Week #13 - Transfers this week, getting a new companion, and Baptism!

Hey!

Everythings still going great. Yesterday, being Easter, just felt like a normal day for us. It really didn´t feel special or anything, just another day as a missionary. But it sounds like you guys had a good Easter!

But looks like I don´t need to write you guys anymore, Hermana Malva can do it. Haha no just kidding but yeah the baptism happened and I had the opportunity to baptize which was an awesome experience. Also in Thursday it was Chile vs Argentina so we decided to wear our Chile stuff. It was pretty awesome. But the bbq is super rare and I think it was my first one. It was really good steak, but that doesn´t happen a lot trust me.

Haha I thought that I told everyone that I wouldn´t be back for 2 years but I guess they forgot. When I´m thinking about missionary work and am focused I don´t have any hard time with missing things of the past but when I think about it yeah I definitely miss it. Definitely miss the video games, music, and movies. It is pretty hard. Last night we went to one of our investigators houses so that Elder Villegas could say his goodbyes and take píctures and they were watching the new Deadpool movie. Man I really miss movies. But no it really isn´t that bad, I don´t have to worry about the old life at all.

Yeah I saw those snow pictures. That´s crazy, end of March and all that snow. Definitely wish that we got snow or even rain. I like the cold weather so hopefully that the weather will change soon and will be a little more cold here but I highly doubt it because it is always hot here.

Yeah transfers are this week. This transfer was 7 weeks because of the change in the MTC´s of 3 weeks now instead of 2 weeks, but they are usually every 6 weeks. Usually a trainer stays with his hijito for 2 transfers for training so we weren´t expecting a transfer. But he has been here for 6 months so I guess his time is up here in Gabriela Mistral (this is our sector and ward not sure if I had mentioned this before). Elder Villegas is going to Arica as a Zone Leader right now though which is pretty awesome. But as I am writing this right now we are still together. He leaves tonight at 9:30 and my new companion arrives at 9:45. I don´t really know him all that well I only know his name and where he is from. His name is Elder Alcantara and he is from Spain. He was born in Peru but only was in Peru for 3 years so yeah he is from Spain. He has 7 months in the mission. And that´s just about all I know about him. Hopefully we will work well together and that he´ll be a good trainer to finish my training. But the thing is, is that he is going to be new to this area as well, I will be the one to have to make plans and to guide the sector which should be interesting and hard. I think that I will definitely learn a lot from this. Should be a good humbling experience.

We actually went on the hike this morning which was pretty cool. Was really, really crazy but was cool. A lot more happened that I won´t say right now, it is a story for after the mission... But don´t worry everything is good now and I have pictures and even a video that I will try to send to you guys. Hopefully the file of the video won´t be too big to where I can´t send. But yeah it was fun and I definitely learned a ton from it.

Thanks for sharing D y C 11:12-13. It was something that I needed for today, thanks! But I´ll try to read that talk one day when I have time to do so.

EDITORS NOTE: This is the talk that I shared with Jordan. https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/10/the-holy-ghost-as-your-companion?lang=eng

Your story in Tahoe is so true. Happens a lot to missionaries everywhere in the world. Especially here...

So we had zone conference in Thursday with President Dalton. Now we are studying lesson 1 about the restoracion(I forgot how to spell it in english) for 30 days straight and practicing with our companions everyday. I didn´t really realize how powerful the first lesson about the restoracion of the gospel through Joseph Smith. It is super powerful, we watched a video of an example from a conference with a ton of different apostoles. Elder Cook was being taught by these two men about lesson 1 and even Elder Cook felt the spirit super strong and cried a little. Even though he has probably heard this lesson thousands of times. So for the next 30 days our focus is on studying lesson 1 and nothing more to become more powerful teachers because lesson 1 is the most powerful of them all. I know that the church of Jesus Christ is true and I know that through Joseph Smith it was restored. The story of Joseph Smith and the first vision is so powerful and can bring anyone to the knowledge of the truth.

Will definitely miss you as well for the Priesthood session of conference. But I can´t wait for conference, there is a room for gringos in the stake center to listen to conference is english haha. Should be good!

Love you guys so much! I´m always praying for you guys! May the Lord bless you mucho!

