WELL, I WANT ALL YOU GUYS TO KNOW THAT I LOVE YOU AND THAT I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY

Riley has been trasferred and it sounds like he is enjoying his new area.

Hopefully I will have pictures up next week. He sent home an SD card that had been corrupted some how and Brett Bruschke is trying to help us out with recovering the photos. I hope....I hope....I hope.....! : ) Here is Riley's letter.

Hola hola hola!!!

Well My first week here in Talcahuano was pretty good. One thing is, it's not nearly as hot as Los Angeles and it's nice and breezy almost all of the time. I think Talcahuano has developed a little since Uncle Gary knew it. Now it's a fairly big city that goes from the top of the penninsula all the way down to Conce. Yes, it does smell really bad and fishy down by the port but my sector is up in the hills so we get plenty of breezes but luckily none of the smell. The hills are a pain sometimes but I actually like it because it's more like home in California and because there our dozens of different gorgeous views of Talcahuano, Concepción, and the ocean all around the sector. It's funny seeing poor rundown places with beautiful hill top ocean views haha.

The living situation is a little complicated at the moment. My companion and I actually just opened the sector Centinela 2 this cambio and there were already four missionaries in the house, so for the moment there are six missionaries in a tiny tiny two room apartment. It's the smallest house I´ve had yet and as of right now there isn't much room but it looks like the missionaries in sector San Vicente found another house so the house should be back to 4 missionaries in a week or so.

The general rule of the missionaries in this sector is that we don't tract too long passed sundown in a lot of the areas because some of them are pretty flaite and a little dangerous past 8:30 or so. But not all of the poblaciones are like that but still we try to have segure citas set for 8:30 and after.

My companion is pretty cool, his name is Élder Sanchez from Nicaragua and he's only been here for two more cambios than me. I actually knew him from my zone in Nueva Tolten when I was in Pitruf but I didn't get to know him all that well because he was quiet and I didn't really speak spanish all that well haha. Now he's not quiet at all. In fact I find it hard to get a word in during contacts and lessons. He´s also a little intense with investigators and contacts sometimes but overall he seems like a good missionary. It always takes a little while to learn the style of your companion and mesh his style of working with yours. We worked hard doing contacts most of the week and are trying to find new investigators. We have some already but a few of them were out of town this week so I will be meeting them this week. Apparently the ones I don't know yet are close to baptism but we will see this next week.

As far as I can tell so far, all the members are very nice and they will actually come out to work with us more than in Galvarino so I´m excited for that. Our ward mission leader served his mission in Los Angeles ,California and he always talks to me about how much he misses Mexican food and In-N-Out. Which always makes me miss it haha but it's all good because the members feed us well here from what I can tell so far.

As far as the Spanish goes, I understand like 95 percent of everything now but I hadn't realized how far that I´ve progressed until this cambio because now we have a brand new gringo in the same house and actually in the same ward as us too. I still got a long way to go but haha man, I´ve come a long way in the past 4 and a half months and I´m excited to improve more with my spanish and my chileno this coming cambio.

Well that's really all I got for this week. This cambio is going to go by fast because most likely it will be my last cambio as junior companion. Maybe I´ll get lucky and get another one as junior but it doesn't look like it so I´m going to kick it into high gear this cambio with the language but especially with the finding and teaching and testifying so I can be ready for whatever comes my way this coming cambio. Well, I want all you guys to know that I love you and that I love being a missionary. Until next week chao!

Su misionero coasteño, Élder Harper :)

SHE THOUGHT GOD HAD BEEN PREPARING HER ALL HER LIFE TO HEAR THIS MESSAGE FROM THE MISSIONARIES

Hola familia y amigos!

Well overall this last week wasn't as good as it could have been but it was a lot better than the last week haha. It's still really tough with the summer and all but we did a lot of working to find new people last week and we could have worked harder but we did find one great family who has a lot of potential. When we did the contact we just talked to the 16 year old daughter and we set an appointment to teach her and her family a couple of days later. She seemed more interested in me being a gringo than in the gospel so we weren't really all excited about it but hey it was an appointment.

When we got there we ended up teaching her and her mom and it was awesome. During the course of the lesson we found out that her 25 year old daughter was murdered by an ex boyfriend a few years ago and left behind two grandchildren that she now takes care of. A lot of the family stopped believing in God but she grew closer to God after the incident and started crying when we taught her how families can be sealed together forever and not just until death do you part like the rest of the churches of the world teach. She told us that she thought God had being preparing her all her life to hear this message from the missionaries. Then some other stuff happened that was awesome but I´ll have to wait until the end of my mission to tell the rest of the story. She doesn't understand everything and has a lot of questions but I´m really excited for that family to progress.

Also Santiago, our Uruguayan, finally came back from Uruguay with his family on Monday. POR FIN!!! He went right back to hanging out with the kids in the ward and he his still hungry to learn and prepare for baptism. He is very humble and what I would consider a golden investigator. We just teach him and he accepts everything like he had known it all along but just had forgotten it. His mom told us she won't let him get baptized until he absolutely knows it's true but he his coming along well and we wants to get baptized on the 19th of Febrero and we plan on asking his mom about the fecha (date) this coming week. So a lot of our investigators that we thought were good have ¨died¨ but now finally the cream is rising to the top and we are separating the wheat from the chaff :)

Santiago (Galvarino)

The only problem is that we got a call from the zone leaders Saturday night and 
I´m leaving Los Ángeles tomorrow morning. Yep I´m getting transfered! Kind of a bummer but if Santiago wants me to baptize him I might be able to get permission to go back to LA for the baptism. So Elder Tapias is going to train a greenie here in Galvarino and I´m bound for the sector Centinela 2 in Talcahuano. Talcahuano is the peninsula part of Concepción and from what I´ve heard my sector is the ¨cerros¨which supposedly is the ghetto part of Talcahuano and even más flayte than my sector right now. Ugh I´m not going to lie I´m kind of sick of flaytes but it is right on the ocean so I will get to see the ocean again :) And I´m not going to let anyone phase me with what they say about where I´m going because I don't even know it yet. The ghetto just means more humble people so I´m excited to work there. I´m sad to leave, especially with Santiago here but President Swenson knows best and so it is time for me to go. Oh and I´m getting another newbie for a companion. He´s only been here 2 or 3 cambios more than me and this is going to be his first cambio as copañero mayor. His name is Élder Sanchez and he's from Nicaragua. He was in my zone in Nueva Tolten and he was very very quiet then but who knows now, maybe he´s changed. Even if not I don't care. I know that we will get along just fine.

