Wk 16 - every week feels like only one day!!

Companion: Elder Incil
Area: Andalein

we got new hats. reppin the usa

this is my favorite place to eat with the soto family!

Hey fam!! it is seriously so crazy how time flies!! i did send a letter back home today that i wrote a couple weeks ago!!

 i see the blessings of the gospel in my family and to other people as they continue to realize the importance of it. i have had lessons where we are talking about how families can be together forever and it makes me tear up almost every time. i have realized how special it is to be able to be with you guys together forever. i want you guys to know that i do love you all. i am very happy to be here serving a mission. 

this past week was the day of independence for chile and so during these holidays hardly anyone is in the streets because they are all cooking food and partying and sleeping. and the people that were in the streets were all drunk. haha so 2 days ago we had another drunk guy stop to talk to us and i would have just kept walking because it isn't like he is going to remember anything and we shook his hand and he pulled my companion in for a hug and i knew i was next and sure enough the drunk guy pulled me in too. i gave him a hug and smelt pretty bad not going to lie. haha 

another thing that is cool the family hernandez leiton well only the mom and the son are going to be baptized this saturday and it is so cool to see how the gospel and helped them out in their lives. one miracle is the dad is a nice guy but he has never sat in one of our lessons and he said it was ok for the son to be baptized and so lucky he said it was fine. so i will send pictures of the baptism next week!!! they are a cool family. i want you guys to know i love you and all is well here.

Love,

Elder Smoot

the family that is going to be baptized

Wk 15 - pictures!

Companion: Elder Incil
Area: Andalein

all the boys in my zone

this week is there independence day on the 18 so there is a lot of flags up right now

we flew kites today and there was a horse and naked statue so it was pretty funny

i am using pics from elder hancock.
the dog is always sitting on this wall and we call it the spider dog

All right this week was pretty cool but man being a missionary is pretty tiring! haha we did a service project with a bunch of missionaries and it was way cool!! we all saw some graves that were over 200 years old!! this cemetery was huge. i saw bones of graves that were cracked open. i saw a dude's femur and a skull. it was pretty sketchy! but yeah the service project was pretty fun!!!

 just so you know that the drunk guys is on a daily basis kind of thing! we had a run in with a drunk guy last night and it was pretty funny because he had no idea what he was doing and man does their breathe stink!! haha he asked if i was from the US and it was kind of an obviously answer! haha we just gave him a card and he kissed the picture of Jesus and it was pretty funny! we just said bye and walked away. he wanted to stay and talk awhile!.

One cool thing that happened this week is there is a less active named Juana and she hadn't been to church in so long. her family isn't members but she hadn't been to church in a long time!! we taught a lesson to her and she attended church this past sunday which was pretty cool! it was cool to see a person who decided that they needed to change and they actually acted on it! 

each week here is long but i do love being here. all the work you put in is all worth it! even when you cant find anybody and all your appointments are falling through it is still nice to be here because i know that i need to learn something about patience or i don't know! one thing that i want to share is from my patriarchal blessing and it is the peace that i have in my life will have to do a lot with the peace that is at home. that right there brings me a ton of comfort because it is very true for me. my family is so important to me and i do love all you guys very much!! i hope all of you have a good week!! 

Love,

Elder Smoot

ps. i swear jenna has a baptism every week!! haha i think those miracle baptisms happened here a while ago and now my job is to keep them going to church! 

this is some Chilean food and it is pretty dang good 

lunch at the bishops house
 and elder hancock was on a mini cambio or splits so he wasn't there.

a horse in the front of our house. this is pretty common as well

the view from presidents house-this is where the temple of Concepcion will be as well by the white building

we had interviews at presidents house this past week. he lives in the tiniest house!(he has the 5th floor and  his house is so nice!)

helping hands is a thing with mormons that i didnt really know about but we took flowers off the graves of people in chile. it is weird that they dont burry people they just stack them up haha 

we did a service project for helping hands.

