Chilean Independence Day

I so look forward to hearing from Alex every Monday! I have had to be a little relaxed in that a few times. Yesterday was the Chilean Independence Day and I had a little bit of a heads up so I wasn't frantic. But still, I really like to get his letters and I didn't and I watched some missionary homecomings and I do NOT recommend doing that. It is still very far away and I cannot get that in my head yet!


Okay. It appears that no one listened to my recording in which I complained about the shaving situation.
Look. I need to get an electric one. I've been trying to find one here but it's pretty hopeless, and the metal kind are killing my face. It's become a problem to the point where I've been using my fellows' electric ones. The ones here are low-end American brands at best, scary Chilean homemade ones at worst. I don't know what you think exactly, but these ones my companions have work decently well. Maybe you could research it a little and find me one? With a little effort I can make it work, but buying one here is sketchy.

This week's been okay. We didn't get all the numbers and stuff we wanted but I don't feel like I should have done anything really different. Sometimes people are just not interested. We put times with people and then they just aren't there. It's kind of frustrating, and it becomes really easy to walk into the day not really expecting anything to happen. Which isn't so great for the excitement level.

Elder Burk and I are doing well too, with only an occasional personality difference or something like that. I figure that every missionary has one of three big motives - Truth, Love, or Faith. I am a Truth missionary, with a fair amound of Love. That's how I think and act. Elder Burk is a Faith missionary. There can be a little friction at times, but as long as the pride is minimal, there's no problem.

The Chilean Independence Day was pretty much the entire country in barbeques, kite-flying contests, and drinking contests. We didn't do a ton of stuff. The party we were allowed to go to was fun. It was a little small, as the ward was small. I ate like six empanadas and twelve anticuchos, which are essentially small shishkabobs. And like two liters of soda. Good real sugar Coke.

Then we a had a PDay wherein we couldn't shop or do internet, as you suspected. So we had like eight hours of doing whatever we wanted. We flew kites, we played soccer, we ate pizza, and we cleaned up some gross stuff under the kitchen appliances. I don't know if I've said yet, but Elder Lowry stayed here, and got Elder Van Dyke, an Elder from my district in the MTC. Needless to say, we've had a fair amount of reminiscing about the MTC a fraction more than a year ago.

Sickening how it's been that long.

But anyway, the pension is still fun, if not as insane as it was when Elder Myres was here. I think you've seen those pictures of him firedancing and stuff. We don't do so much of that anymore.

Unfortunately we're all getting a gross gut-and-aches virus. Elder Lowry is going to the hospital for it. So it's not great.

I'm glad to hear everything's pretty good. Make sure Connor doesn't get too messed up about getting hammered by grades - if his grades where always about 95 he would not be taking hard enough classes. Does everyone still go to Grandma's house for dinner? That was like my favorite thing. Heck, it still is


Alex sent this much, then more!


Maybe I'll just end an email without wierdly sending it halfway through. The computer's being wierd so I'm being sure it doesn't crash without me getting a word off.

I gave my first ever talk in Church last Sunday. Which was wierd, being that I've been here so long. I was very pleased that at several points I paused and could not hear a single sound as people pondered what I said. I told them that when God brought them into the church, He called them into His service. Forever. I urged them to work and help others. I hope someone heard it. It was really the first super- cutting talk I've ever given. I didn't laugh at all. I felt like that one time President Monson got up in Priesthood and just said it straight. (Last Conference, I think it was). I felt really hot when I asked, like Jesus did to Peter "lovest thou me more than these? Feed my sheep." I'll never forget how it felt to say it to them as a ward (Ask my about this in 10 years and I'll recognize it.) Villa Brasil - Me amas? Apacienta mis obvejas.

Sorry to go lame on you.

Find me a shaver please! They have told me that phillips and braun, especially braun are good. Keep up the emails. They worked.

