Belen and her nieces:
Daniela's baptism:
Camille with her good friend Kathy:
Marta and Victoria's baptisms:
Sisters in action:
Friday, March 13, 2009
More pics
The winning cake:
Belen and her nieces:
Daniela's baptism:
Camille with her good friend Kathy:
Marta and Victoria's baptisms:
Sisters in action:
Belen and her nieces:
Daniela's baptism:
Camille with her good friend Kathy:
Marta and Victoria's baptisms:
Sisters in action:
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Hola,
Well today is my last day with Hermana Wheatley...lagrima...I am really going to miss her. My new compañera’s name is Hermana Hutchinson. I don’t know very much about her except that she is from New Hampshire (close to Lake Winapasake for those of you who have seen What about Bob), that she is a little bit serious, that she has a beautiful singing voice, and that she speaks spanish very well. I am excited to improve my singing and my spanish. I am also excited because I hear she is a very hard worker and there is much to be done here in Consti! Oh, and she is a vegeterian...I don’t know how she survives here in Chile but I am excited that they will have to start serving us more veggies!
It is so nice to see the fruits of our labor every once in a while! This week we had two different families cry and tell us that our coming to visit them has made their families more united and more peaceful. That was so nice to hear. One of them was the family of Benjamín. We met his mom in a colectivo (a bus-type thing) by some miracle and started to visit them. Benjamín was baptized yesterday and his whole family was crying. Their family has really come together in the last few months that we have been meeting with them.
Well, that is pretty much all of the news of this week! I am going to send some pictures and I hope they actually go through this time! I love you all a lot. I hope that you all remember to count your blessings and reflect on where they come from!
Hermana G
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Hello All!
So I only have one more week with Hermana Wheatley!! Sad!! She is finishing her mission and going home soon: (. It was really great being her compañera...I learned a lot from her and will really miss her.
Well this week was full of interesting stories. To start of, the other day we were eating lunch at the house of a family from the church when I started itching my head a little bit. I have had some skin problems with the change in climate and everything but the woman we ate with insisted that I must have lice (it is very common down here). So that night we went home and began to check our heads. I had lice once as a little girl and actually have a really good memory of what it was like, so I knew what to look for. I checked my hair and had Hermana Wheatley check my hair as well and LUCKILY, no i did not have it. But then as a joke almost, Hermana Wheatley brushed her hair with fine come and what did she discover, but a little bug! So I looked in her head and saw literally hundreds of eggs! We woke up early the next morning to buy shampoo and I have spent every morning and night since pulling out eggs from her head! It is now a lot better and by some miracle I still don’t have lice!
I don’t think I have mentioned this before, but I sink in front of people literally ALL the time down here. Their isn’t very much musical education down here so when they hear a half-trained voice they think it is amazing...lucky me! So I sing at church, baptisms, firesides, conferences, etc. Usually it is in a trio or duet. Crazy, huh?
So I would like to talk a little bit about Gastón. He is a 55 year old Chilean man with a big heart and a lot of personality. He was one of the first people that I met here in Chile and the first person to get baptized in the church (back in January). He used to be an alcoholic but through a lot of prayer and faith COMPLETELY changed his life before the baptism. Well, last Saturday night he went out with some friends and when someone offered him a drink, he decided that just one wouldn’t be bad so he had one. Well one drink is NEVER one drink for an alcoholic. He literally spent 24 hours a day drunk from Sunday until Thursday. People had told us about his relapse, but on Wednesday night we actually encountered him in the streets. It was SO hard for me to see him like that. I tried so hard not to but I actually started crying (which believe or not was my first time crying in the mission). I just had seen such a big change in him that it was too hard for me to see him. He saw my reaction and in a drunken stupor asked me to forgive him and told me he loved me. He tried to hug me but by that point I was no longer sad, I was mad at him. We walked him to his house and left.
So we spent the entire rest of the week praying and fasting for him. We have so much love for him and a TON of faith. On Saturday night we went by his house which was empty. His niece who lives nearby came out to tell us that she had him locked in a room in her house since Thursday and that he could not come out to see us. We were grateful to hear that because we knew that that might be the only way to help him. She said she was planning on letting him out Sunday night. On Sunday morning at church we gathered a bunch of his new friends together and told them about the situation. We decided that we all wanted to be their to support him when he was let out. So gathered at his place at 7. He came out looking very sick (he hasn’t eaten or slept in days). We all hugged him, told him we loved him and were their for him, that relapses are normal but that we were going to do everything we could to help him. We prayed for him and dried for him. When we left he was smiling and very animated to do better. His nephew who is also a new member of the church spent all night with him last night. We have people visiting him almost every day. I have a strong testimony of repentance and I know that people can change their lives know matter how hard they fall. I have a ton of faith that Gastón will fully recover.