Love
Elder Newkirk

Baptism!

Baptism!

Hike in Antofagasta with Elder Villegas

View from the top of the hike! WOW what a view!

Week#12 3 months into the mission!

Today´s been good. Went and did visa stuff for my companion, cleaned the house, played ping pong, ate empanadas, but didn´t have the chance to go hiking today. I´m hoping soon but I´m not sure when. I actually have the exact opposite of great pictures, I don´t have any. I think I´m going to not send all the pictures that I have in one week but start to spread them out a little more so I actually have some pictures to send every week. But yeah sorry, don´t have any pictures for today. 

This last week was great, not a ton happened but it has been good. One thing that happened is that the baptism on Saturday will be happening which is awesome. So the story is on Saturday we went to visit the family to see if Soledad (the girl who is getting baptized) was ready to be baptized for this Saturday. She said she still didn´t know and still had some doubts. But yesterday after church something changed for her, I have no clue what happened but she now wants to be baptized this Saturday. So yeah we have a baptism on Saturday! 

With the question of if we made some solid contacts, yes I believe that we have. One thing that Elder Cook said when he came to the Antofagasta mission before I arrived is that the key for this mission is through the teens. I think this week we contacted 5 teens and I think they are all curious. A lot of the teens have really good questions and are searching for the truth. With the adults they have strong beliefs in whatever they believe in. One of the teens this week actually speaks a little bit of English, he was a foreign exchange student who went to New Zealand and learned some English for 4 months. We only talked with him outside of his door, but talked with him for a good 30 minutes, he is super cool and also plays Hearthstone haha. But all the teens that we contacted are awesome and definitely are key. They are key because after the teens join the church the parents usually see a change in their kid and want to know why. So that is when the family opens up and we can start teaching all the family. It is really great and cool to see happen!

I guess there is one interesting story that happened to me this week. We went to try and contact someone to see if they were home. They weren´t home but the father was. He said that he wasn´t interested at all in any religion so we told him that was ok and that we wanted to leave him with a pass a long card. He said that he didn´t believe in anything that we gave away either. He started a conversation with us on how there isn´t any sin in this world and a lot of different weird stuff that he was just trying to confuse us with. I really didn´t understand all that was being said but my companion explained everything after, because I still don´t understand everything in Spanish. But yeah basically the conversation ended with him and us saying see ya in judgement day, shook hands, and left. So yeah that was pretty interesting. 

Yeah mom told me about Hermana Malva looking mom up and stuff on Facebook. She has a son right now out on a mission serving in Peru, but all of their family is awesome.

How proselyte works for us is if we have a name and a house we go and visit. We have lists of old registries of people that we can visit, references, people we contact in the streets. But as long as we have a name and a house we visit the person to see if they want to listen to the gospel. It really just depends on the area and everything on how you contact people. We don´t do a lot of contacting people on the street. We usually just go and knock on houses of people that we have names for. But yeah we don´t set stuff up in the street or anything like that.

Yeah we have ward council after church on Sundays, when we can we go to them. Like this Sunday we couldn´t go because we had a meeting with someone but the ward mission leader was there to talk for the missionaries. We also have meetings with the ward mission leader every week which is great too. 

I haven´t gotten too many messages from others but from a few people yeah I´ve gotten messages.

Things from my studies, great question. Haha no I´ve just been reading through the Book of Mormon, Preach my Gospel, and Jesus the Christ. Preach my Gospel I have been studying how to be a better missionary and also how to teach lessons better. In the Book of Mormon I have been learning a lot about my question of how to become a better missionary. And in Jesus the Christ I have been learning a ton more about the life of Jesus and the time of him. Jesus the Christ is a great book. But honestly I don´t have anything super specific and don´t have all my books on me right now. 

For companion study you read pages from the mission manual, plan lessons for the day, there is a booklet for new missionaries and trainers that we do, and also do practices with lessons and inviting people to do things. That is basically companion study in a nutshell. 

We have a set schedule for studying. We have one hour of personal study everyday, right now we have 2 hours for companion study because we have to do the first 12 weeks manual for new missionaries and trainers, and about 1 hour for language study. Depends on the day how much time we actually have but this is what is scheduled to be. 