Thanks, love, and stuff
Elder A Conrad Crist

I really wish I could get longer letters! I want to know every detail and I feel like Alex is leaving out a lot! I want rambling, long detailed, and packed letters that take 20 - 30 minutes to read. I guess he just does not have the time. I have seen letters like that and I miss them. I know more is going on with him than what he writes in the letters and I seriously just want to know all!!! It is kind of frustrating to hear from him but have him not answer any question previously asked. I want him to be happy and I don't know if he is!


Before I start talking, one thing -

Email

Me

Songs

in

mp3

I bought an mp3 player thinger that you can just put mp3s on, and it's great - but I still need to get mp3s to play on it. I have a few here in DVDs people have given me, but you have to realize - you have the power to email me them *IN MP3 NOT MP4* whenever you want, simply over a few emails. For example, if you were to get ahold of Josh Groban, you could rip the CD to mp3 and send it to me in all of ten minutes.

That said,

This week was a little rough in terms on numbers and appointments, but these things happens. I've been here long enough to not freak out about these things, especially because it's been the second biggest party week of the entire year. Next week would be the biggest. We'll see how it goes. According to President King, the mission's been doing really well recently. We'll see how it goes.

So far Elder Burk is doing well. He's a little up tight, much like I was when I got here. It's the hardest thing to realize in the mission - that you can still be calm and not super retentive about everything. It's not to say that we can be disobedient, obviously. He's started to loosen up in the last few days, but there's still some way to go.

He's really into that kind of "I think Jesus really started to become a God when he started the Atonement" doctrine. Or like when people reject us, he's like "but we are representatives of Christ!" I don't know, it's a kind of mormony metaphysics.

Not to be negative or anything. We really are doing well.

Well, my stupid computer just crashed. Explorer died, but Chrome still goes. So now I have no taskbar, nor folders. Cool

Luckily I was able to start a new iteration of explorer.exe by opening a new task in the Process Manager. It's a good thing I'm a nerd.

So anyway, that's that for now. The week is lame because of our circumstances. I'm fearing that Elder Burk is getting a bad faith-starting training stange, or perhaps that he think's it's that I'm lazy or something. I don't really know.

Alex sent this a little later. I think they were having problems with the computers or something.

I don't really know why I sent that last one. Whatever. Maybe to free up some RAM with all those attachments.

I'm way sorry. I don't really have anything to say to you more than that. I'm still in the shaving dillema, but what else is new? I still look like a scrubbed off my facial hair with a lathe, but that's okay. Nothing really exciting about it.

Have you ever read Lectures on Faith? It is a book to blow through all rhetoric concerning faith, all examples, all everything of the sort. Basically it's seven lectures, each only a few pages long. Each has a purpose (this was written by the First Presidency for the School of the Prophets in the 1830-40s ish era). I suggest that you read it. For some people, like me, being low-rhetoric people, it can change your life. For example - there are three requirements of Faith in God:
A belief that God exists
A correct knowledge of the attributes and character of God
A knowledge that the path one is taking pleases God and complies with His will
Think about that for a second. Why does a person need to be in the Church? They would not otherwise be able to understand God, nor His plan. Therefore, for the much they want to believe, they could not have faith for life and salvation. There is a reason we do missionary work. It's one of those things.

Just keep thinking about it. If you read the book and think about it, it seriously takes all the vapid rhetoric and opinion out of religion. I really could have used it a few years ago.

And there it is. Email me songs. Good. Take Luck.

Elder A Conrad Crist

One down and one to go!

This week marks the 1 year mark from when my son left for his mission. I have seen him once in real life when I stocked him right before he departed to Chile, twice on skype at Christmas and Mother's Day, and a letter every week for 52 weeks. It does not feel like he has been gone that long but my heart knows it. I gave a Sharing Time in Primary this last Sunday and it was on Missionaries. I could barely get through the lesson I was trying to teach and every song I sing in church makes me cry, and every time I look at his picture on my counter I tear up. So yeah, I think my body and soul knows it has been a long time but thankfully the mind can linger on the happy moments and know that I will see him again! Maybe that is something like what the Savior is teaching us. We can go back and live with our Father in Heaven again. We just have to be true and faithful and our time will come. Maybe that is what makes this separation such a poignant one. I miss my Father in Heaven as much as I miss my son.