Well I´m just about out of time now. I got to go finish mi despedida (saying goodbye) to all my converts and a few others from the ward that I´m going to miss. So until next week I love you all and Chou!

Con cariño, Élder Harper :)

Familia Román (Galvarino)

Hermana Lydia (Galvarino)

WORDS WERE PUT INTO MY MOUTH AND I BORE POWERFUL TESTIMONY TO HIM OF HOW MY MISSION IS BLESSING MY LIFE

Hola familia y amigos!

Well let's see what happened this week. There have been worse weeks but this last one definitely wasn't one of the best. Wednesday we had entrevistas (interviews) with the President and that was good. I got to talk to Sister Swenson and President Swenson and that's always good. Then the zone was capacitated by the zone leaders and the assistants and they came down on us to make good goals for this new year and to kick things up a notch to realize our goals. During the entrevistas President asked me what my goals were short term and long term and he asked me how I was doing on my preparation to become companion mayor (senior comp). We talked for a little bit and he told me that it looks like none of us from my group have to go up yet but that if we don't subir ( umm...go up? Something like that) to comp mayor this cambio then it will for sure be the next one. So that's a sigh of relief but at the same time I still have to kick it into overdrive to be prepared. He also said that it looks like I might stay with E´Tapias in Galvarino for another cambio but he´s not sure yet. Nothing is for sure until the call comes for the cambios Saturday night, so we will see.

The same day as the entrevistas, in the night we did intercambios with the assistants so that was good working with a veteran missionary and learning from him. As far as how my companion and I are getting along, for the most part good, but he is very sensitive and very moody. His animo and moods change really easily and I don't know what to do about it. Like on Saturday, he accidently used the Lord's name in vain (remember he's still a pretty new convert) and then he got all mad and wouldn't talk to me and was desanimo´d for a good few hours after. If we are going to be together another cambio there are a lot of things we need to work on with his mood problems, my sarcasm (he gets offended easily with sarcasm) and just how we work together. We are working well but the summer is killing us and we need to change some things with how we work if we are going to have success this summer. We have a lot of investigators but because of the cosecha (fruit harvest) and vacaciones they are all dying. We found some new good investigators last week and on Thursday we planned to bring 10 to church with us Sunday but when we went to go get them Sunday they were either gone, or no one answered the door and so we had no one with us Sunday. Whenever you have a week with nobody it's quite a blow to the animo but you just got to pick yourself back up, analyze what happened the last week, and go out and work harder the next week to make sure it doesnt happen again.

There are also a few good members and families going innactive right before our eyes and we are trying to get them reanimo´d about the church and we haven't really seen results from our efforts yet but we are working on that. It was really sad, on Saturday we stopped by the house of a strong family who´s 19 year old son was getting ready to go on a mission. When we got to the house it was just him there and after talking for a while we discovered that him and his Dad have been fighting a lot the last few months and that he's been thinking of moving out and using his mission money to pay rent. And he also told us that he had stopped praying and reading the scriptures and was losing his testimony and that he didn't really want to go to church anymore either. We talked for a while and words were put into my mouth and I bore powerful testimony to him of how my mission is blessing my life and how I couldn't imagine where I would be if I hadn't gone out and everyone felt the spirt. He told us that he would start praying again and that he would try to get back on the right track again but sometimes no matter what you do, no matter how much you want to help and testify the person still chooses another path. I just wanted to slap him upside the head and show him how much of a blessing and life changing thing a mission is but I can't force him to open his eyes and see the light. He has to make the decision for himself and so we will keep working with him and see where it goes.

Haha well I think that I´ve rambled enough for this week and even though this week wasn't all that great, I learned a lot about how to connect with people better, how to better use the spirit, and other things as well and I´m going to make sure to use the things that I´ve learned and make this next week better.

Well it sounds like all is well with everyone at home which is always good to hear. Bueno tengo que ir hora entonces hasta que el proximo lunes, les quiero harto y chao!


Con amor, Élder Harper :)

p.s. I´m not in a rush for the movies dont worry, but another request I have for when you do send them is a rubicks cube. A real rubicks cube, like from the brand rubicks cube haha I´ll explain later.

HORSES ARE MADE FOR RIDING AND NOT EATING. I HOPE THAT YOU ALL MADE PLENTY OF GOALS TO GROW CLOSER TO YOUR LORD AND SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST THIS YEAR

Hola querida familia y amigos,

Yay the holidays are over!!!! Haha here in Chile the holidays are so bad for the work. Everyone and their dog leaves for the campo or the rio which is in the campo after Christmas and after New Years. New Years wasn´t too exciting. It was very hard to work and we spent New Year's Eve in a member's house eating dinner and stuff (holidays are the only times they have dinner ever) until 11 and then we went back home. My companion fell asleep promptly at 1130 so we had fun waking him up with the party poppers you sent me at midnight. We also had fun with the glow sticks haha you´ll see what I did with those in the next sd card I send home (yes i finally sent the first one home today).

New years day Los Ángeles was a ghost town until like 6 in the afternoon. Everyone was either inside sleeping off a hangover or at one of the 5 or so rivers or the waterfall somewhat close to the city. So we weren´t able to do too much except divisions with the zone leaders. As far as the work went, this last week was not very eventful at all. Almost all of our investigators (except the Uruguayo who comes home this week) have either ¨died¨ or at least are not going to get baptized this cambio because they´ve taken off for the summer. So this next week we are going to work hard to keep the ones we still have and work hard on finding as well. It's been really tough losing people, especially when you know how much they need what we have to offer them in their lives but what can you do? You feel sad but then you got to brush it off and press on to find those who are ready to listen, learn, progress, change and get baptized.

The mission actually as a whole right now is changing its culture slowly. It used to baptize a ridiculous amount of people but activity wasn´t all that great. Now we are not baptizing nearly as many but retention has gone through the roof. There are a lot of innactives in Chile and so we´ve taken alot of time now that the work has slowed down with investigators in reactivation and I think we are going to see some sucess with that pretty soon.