Sounds like it will be a busy week for you guys but sounds like is will be fun!

Yeah I heard about Grandpa O, scary. But yeah it sounds like he is doing better though! 

That´s also good that Grandma N is getting better and is able to walk around with a cane now.

Why did everything happen when I left? Haha

But I will definitely be praying for them both!

Oh one thing that I forgot to mention is that if you haven´t seen the video for Easter that the church has put together you should. It is really good and you can just find it on lds.org, it is only 2 minutes long. We have been sharing this video with a lot of different people, it is really good!

Here is where the video is -- https://www.mormon.org/easter?cid=HP_SU_3-13-2016_dMIS_fSPC_xLIDyL1-A_

Love you guys a lot! Hope you guys have a great week!

Love

Elder Newkirk

EDITORS NOTE: We are sharing some pics that Sister Malva in Antofagasta sent to us. Technology is incredible now days. 

Elder Newkirk and Elder Villegas eating lunch

Elder N and V's mamita who does their cooking and laundry.

Week# 11 weekly update from Elder Newkirk

Hey! Everything´s is still going great! Yeah you guys are now 4 hours behind instead of 5 because I don´t believe there is a time change here like there is in the States. Haha I wouldn´t call the weather nice, it is hot everyday. But is definitely is more humid heat, it isn´t dry at all that I have noticed. I haven´t had to use lotion at all and my hands have never been this smooth as they are now. But it might be a completely different story in different areas of the mission.

This week was pretty good. Yesterday we had Stake Conference and for this conference we got to listen to the President of the 12 Apostoles who gave a transmission to all of Chile. It was super cool because he gave his talk to us in Spanish, it didn´t have to be translated like other talks. I had no idea that he knew Spanish like he does haha. He talked about the importances of the commandments and especially tithing and temples. It was a really good talk for the people of Chile.

About the baptism, we should know this week if it is going to happen on the 26th or not. She doesn´t know whether she wants to be baptized or not. She is 14 but a lot of her family are members who just became active again in the church. The funny thing about people in Chile is when we meet them, and this is what happened with this family too, is we don´t know if they are members of the church or not. When Elder Villegas and the companion before me started teaching this family they had no clue that they were members. In the second lesson they asked them to be baptized but they responded that they were already members of the church. It happens a lot here, there are a ton of less actives. The statistic here in Chile is every 1 in 10 members are active. But yeah she is a part of this family but doesn´t know if she wants to be baptized or not. She likes the church and has attended a lot with her family but doesn´t know, but I think that she will. But yeah that´s the update on the baptism.

Yes, I got my haircut from Sebastian, he did a great job! I was actually surprised because he didn´t use fancy equipment or anything. But I am super picky about my hair I know, but he did good. He told me this week that he wants to open his own barber shop in California near the Warriors stadium and whenever the Warrior´s play he would close up shop and go to the game haha. But first he has to finish high school. He left high school after the first year and is going back but during the night. He is honestly the best, he also comes with us at times which is awesome!

I got my Valentines package finally haha. I honestly don´t think it takes that long but it honestly just depends. Elder Villegas told me that one of his old companions received a package for Halloween in December so I honestly think that it just depends.

Haha you guys are already thinking about the Skype in May, you guys are more trunkee than I am! Trunkee is when a missionary misses home or thinks about home a lot or about the future of leaving the mission or anything.

My shoes have definitely taken a beating, I´ve just been wear the slip on shoes pretty much all the time. I use the other shoes when I go to church or to conferences or anything nicer when I have to wear a suit because these shoes are a lot more clean and not beat up like my other ones. 

Our church building isn´t big but it is nice and works well for everyone. It is definitely a lot smaller than the home ward, but the Stake building is actually really nice and more like the home ward.

For teaching actually lessons we usually get around 15 lessons a week. But is honestly depends on the week and if people want to hear from us or not. We talk to a lot of different people in the streets but it really isn´t an actual lesson.

