A little e-coli anyone?

I've had an odd week.

 You see, on Monday I went to a barbeque thing with the zone Maipu, which was fun (even though it took forever to start the fire). There was this last piece, after all was eaten, and since I hadn't eaten very much, I decided to eat it. The coals had been going out, fact unknown to me, so the cooking had been somewhat substandard. I bit a few times, but on perhaps the fifth, pure blood came out of the middle. I stopped there, of course. I went through that whole day fine. I got up the next day, ate breakfast, went to my meetings, went to lunch, then went to get some blankets we needed from the store... and then everything went bad. I don't want to be really graphic, but I think I will just say diarrhea with the adjective "extreme" and leave the rest to your imagination.

 I had just ferried another missionary to the emergency room a few days earlier for dehydration incident to the same problem, so I did what I could to drink. I came back to the office feeling rather bad. I was struck by terrible chills on the way home. I came back, found a space heater, and sat in front of it between bathroom trips about from six to ten that night (tuesday). I had the whole works - sweating beads while still cold, shakes, kidney pain, headache, urge to vomit, etc. It was the most intense I can remember those symptoms. Toward the end of the day I was on the border on consciousness several times. I had the sense to drink, which saved me. I woke the next day pretty much in the same situation. That entire day was fitful rest (wednesday) due to the kidney pain, which had worsened. I don't remember the day too well. The next day I got up at ten and basically worked, but couldn't stand for a long time.

 But now we're on Saturday, and I'm just like I was last Saturday, except two kilos lighter. I don't know what the purpose of that whole thing was. I guess I'll avoid beef for a while. I probably won't tell the missionaries who cooked that day anything...

 The other highlight (there are actually three, this is number two) is how I think I have ended up with the fix-stuff bug from Dad. Yesterday Elder Wheelwright and I went out and replaced a bathroom faucet and that plastic tower thing in a toilet that decides how much water to put in. It was hairy, in reality, because there's no way to get to the assembly that holds the sink on without ripping the whole thing off the wall, including ripping out some rusted wall anchors and silicone. So we redid the wall anchors, switched out the faucet, put it back on, screwed it in, put on new silicone, etc. That was fine, what was strange was how satisfying it was! I had recently unclogged the drain in the same sink, so I just watched the perfect new faucet run at full speed and the drain drain too. Awesome. It's like, "I did this." Of course I got my summer pants and shirt rather filthy without noticing, but hey - it's supposed to be cold soon, so I won't ever need them again. I'm going to need a lot of bleach. (Side note: How much of my clothes should I be keeping when I come back? The bodega(clothing warehouse for poor missionaries) here can really use it, and I could fit more Chile in for every thing I don't bring back.)

 Third highlight of the week - tonight we have a movie night with our ward. We are expecting some sixty people, because this ward is cool and has lots of youth that are up for anything. We'll be watching the new Joseph Smith one that no one has seen here on a projector. That´ll be good, I think.

Also, I did my visa, because I was illegal. I am now not illegal. It was fun, though, because all the people I knew in the MTC were there because we all went illegal at the same time, so I saw them. 

This week was basically a dream because I was only really conscious for three days this week. That's all I have to report. If you've not read Drawing on the Powers of Heaven, I'd recommend it. Elder Wheelwright let me borrow it. It's essentially about how there's a big gap between our personal righteousness and our blessings, or rather, we should have more blessings for how good we are in most members' cases. It's worth a shot. I would actually like to ask for a copy from you if you are sending anything in the next few months.

 Thanks,
Love,
Elder A Conrad Crist

In the Millenium Elders...

That kind of reminds me of that one time when they cut my underarm up in Santiago and then I went out and worked... I had a nutty trainer, you see. It was probably for the better, in all reality - you can not work when you're mission-dead.

This week we went to the temple! We finally as a mission got permission to have a conference there, so we did. The Area President before the current one said we should be able to "feel as much spirit in you personal study as you can in the temple." We're all like, "Yeah... but..."

