El Salto 2 - Week 2

¡Hola Familia y Amigos!

Esta semana has been full of all sorts of fun. We have an ex-drug dealer or user or something we are teaching (hopefully EX) and we are planning on him putting himself with a baptismal date tonight. Last night we taught him about a 10 minute lesson after he left Elder Low and I in his house by ourselves for about 35 minutes while he and his palola went to get their kids. (FUN!!! In the neighborhood.) Friday I had what the call Fase 1 training for new missionaries in which we learned about the mission and some of the rules. It was great, we got to go to the mission home in the rich part of Santiago (obviously not our mission) and enjoy the morning learning and then have almuerzo con Presidente y Hna. May. It was definitely a good experience.

This week in El Salto it has been tan vientoso. I don't know where all this wind is coming from, but it has made it un poco frio over the past couple days, especially at night. Although I can't complain much because it should be in the 90's as we are approaching verano here. Today for p-day we are going into el centro to go to a tourist attraction se llama Santa Lucia. It is apparently a big castle built into the side of un cerro (hill). When you climb up to the top you are supposed to be able to see all of Santiago, unfortunately está nublado hoy día, so we'll see. One thing I love about our sector is that you can see Los Andes to the north. Last night when we were contact (tocando puertas) we looked over and saw the sunset reflecting off of the clouds over Los Andes and the pine trees sticking up in between us and the montañas, it was an awesome sight to behold. (I'll try to get pictures this week and send them next week).

My companion is requesting printed pictures of the house to be mailed to us ASAP, since we only have limited e-mail time and we are already 1/3 of the way through this cambio. We had conferencía de estaca ayer and I was to the point of boredom from not understanding anything that I drew the floor plan of the first floor of the Hen. House. He absolutely loved it and really wants to see pictures!!!

Home sounds exciting, especially between the cats and racoons. I'm sure Gabe enjoyed having some fun with them! LOL. And I agree with getting another big dog, my vote is on a female rottie (my spelling is going out the window en inglés!). How is the house coming? Nobody said much this week about it.

Mom: Sounds like the job is going good and that you are progressing in your learning. And isn't the switch in computer programming how it always seems to work out. You'll get it, by the time I get back you'll be proficient at using a computer...LOL. Good luck with the food storage, if by some miracle you figure out how to freeze-dry food...my companion and I would love to have some chili and tacos. (No rush, just within about the next 4 weeks...if there is some other way to get it to us and it still be good then that would be great too.).

Dad: Work sounds fun as usual! The stories never get old, especially when they result from somebody's stupidity and turns out in a cool medical problem...LOL. My companion likes all my medical stories too. He plans on going into medicine when he gets back to BYU in just less than a year, his specialties of choice right now are neurology and anesthesiology! We get along very well.

I miss all of you at home and also the Texas weather, even if it is super rainy. I miss the rain!!! And I get to continue doing so until at least about Marzo...yuck! I get a hard time from all of the English speakers around here about being from Texas, especially with the Texas Pride factor figured in.

I'm loving Chile, every second of it!!! The work that we do here is unique, and the opportunity that we have to be the Lord's hands in it is an experience that I will never forget. At times it is hard, like this week to come will definitely be. Right now we have 11 investigadores con una fecha bautismal. Only 1 of those is progressing and 2 of our other "investigators". This week we are going to end up dropping at least 7 of our 11 that have a baptismal date because they aren't willing to keep commitments and are wasting our time and the Lord's time. Keep us in all of your prayers for our success in this gran obra (work) and as well that our investigators may do the things that they need to do to progress in este Evangelio and recieve the ordenanzas neccessary to recieve salvation and find the path to eternal life.

La Idioma (the language): So far the language is coming along very nicely. I'm at the point where I can definitely speak more than I'm able to understand because of the accent of the people here, and because many are missing teeth. I'm working on figuring out a new approach to my language studies and continuing to improve. It is amazing how much just listening helps. My companion does his best to speak Spanish to me all of the time, he is successful about 98% of the time (it is more difficult to speak Spanish when you are mad...LOL). We just set a goal today to not speak English, except in the apartment after 11:00 pm. We'll see how this works because one of the other elders is in his 2 cambio (change/transfer) and speaks English a lot of the time.

I love you all and miss you alot. My prayers are with all of you daily in your individual endeavours. I look forward to seeing you again in 21 fast Sundays! (I'm not counting). It feels like we've been apart for so long, but I know there is only a short time past and only a little bit longer one ahead.

¡Toda mi amor! ¡Besos!

--Elder Todd