Way Better

Gunnar
September 16, 2013
Angamos, Chile (Elder Said)

Way Better

So to make a short story from what has happened this week all I have to say is a repeat of something that happened last week. Hamblin is now living with me and it is so much better then it was. So much better! First off Said has chilled out quite a bit and really enjoys chilling with Sunderland and Hamblin, and Hamblin is one of my best friends. It has been a very fun week here in the pension and also just in general.

This Saturday the ward had their 18 of September party and it was really fun. There was an incredible amount of food and it was so good. They had a bunch of classic Chilean games and they had a lot of traditional Chilean dancing. We were there just about all day but it was so much fun and pretty much the entire ward was there so it was a really good day. I ate so much especially on Sunday when we had tacos with a member family. So much food, but soooooooo good. Really good time.

We have been able to find some good investigators but the work is still slow here in Angamos but it is picking up . . . slowly but surely. All of our investigators told us that they will not be able to meet with us at all this week because of the patriotic festivals. Independence day in Chile is a weeklong festival and President today basically told us that if we cannot really work this week that is fine. So it will be an interesting week.

(From what I have seen online Chile literally shuts down for an entire week to have a party. They go all out. Think of a large July 4th party that would go on for a week straight. I hear it is quite something to experience. We will just miss it because as of Monday [23rd] Gunnar will have one year left on his mission; so we will be showing up just as it ends.)

Very interesting about **. One of the missionaries in the mission is Elder Brent Packard and his parents are the mission presidents of that mission. Also on of my good friends, Elder Kyle Vallace, is from New Hampshire and his ward is in that mission as well. Good for him.

(One of Gunnar’s friends had a false start on his mission and had to come home to regroup for a while. Well he was reassigned and just flew out to his new mission this morning)

Not a whole lot to say this week. Just that everything is better than it was last week. WAY Better! I also got an email from my RA from school congratulating me on my decision that he read in my email so that is cool. I should be on for a little bit longer so if you have any questions. I do not know how to yo-yo, going to learn. Still have not gotten any more packages . . .

Love You Guys,

Elder Peters
(Happy again!)

Pictures courtesy of Sister Catron's blog

Tall guy in short country

Saw this picture on another missionary's blog (who is also serving in Chile, but a different region than Gunnar).

It really demonstrates what it is like being a tall Norte in South America.

Can I say that?

Gunnar
September 9, 2013
Angamos, Chile  (Elder Said)

Can I say that?

So there has been something happening here that I have not been telling you about and I feel like it is something we were all expecting to happen eventually. So basically, like I told you a couple weeks ago, the missionaries here in Angamos have given up on missionary work for a while and were not really working at all. I just did not realize how bad it had gotten. A couple weeks ago I walked into a members house for lunch and the other two missionaries were sitting there in street clothes playing FIFA on the members Xbox. My companion joined in on the playing and I had a long talk with him afterward about how we do not do that stuff. I thought that was the end of it. 

Well I hear that the other two have been playing video games with a couple of different members but there was nothing I could say because they always tell me not to be a pain when I tell them anything. So then it gets really bad on August 30th. We get home and there are 3 of the soon-to-be-missionaries in our pension with pizza for my birthday. Although that is not okay (for them to be in our pension) I just kind of brushed it off because it was my birthday, whatever. Well I go to sleep but I go to the bathroom in the night and they are sitting in the pension with the 3 kids playing FIFA on an Xbox in the pension. The next day they played more at another members house. I started to feel really bad because of the absolutely terrible example that this was for the soon-to-be-missionaries. They would not listen to me though, so I had to go to President.

(Okay, Angamos is quite wealthy and thus it is very hard to do missionary work. Pride often comes with temporal success and that will make you unreceptive to hearing a message of the Savior. So you can either continue to work hard with little success or you can just give up and screw around. These other two missionaries chose the latter, and this is particularly bad for Gunnar because as the District Leader he is responsible for them. It seems the straw that broke the back was the terrible example they were setting for a few of the future missionaries in the community. These would be a few of the teenagers getting close to their 18th birthday. Plus it is definitely against the rules to have non-missionaries in your apartment if you can avoid it. Nothing good comes from that.)

We had interviews and then he sent Elder Said and I away and kept the other two there. Four hours later they call us and tell us that both of them got sent home. Turns out that was a lie just to make me feel bad but they told it to other people in the community as well and that they were going home and it was all my fault. So they stayed in the pension for the last week of the transfer, very angry with me, and then they closed Angamos A and took out the other two but are keeping Elder Said and I together. There are a few families in the ward that really do not like me because they loved these terrible missionaries and it is my fault that they got transferred.