Questions/Answers:

*what do you eat for breakfast and dinner?

i eat eggs and pancakes and fruit pretty much everyday 

*what do people feed you?

nothing really out of the ordinary but mayonnaise and tomatoes seem to be in them. but mostly chicken and rice. as well lasagna or i don't know how to spell it. but a lot bread too. bread is pretty good here

*a day in your life?! 

wake up and i at least do 50 push ups and 100 sit ups because i don't really want to get too big but today i did 100 each and we eat and shower and get ready and study at 8 30 for an hour and we have companionship study after that and we talk about some things and plan for the lessons for the day and we leave for work a little bit before lunch and lunch is at 1 30 everyday and we do that for an hour and we go to the house after and i study spanish and we go to work at 4 because i need to practice my spanish for 30 minutes more. and we go to work after that and we get back at the house at 9 30 to 10 and we plan for our day and get ready for bed and we can eat a little something and we go to bed by 11.

*how far do you walk a day?

 

pretty far. we walk every where we go and so we are either teaching a lesson or walking for 6 hours

*are you sleeping good? 

oh yeah. i sleep like a baby 

*how are your clothes holding up? are you warm enough? 

yeah i am. it is getting warmer here every day and it is pretty nice

Wk 14 - love you fam!!

Companion: Elder Incil
Area: Andalein

picture taken from the mission blog-
September interviews with the mission President

so this week was pretty good!! it is so crazy how time flies! for example that ruger has started school? that is so crazy!! talias kids all look older already!! time really does fly here!! i am so happy to be here serving a mission. yeah of course there is hard times but without hard times you cant grow. for example that austin never works out and puts strain on his body therefore he is small. haha every day here i see a drunk guy either passed out or a guy struggling to walk because he is drunk. it never gets old and brings me temporary joy. one thing is at times i am typing i forget how to say things in english because in spanish it doesn't translate directly! 

yesterday my companion and i taught a lesson to a guy named mitchel and he is a way cool guy. he wants to be baptized but we need to make sure he has a testimony before baptism! the family that my comp and i are teaching the family hernandez leiton. they are getting baptized not this week but the week after that! which is cool! we have taught about the temple and they have a goal to be sealed in the temple!! that is so cool to me!

One thing that i have realized that is so important in this life is the temple. i am so grateful for the temple because i get to be with you guys for eternity!! that is way cool!! i have realized how much i like being around you guys from being on my mission. the hardest part is definitely being away from my brothers and sisters and of course my parents;) i sure do love my family! (this letter is about 3 paragraphs just for my mom) ;) 

Love,

Elder Smoot

Wk 13 - power of faith...

Companion: Elder Incill
Area: Andalein

sorry i dont have any pictures this week because my camera broke but i am still in the same area so no worries!! 

so this week my companion and i found a few investigators that i can see potential in them which is good!! i also have had a pretty cool thing that happened! i am going to tell about this guy name Marcelo! he was a menos activo which is a less active because of his work. he worked on sundays so he couldnt go to church. i have become pretty good friends with this guy as we go and teach him lessons. when we were in the lesson with him we were talking about going to church and the importance of that and it is hard at times because he is the only member of the church in his family. i told him that i dont know what it is like to be in situation like that but i do know that the church is true and it is important for us to go renew our baptismal covenants each week. i asked him if he thinks God will prepare a way for him to attend church every week. he looked at me very seriously he said yes. this past sunday he found out that he doesn't have to work anymore sundays and he can continue to attend church every week. that was a cool experience for me of how much faith one person has and the power of faith. 

this week was really good and we play soccer on wednesday nights with some inactive members and some people who arent members and some members. i think i am getting the hang of soccer!!! i actually kind of like it now. the only reason i can play with them is they all weigh 100 lbs. haha! its pretty funny i just bump into them and they fly haha! next thing i know i got a soccer ball at my feet and yeah its not so bad haha!

 my testimony is definitely strengthened and tested each day but i know without a doubt that God is there. i have felt him so close to me here in the mission. i love this gospel so much and i love to learn more about this gospel each day. 

one thing i took for granite when i was home was going to the temple. nothing compares to the feeling being in the temple. i miss going to the temple right now and now i cant go for 2 years and it eats me alive that i cant go to the temple for 2 years.

but one more cool thing that happened is we did a service project and we had to wreck a house and tear it down. it was the funnest thing i have ever done and it is great stress management btw. 

the past week was pretty awesome and i am grateful to be here in a mission although it is so hard I love it here. 

chau no mas!! 

love,

Elder Smoot

wk 12 - I hope I turn into Spider-Man!

