Semana 4 en Los Arcos

"I will start by answering some of the questions from the letters: Yes they do talk faster in Santiago and a lot of the people are hard to understand but for the most part I can understand what we are talking about in most situations and I am able to respond. My Spanish has been getting better since I pretty much don`t speak English anymore. But yeah the Chilean accent is interesting. I am not sure if I would call it beautiful... haha I think it is actually kind of funny. The way that most people talk here is flaite (fly-tay) which basically means gangster talk / ghetto. Both sectors I have been in are pretty flaite but they are not dangerous, it is just the way the people talk. I am not sure if I have told you, but here they say `po`a lot. It does not mean anything, but people just say it. I don`t know why. For example, if you ask me if I am having a good day, I could say `sì` or I could say `sìpo` and it basically means the same thing, I think the po just adds more emphasis. You can also say no or nopo, basically just through it onto the last word in the sentence and you will sound like a Chilenopo. So that is our Spanish lesson of the day!

"I have not gone to the temple yet but I will sure let you know when I do. I saw only the back of it when we got to Chile in September (the pic of me and Elder Butterfield and President and Sister Jones was taken behind the temple). I have heard that we go once a year usually and also we get to go if one of our converts receives their endowment or gets sealed, so I am hoping I will have that opportunity some day, maybe with the familia Correa.

"About the old buildings there was one we went to in my old sector called estaciòn central (central station) we went there every monday to do email, but I never got a picture there. I think you can see it on wikipedia. We also went to the post office in central station. It is called correos chile. They are pretty much like ours.

"I believe I am actually farther from the ocean now, but we can still see the mountain range through the lovely Chilean smog. I wouldn`t exactly call the sector pretty... I have often thought that Cara would have a heart attack if she were to see the state of the interior design of some of the houses here. We do not do service on pday we usually do service in the morning before we eat lunch. We are very close to the grocery store in our sector, it is called santa isabel. And the members still feed us and do our laundry.

"And yes President does give us hugs when we see him haha. The way of greeting is really cool here, I think. When two men great each other that are friends they first shake hands, hug, then shake hands again. When a man and a woman greet or two women greet they first shake hands then kiss each other on the cheek. Obviously as missionaries it is not the best idea for us to be kissing girls on the cheek, so we just shake the girls' hands haha. So yeah just get used to that idea so you dont get surprised when you come to Chile. A lot of times the women don`t know that we elders don`t give `besitos` (little kisses) on the cheek and they try to do it and we have to take evasive action. haha then we have to awkwardly explain that we dont do that and they always get really embarrassed. good times.

"So this week we had some good things happen! yay! I told you before about the ward mission leader`s mom, right? We started teaching her this week. We taught her all of the first three lessons and now she has a date for a baptism! she came to church for the third time in a row yesterday and her date for her baptism is the 29 of november. She is very receptive and understands very well. She is a very strong christian (which usually makes people not want to listen to us) she used to think that we worshipped joseph smith in place of jesus, but know she understands that we worship the same christ as her and that Joseph Smith was just a man. A prophet, but still a man and we do not worship him. So yes we are excited about that.

"I also believe I told you about the family that we met last week? when all of the families were at their moms house for Sunday dinner? Yesterday we went to the house of one of the families. The dad, Hèctor, is an inactive member who got baptized when he was 13 but stopped going to shurch about 3 years later. I helped his son Ignacio study for an English test on tuesday and he came to the English class on Saturday too. Yesterday we went to their house and taught the plan of salvation and it was pretty much awesome. The only downside is that we can`t teach them again until next Sunday becasue they are so busy during the week. I don`t want to get my hopes up too much because we have a lot of great first lessons and then nothing happens after a lot of the time, but it was just cool to teach a whole family again.

"So that was my week! Thanks for the emails I will try writing letters today since we should have time. Love you all talk to you soon (Christmas is only 1.5 months away! yay christmas!) and tell the Dickens family congrats, tell Nicholas hi and also let me know what happens with the fires. I am glad to hear that everyone is okay."