Aug 15 letter

Carebear,
How´s it going? Consti is awesome. We meet for the first time in our substitute-chapel for the next six months. It´s an old school right next to the river. Apparently when the tsunami came in through the river it filled the school with a couple of feet of mud and sand but they cleaned all that out already. And there we are. I gave a surprise talk yesterday (we were in charge of planning the talks this week) and the new converts that we asked to talk didn´t fill up very much time. It was kind of cool to see how far I´ve come. I remember when I was so relieved that I got out of giving a talk before I left for my mission, even though I was still so nervous to give my testimony in front of everyone. Yeah, the Lord really helps us do things we never thought were possible before. I gave a 10 minute talk in Spanish with about 5 minutes prep in front of 130 people. And it made sense. God can really work wonders with us if we let Him. So cool and legit.

Hahaha!!!! Someone here today told me that I will probably lose weight here in Consti because of all the hills. (The Chileans are VERY honest) I just looked at him with a lot of patience and charity (pure love) and said, "Actually I walked more in Conce so I´ll probably get fatter". I always like to have the last word.

My companion is so funny.

The guy that said I will probably lose weight just gave me some cake. Hahaha. I am going to miss Chile so much.

Diego (and I assume Oscar) got confirmed on Sunday!!!! Hooray! Diego came in a suit that he borrowed from his cousin. He looked so cute in his little suit. The sad part is we didn´t make it in time to see his confirmación because we were helping other investigators (Roxana and Charlott) get to church. So we missed the Sacrament (only the 2nd time in all of my mission that I remember). Yeah, but now that we are in the Colegio Polytecnico the room where we have Sacrament Meeting is all glass on one side so everyone can see and they just stare. Not just the little kids but everyone. Super awkward. Good motivation to always get to church early. I think they should install huge glass windows in every chapel.

Everyone here flies kites, but not just any kites. Homemade kites. I am going to try to make a kite today and see what happens.

We have a missionary table in the feria (street fair basically, like the farmer´s market) that we do about once a week. The last time we went I brought my guitar to play to see if it would encourage people to stop and read some of the signs we use with info about the doctrine and everything. It worked more or less. And then a guy tried to give me money and I was just waving my hands like, ¨no! I can´t take your money, man¨. I felt accepting money would be somewhere along the lines of Priestcraft. Awkward thing for a missionary to do. But good to know that in a different time and place if I played in the street someone might have compassion and give me a buck or two. If not for what I sang, to get me to stop. That´s worth something at least.

This Sunday 3 of our investigators are getting baptized! Gladis, a middle-aged woman who works for the city and has a son that is 11 years old. And also Roxana and Charlott, her 8 year old daughter. They are so cute! I am so excited! We have a pool to do the baptisms in but we need to figure out how to use warm water or Gladis said she won´t get baptized because of her health. So pray that we can figure something out please. :)

Well, I hope you are all great. I still haven´t found out which cambio I go home. I know that it´s totally kosher that you come to pick me up and we rtavel for a bit. I´m not sure how much travel is kosher, especially since I´ll still be a missionary till I get back to the states but I know at least 1 week is cool. Maybe more. I´ll try to figure that out so you can know soon. You can see how cool Chile is and meet all these people that I love so much!
 
CUTE!
I love everyone.
Hermana Smith / Sami