So anyways, this P-day was pretty fun. My companion and I and the zone leaders went to the Salto de Laja, which is this huge waterfall in this nice forresty area and that was a lot of fun. I tried Charqui, which is jerky of horse meat, and it was not good. Horses are made for riding and not eating I decided and I hope Izzie isn't too disgusted that I tried horse meat, haha sorry Iz! But I got some good pictures, if I have time I´ll try to email you guys a few of them. As far as my spanish is coming, it's coming but I still have a long way to go until fluency. I can say pretty much anything I want to now but a lot of times it's with choppy grammar. But the point is is that I´m getting there. I´m learning a lot of chileno as well haha. Its' kind of funny actually because I know more chilenismos then my companion and he´s been in the mission for 9 months and he's latino. But I guess that's what happens after almost 3 months in a flaite sector of the mission. Now he´s trying to ¨fix¨ my spanish haha. Pero na´ que ver, mi castellano e´ bien po! Tal vez e´ chanta pal resto de mundo pero a los chilenos les gusta, ellos creen que es bacán. Yo soy ma´ chileno que los porrotos ahora les digo. Y ma´ encima hay que embrecer la cultura po! Entonce´ mi compañero e´ medio enfermo del mate si el cree que yo necesito corregir mi español.

Well I´ve got a lot of goals for this new year and they aren´t exactly easy to reach but hey goals aren´t supposed to be easy to reach and I´m excited to get going on them al tiro (right away). I hope that all of you had a great new year and that you all made plenty of goals to grow closer to your lord and savior Jesus Christ this year. Well I got to go pero les quiero muchos, a todos pero especialmente mi familia, y también FELIZ AÑO NUEVO!!! Ya listo, chao!


Con amor, Élder Harper :)

ONE OF THEM DIDN'T LIKE THAT SO MUCH AND AS I PASSED GRABBED MY BACKPACK

¡¡¡HOLA TODOS!!!

Well Christmas is over but it was a good one here in Chile. Very different but good nonetheless. My favorite part though would definitely have to be talking to you guys though. It was awesome hearing the whole family and just hearing your voices and talking to you guys on Christmas day. My favorite Christmas gift by far :) even though I did love and thoroughly enjoy all of the Christmas gifts in my package and thank you very much for them. My companion and I are enjoying our dulces and I've already used the laminated visual aids you've made me a bunch of times. Oh and everyone in the house is jealous of the pijamas haha. Well on the phone it sounded like all of you guys are doing great and that you had a wonderful Christmas.

Christmas - Familia Gutierrez (Galvarino)

Not too much has happened since I talked to you guys on Christmas. The partially raw Turkey decided to bother my stomach for a little longer but now its almost back to normal. It was fun celebrating la noche buena with families in the ward. My family already knows but for everyone else here in Chile they celebrate Christmas at 12 oclock midnight Christmas day. They eat a huge Cena Navideña (christmas dinner) at 12 and then afterwards open all their presents. Then celebrate until like 3 in the morning and then sleep in until like 3 in the afternoon Christmas day. As missionaries we obviously couldnt stay out that long so a family in the ward invited us to cenar at 1030 and we got home by like 12ish which was still late but what can ya do.

Then Christmas day we had a zone activity where we watched a movie and ate, and then after I talked to the fam, and after that we went and visited an hermana viejita in the ward to keep her company and take once because she was alone on Christmas day and feeling sad. But fortunately we were able to cheer her up abit :)

As far as the work goes it's tough and we are loosing good investigators left and right but we still have a few good ones that whent to church yesterday and still want to be baptized. So we didn't get our white Christmas but we have a few baptisms coming up in a few weeks here. Two of them are a brother and sister (Cecilia age 17 and Juan age 15) and they are great. They are now friends with most of the jovenes in the ward and Juan wants to get baptized as soon as he can and even talks about wanting to serve a mission in the future. Cecilia is moving a little slower than her brother but she is progressing as well and I think she'll catch up to her brother pretty soon here. The familia Godoy which was great just got into the fruteria business and now they have to go work in the campo Sunday mornings so its looking like they wont be able to continue to progress which is sad but it happens. We have some other good ones too but none of them came to church yesterday so today and tomorrow my companion and I have to make some rounds to see what happened. Besides that we're just knocking doors and trying to find new people.

This weekend is going to be tough though because el año nuevo is bigger than Christmas is here and there where alot of drunks out on Christmas which means Friday will be terrible. Oh and that brings up another story before I let you all go. So my back pack had a little rip in it before Christmas but it was'nt really that big of a deal. But going back to the house on Christmas day we ran into a group of drunk flaites. They all started asking for money and as usual I ignored them. One of them didnt like that so much and as I passed grabbed my backpack. I kind of just tried to shove him off without angering him further but it turned out unnessary because his friends told him to lay off. All in all the situation wasn't a big deal except that the little punk made the little rip in my back pack alot bigger. Which means I either A. have to give it a try with a needle and thread, B. ask an hermana to help me fix it, or B. Buy a new one. I think the most promising option looks like B. so I'll give it a shot and let you know how it goes haha.

Well that's all I've got today but I hope that all of you guys are having fun up in Arizona with the viejito mañoso and grandma oh and HAPPY ANNIVERSARY GRANDMA AND PAPA!!! Love you all very much and until next week chou y prospero año nuevo!!

con mucho amor, Élder Harper :)

p.s. Una nota para todos que hablan español y leen mis emails. Mi Padre grabó una parte de la conversación que tuvi con ellos en el dia de la navidad y me pidió para dar mi testimonio en español durante la grabación. Pero yo estaba muy emocionado y estaba un poco nervioso también entonces yo quiero advertirles que el castellano en el tesimonio es muy fome. Como bien bien malo y chanta. Y ahora yo tengo vergüenza porque yo creo que el va a poner la grabación en el blog. Entonces perdonen el español y les prometo que en realidad es mejor que el ejemplo en la grabación. Y eso es todo. Ya, listo, chou!

I CAN SEE THEM GETTING WARMER AND HAPPIER AND MORE SMILEY

Hola querida familia y amigos!

Well things are getting pretty close to Christmas and here in Chile you can barely tell the difference haha. Some people have trees and a few decorations but no one really has lights but for the most part not too many people seem all that excited. As far as when I will call home, to be completely honest I'm not sure yet, but I'm going to try to call at around one o'clock Chile time.