It was a good conference, complete with Q&A with the first temple counselor. You can guess how that went. We started with sane questions, like, "Why do parents need to be sealed to their children?", "What is a temple divorce?", etc., but as the more intellectual missionaries got warmed up we saw, "What's the deal with poligamy?", and the classic "What happens to me if my wife doesn't qualify for life eternal but I do?" The conselor answered the questions... vaguely. At the end of the day, the answer for the hard questions is "Millenium, Elders. The millenium. Somebody will figure it out then."

I certainly do like the temple, though. I went with the question you can imagine would have been on my mind, knowing that next Friday I will only have four months left - "How can I finish the mission right?"

I went to General Conference with the same question and it came across more like, "When you get home, family is what matters." Then I say, "Okay, but what about the mission? It's not over 'till it's over."

The temple helped me out. I'm hesitant to tell the whole universe about what I recieved in there, but it sufficeth me to say that I know what I have to do. You can generally depend on the temple for that kind of thing. The rest of the mission is going to be fantastic. It's like when you're running and you can see the end, so you forget about all the pacing-yourself stuff and your fears about ending the race. How could I not make it to the end I can see from here? I don't worry about eating or sleeping as much - just to keep me moving. I can only do this once.

I really, really need to write a letter or two, so if you don't mind. I'll leave you with that.

Love,

Elder Crist

Doctor Elder Crist

I really couldn't tell you what I will do when I get back, but I did think I had to have 15 credit hours to get New Century stuff. I will pretty unavoidably work. I hope at least my mission office group of bizarre skills will help me out a little.

 I was looking at the schedule. It is a lot, though. I don't know when I would work, but I have to. I won't have any cars or other expensive nonsense, I hope, but I still will have to pay tuition and those insane books. (I don't know how you could, but if you could look online for some of those books, you could save my bacon.)

 I do think, though, that I can be a lot more disciplined than I was before (and I even got good grades.) As I challenge myself more I find that I get a more-than-multiplied increase in performance... or rather, when something is twice as hard, I get more than twice as much work out of myself. So I'll do good. And I can't be more busy there than I am here. No way.

 To not be repetitive, I'll quote my weekly report: "This has really been a good week. We're back out into the sector every day helping people out. I'm getting along great with Elder Wheelwright and we're working hard to be ready for when I leave. He's a very hard-working fellow and he's learned just about everything. I think I'll retire on Monday from the job mostly and be around doing the datos projects and being backup for him and Elder Fuentealba to make sure they both are okay with their new responsibilities.

 I've been practising something Elder Christensen told me to do that has made a great difference. He told me to focus on loving - loving people we contact, loving investigators and members, and loving God. As soon as I did, everything became brighter, easier, more fun, more desirable, more hopeful, and so forth. Since I have been doing it time in my day usually is made up of loving people and enjoying what I'm doing - right down to difficult contacts - and not enjoying something, realizing I should be loving, returning to loving, and enjoying it.This is a pretty big revelation for me. I have always wanted to be a youth leader, but I was afraid I would not know what to do or to say. I can see that if I can love them fiercely, I'll know what to do and say. I hope to be able to apply this to the maximum for the rest of my mission." It turns out, Elder Christensen and I are an example of that same principle. I might not have talked to him if we hadn't been "relatives" of some degree, but now we're great friends because it started on a pre-friend ground. Something to think about.

 Well, here I am, learning secrets of the universe and also very slightly freaking out about my future. I'm good though. The two people who are taking over my jobs here (one's taking my old job, the other one is taking my new job that I've had for only a change). I kind of bounce between them and my projects to present the retention data to the stakes of the mission.

 I'm elbows-deep in Pivot Tables, if that means anything to you. I remember like ten years ago I started to make a graph in Paint for a science class and Dad came in and looked at it and said,"Nonononono - Let me see it." He made me my very first Excel chart. It's very odd that God prepares things so far in advance - I got here knowing how to do graphs in Excel pretty well, but that was the absolute last thing I could have expected to do here. But it is needed - the stake leaders very often have no idea if the Ward Mission Leaders are working or if their bishops are doing meetings. Glad to be a part.