So Adri asked me about what we do here on Pdays. Usually on Pdays we just do emails and shopping and relax a little but sometimes we do something fun. The rest of the missionaries live at least 2 hours away but sometimes we travel over there and play games and eat together. Today we decided to go out to the countryside (about 30 minutes away). There are some members of the church who have a home out there by a beautiful river. I will send pictures next week. We went with a group of 20 somethings from Chile and we also invited Gastón. I think it was good for him to take in some fresh country air. It was a lot of fun.
The other day the church had an activity where everyone brought a dessert and we had a contest to see whose was the best. In January Donald had sent me a carrot cake mix with cream cheese frosting for my birthday. I never ended up using it but decided that this was the perfect occaison! We ended up using it to make a 3 layer cake with dulce de leche in between each layer...yum!! And we won 3rd place (out of about 30!). Everyone wants the recipe...haha. Thanks Donald!
Well thanks to everyone for their love and support. Especially the Pali Ward YW! I finally got your letters (woo-hoo!).
Hermana Gamboa
So I only have one more week with Hermana Wheatley!! Sad!! She is finishing her mission and going home soon: (. It was really great being her compañera...I learned a lot from her and will really miss her.
Well this week was full of interesting stories. To start of, the other day we were eating lunch at the house of a family from the church when I started itching my head a little bit. I have had some skin problems with the change in climate and everything but the woman we ate with insisted that I must have lice (it is very common down here). So that night we went home and began to check our heads. I had lice once as a little girl and actually have a really good memory of what it was like, so I knew what to look for. I checked my hair and had Hermana Wheatley check my hair as well and LUCKILY, no i did not have it. But then as a joke almost, Hermana Wheatley brushed her hair with fine come and what did she discover, but a little bug! So I looked in her head and saw literally hundreds of eggs! We woke up early the next morning to buy shampoo and I have spent every morning and night since pulling out eggs from her head! It is now a lot better and by some miracle I still don’t have lice!
I don’t think I have mentioned this before, but I sink in front of people literally ALL the time down here. Their isn’t very much musical education down here so when they hear a half-trained voice they think it is amazing...lucky me! So I sing at church, baptisms, firesides, conferences, etc. Usually it is in a trio or duet. Crazy, huh?
So I would like to talk a little bit about Gastón. He is a 55 year old Chilean man with a big heart and a lot of personality. He was one of the first people that I met here in Chile and the first person to get baptized in the church (back in January). He used to be an alcoholic but through a lot of prayer and faith COMPLETELY changed his life before the baptism. Well, last Saturday night he went out with some friends and when someone offered him a drink, he decided that just one wouldn’t be bad so he had one. Well one drink is NEVER one drink for an alcoholic. He literally spent 24 hours a day drunk from Sunday until Thursday. People had told us about his relapse, but on Wednesday night we actually encountered him in the streets. It was SO hard for me to see him like that. I tried so hard not to but I actually started crying (which believe or not was my first time crying in the mission). I just had seen such a big change in him that it was too hard for me to see him. He saw my reaction and in a drunken stupor asked me to forgive him and told me he loved me. He tried to hug me but by that point I was no longer sad, I was mad at him. We walked him to his house and left.
So we spent the entire rest of the week praying and fasting for him. We have so much love for him and a TON of faith. On Saturday night we went by his house which was empty. His niece who lives nearby came out to tell us that she had him locked in a room in her house since Thursday and that he could not come out to see us. We were grateful to hear that because we knew that that might be the only way to help him. She said she was planning on letting him out Sunday night. On Sunday morning at church we gathered a bunch of his new friends together and told them about the situation. We decided that we all wanted to be their to support him when he was let out. So gathered at his place at 7. He came out looking very sick (he hasn’t eaten or slept in days). We all hugged him, told him we loved him and were their for him, that relapses are normal but that we were going to do everything we could to help him. We prayed for him and dried for him. When we left he was smiling and very animated to do better. His nephew who is also a new member of the church spent all night with him last night. We have people visiting him almost every day. I have a strong testimony of repentance and I know that people can change their lives know matter how hard they fall. I have a ton of faith that Gastón will fully recover.
So Adri asked me about what we do here on Pdays. Usually on Pdays we just do emails and shopping and relax a little but sometimes we do something fun. The rest of the missionaries live at least 2 hours away but sometimes we travel over there and play games and eat together. Today we decided to go out to the countryside (about 30 minutes away). There are some members of the church who have a home out there by a beautiful river. I will send pictures next week. We went with a group of 20 somethings from Chile and we also invited Gastón. I think it was good for him to take in some fresh country air. It was a lot of fun.
The other day the church had an activity where everyone brought a dessert and we had a contest to see whose was the best. In January Donald had sent me a carrot cake mix with cream cheese frosting for my birthday. I never ended up using it but decided that this was the perfect occaison! We ended up using it to make a 3 layer cake with dulce de leche in between each layer...yum!! And we won 3rd place (out of about 30!). Everyone wants the recipe...haha. Thanks Donald!
Well thanks to everyone for their love and support. Especially the Pali Ward YW! I finally got your letters (woo-hoo!).
Hermana Gamboa
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