As far as the work goes, this last week was both really good and then really disappointing at the same time. We got to teach the family that went to church last week, la familia Godoy, again and they like the church a lot and a few of them already want to get baptized. They are all very different and have different needs as far as teaching goes and spiritually but I think we will be able to baptize all of them for a complete family. The only thing is they didn't come to church this last week but we are going to get a hold of them tomorrow to find out what happened.

We also taught another family, la familia Gonzalez Chavez, and they are a little timid but awesome and 4 of them commited to being baptized and two of them came to church! The other two had to entertain family coming into town for Christmas. We also had a noche de hogar with the family Carrasco and their son's friend Cecilia that we've been teaching and that went very well. She brought her 15 year old brother, Juan, as well and at the end of the lesson they both said that they want to get baptized. But they both couldn't go to church on Sunday because of family coming into town for Christmas.

It's good that all these people want to visit with family at Christmas but they're not getting what Christmas is really about! They need to put their focus on Christ and if they do that, then family comes naturally. But Oh well what can you do. We have a lot of other investigators as well but those were all the ones that have already commited to be baptized and they are all good and very different. We were supposed to have 15 investigators at church on Sunday but we could only get two there so that's why the week was good but didn't end so great. But we aren't too worried because we are going to help our investigators a lot this coming week and we are going to have a lot more next week! So even though it was disappointing, I didn't let it disanimate me too much because we did a lot of good work last week and I know we are going to start to see some fruits real soon here. The people that we do have are growing and changing and I can see them getting warmer and happier and more smiley. They are not quite there yet but we are helping them get there and we are planning what we need to do to continue to guide them in the right direction.

Haha sorry I'm starting to ramble now, well besides working a lot and teaching a lot, it was a pretty normal week. My companion is a little moody and loses animo easily but we are working on that and I'm working on being more dependent. Because when he loses animo it's easy for me to lose it too so we are working on that. No companionship is perfect. And your right Dad, giving the Christmas story from Luke to investigators is awesome because you really can connect it to any gospel principle. I usually just connect it to baptism but it works for everything :)

Oh, one interesting and sad thing that happened this week was that a house burned down pretty close to our house and almost took two others with it. It was really sad just watching the flames devour the thing and that the Bomberos couldn't put it out in time to save it. Luckily they were able to save the other two. The house was in sector O'higgins and they went to the site but nobody was there and the neighbors said that they left. Hopefully that family will be able to take their situation and grow closer and find the true meaning of Christmas now that their material posessions are gone. Haha there I tried to end the sad story on a good note. Oh and we got to watch the Christmas devotional yesterday so that really got everyones spirits up.

Well it sounds like you guys are going to have a very merry Christmas way up north in southern California and that everyone is doing well. I'm really excited to talk to you all in just four days! Bueno les amo! Chou y vamos a hablar en solomente cuatro dias! Tengan una feliz navidad todos!

Con amor, Élder Harper :)

OUR GOAL IS TO HAVE A WHITE CHRISTMAS, DRESSED IN BAPTISMAL CLOTHES : )

Querido familia y amigos,

Que pasa? Well I had just finished a nice long email that took me a good 45 minutes or so to write and when I tried to send it, the internet decided to shut down on me and the email was lost. So now I have like no time left to write but I'll try to give a brief overview of what I wrote in my last email.

Well first off my compañero nuevo de Columbia is pretty cool. He has the highest squeakiest voice I've ever heard come from a male in my entire life, but he's awesome. I thought his voice was going to bug me after a while but now I've gotten used to it. Well this last week was a sanctification week when the president tells us to make 200 contacts rather than the usual goal of 140. We completed the goal with almost all of them long good contacts. I thought that E' Terrazas and I worked hard but now I realize that we could have worked harder.

Last week we left it all out there. We came home every night exhausted and I absolutely loved it. I've learned that if you're ever feeling a little down, discouraged, or disanimo'd or just plain tired that the secret is to just work harder and give it more. The harder you work the better you feel. And you see the blessings from it. We are now teaching a few families and 3 people out of a family of five (all over age 16) came to church with us. The mom and one of the other kids were voting (yesterday was elections) but they plan on all going to church together next week. Also a friend of one of the eighteen year old kids in the ward has been going to church and wants to be baptized. We are going to teach her and her family this next week. We have a lot of other investigators as well but right now I really don't have much more time to write.

But our goal is to have a white Christmas, dressed in baptismal clothes :) and it looks like we might be able to make that goal. Well there was a lot more that I wrote in the other email but I'm now out of time. We have a cita pretty soon here and have to go. But I'm really excited about this cambio and I can already tell its going to be the best most hard working, and hopefully most successful cambio yet. Chile seems pretty sleepy and not too excited about christmas but I'm doing my best to keep the spirit up and to make everyone else feel it as well. Well I love you all and until next week chou!

Con el espiritu de navidad, Élder Harper :)

p.s. I bought a new camera but because of the whole losing the email thing I now have no time to burn a cd of pictures so I'll send them home next week. Oh and if you could put like 120 dollars or so on my card mom that would be good because I'm now out of money hahaha thanks.

p.s.p.s. Thats awesome that you got to be with all the Harpers for Grandpa's birthday. Sounds like it was a fun family bonding experience. Send me a picture from it! Oh and sorry everyone, I dont have any time to email anyone else this week. Stupid chileno internet connection.

I LOVE SEEING FAMILIES BROUGHT TOGETHER THROUGH THIS GLORIOUS GOSPEL

Hola querida familia y queridos amigos!

Well this last week was both good and bad, weird and awesome. A lot happened and at the same time not that much. You know, just the missionary usual. The whole house was recovering from being sick so things seemed lethargic at times but despite all that, we did a lot of work and had a lot going on.

 On Thursday we had to go to the centro to the government office to work on my visa so that took a little while, plus, Thursday is weekly planning day. On Friday, Marcos and Marcela got married in the church!!! Por fin!!! (finally!!!). After the ceremony, which was performed by the state, (churches can't marry under the law here) we had a small humble little voda (wedding reception) with Marcela's grandma, Marcela's two little munchkin kids, and the whole zone. It was a lot of fun and was awesome to see them finally get married! Nelson was also there at the voda. We've been worried about him because he moved and we haven't been able to see him, but he's doing just fine. He's halfway through Alma in the Book of Mormón and his countenance has just gotten brighter, its awesome :).