 I think you'll like this audio, even if it's very random. You may need to know that "Semana Santa" is the "Holy Week" that's going on right now. It's supposed to be dedicated to the Resurrection of Christ. Mostly people just drink. And they don't eat meat - the tradition is that all meat is the body of Christ this week. Needless to say, meat was discounted at the store.

 Sorry, a missionary just called from the city center having fainted and needs to go to an ER. We're going now.

 Love, Dr. Crist

Conference Weekend

Conference has been good so far, I think. I have made some pretty big advances since last conference. I remember in the past I always tried to write down everything more or less that each person said. That is a pretty big error. You must pay attention to the Spirit's impressions. You may be writing things that are almost not mentioned in a talk, but it's what you need to know in the coming days. Not only that, but the guidance and insights you get will be absolutely personal. This leads me to a theme I've though about a lot recently. I think I'd do better to give you an example.

Since I can remember, I've always needed to be different than others. It took various forms over the years. I didn't play sports or like watching them. I spent bizarre amounts of time reading and researching scientific and mathematic concepts. I really looked out from my high tower at people who simply went to school, played sports, had testimonies, and so forth, thinking I was, if not superior, at least distinctive.

If you talked with me at sixteen, my plan for life was really something. I would be going to an Ivy League school, far away from my family. The mission was distant and very, very low priority. But there was one nagging fact that indicated to me that my vision was not yet correct - it didn't make me happy. It satisfied me, surely. I planned a late marriage between two stable adults wherein money would never be a problem and my professional interests would be optimized. I was headed for an illustrious career as the top of my field with my family and religion as a footnote on the Grand Thesis of my life.

God's plan, as I saw it, would be to be mediocre. If I were to submit to His plan, (again - as I saw it) I would do virtually nothing but prepare to convince people to join the church on a mission, go to BYU like my dad, and his dad, meet a girl immediately after and marry her, graduate poor with two kids, and teach young men's for the rest of my life.

I hated that vision. "You can't tell ME what to do!", I thought. "I will be a success like there's never been before."

As time went on, though, as I understood more of God's power, with the help of some Seminary teachers and teachers in Church, the two visions started to come together.

If something makes you happy, it's for a a reason.

Every human being needs a quantity of love. Where he looks for it is up to him. You can fill up your need (and it is an absolutely irrevocable, unstoppable one) on junk love, love for entertainment or food or something like that. But just like the junk food which it resembles, it leaves you hungry in minutes. (How long does Trix keep you satisfied?)

Or you can put in the real kind.

As time continued by, I began to see that the reason my dad did things how he did, and how his dad did things before him, was that it made them happy! The real wholesome love they found in doing "the same things" as every other grandpa and dad have done filled their souls and didn't leave them wanting.

So I went to BYU. I served a mission. I took notes on conference and tried to listen to the Spirit, like the books say. Like the leaders say. I'm sitting here telling you this so that you'll do what I have done before you, if you haven't yet found this realization.

One time, I was thinking about the path my life was taking. I was thinking about how if I were to get married fast, the money would be very difficult. I thought about how that could be negative for the marriage. I though about the terrifying (to me, at least) prospect of kids and all that stuff that comes with it. I thought, "How can I do all this stuff? I want to be a doctor. I want to really raise my kids and not put them in day care. I want that all that stuff so much."

The reply came back, "Don't you think I know that?"

He does know that. His plan is going to get me what I want. So I'll do it.

Sorry, I'm in a conference mood this week. That's my talk.

Love,

Elder A Conrad Crist

Training a replacement

I'm afraid this will have to be somewhat fast because today I went to the fancy-pants part of Santiago to have a despedida (goodbye) lunch for an outgoing assistant. The office is cool for things like that. 

We are done! We finished doing all the pensions we needed for the new missionaries, so now we can return to normal mission stuff and easy routine pension and medical incidents. Yesterday a missionary "stepped" (Or rather, played football on) a pipe in a pension and blew it to pieces, so they got everything wet and had to have a plumber come over and put in some new pipe. I get the tithing dollar signs in my eyes when I hear things like that. 

