You could fill a mini sticky-note with the tallies of times I fell.
There are lots of hills and...well, just ground..if you are me, to slip on! Here in Chile, to say something like, ''You ate it.'' They say ''Compró tierra'' or 'He bought land.' I'm pretty sure in just a little time I will have bought all of Patagonia. I guess it's not too expensive! Just a few bruises and concussions is all :)
But this week the pain proved worth it because breaking the ice makes a good ice-breaker! And I'm not kidding! We made a lot of contacts through my falls, not like it was my intention, but it went in our favor after all. So after this week I kind of got the hang of things maybe. The trick is to put panties over your shoes to cause friction (and by panties I mean Nylon tight things, not underwear. It's just that here in Chile, tights are panties, so that was the manner of our instruction of how not to fall). And everyone does it. Even the men. And it works! You still have to walk like penguins.
Yes, just a clarification, there are not penguins here. Because they come in the summer. And right now it is winter.
Patagonia just has human penguins. It's a good mental picture I'm going to keep in my memory box of my mission forever. It's been fun to just look around the town down the street and watch the waddling people go about their day. It's almost as entertaining as watching penguins at the zoo.
It's probably more entertaining for the Patagonian people watching me waddle around.... hahaha but it's a fun ice breaker with strangers or even just small talk before lessons. A lot of the small talk has naturally morphed into ''So did you fall yet?'' or ''Did you buy land yet?''
And now when you leave from somewhere instead of saying "Que le vaya bien" or something like that, everyone says ''no se caiga!'' Which is changing it all from Have a good day basically to Don't fall! And everyone says it!
haha
Axel's baptism!!! And it snowed! His dad came to church for the first time in 25 years! Almost all of the ward came. His mom, who didn't want him to be baptized ever, and then a little later decided it was okay as long as he got baptized in the catholic church first, and then wasn't okay with it, came and talked to us afterward. She told us that she felt something really different and couldn't be happier for Axel. She said she wasn't anticipating to feel so pleased and touched to see her son be baptized. She's going to come to church next week!
After the baptism we were walking outside and it had snowed a little bit outside. Some of the primary kids started throwing snowballs at us and we all had a SNOWBALL FIGHT until there really weren't any more scraps to pick up. Axel's mom was taking pictures of it all and laughing. When we were getting ready to leave, Axel's dad ran over to us and asked if he could get a picture of us for to remember. It was a good day. I enjoyed it a lot. I really like Axel. He's a superstar and such a smart, good, righteous 11 year old. He'll be an awesome priesthood holder. It was quite a pleasure to teach him.
This week we had intercambios and I stayed here in Patagonia with Hermana Figueredo from Argentina. She's great!!! It was an interesting day because I have a terrible sense of direction so finding houses included lots of circles and laughs.
THE WIND IS BACK and we almost were pushed down to the ground four times.
And the South American Soccer Championship started and Chile was playing that day. So there were absolutely no citas! Which was an interesting comparison to last week when we had 9 to 11 appointments three separate days! haha so we tried doing a lot of contacts or recontacts but the outside world is like walking in a twilight zone when there is a soccer game. The whole day people are just in their houses or go to other peoples houses and no one answers to missionaries! hahaha There is another game tonight, so that will be interesting haha. One of our investigators, Ociel, told us to come find him in the next month after the championship is over! hahahaha Chileans love soccer! It's awesome.
Intercambios were great nonetheless!
A few days ago we went to the house of a woman we contacted a few weeks ago named Angelica. She was very easy to talk to and invited us in. After talking to her for a little we asked if we could share something with her and start with a hymn. She started laughing and gave us a note in advance that she will probably laugh and she was apologizing in advance because she just couldn't handle the fact that two ''gringa angels'' were going to be in her house singing to her! hahah
Well so we sang Lead Kindly Light and she didn't laugh. She cried. We said a prayer and she said that she felt different. She told us that the first time we contacted her was the precise moment that she had come back from the hospital finding out that she had a miscarriage and felt hurt and just sad and then we knocked. Then she told us she was amazed at the maturity that we carry and the feeling (of the spirit) that we brought to her heart. It was very neat to see such a drastic change in the way she was treating us, or I guess her attitude after we invited the spirit with a hymn.
We have another cita with her and she invited to make lunch for us! She is very excited to learn! It was a special experience for us all :)
Embarrassing moment of the week:
We were eating almuerzo with the family Frías and talking about embarrassing moments. The grandma was telling about how she was eating at her mother-in-laws for the first time, well first time meeting her then future mother in law and she spilled her tea all over the table. That was her most embarrassing moment.
Well, we were eating Casuela, a soup thing with steak, cracked wheat, carrots, and corn on the cob, and pototoes. But all of the things are served whole inside of the soup so you have to eat the soup and then cut the stuff and eat it. It's really yummy, but you have to cut the corn off of the cob. It's not very easy. Anyway to make a long story short, I was cutting the corn off the cob and my knife slid and my fork holding the cob up slid through the bowl shoving ALL OF EVERYTHING ALL OVER MY FACE AND MY SHIRT and skirt and everything.... hahaha Everyone looked at me and we were all silent and then I said, ''At least you aren't my mother-in-law!'' And we all laughed a lot. And I ate the few kernels of corn left in my bowl and we went on our merry way of being missionaries after going home and changing.
That's all I got for now! IT SNOWED TODAY AND HASN'T STOPPED! It's magical. And beautiful and I love it! It makes up for the four hour sunlight days!
I love you! and I love being a missionary in the end of the world IN the end of the world.
Con mucho Cariño,
Hermana Olson
P.S. next week we will be writing on Tuesday.
P.S.S. Daniel you look way older than 13. Stop growing.
Dad, my excellent wonderful Dad. Happy Father's Day. I love you.
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