Saturday was Marcela's baptism! Élder Terrazas baptized her and I ended up giving the talk because the hermana who was supposed to didn't go. Hey, but that's Chile for you haha. It went great and was very spiritual. She was so happy to finally get baptized. Now she has her sights sent on bringing her family to the temple. I felt the spirit very strong on Sunday watching her take the sacrament for the first time sitting with her husband and her kids. 

I love seeing families brought together through this glorious gospel.

In other news, now that all our golden investigators are baptized, we just have a few very slow progressing investigators and like 2 good contacts that we need to visit next week. In other words, no one. Finding didn't really go too well last week because we were busy, but next week we plan on hitting the streets hard for contacts and hitting members hard for references. We have one good reference, which is a family of seven that sounds like they are interested so hopefully that will go good. I really want a family this next cambio.

Speaking of cambios, we got ours on Saturday. I'm staying in Galvarino but my companion, who has only been senior companion for this last cambio and the one before it, is going to be a branch president in a little pueblo 2 hours south for the next six months. He's kind of freaking out because he hates leadership positions but I know that he'll do just fine. Im getting a Columbiano companion named Élder Tapias, who in the words of Élder Terrazas, "El es mas fleto que yo elder harper" a.k.a he's even more feminine than Terrazas but as long as he's a hard worker I couldn't care less. I've heard he's baptized a lot but that this is going to be his first cambio as senior companion. I'm a little nervous to lead the sector for the first week or so as my campanion learns it but I'll just have to step up and do it. I am excited to have another latino companion so my spanish will keep improving. The Argentino is also leaving the house to become a zone leader and is being replaced by a latino so now no one else besides Kamalu and I will be able to speak english in the house.

Well as all change is, I'm excited and nervous for this cambio but I have plans (like always) to work even harder, find ways to waste less time, and be less timid and akward with contacts (that one is a work in progress). Well friends and family it's time to say good bye but I love you guys and enjoy your Christmas season while I'm roasting here in Los Ángeles, which unfortunately lacks Christmas spirit as of right now. But that's ok, Iĺl make my own Christmas spirit! chao chau (still dont know exactly how its spelled)

Su misionero en la tierra de la navidad con calor,
Élder Harper :)

Baylor the Sailor,

Well good job with cross country you little stud. You now go kick so major butt in lacrosse!!!!!!!!! ....yeah that's all I got this week... Love ya chao!

Élder Harper :)

I AM ASHAMED! I FORGOT ABOUT THANKSGIVING!

Querido familia y amigos,

I am ashamed! I forgot about Thanksgiving! It doesn't exist here so it just came and went and I woke up Friday morning and realized I missed it. In fact, I can't even remember what I did on Thursday jajaja. It was just another day. In fact, until Sunday, this week was pretty uneventful. I got sick again thanks to The Argentino Élder Rodriguez. He got here sick and then he infected my companion and when your companion gets sick, well, it's only a matter of time after that untill it's your turn. And I ate some bad pasta so that added to it for a day or two but after how sick I was last cambio this wasn't a big deal. It was just kind of a groggy week. Even though we were both sick we still went out and worked. I just cant remember too much of what we did haha.

The search for the family still goes on. We found a good one and taught a great lesson with them but they are never at home during the week so we can only visit them on the weekends. And as the missionaries here in Chile say, "Tiemp mata el investigador" (time kills the investigator) So we will have to wait and see on that one. 


The highlight of the week was definitely Victor´s baptism. In case you don't remember, Victor was the old stubborn guy now turned soft by the gospel. His testimony is great and he really loves the church and the service went perfectly as planned (which rarely happens here). It started on time, everything went smoothly, and the spirit was felt strongly. We had a good turn out and a friend of his from the ward baptized him. Oh, and Nelson was confirmed last week and is doing better then ever, and now that he has the gift of the holy spirit, I know that he is going to continue to grow :).

Some other news is that we finally got Marcela and Marcos to set a marriage date. They are getting married under the law on Friday and then after wards we are having a little reception in the church with the whole zone. They want only missionaries at the party for some reason so that will be good. Then the next day on Saturday we are going to baptize Marcela. She is so ready and excited to be baptized. I cant wait :).

We also did some good reactivation work last week. We got two families who hadn't been to church in years to come to both church on Sunday and the baptism. So hopefully they will stick. As far as the spanish is coming, I have my good days and my bad like always. Im starting to dream more in spanish (don't get too excited. it's still very broken) but I´m learning to have patience. It's kind of funny because your never satisfied with it. The more you learn and the better you get, the more you realize how terrible you really are and how much you have to go. But hey, I'm still improving and that's all that matters.

Well, we didn't work as hard as we could have last week because both me and my companion were pretty sick but we are both recovering now so this next week will be a lot better. Plus, we have another baptism this next week :).

Well, it sounds like you guys all had a fun time down at the river. It's funny that it's cold there cuz it's really starting to get hot here in Los Ángeles. I'll be wearing short sleeves and eating asado (barbecue) on Christmas haha. That's too bad about Zach, but that sounds like usual Zach and Blake logic to me, going out without the proper gear and such. Poor Zachy, what are we going to do with you? But hey Zach, at least when people asked you what happened, it sounds cool to say that you did it dirt biking.

About the camera Mom, I can buy I decent one here for about 60 or 70 luca (like 120 or 130 dollars) so I think that I'm going to do that. And yeah, I´ll start doing the cds with the pictures. Well that's all I got for this week but I love you all and enjoy getting ready for the Navidad. Hasta el siguiente lunes chao!

con amor, Élder Harper :)

The Baymeister,

Wad up my brotha from the same motha? It sounds like you guys had a pretty sweet Thanksgiving. Meanwhile I completely forgot about it. But in my defense it doesn't exist here and I was sick. Here I´ve learned not to let the old chilenos know that your sick when you're in their house. Porque cuando tu les decis que estai enfermo, ellos ponen cualquier porqueria plantas en un vaso y te obligan para tomarlo.

Translation they throw a bunch of weird smelling plants that they got who knows where into a cup, pour hot water in it, and make you drink it. Surprisingly though sometimes it does make you feel better, or worse, it depends hahaha. Well I got to go man but take care y porfavor portaté bien. a.k.a dont get into too much trouble. Well until next pday chao.

tu hermano mayor, Élder Harper :)

THE SPIRIT AND SIMPLE TRUTH ARE A LOT MORE POWERFUL THAN ANY AMOUNT OF ELOQUENT SPEECH

Hola de nuevo de su chilenito favorito!

