´ve ever had!¨ And so without a second though they said alright cool you get all the dangerous sectors. Hahahaha
Since then i´ve been working a lot more in the area i´m going to be in and it is just going fantastic. In the past missionaries have kind of avoided being up there and stayed in the south end of the city where it is safer, not that it´s dangerous, my personal opinion is i just think they were lazy, but i´ll rant about that another time. But i have found a couple of people who have clearly have been prepared to receive the gospel. There was one man who came up to me. And when i first saw him he was leaning up against a corner or a building around of bunch of people who generally just ask for me for money. Which until just Today i have literally had None. That´s not even an exaggeration. And we aren´t aloud to give money away anyway, but that's beside the point. But he comes up to me and starts talking to me and the first thing he says is ¨I recognize you as a man of Jesus (makes more sense in spanish) and i want to be like you. He then tells me this story about how his wife and all of his children are all dead. And how mad he was at God for letting something so terrible happen to his family. And one day he was in his front yard praying for help when he saw me (And i totally remember this part it was only like a week ago, because i saw him praying so i decided i was going to go talk to him) and he didn´t want to talk to me so he went inside and hid from us. And i went up to his door and knocked but he wouldn´t answer. So after a couple of mins i walked away. And he told me how he watched me walk away out his window, and how terrible he felt. Because he knew he was praying for help. And then saw me come along, and recognized me as a person who claims to teach about Jesus Christ, but then ran away because he knew i was coming to help him. And how he thought that he blew his chance. But then when he saw me again he knew God hadn´t given up on him.
I wish i had time to keep writing but i already went over my time. Love you all!
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