E-mail

Hola!!  Thanks for the weather forecast Dad - it has been getting stinking hot down here!  And the truck's AC is broken, so it gets pretty tough to drive around!  Think I will have to go get that fixed pretty soon here!  It got up to about 98 two days ago and this is stilll just spring time - hopefully it does not get too much hotter though!  Well, this week was just a pretty good normal week for a pensionist, haha.  Just lots of driving around!  One of the Senior Missionaries has been going around with me a little bit more though, so that has been fun.  He is kinda like my grandpa on the mission.  I have gotten to know him pretty good over the last couple of weeks.  He always sneaks me out of the office and takes me to lunch, haha.

   We had changes this last weekend so it got pretty crazy again, but we were a lot more prepared this time so it wasn't as bad.  And the day after President saw that we were all pretty tired so he invited us all over and he cooked hamburgers and we just relaxed at his house a while - that was pretty fun!  He has been awesome to have as a president. He really does love and care for all his missionaries a lot!  This week should be pretty fun too.  Thursday is actually gonna be our p-day, so that is when I will be writing.  And then Thursday in the evening everybody from the office is gonna head up to President's house to have a big Thanksgiving dinner, so that should be pretty sweet!  I definitely get a little bit of special treatment being here in the office! haha.  I hope you guys have fun going over to Carrie's for Thanksgiving!  Don't get stuck in a big snow storm going across Wyoming!!

   Yup, it was President Gonzalez that came to speak to us - he is a pretty funny guy.  I think he has given a talk in conference recently hasn't he??  Pretty crazy that Josh is already home from his mission!  That went by pretty stinking fast!  It is crazy to think that Cameron and Blake only have 5 and 6 months left!  Crazy how fast that has gone!

   My comp is gonna start driving lessons with a place this week so that should be pretty interesting!  President wants him to be driving before I leave the office, so I hope he is a fast learner!  I am kinda scared to drive in downtown Santiago with someone that is recently learning how to drive, haha.  Anyways, you guys better say lots of prayers for me when that starts!!

   And for Christmas, well the only thing I can really think of that would be sweet would be some of those blue diamond flavored almonds!  One of the senior couples brought them from the states and man they tasted good!!  Oh, and a United States soccer jersey would be pretty sweet!  I have no idea which one or how much they cost, but that would be pretty cool if you could find anything like that.  And about the CD - we can play CD's. I can put them on the computer here in the office and put them on my ipod and stuff.  And musical instruments.  Well I guess we could!  There are some people that have them here.  Hey, how hard is the harmonica??  To play like some hymns or something??  Elder Harman has a violin and we heard a sweet harmonica -viloin duet.  Does it take a while to get kinda good? 

   Well, everything is going pretty good here - still happy and just chugging along here in the office!  I hope everyone is doing good back home!  It is great to hear from ya!!  Have a great week this week!!

Elder Moser

E-mail

Hola!  Well Dad, those were some pretty sweet pictures you had from California!  Got a little jealous about the Mustang though, haha.  Looks like way too much fun!!  And those are some pretty pictures of the coast.  It is crazy how much some of the coast looks like Chile!  Looks like you guys just drove down the coast of Chile!  But the boats in the harbor are waaay nicer than the ones here, haha.  I am glad that you guys were able to have a good trip though - looked like a lot of fun!  This week has probably been one of the coolest weeks of my mission!  Some pretty cool stuff happened.  It started on Sunday when we had the Area President come to a Stake Conference with the Temple President here in Maipu.  Elder Harman and I were in charge of welcoming him in and walking him in so that was pretty cool.  He is a super good speaker, and I learned a lot from him.  Then two days later on Tuesday we attended a 4-mission Mission Conference with guest speaker Elder Jeffery R Holland!  That was pretty sweet!  He mainly talked  about how missionaries need to stay strong after the mission and if we don't, the whole two years was a waste.  He used a pretty sweet scripture that I had never seen used like this before. He said everything pretty straight forward, and he talked about the scripture in Joseph Smith History where it says "they draw near to him with their lips but their hearts are far from him" and he said this was first said for people in the time of Joseph Smith when all the churches were preaching different stuff, but then he also refers to many things, and one of them is the missionaries in our time.  He said for two years young men draw near to him with their lips and they say what they need to say, but really their hearts are far from him, and they never do become converted, and fall away and become a burden to the Church.  It was a very powerful talk.  Every missionary in the place had their eyes wide open, that is for sure - pretty cool experience!  It was held in a chapel over on the east side of the city and there were over 900 missionaries there!  It was a great talk.  That was the first time I have seen him live I think and man he talks with a lot of power.  It is a pretty cool feeling with that many missionaries in the room and with the spirit so strong and stuff.  Definitely an experience I will never forget!  I was able to see my old roommate, Daniel Gleave, there too - he is over in the east mission so that was pretty sweet to see him.  So that was a pretty good start to the week, then we just had some really interesting things happen later on in the week.  My testimony grew a ton of the power of the Priesthood and that it really is a real thing.  I wanted to write a letter about the experience I had, but I would feel kinda weird writing an e-mail about it, so you should get that there in a few weeks. 

     Wow, I thought the pictures of Cayden were pretty crazy!  That kid is growing up!  He looks bigger and bigger every time you send a picture - he is gonna be able to beat me up when I get back!  Payback for all the picking on him I did, haha.  I better watch out!