Well.. this last week was both very good and pretty bad all at the same time. A lot happened which means this letter will probably be somewhat unorganized and a little bit of rambling but you´ll just have to deal with it haha. First off, we had entrevistas (interviews) yesterday so President told us to have our P-day on Tuesday instead. Thus, that is why you did not receive my email yesterday.

Moving on, I will start with the bad. First of all, when I went to do the things that you asked me to do last week I found that my camera was broken!!!! AHHH!!!!!! It's weird, the screen and everything still works. Everything works except the lens! It's not cracked or anything but the screen just shows up black and when i take a picture it just turns out black. Second of all, the memory kick freezes up sometimes but luckily there is a reset button for that. But last time I reset it, it erased all of my photos!!!! and now it won't read my sd card to upload all the photos I have on it. And when it does read it, it comes up blank even though it's not. Don't worry, I checked on someone else's camera. Yeah so that's that. Sad, but what can you do? So anyways, I did not send the sd card home yet because I'm going to try to figure out what to do about this whole situation.

That was the worst of last week. Satan is also working very hard with our progressing investigators, but fortunately the spirit and us are working harder. One thing that happened that I won't go into too much detail with, is we got led into a trap, into a "discussion" with three medio loco and thirsty-for-blood seventh day adventists. One of which is there pastor who has like hundreds of scriptures memorized of which he manipulates to his cause. What happened was our investigator Nelson´s dad is a seventh day adventist and he put doubts into his head so Nelson's dad wanted to meet with his son and with us. Which was fine. But a half an hour into our meeting, in walks the whole crew and they just started monolouging basically and wouldn't even let us talk. My companion was very timid with them so I was basically left to defend by myself. Fortunately for us, the spirit and simple truth are a lot more powerful thAn any amount of eloquent speech, an arsenal of scripture and quite frankly, just a bunch of smoke and mirrors.

Which leads us too the good news. We were able to resolve his doubts and we baptized Nelson on Sunday. Yayyy!!!!! My first baptism :). His testimony isn't very strong yet but it's stronger than he thinks. He is almost half way done with the Book of Mormon and I know his testimony is going to continue to grow rapidly. It was awesome to see his journey from just leaving a punk nazi life just a few months ago to a now spiritual and rapidly growing faithful member of the church.

I was nervous to do the ordinance but I managed through it without having to redo it and the spirit was very strong. The feeling afterwards is very humbling when they are thanking you from the bottom of their heart and you feel like you didn't really do anything except point them in the right direction. Because I mean the spirit converted him, not me. But anyways, we have another baptism next week (Victor) and maybe two if we can help Marcela and Marcos through the trials that are being thrown at them right now. We have some more for next cambio too when the twins get back from Uruguay.

Since things are moving along with our investigators with fechas, we have to really improve our finding efforts. We have a few good investigators that we just need to start getting to progress faster and we have a lot more work to do with the members. Street contacts are great but references from members and uniting part member families is so much more fruitful. So we have a lot of work to do here in the next couple of weeks. It's really hard to keep up with it all but I wouldnt have it any other way :).

Oh, and thank you very very much for the ridiculously generous Christmas packages grandma and papa and mom and dad. My companion and roommates are very jealous and in disbelief on basically how awesome you guys are hahah. Don't worry Mom, I´m following all of the rules and directions and am resisting the temptation to cheat haha. But sorry grandma and papa and family I'm not waiting to eat the food :D.

Well last week was very eventful but for now I think that that's a rap on the email. As always I love you lots and enjoy your Thanksgiving for me because it doesn't exist here in Chile jaja. But I'll survive and I'll eat even more than usual in honor of it (if that's even possible) Bueno, chao todos! Les quiero mucho! portase bien y haz lo justo como siempre. O a menos epero que es como siempre :)


Su favorito flaquito en el campo chilenito, Élder Harper :)

IT WAS CRAZY HOW MUCH MORE I COULD UNDERSTAND AND SPEAK THAN NORMAL...

muchas holas mi querida familia y amigos!

Well, this last week flew by. It seems like I was just writing home yesterday. But don't worry, I still have plenty to write :). Let's see here.... what happened this week...? We did divisiones y intercambios a lot (splits and divisions with the priesthood in our ward and other missionaries). Tuesday I went to work in the pueblo Laja, an hour away, with mi hermano Élder Moreno. He's my hermano because he was trained by Élder De Leon as well. So it was good working in a different area and seeing another missionary's style. We ran into a Pastor Evangelico that day and I pretty much had to drag Élder Moreno away from that contact because I hate bible bashing, even when you make your point, it gets you absolutely nowhere because bible bashers are too stubborn and hard to see change.

Wednesday we did divisiones with the Presbiteros (priests) of the ward and I went with one of them by myself to teach a lesson to Nelson, who´s baptismal date is this next Sunday. I was really nervous to go by myself to teach a lesson. Unfortunately, the kid didn't help me out at all during the lesson, but fortunately the gift of tounges is real, jaja. My spanish was still a little rough but I was able to teach the lesson by myself and answer/resolve all of Nelson´s questions and doubts. It was crazy how much more I could understand and speak than normal, and then a few hours later, after the appointment, my spanish was back to normal.

Heavenly father gives us the words we need when we need them, then after that, we are back to normal. But experiences like those are very spiritual and testimony building. I mean, I wasn't speaking fluently but I know that I definitely received help. I still need to work on being confident and having more faith. I´m fine with talking during lessons and putting my bit in during contacts but when it comes to starting my own contacts and talking to everyone in the calle (street), I´m still pretty timid. So one of my goals is to break that this cambio. It's crazy that this cambio is half way over but I still got three weeks and hopefully another cambio here with Élder Terrazas. He´s a great guy and I enjoy being his companion. Of course he gets on my nerves every now and then but overall we get along well.

Another really cool experience we had this week was from a reference that E´Rodriquez y Kamalu gave us. References usually aren't very good so we didn't exactly have high hopes. It turned out that we were wrong. The reference was an innactive member from Uruguay whose really buena onda but is a chain smoker and doesn't want to go back to church. But, her twin 13 year old boys were stoked to hear about the gospel and asked us to take them to church with us on Sunday. They asked us!! They loved church and made instant friends with a few members of the deacons quorum and they both want to get baptized. But unfortunately, they leave on the 23rd for Uruguay and they don't get back until the beginning of January so we won't be able to baptize them this cambio. Hopefully though, we will both still be here next cambio and will be able to baptize them then. They are both pure gold. We didn't have to do anything, just find them. After church they thanked us for bringing them and for showing them the church. It was awesome and very spiritual; you can just feel the spirit radiating from them. It's too bad they have to leave. But igual, I´m sure I´ll still be here when they get back :).