The question about my Spanish again... Haha. No spanish is definitely getting a lot easier. I still have a hard time understanding some of the people here though. There are some people who actually pronounce their words and I can understand the concept of what they are saying, not all of the words but the concept. But there are others who don´t pronounce anything and I can´t understand, I might be able to pick out a few words here or there but I have no clue what they are trying to say. I´m getting a lot more confident in speaking Spanish now though, I can get my point across mas o menos. But once I start to understand what everyone is saying it will get a lot easier from there. I definitely know that at points that I have the gift of tongues, there is absolutely no other way that I would be able to learn Spanish this fast. I took 3 years of Spanish through school and remember nothing of it. I have learned probably 100x more Spanish in 2 1/2 months than I did in 3 years of Spanish in school. It is really crazy!

So one thing that I learned for myself last night is that our sector is pretty dangerous especially in the night time. My companion has told me that our sector is pretty dangerous but I never believed him because I hadn´t seen anything really dangerous. But last night right outside out house someone got robbed. The guy who got robbed was in a wheelchair. The robber knocked him out of his wheelchair and robbed him. This happened during our planning for the next day and we heard a lot of shouting going on outside. It was pretty crazy. Also Elder Villegas told me that on new years there was a huge fight outside with columbians and chileans with knives at like 5 am. So yeah out area is a little dangerous but it´s fun! Don´t worry about me!

Love you guys so much!

Love

Elder Newkirk

This is the only photo that I have to send this week. Next week I think that we are going on a hike that I will get some really cool pictures of Antofagasta! So next week I should have some more to send. But this is a pirate ship that we found today, they do tours in it! I really wish that we could be able to do it but it´s a rule not to get in boats or to swim or whatever the rule is. But the pirate ship is super cool!

Week #10 singing solo "Happy birthday" in English (funny story inside)

This week went really well. We have appointments almost every day. Sometimes we don´t, but most of the days we are able to teach. We actually found a lot of people who want to listen to the Gospel which is great. One thing that is really hard for people is going to Church on Sunday´s. Our church starts at 3pm which is different from pretty much the rest of the wards in this mission. Usually Church here starts at 10am, but our ward starts at 3pm. A lot of people work on Sunday´s, a lot. There are a lot of people who are ready to be baptized and progress in the Church but they can´t go to Church. To be baptized there are 3 requirements, have the desire and testimony, get taught all the lessons, and go to Church 3 times. A lot of people have the first two requirements but the last one is the hardest for people. 

Spiritual experiences happen every single day that I notice. Another thing that Elder Bednar promised us in this conference, to the missionaries, is that we have the ability as missionaries to see small miracles that not even members would be even able to see. And I have definitely been able to see these small miracles, they are everywhere. One thing that happened this week is that I might have the opportunity the end of this month to be able to baptize, but we´ll see. I´ll talk more about this if I feel like the baptism will happen haha. But honesly not much has happened that has been super significant or anything that I can remember being significant this week. Sorry I need to be more spiritual in my emails and share more things that I have learned. I´ll try to make it better next week.

I´ve emailed Trenton a little bit, not too much but I have been able to read his blogs. Sounds like he is having a completely different experience than I am haha. But sounds like he is doing really well and having a great time in his mission. And yeah, I have been able to see the posts that you post to the blog! Thanks!

So as far as meetings go, we have a district meeting every Tuesday. There are only 4 of us in our district. Me, Elder Villegas, Elder Abraham, and Elder Jennings(the district leader). And on the second Tuesday of the month we have a meeting with the zone. And every 3 months there is the big zone conference with President Dalton. The conference is this month. He travels to all the areas of the mission to give this conference. All the missionaries in the area go to this and it just depends who is all the the area. Elder Wild and Elder Jennings are both in my area and I have been able to see them once. We all met in the same chapel for the conference with Elder Bednar so I do get to have the opportunity to see them every once in a while.

Everythings going good with Elder Villegas, we get a long really well he is a great companion/trainer.

Fast and testimony meeting was great, I don´t think there was a time of silence. Sacrament meeting had about 51 people in it and was pretty good. This was the last weekend of the summer for most people. A majority of the kids went back to school today so hopefully next week we will have more people since everyone will be in school and at home. 