Little sidebar here, I think the Dad fix-stuff-in-the-house-and-car thing did, in the end, stick to me. Elder Smart and I have been cutting down on expenses by doing most work on the pensions ourselves. The other day we took out another Ptrap and pulled out some... stuff and it ended up perfect. We were considering buying an arc welder... but then we decided that it would be good if we stayed in for a year, but that it was unlikely that the next set of office elders would be as into it. So we didn't. Almost anything else is our territory.

 On the medical front, it's just people with the normal problems: cough, ingrown toenails, my companion with an infection like the ones for which I am famous (I treated it personally), etc. It is my favorite part of the job, definitely. When the ward members ask what I do in the office, I say, 1"Bueno, fui financiero, pero ahora soy el encargado de medicina y pensiones." To which they say, without fail, 2"Tienes cara de doctor."

 1(I was financier, but now I am in charge of medicine and pensions.)
2(You look like a doctor.)

 The end of my time here is quite evident. I am in my last change of six weeks here. I know because President has asked my to get ready to train my replacement. So I'll soon be leaving my favorite sector in the mission. Well, my next sector could be my favorite still. I'd leave with three and a half months-ish. Then it's just a sprint to the finish.

 I just looked up and read about the package. I'm going to go see if it is in.

 I need to shop. Sorry. I'm no good.

 Well, I may send some stuff with Elder Christensen to you. We'll see how that goes.

 The church is true.

 Elder A Conrad Crist

Over the five month left mark...

I feel like I did this yesterday. Nothing to report.

 We moved lots of stuff. A really obnoxious dueño decided that we had to fix a house we are trying to leave, which was awful. I'm still not sure what to do about it. There's a bunch of damage that we probably did, but I have to convince President King that we should pay it, or convince the guy (and he lives in Chiloe) to back off. Either one looks impossible.

 I'm also the acting medical coordinator for the mission, and the computer person. I have been utterly convinced that medicine and computers are the fields in which I must work. I know, from experience in the office, that I would not like to sell, be a corporate leader, be a realtor, be a driver, be a secretary, or be a negotiator. I do, though, like very much medicine, computers, general house repair (another one of my recent duties with the change resultant from Elder Fuentealba taking finances) and accountancy, in that order. I did an inventory of all the first aid kits and medications we had yesterday and I enjoyed it. I do the graphs each month and fix the network and stuff and I enjoy that too. It's like I asked God, "Should I be a doctor or what?" and he just nodded slightly and winked.

 It's really starting to hit me that this is getting over. Before I write you again, I'll have walked over the five-months-left threshold. That is not a lot of time. I have seven weeks left in the office, then two and a half changes of six weeks on the outside. Just enough time to really get working and... that will be it.

 I was thinking the other day that I really am not that different than I was before. The more I thought, though, I started to think about lots of mañas, or weird habits or pickinesses, that I don't have anymore. I eat tomatoes. I don't freak out when people touch me. I can talk to anyone for any reason, even on the phone in Spanish, even if it's a girl or a person who wants money from me. That's just the things you'd notice easily.

 I had a my second-to-last interview with President King on Monday. He asked me about how I've come to be converted to the gospel, or how I've progressed so far. It's a theme I've entertained a lot looking out on my mission. The biggest change is not how much I live the gospel. I think I always more or less was "living" it. But I've made it an inside force outward, not an outward mold on my actions. That way is a start, but it isn't the tenth of the power and joy that is the real gospel.

 I feel like I can't teach what I've learned. I wonder a lot if most people get to the conclusions that I have. I didn't even hear of the higher concept of it in Church except from a few specific people, all of which had a bigger impact than average on my testimony, for example, Brother Troyer, Brother Leavitt, both good seminary teachers, Adam Dunn from Saint George, and a few scout leaders in their moments.

 I keep coming back to my patriarchal blessing - it is pretty obvious that I will work with youth. Is this why? If I can communicate even a part of the Real Christianity that I have learned here, I'll help anyone who can understand it. That's it's effect - everyone needs it, everyone benefits from it, everyone is a part of it. So in effect, I know why I'm here, I know how long more I'll be here - all I need to do is finish it well. So I'm just going to keep being busy for a while longer.