In other news about the work, we are baptizing Nelson next week. Then viejito Victor the week after and hopefully Marcella the week after that. And Alex baptized Keka in Pitrufquén last week. So it's going well but we are making goals to work harder and do better. We are praying to find a family so we will be looking hard for one this next week.

Well, there's probably more to say but I really can´t think of anything more. The days and weeks start to blend together after a while. As far as Spanish goes, I have my good days and bad days. Sometimes I feel like I can decently hold a conversation and other times it feels like I can't understand or speak a word. Im still rough on myself about it but I´m working on having more confidence and faith and I know my Heavenly Father is helping me out with that as well. Well before I go, don't worry Mom, I´ll do everything you asked me to do and send it all in the mail next P-day :). Well as always, I love you all and am eternally gratefull for your love and support. I couldn't ask for a better family. Until next week CHAU!

Con amor, Élder Harper :)

p.s. Elder Terrazas manda salud y holas para ustedes

p.s.p.s. yo se ahora que Ecco es mucho mejor que Coronado Bro. Baker. Yo he visto la luz que es Ecco. Y también muchas gracias por su emails que usted me envio de animo. Estoy agradecido su animo y fe en mi, entonces le mando gracias. Oh también portase bien! Chau :)

MAN, IT'S CRAZY WHAT WE 19 AND 20 YEAR OLD MISSIONARIES HAVE TO DO SOMETIMES....

Hola querida familia y amigos!

Well, things have been going pretty well here in Los Ángeles. Parts of last week were kind of weird but as always I have plans for what I´m going to change next week. Let's see here... first off, I will start by answering questions.

No, we don't have a mamita but as far as lunch appointments go here, the members almost fight over who gets to feed us. All of the members invite us to eat with them and we have to turn down offers all of the time. We are only allowed to make appointments for lunch in our mission. We are on our own for breakfast and once (dinner). And we have a mamita for laundry but she doesn't iron our stuff. From what I´ve seen, irons dont exist in Chile haha. Oh, and we are out of the house working for 8 hours a day.

My companion and I are getting along just great. He has a bunch of weird quirks about him and some things about the way he operates as a missionary don't make too much sense, but overall we get along great and he is a good missionary from what I can tell. He is great with people and is very good at gaining the trust of investigators which is very important. Communication is definitely still a problem sometimes when he has to take 5 or so minutes to explain something, but overall I think it's getting easier to converse with him.

I can understand most of what he says and even though I usually can't say everything I want to say to him in the right way, I can usually get my point accross to him. My grammar is still terribly painful but he says that I´ve already improved a lot since I´ve gotten here and that I need to give myself more credit and have more faith in myself. He always chastises me for my lack of confidence and faith in myself when it comes to the language. I think that he's right and that I'm still being a little too hard on myself. It's just hard to see your own progress sometimes. But I´m working on being more bold and confident. I just wish the chilenos didnt talk so fast. I can understand some of them but then there are just some who speak way flaite or just stereo type poster child chileno. It's kind of funny because a lot of times if I don't understand a question or something that someone says, I can turn to my companion and he basically says the same exact thing they said and I can understand it. He translates from chileno into spanish for me hahaha.

Anyways, for most of last week I just let my companion do most of the contacts and most of the teaching because of my lack of confidence, but the last few days he's forced me to do a lot more of the teaching and the conversing and it's helping me to just start talking without fear of making mistakes and overthinking what I´m going to say and how I´m going to say it. I've started to notice that when I just start talking and conversing without thinking so much on the language and how I'm going to say things, is when I speak the best and understand the most. Oh, and by the way mom, sometimes parts of my dreams are in spanish but it's really broken spanish and I can never remember what was said.

Anyways, the work still isn´t going how we would like it to, but it's starting to pick up a lot and we are starting to see little miracles happen in the lives of our investigators. Right now we have 3 firm fechas (baptismal dates) and are working hard to start setting more. One of them is this old stubborn 70 year old man who has a shoe repair shop, and until recently, refused to let us teach him becuase we are just "children" and thought that he didn't need baptism. He went to church every week but wouldn't really let us teach him. Then, out of the blue, when we stopped by his shop last week, he told us that he wanted us to teach him and after that he said that he wants to get baptized.

The other, Marcela, is the "wife"(they are getting married in two weeks because she really wants to get baptized) of a just until recently, innactive member, Marcos. We weren't sure about Marcela until yesterday when during church, there was some drama and it's a long story, but we ended up helping them solve some marital problems and resolved all of her doubts about the church and her worthiness to be baptized. Hahaha it's too long of a story to say but man, it's crazy what we 19 and 20 year old missionaries have to do sometimes. I´ll tell you it wouldn't be possible without the help of the Lord.

The last fecha is a friend of Marcos who until yesterday we had only talked to for 15 or so minutes and gave him a Book of Mormon. Then out of nowhere. yesterday he shows up to church and after church said that after only reading like 2 chapters of the Book of Mormon he knows that it's true and he wants to get baptized. Yesterday was crazy but awesome, I felt the spirit really strong the whole day and for some reason my spanish was pretty dang good yesterday. It's gone back to being blah now jajaja. I guess the Lord just needed me to speak better yesterday.

As far as the area goes, we are safe. In some of the seedier parts of town and at night the flaites will yell things at us but I´ve learned that if you show them you're not scared of them then they leave you alone. They just like giving the mormons a hard time, mostly because they think all mormons and all gringos are rich. But anyways, when the yell at us, I just yell something in English back, doesn't matter what, just anything, and they´ll laugh and let us be. But igual (even still) we stay away from some of the neighborhoods after dark.

Oh, and some random things that I've noticed that are different here then from Pitruf are the majority of people, even the old ones, have teeth and despite it being one of the more "ghetto" sectors of LA, overall, the people here are wealthier than the people of Pitrufquén. Well I think that I´ve done enough rambling for this week. As always, I´m doing good and enjoying my time here. It's not easy and it is very draining work sometimes but I wouldn't have it any other way. I see where I am now and I can envision the missionary that I want to be and it seems impossibly far off sometimes but I´m determined to get there. Sometimes I feel a little discouraged or lazy but whenever I get those feelings, I try to shake them as soon as possible. It´s not possible to be perfect but you know we have to try like it is. I love you guys very much and I will talk to you next week!