     Today one of the senior couples invited us to go eat with them so we are pretty excited for that!  She said that we are gonna eat funeral potatoes and pulled pork sandwiches with carrot cake for dessert!  Sounds pretty good to me!!  Hope it tastes like the real stuff!!! :)  But they just called and said that they are waiting for us, so it looks like we've got to get goin!  But I hope everyone is doing great!!  I love and miss you all! Have a great week this week!!

Elder Moser

E-mail and photos

November 9, 2013

Hola!  Wow, Dad, sounds like you and Mom are having a pretty good week!  And a convertible Mustang!?  Dang!  Sounds like the best part, haha.  I bet it is nice getting out and enjoying some of the nice weather down there!  You guys should come pick me up when I am done and rent a convertible Mustang so we can drive down the coast of Chile ;) haha.  It is not as fun when you have to do it in a Ford Ranger like I do right now!  But I definitely enjoy the driving a lot!  My comp does not have a license yet, so I am still driving everywhere we go.  I am liking that part a lot!  Downtown Santiago has been pretty crazy, but I feel like I will be able to drive anywhere after that! 

     Well the week has been pretty good.  It was pretty stressful because an apartment that we had for the senior couple that is coming in on Tuesday fell through, and it is super tough to find apartments there.  But we were able to do it with some miracles from the Lord!  Not sure how we were able to get it.  Usually takes a couple weeks, but we were able to find an apartment and sign the contract and finalize everything in three days - pretty sweet stuff!  That apartment has been what I have pretty much been working on all week so not too much else too exciting happened, haha.  We were able to teach the owners lesson 1 though, so that was pretty fun.  It is always really good when we have the opportunity to do that.  People just think it is so weird that a twenty year old kid is here in Chile not getting paid by the Church doing what I am doing - like taking care of all the houses and stuff.  They always ask why we would do something like this so that leads perfectly into teaching them lesson one, haha. 

     The realtor for the owners was talking to us after and starting showing us pictures of her daughter and told us she wanted us to meet her so that she could go home with us when we went home, haha.  That was kinda weird!  Definitely gonna stay away from that realtor from now on!

     It has been pretty sweet being able to learn everything I have learned from doing all this housing stuff.  I had no idea about a lot of this stuff before and it is helping me a lot to understand a lot more about the business world and stuff.  It really has turned out to be a good way to share the gospel too.  I never teach in my sector, but I am always teaching people from all over Santiago.  At least helping people get a lot better idea of what the Church is.  A lot of people have no idea and have some really strange views on the Church.  That has been something pretty interesting to see after coming out of Star Valley and Rexburg.  I can definitely understand people's views on the Church now. Helps me a lot in becoming a better missionary! 

     Anyways I hope everyone is doing good!  Have a great week this week!  It is always good to hear from ya!

Elder Moser

E-mail and letter from President

Hola!  Wow, the weather is looking pretty good for this week!  It has been starting to get pretty warm here.  Makes me want to get outside out of the office some more!  This next change we are only going up 2 missionaries, so it looks like we are gonna be able to get out and teach some lessons finally!  Should be pretty good!  I think I have forgotten how a little bit!  Hopefully I will be able to learn how pretty quick again!

   Hey thanks for sending the package Dad.  I will be sure to let you know when it gets here.  And man, chocolate sounds like pretty good packing material to me!  I've got no problem with that!  Speaking of packages, this week I should be sending something home for you and Mom for Christmas,  so let me know when that gets there.  I think you'll like it.  Chileans can do some stuff pretty good!!  You will see what I mean when you get it.  Hadn't seen anything very similar to it before, and I might end up having to get me some too!  Just hope I can get it out of the country!  All of the government offices have been having a ton of strikes down here lately.  The place where we get our visas and stuff and the post office was shut down for a long time, so it was pretty tough for us missionaries, and some people almost had to go home early because of it.  And now everyone else in Chile is starting to go on strikes, and even the store where I buy all my housing supplies shut down for a while.  Just kinda like a chain reaction I guess! 

   Well everything is going pretty good here!  Nothing too crazy happened this week, just kinda the same old office life, haha.  We did find a juicer in our pension so we went to the street market and bought a ton of carrots and apples and lemons and we have been juicing every morning for breakfast!  Thought Mom would be pretty proud of me for that one, haha.  Here you can buy a kilo or a little over two pounds of apples for about 80 cents, and carrots are like 60 cents a kilo and lemons you can buy for 150 pesos a kilo, or about 30 cents.  Pretty cheap stuff!  So that makes it nice to do the whole juicing thing.  Definitely makes me feel better throughout the day.  It is pretty funny how cheap some of the fruit can be but then any other food here is at least double than what it is in the states.  A hamburger at McDonalds is 8-10 bucks for a combo.  And milk is about 6 bucks a gallon and stuff like that.  Crazy how people can pay that much for food.  The minimum wage here is less than a buck an hour.  Not sure how people do it, guess that is why people are never home, just constantly working!  Sure are blessed to live where we do I guess!

   It looks like everyone had a pretty good Halloween this year!  Pretty sweet costumes!  I forgot it was Halloween till we went out that night and everybody was dressed up funny.  I was kinda weirded out for a minute before I realized what day it was, haha. Sure do miss the pumpkin seeds though!

Well we got to get going, but I hope you all have a pretty good week this week!  I love and miss you all!

Elder Moser