(So basically the Mission President waited a week and broke up the problem companionship and closed the area – that means Gunnar’s area and the Sister missionaries areas absorbed it. I am willing to bet that for every person unhappy with Gunnar for turning those two in there will be twice that many happy he did so. And do you want to guess whose respect you would rather have? I am sure that was an awkward week though. It just confirms what I was taught about leadership back when I was a missionary; you are called to be responsible, not popular. And a lot of people shrink away from that standard when they come face to face with it.)

Well to quote dad "The #%$@ really did hit the fan". I am not sure if I can say that, or the other things that I said about the whole story but there it is. The good news is that I am still here and still a DL and not going home and I am also not in trouble at all. So that is good.

(And I think it will show he earned the respect and confidence of a lot of people in the ward and his Mission President. Enough that it will be a boon to him and the work.)

Brazilian BBQ

Saturday was Brazilian Independence day and a couple Brazilian families in the ward invited us to a Brazil party with some really, really good food. Elder Hamblin and his companion, Elder Sunderland, are moving into our pension with us and I am very, very happy about it. This is the last transfer for Elder Hamblin so it will be good to spend this time with him. Hertler finished his mission today. He came by the pension with the assistants at 3 am last night to say goodbye to me so that was cool.

(The longer you serve the more people you know who go home. The same with life too. Hamblin and Sunderland are the missionaries from the office and are great guys; so it should be a fun transfer.)

I did get one package with 3 shirts, the yo-yo, the beef jerky, and the m&ms so thank you for that. I am headed to the office a little bit later to see if any others have gotten here. 

(Gunnar had three packages from us en route when the Chilean Postal Service went on strike. That lasted a month and finally broke up last week, so the mail and packages should start trickling in as they clear their backlog. As they are beginning to enter spring Gunnar requested more shirts, specifically short sleeve ones. So I got five and then split them up over two packages. So he got the one with the three shirts in it – yeah – and now he is waiting the other two shirt package and his birthday package with silly stuff. Plus I know one or two of you out there have sent him a package too.)

So basically what happened from my letter to President about Hermana *** ended up with Sister Dalton thinking that Hermana *** and I are in love with each other. Good . . . oddly enough they kept us both in the same ward. 

(I am guessing she saw that Gunnar was really concerned for her welfare and thought it must be love. He must not explained the part wherein myself and another person on the list insisted he talk to the Mission President about her. I am gathering she must be doing a little better then she was, so in the end it is all good.)

I have decided something : What is the point of being average when you can be awesome? I want to be awesome. I want to play piano well, dance salsa and samba, know how to fight, know how to use guns, play the fiddle, speak a lot of languages, and just be awesome. There is a phrase that has been very prevalent in my mind here lately: It is necessary to get the losers out of your life it you want to live your dream. That has been very prevalent this transfer.

(Gunnar is 20, the verge of being a fully independent adult. Hence his mind has been on his future a lot. Good for him; I wish more 20 somethings would spend a little time thinking about their futures before impulsively just jumping on the latest bandwagon. I related to him about a young man from Austin who seemed to know exactly where he was going from the first time I met him – he was in elementary school. He always seemed driven and undistracted from his goals and he just landed a dream job at Nike here last month. If you pick great goals and stick with them through the good and bad, you can achieve great things.)

Well I should be here for a bit longer so write me back. That really sucks about Moose . . . let me know what happens.

Moose

(Our little guy Moose – Shih Tzu – disappeared last night after 6 pm. Even though we spent half the night looking for him and posted all over social media we had not located him by the time I wrote Gunnar today – or when he had written us. The good news was he turned up on our porch at 3:30 this afternoon naked and stinking to high heaven. So who knows what sort of partying he got up to last night but we are very blessed he made it back home again. So we bought him a new collar and gave him a bath and all is good again.)

P-Day in the hills hiking

 With Elder Storey (his last comp)

Love,
Elder Peters

Short One

Gunnar
September 3, 2013
Angamos, Chile (Elder Said)

Short One

Well this was a very interesting week with a lot of interesting stuff that happened. Basically, I turned twenty, ate a lot of food, climbed up a mountain to receive revelation for the next decade of my life, and am currently writing you from the mission president's computer. The things here in Angamos have taken a turn for the worse lately as far as the missionaries are concerned and I had to tell him, couldn't keep it secret anymore. Don't worry, I am not going home and everything is fine, I just had a few things to talk about.