Haha yeah I kind of know a lot that has been happening in the NBA. There is a recent convert who got baptized like a month and a half ago who is way into basketball as well. He is a fan of Golden State and shows me standings and scores every once in a while. He also showed me some highlights of the Warriors beating the Thunder twice this last week...... Also showed me some of the dunks from the dunk contest this year. Holy Cow some of the dunks were insane. But he is 18 years old and has a ton of tattoos and what not but he is awesome. Oh his name is Sebastian, but we actually played a little basketball with him today and I think we are planning to get our haircut by him today for free. He wants to own his own haircut salon but he does ours for free so we´ll see how good he is...

So I live towards the north of Antofagasta. our sector is street Humachuco(don´t know how to spell it) until Heros of the Concepcion. But I don´t remember the other 2 streets that our sector goes to. A lot of dirt and every house has a gate. Feet are holding up, a lot of walking every day. We walk to everywhere in our sector, but if we want to leave our sector on our Pdays we take the bus or a taxi. The bus is a lot cheaper but a lot slower. So it just depends on how much time and money we have. Shoes are holding up as well, let´s just hope they last the next 2 years, but we´ll see. I honestly don´t think that they will. Probably around a year or so. But everythings going fine right now.

Well you guys have fun in Florida in April. Sounds like it will be a lot of fun and that you guys will have a lot to be able to do. 

But yeah the pig blood story is pretty funny. No we were just walking in the streets, and this street is aparently known for the drugs and is just a bad street. But we were walking and he stopped us to talk and he was completely out of it. He was not in this world. He actually came up to us later in the day and asked us the same questions. He completely forgot our old conversation and just remembers the guys in white shirts and ties. It´s funny how an outfit completely changes who you are. If we are walking with normal clothes on and saying hi to people they usually just look at us or keep going. But when we wear our "church" clothes they repond and say hi and everything. 

Another thing that happened to me last night which was pretty funny that I´d like to share is that we got invited after church to go to a birthday party. It was the birthday party of Aylean who is a member but her soon to be husband(Oliver), who we have been teaching and who we are waiting on to get married to be baptized, isn´t a member. They are both awesome. They are in their early 20´s and have a little baby girl who is so cute. We were also able to give the baby a baby blessing yesterday too, me, my companion, and the bishop which was cool. But yeah it was her birthday but they got me to sing happy birthday, solo, in English which was pretty funny. 

So we go to this Negocio, which is a store in a house, to use the internet. I wouldn´t call it an internet cafe but they have nice computers and decent internet and they´re close so we just use them. It is also pretty cheap to use the internet. It is 500 pesos for one hour. We usually use 2 hours so it is only 1000 pesos. 

And also about the mail it works the same in every area of the mission. The Zone Leaders every month travel to Antofagasta to get mail for everyone in their zone. So I will get mail the second Tuesday of every month. Also since I´m in Antofagasta if I want to I can travel to the office on Pday to pick up mail too. But I´ll probably just always wait for the Zone Leaders to give out mail because the office is kind of far and we have to take either a bus or a taxi to get there...

Got to end it here. Love you all!

Love 

Elder Newkirk

EDITORS note: Elder Newkirk also emailed Hailey, and I just wanted to share what he wrote to her, cause I thought it was really good. It may help someone else!

One of my recommendations for you as a missionary (not as a brother) if you haven´t read the Book of Mormon all the way through is to read it. One thing that you guys probably didn´t know is that before my mission I hadn´t read through the Book of Mormon all the way... How terrible am I, but I have read through it now and I now I know why people always say to read it. It really is an amazing book and has strenthened my testimony a lot. Or reading your stuff for seminary is great too. All scripture is really good and helps with everything in life. But I expect you go to seminary every morning and just love it! Right? 

For us who have grown up in the church we don´t really see the importance of these things in life because we have always had it. But now being out on my mission I know that the Gospel changes lives completely and is such a blessing in our lives. It can help with any problems that you have or any stuggles that this life brings. I know that this life is hard and there is a lot more than just the Gospel. Trust me I miss a lot of the things of the world, especially video games and music. But I know that it might be hard to go to seminary or it might be hard to go to a YM thing(or whatever you girls do) or to go to Church or whatever it may be. But I know that if you take just a small part of our lives every day to the Gospel you will be blessed. I promise this to you! I love you soo much and I want the best for you in everything, in normal life, in school, in cheer, and in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Love you so much and miss you!