Yeah, I may have forgotten my camera.

Whatever.

So, here I am. With the somewhat young Elder Burk. From Arizona. This last week has been ridiculous. First, we went around and Elder Myres said goodbye to everyone. The next day I went to the temple after 10 months of not going there - sort of a lot, I think. It was a great time to reflect about the mission so far. Just about exactly half. I technically complete a year the eighth, which is thursday.

You know, it didn't seem like I've done that much. I understand always, and I know the lessons, and I know how to teach them. I get how to write in the area book, and eat properly, and all that kind of thing. The thing is that it feels as if I've not really done that much for people. It could be that I've been in seeding and tilling sectors while others have been doing the harvesting. I don't know.

Elder Burk is a very dedicated missionary. He just wants to work and baptize people. We have a very minor personality clash, but we work well together, especially once we are actually teaching. He's very outgoing and does contacts automatically, even when the situation is somewhat unfavorable. (I don't want to dampen his enthusiasm, but interrupting people while they talk to each other to contact them just makes them angry - or let us say that they have a hard time seeing us as representatives of Christ.)

We get more study time so we can practice and figure out all these things. I think it'll be okay.

I don't know if Dad has any experiences about this - it's very difficult to get to know Elder Burk because he won't talk about anything but missionary work. He may answer a direct question, but then a few sentences later he'll be talking about how the Gospel is so amazing or how the solution to world hunger is tithing, etc. I find myself in a similar position to when I was with Trent at Wyview. I wanted to just be a person and I couldn't. It says in DC 4 that you have to have your gaze only put on the glory of God, or something like that - so where should I be here?

It's very good that he does want to work and has no obedience or homesickness problems. He's the eleventh of sixteen brothers and sisters (luckily there's a law-only relationship between the first and second eight). He's only worked a little and gone to BYU Idaho in terms of education. He's a choir person, which is cool. And he plays the viola, but he says "not well enough to bring it on the mission." His parents are somewhat older people, and it is noticeable in his personality - he's disciplined, but kind of odd.

Let's change gears. You know what I liked to sing? It wasn't ever the simple ones. It was always the ones that were kind of "adulty." I remember we sang a few hymns, and I liked those more than the others. Also, A Child's Prayer and those kind of more serious even if a little childish ones actually called my attention to the words. The doofy ones not so much. I thought harmony anything was cool, even if I pretended to think it was dumb for my classmates. Treat them older than they are and they'll act it.

Can someone ask Kelsey what is Family Processes? I'm weirded out by that.

I'm going to buy an Mp3 player thing from Chilean Walmart today - so I'm going to be doing a lot of asking you to email me things. Starting now. The cool thing is that I won't ever have to ask for CDs - you can just send them. Not only that, but I can get them from other Elders. So if you get a hold of The Lower Lights or that other one I mentioned earlier and you haven't sent it yet, just rip it and email me it IN MP3 or I won't be able to do anything with it. Please. I think this is the best way I can do it. I wish someone had told me from the beginning.

Someone should make a decent recording of Grandpa's improv riffs. It would be so cool to get a good microphone and and Apple Product and record a whole album full of Crist stuff. We could produce it really well and make album art! Just think about it.

Abrupt ending!

Elder A Conrad Crist

I don't know if you knew but you can find my chapel on lds.org (and riley's too) really easy. Just put in like Villa Brasil of La Cisterna or my bishop's name, Bishop Valdivia. Just in case you're interested in that sort of thing.


To Abby after a short note for him.

Just another school year and I'll be back. No problem.

We did make the cake you sent. The funny thing was there's no frosting in Chile. So we used Dulce de la Leche. Let's just say it was okay. Or really good. Or amazing. The other missionaries went nuts too. It was a fun day.

Make sure Mom and Dad email me stuff and music! and pictures!

Love and stuff,
Elder A Conrad Crist


And to Kato:

Dear Kato

Roof roof grrrr grr roofy roof.

Roof grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr grrr. Roof.

Roof roof,
Elder grrr Crist roof