Con amor, Élder Harper :)

I STOOD MY GROUND AND STARTED THROWING KICKS LEFT AND RIGHT

Querido familia y amigos,

Hola from the city of Angels! Well a lot has happened from the last email but at the same time it was kind of a sleepy first week here in Galvarino Los Ángeles. For starters, last Tuesday for transfers it was a 4 hour bus ride from Pitrufquén to Los Angeles. Élder De Leon rode with me the whole way because he was heading up to Concepción to leave. We had to switch buses in Temuco to go to Los Ángeles and like 5 of the youth from the rama in Pitruf where waiting there to despedirse (say good bye). I didn´t realize that they liked us so much, they were all very sad to see us go.

Anyways when I got to LA (faster to write LA) my companion, Élder Terrazas, was there to meet me and we went straight to the house to drop our stuff off and then to lunch. Oh, and no he doesn´t speak any English so this last week has been quite the adventure. First off though, we live in a nice cozy little house with another sector, Via O´higgins, and my buddy Élder Kamalu from the MTC is in that sector! So it's cool being in the same house with him but at the same time it's a big blow for my spanish self esteem. He was a stud with spanish in the MTC and his trainer was latino so he speaks really well and understands almost everything. And Élder Vincent is in my zone too and he is speaking like a gringo who´s been here for over a year so I´m just trying my best not to compare myself with them or else I´ll go crazy! hahaha.

Castillano is still rough but I think that I´m still being too hard on myself. My companion says that I´ve already improved a lot since I´ve gotten here and all the families in the barrio (ward, yes we have a ward here) say that I speak well and understand a lot for having so little time here. I guess I can kind of see the improvement. It's just painfully slow. But once again I think that I just need to worry less and have more faith. I know that I'll get it and know I don't need to worry about not speaking it enough now because I don't have a choice haha. My companion is a good guy, his high voice and feminine mannerisms get on my nerves every so often but we get along great. His style of contacting and teaching isn´t as effective as Élder DeLeon´s (I'm starting to appreciate how much deleon really taught me now) but he works a little harder then deleon did and walks faster. And well you can't have a perfect companion and I´m glad I got Elder Terrazas. He´s a good missionarry and a good guy.

Well the work here in Galvarino is a little slow, kind of like it was in Pitrufquén. We only have three good investigators right now and 2 of them need to get married before they are baptized. They are living with their boyfriends of like 7 yrs with kids and everything. You see that a lot here. I´m not too worried about the work though, we are working hard and I have a good feeling that we are going to baptize at least a few this cambio :) So Los Ángeles isnt nearly as big or dangerous as the L.A. back home but if it was, our sector of Galvarino is like the Compton or Inglewood of the LA back home hahaha. There is lots of grafiti and flaites everywhere. The flaites have like their own language here, they talk faster then normal chilenos and use so many of their own words that the older people here can´t even understand them haha.

But don´t worry about me, I´m safe. There are a few neighborhoods we steer clear from at night but my companion is kind of a wuss and thinks every neighborhood is peligroso(dangerous). At night, sometimes when we walk through really flaite parts of town, he tells me to put my hood up and not talk because he thinks that they like to bug gringos but I think his high voice and mannerisms would attract more flaites looking for trouble than my gringo accent. Besides, all the ones I´ve met seem to like me. I just use some of their phrases, give them the flaite handshake, and say that I´m a Colo Colo fan (their favorite soccer team whose name is grafitied everywhere) and they love me. Heck, all I have to say is "yo soy de colo" or "vive colo" and not only do they not bother me, but it's a conversation starter that seguays into a discussion about the gospel.
To answer some questions, they don't do dia del muertos here. They do Halloween but it's an extremely weak weak copy of the Halloween back in the states. It's not nearly as cool here. And don't worry, I´ll send my card home this week. Well, I never thought I´d say this, but I kind of miss Pitrufquén. I didn't fully appreciate all the friends I made there and the strength of the one group of jovenes there until now. We got so many references from them it was insane. But I know it was time to leave and Galvarino is starting to grow on me more and more each day. I just need a little more time to get used to the new sector. But I already like this sector a lot (it's huge so we walk a lot) and I´m excited to work here for the next month and a half or six months. However long they want to keep me here.

Oh, before I go, I have a few funny stories. A couple of days ago we were on a bus traveling to this neighborhood on the far edge of the city and our sector, when all of the sudden my companion got up and starting passing out pass alongs to the entire bus. When he was done he walked to the front of the bus to face everybody and basically started preaching and inviting everyone to church. Hahaha it was awesome!, just like the old soap box days 200 years ago. When we got off the bus I asked him if that was normal and why he did it and he said that he never does stuff like that and he just felt like he needed to. So who knows? Maybe we will get a baptism out of it haha.

Oh, and I had my second dog attack, another big awnry sucker except this time I stood my ground and started throwing kicks left and right. When his dog buddy saw that I was fighting back he joined in with snarls and lunges at my legs. Finally, after one of my kicks grazed the dog's head, they decided they had had enough and ran off. So hah! take that mañoso(uhh..i dont no.. awnry maybe) mutts!

The last story. I lost my last plaque so I now have to go plaqueless until I can order a new one. It was very sad.. I feel naked now hahaha...yeah..

Anyways I´m healthy, I´m safe and I´m happy so don't worry about me. I just need to develop a little more patience with mi español and to start seeing success. I know that both will come, the Lord is just trying my patience and faith, so that's what I will be especially working on for the next bit. Well, as always I love you all and enjoy all of your Halloween candy. Oh, and don't worry about me eating here. The members here are a lot more willing to feed us and there is an empanada factory next door with empanadas almost the size of my head and completos(hot dogs) the length of my arm. And I'm not even exagerating hehehe. I'm getting fat in this sector! Well once again love you all and don't forget to say family prayer everynight!

   Con cariño, amor, y comida grasa, Élder Harper :)

I just read an email Alex sent me in Pitruf and he's baptizing one of our investigadoras, Keka, Next week.

YEEEEAAAAAHHHHH!!!!! the work wasnt a waste there!