 Have a good week on me,
Elder A Conrad Crist

 Note A I'll try to register here. I'll let you know if anything doesn't work. I really can't research for scholarships here. Do you think I can go in right as I get home to look for them?

Heading into Fall as we head into Spring

Hey, what do you know, it's just getting not-hot here!

The majority of the new missionaries that are coming are actually going to double up in pensions we have already, which calls for more stuff that we have to take out to the pensions, but not a new pension. We actually only have two of those at this moment. One is in the middle of nowhere (search for El Monte, Chile). We're renting it from a lady who'd never even heard of contracts before now. The other is actually owned by the same person, so it's a pretty safe change.

That said, there is still a good amount of stuff to do. We have to move another carfull of stuff to Melipilla, my old stomping grounds. I think the main part of it is going to be over this week. At the same time, though, I have to teach Elder Fuentealba, the new senior missionary, how to do the finances. And how to work with the pickiest, finickiest Access database ever to take up space on a terrestrial hard drive. Lots of internet and Excel for a guy born in 1938. Even so, he is really doing well. It takes a long time for him to get something, but he's much better (as he was an accountant) than I am at the real accountancy parts. He was all kinds of executive and master accountant IN THE 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s, including working for the church for the 80s and 90s as the Chief of Purchasing in the Chile Area Office. His wife was a homemaker, or in spanish, an owner of the house. She is sorting mail and taking medical calls, but she has a hard time doing any computer things, so I help her do her medical log like a secretary taking dictation. She's already got a thing going with the missionaries as kind of the grandma of the mission. I think she really likes that.

I still keep graphs, computers, and legal. All that Handel on the Law has really paid off. It's really quite an experience to be a tool of God in a way that is almost completely not spiritual. But I like it. I am pretty sure God is helping us, because we never fail in what we need for the mission. We needed a way to assemble two years of retention data that no one knew how to use. It has to do with how many people who were recently baptised are still coming, how well the wards are recommending inactives to be taught, and how often the Ward Mission Leaders are meeting with the missionaries. The main purpose of the data is to report to stake and district leaders on how well their wards are working. We needed a way to present it by ward hierarchically below take and by date to show when things didn't happen that should have. After looking at it for an hour or two and messing around with dumb graphs and an Access database, I half-designed and half-stumbled upon a way to do it that goes beyond our wildest dreams. Out of nothing I set it up into a "Pivot Table", which I'd never heard of before. And it worked exactly like we wanted. There was a little data cleaning to do - for example, taking out data that came from 2174... I mean, we understand faith and everything, but 2174? I think it was even on the 30th of February. - but it's all fixed now. (Are you getting that I'll probably be a Young Men's leader or in Family History forever? I am.)

Even President King has said to us, "You know, you really need to work in your sector, but I understand that these next two weeks are going to be difficult. Just do your best to stay out and visit those people." What I mean with that is to excuse myself for not being appreciably spiritual for you this week. In two months or so I am almost certainly out of here, and I'll be back to a short sprint to the finish in the normal missionary world.

I'm just now putting together how much I needed to come into the office. I've had to learn to keep studying in a more chaotic environment. I've learned how to be firm with people and not be afraid of calling them to oppose them. I was also getting sick of the mission daily routine, and that routine is completely gone in the office. It was a long and much-needed break from the monotony. Now when I go back, I'll know how little is left and not have time to get bored. In other words, It will be like getting to five hundred meters from the end of a 5K and sprinting and beating tons of people who'd passed you farther back because you know the end is right there and after that you don't have to run any more when you finish. It will be a glorious end.

But for now, I am God's gopher.

Elder A Conrad Crist

Note A

I don't get Riley's letters, except for those he writes to me directly. If someone could add me, that would be cool. (I read fast; don't let anyone not send something because they're afraid of taking all my time.)

Note B

When is registration again? Remember, I'm a Junior, not a Freshman, so I should have an advantage somewhere in there.