Companion: Elder Incill
Area: Andalein

lunch at a member's house after church

the guy is not the dad he is a member that teaches a lot of lessons with us. he is a pretty cool guy!!

I don't even remember what i do on all the days!! all i know is that time goes fast here!! i will send a pic of the family that two of them have a baptism date. the family is awesome and are so ready to receive the gospel. they have a little kid who is 7 so he can't be baptized yet. i love teaching the family because they are always so interested in what we have to say! i love all the times we teach because it is always a spiritual experience!! 

every Mericoles or wednesday we play soccer at the church with kids who are inactive and other kids who aren't members. i guess i found out that i am not terrible at soccer well... the only thing i have on them is i can kick the ball a lot harder! haha but the little chilenos are pretty good!!

My spanish is coming along slowly. i always can understand a little more each day and i can most of the time understand them. It is hard here because people talk so fast!! but i am getting the hang of it but i still need to improve a ton!! 

so on saturday in the morning i woke up with this thing that i thought was a huge scratch! i didnt think much of it so i just kind of went on with the day. by saturday night i had three little blister things on my arm and i was thinking this cant be good. my companion said oh dont worry about it. i didn't really worry about it until sunday morning it was pretty big. the three little blisters were one huge blister and it popped in my sweater and there was so much crap that came out!! it was nasty! i cleaned it and i asked the mission nurse about it today and i showed her the picture of it with the blister and the first words she said was OH NO. haha i was thinking oh crap what is this. she gave me some medicine for it and i will clean it for the next couple days and if it gets worse i am supposed to call her. so i hope all will turn out all right! 

my week was pretty good other than now my camera doesn't really work anymore and a spider bit me. but if i turn into spider-man i wont mind.

 i am staying in the same area in Andalein for another cambio. I just finished 6 weeks here in chile! so that's something that's cool! i am still living with the same elders in my house. 

but i want you guys to know i love you and i hope you have a wonderful week.

Love,

Elder Smoot

(more pics from last week's zone activity )

Wk 11 - i love pirates!

Companion: Elder Incill
Area: Andalein

i have a ton of pics but i might not have time to explain all of them 

but the pictures on the beach was one from a zone class 

with Elder Hancock

Elder Hancock, Incill, & Pavon (our house)

we had a mini combio i was with elder catron from argentina and i stayed in elder mittons house on his birthday. it was pretty cool. i learned a ton from them. elder mitton is a stud out here!

 you usually can see a city behind us
 but it was so foggy you could hardly see anything!

i know you want longer letters but because of all the pictures i sent i have a little time!! 

this week was pretty good!! i went to the new missionary conference and learned a ton!! i was with elder catron who is a freakin stud!! he is from argentina and he is companions with elder mitton who is only a year older than me and went to pg! all the new missionaries were companions with zone leaders so they get to learn a ton. i learned i needed to contact more!! i told my companion that we needed to talk to more people!! we did that and had 247 contacts this week which was pretty cool!! elder mitton and elder catron have over 300 contacts a week which is insane! i am enjoying it though!! i can have simple conversations in the street but i am still no where near good yet!! 

(pictures from the mission blog of the new missionary conference)

I had another funny experience with a drunk guy!! my companion and i see this drunk guy and he says cuidado which is be careful and i see he is drunk and i am thinking oh this is going to be good. i dont know why but the drunk people always try and talk to you. but he was talking to us and he was a pretty fat guy and was just so drunk and he started crying and i could help but try not to laugh! oh man it was pretty funny!! 

i love you guys have a good week!

Elder Smoot

when i am wearing regular clothes that was from today when we went and had a bbq with our zone. 
it was pretty dope and there was a pirate cave there. 
one thing you might have never known about me is i love pirates so much. 

this is the pirate cave

with Elder Hancock

elder hancock and i had to run from the pirate cave on the beach to our bus and i was so sweaty!!