(When Gunnar arrived in the area the other Elders there really did not like each other and that has been an ongoing problem. Plus he had the Sister missionary demonstrating some anxiety issues last week. So he had to go in and talk with the boss and get some advice. Since he is on the office computer he is unable to spend the time to elaborate, so we will have to stay tuned for next week to get the inside scoop. I think by keeping it a secret he meant he was trying to work it out himself and not get the president involved, mainly because you hate to see someone else get in trouble; especially when they are causing their own problems. But as you get older you realize that “telling” on someone can sometimes be the best thing you can do for them.
Plus climbing a mountain to gain personal insight is good for the soul – everyone should try it sometime.) 
In lighter news, I really enjoyed my birthday, had cake with 2 different families and it was really, really good. I thought that I had broken the camera because I could not get it turn on for 2 days (that is why you did not get any pictures last week) and I seriously thought that it was broken. Fortunately it is not but there will be no pictures this week either due to the fact that I have a very short amount of time to write you.

Well I love you, lots of pictures next week!!

(We have heard that before – we will see.)

Love,
Elder Peters

Zone Conference

Why Gunnar is on a Mission

That was condemning

Gunnar
August 26, 2013
Angamos, Chile (Elder Said)

That was condemning

So the biggest thing that happened this week was our zone conference with Elder Viñas of the Seventy. The Conference started off pretty normal with a few talks from President and Sister Dalton. Then Elder Viñas came to talk about the Atonement. It was really, really cool and I learned a lot of stuff. He talked all about how we can know if we are truly forgiven of our sins and what is required to enter in the celestial kingdom. Then came part 2 of Elder Viñas talk. 

To keep things short, Elder Viñas used the phrase "We need to eradicate the old vision from your minds". Basically what happened is that the majority of the missionaries, especially those that are almost done, are sitting thinking that they have done their entire missions incorrectly.

(Elder Viñas addressed the way missionaries approached the work previously was wrong minded and they needed to realize this. Mission work is not about baptize, baptize, baptize. It is so much more and that was lost over the last few years. It is good to know Gunnar picked up on that early on and consequently he feels pretty good right now, unlike some of the other missionaries.)

But life goes on and the missionaries are finding ways to deal with it. I have other things that I need to deal with. You remember how back when I started my mission you sent me an email telling me about the different types of missionaries that there are i.e. bro, give up, etc. Well I have realized that I am surrounded by Martyrs (Self-righteous types). It is funny, really annoying, but funny. 

(No matter what you do in life you will always meet the Martyr types; they are annoying.)
Just so you know I have pictures of every single room of every single pension I have ever lived in, they are just not on top of my priority list to send to you guys seeing a gmail only lets me send two pictures per email (I do not know why). 

(Every email I tell him to send us more pictures of his apartment and he hardly ever does. So I told him I was done asking since he wasn’t going to do it. We will see if we see any more now.)

Angamos

Also as far as things about Chile in general . . . where he is going every house he goes into will give him food. Lots of it. Unreal amounts of Coke. With every meal, in every house, coke. There is no Mountain Dew but you can find Dr. Pepper and A&W Root Beer in a store called Jumbo. No beef jerky. Average meal-bread, rice, chicken, fried eggs, potatoes, mayonnaise. Yeah, that is about all I can think of right now.

(This is for my friend Kelli, whose son received his mission call to the Chile Concepcion mission last week. So no jerky and he will be drinking real Coke until he bleeds it. Peanut butter is also pretty hard to come by and brown sugar is rare too. No doing the Dew either.)

I only met Hermana ** one time but she seemed cool and all of the elders talk like she is so I do not know. 

(I told Gunnar I like to read all the mission blogs I can find so I get a feel for Chile and his mission – and the people in it too. Well I said I wasn’t sure if this Hermana was wickedly funny or just really grumpy. I am glad to hear it is the former.)

I am trying to set up that online folder so I will not be sending any pictures in this email. Wait an hour or so. 

(Since Gunnar is in the nicest area in the mission I told him to see if he could work with a member to upload his pictures – all his pictures in the mission so far – to an online folder that we could access. That way it would be insurance if his camera or card was ever lost or stolen)

As far as Hermana**, I was not sure how much to trust in the story from Elder ** but she has been acting kind of strange for a while (always asking me about other missionaries, how many baptisms they have, how well they work, that kind of thing), so I dropped President an email expressing concern for her mental health and anxiety level and asked if he could talk to her to see if everything is alright.

(If you recall last week’s letter he mentioned briefly about a Sister Missionary who seemed to have lost it a bit mentally after a dinner appointment. Well, being someone who used to work in the Mental Health business it set off all sorts of Alarm bells. A person in their early twenties under a high stress environment is prime for all sorts of anxiety disorders. Plus another reader of Gunnar’s letter who also has a lot of experience with this topic also had her alarms go off too. So I wrote Gunnar a long letter explaining why we were a little worried and asked him to talk with the Mission President.)

Well I love you and I should be on for a while so if you have anything else I will be here.


Angamos

Elder Peters

Me Importa

Gunnar
August 19, 2013
Angamos, Chile (Elder Said)

Me Importa

So not a lot to say this week. Said and I have been working hard but still are not seeing very many results. We have a number of references that we have to contact this week and we have plans to have members come with us to every single one of the lessons so that should be good. This week we have Zone Conference with Elder Viñas of the Seventy so that should be really cool. President thanked me this week for my great leadership and told me that the results will come, patience is a Christlike attribute. 

(The seventy is a regional leadership position within the church; so a pretty important speaker. Zone conference is when several zones of missionaries get together for training and speakers, like 50-75 missionaries.)

President has told me that he will be taking one of the companionships out of Angamos this transfer but he has not told me which companionship. I talked to Elder Congelton and he told me it is most likely the other elders but it could be the sisters. My sector is basically safe but he said it is not for sure that I am staying. I really hope I stay. I have the opportunity to do something so great here, so awesome, so incredible but it is going to take time and I really hope that he does not take me out before that time comes. Honestly if President were to give me the option of going up as a ZL of staying in Angamos I would choose to stay in Angamos. 

(Elder Congleton was in Tocopilla the same time as Gunnar, and now serves in the Mission Home office. He also served in Angamos at one time. Anyways Gunnar and him are good friends. But if you read what Gunnar is saying it could be the other Elders that are moving, but it also could be the Sisters, but then again it could even be him. Essentially he knows nothing but that never stops anybody from guessing. A ZL would be a leadership position, but I am guessing he doesn’t need to worry about it.) 


In other news Hermana ** is completely stressing out. She is a Sister Training leader, a leadership position. The other day we had an appointment, the six of us in Angamos and Congleton, to visit some of Congleton’s converts and eat completos. We were there for about an hour and a half and Hermana ** was super jittery the whole time. Afterward (I heard this story second hand) she started yelling at her companion about how they did not have time for that, about all of the appointments that they have. Her companion was on the verge of tears asking Hermana ** what she could do to help her. This is when she started running around with her hands in the air and yelling in the street that she felt so disobedient and unworthy to be a missionary. All of this because of an hour and a half dinner appointment.


(Everyone reacts under stress their own way I guess. And we are all allowed a bad day. The general rule for a dinner appointment is an hour, but that is loosely held to – anotherwords it is situational.)


Duct tape is very useful and the knife . . . well you never know. I have never used the rope, but who knows? I really cannot comment on what to bring to Concepcion because it is sooooooooooo much different from Antofagasta. It is a completely different world. I have a good friend in Concepcion right now, Elder Shumway. Also a young man from this ward here in Angamos recently left for there, Elder Villarroel. 


(So these are responses to some specific questions I put forth. When he packed for his mission I threw in some things that I would have liked to have when I was serving 25 years ago. So he is using the roll of duct tape and the multi-tool I included but not the paracord (as we call it in the business, the MacGyver bundle). Also a good friend of mine from my Indiana days; her son just opened his mission call this week for the Chile Concepcion mission so I was asking if anything would be helpful. I was speaking generically and Gunnar did his usual and took it literally. So while there are many similarities between Northern and Central Chile, he was unable to bridge that gap of several hundred miles and notice any of them. So while they are indeed different, thay are a lot more similar than say Antofagasta is to Poland – where her older son is currently serving. That is so Gunnar.)


For my birthday I found a woman that makes the leather scripture cases. They are expensive ($45 a piece) but they are very well done. I also had to buy a new triple combination in Spanish and some underwear online. I also bought myself the electric toothbrush that I wanted. So I kind of got weird here for my birthday but the I really like what I got. 


(We told Gunnar to see if he could find what he wanted for his birthday there as the cost of mailing is expensive, the postal service is unreliable, and they have a mail strike on right now. So he got himself some covers for his scriptures, some underwear, and an electric toothbrush. Who says Mormon 20 year olds don’t know how to party? A triple combination is what we call our other scriptures. We use the Bible like anyone else – Old and New Testaments, but we also have three other books that are usually under the same binding – the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. You can also get them all bound together and it is cleverly referred to as a “Quad” in Mormon parlance. Anyways if anyone wants a copy of any of those books just let me know and you can have one.)




Really scary about Mom, but very happy that everything is alright. 


(Lisa recently found a lump that was biopsied and diagnosed as benign.)


And no my companion does not know how to fight haha. 


(Elder Said is from a city in Brazil that is world renowned for their jujitsu skills; but I guess not Elder Said.)



Love,
Elder Peters