Elder Newkirk in front of the mission office

Nike Chile jacket

Nike Chile jacket

week #9 baptism

Yup, everything´s still going good! That´s awesome that Hailey took 1st place and won a bid to go to Summit! Great job! But it sounds like it was a lot of fun! And speaking of jackets I bought one today at the Nike store in the mall with some of the money that Grandpa/Grandma Oldroyd gave me. It is a Chile Fútbol jacket and it´s pretty sweet.

This week has been productive, it´s just hard to work when people aren´t there for times you set up with them or just lie and not do things that they say. We invite so many investigators to church and a lot of them say yes. Out of all the people we invited only one showed up which makes things hard. And it also makes it hard when a lot of the members don´t help a lot. We had a meeting this week with every leader of the ward but only the ward mission leader showed up. I love the members in our ward and they are all really strong but it seems sometimes like they just don´t care. But don´t get me wrong I absolutely love the ward and the members! One big thing that I have learned on my mission is the members play a huge role in missionary work. Sometimes members don´t see it but member are the key to missionary work. Apostoles have also said, that members should be the ones finding and the missionaries are the ones who teach.

The only interesting thing that happened to me this week was my first intercambio, or when you change companions and sectors for the day. We do intercambios with the district leader and his companion. I went up to the district leaders sector and worked with him for 24 hours and his companion changed places with me and worked in my sector with Elder Villegas. But during this intercambio, with Elder Jensen (who is from Canada and is a great Elder), we were walking in the worst street of the sector. There was a guy who stopped us who was completely gone. He had a bucket full of pig blood as well, he was trying to get us to go with him to see him kill another pig. It was pretty crazy. He was also trying to speak English with us which was pretty funny. I get a ton of people trying to speak English with me, but the only thing that they know how to say is "Hello, how are you?" I have also taught some people things if they ask me haha. We also have another intercambio but this time it is with the zone leaders. It is our turn to do intercambios with the zone leaders. Intercambios happen every last week of the month with the district and the zone leaders do a rotation with everyone every month. But pdays are usually just going out and buying things or going and playing sports or going and checking things out around Antofagasta or sleeping. Like today we recieved our money for the month of March so we went to centro to get out money then went to the mall and then the store. Then after that we went home and had like an hour before we left to email which is what I´m doing right now. So honestly pday is whatever you and your companion want to do, like we could leave early and go on a hike with other missionaries or do whatever. 

There are dogs here everywhere. On every single street there are some dogs. I feel bad for some of the dogs, Calvin definitely has it lucky. And it definitely makes me miss having Calvin. But people just buy puppies and when they grow up they put their dog out on the street and repeat. There are some dogs that have a ton of fleas and stuff and there are also some mean dogs. Not a lot of mean dogs but there are a couple.

I haven´t really seen any fleas, expect for on the dogs, but I know that there are some and my companion told me that the fleas are terrible in the winter time. But as far as spiders goes and other bugs they aren´t that bad. The only promient bug around are flies. There are soooooo many flies everywhere. The spiders here also aren´t that big or anything, but last night we actually had a pretty big one on the wall. But nothing really bigger than what there is in the States.

Spanish wise I feel like I´m getting a little more every single day. Still don´t understand a lot, I´ve been told that it takes about a month and a half to start understanding the concepts of what people are saying. It also depends a lot on who is talking. There some people who I can understand more than others. There are also some people who just sound like they are mumbling. My goal is to be good in Spanish in about 6 months, be able to understand what everyone says and be able to express myself how I want. I have heard a lot that it takes about 6 months to actually start feeling comfortable with Spanish and everything. It also depends on who is learning it too. So I guess I´ll find out when I acutally feel comfortable with Spanish. But for now still don´t understand a lot and don´t talk a whole lot.

Study is always great. I have been learning a lot from reading the Book of Mormon with one question. Through reading a lot of my answers have been about having faith. Always having the faith that everything will work out if we give all that we can give. As long as our lives are in harmony with the gospel and we are keeping the commandments God will help us. I also just started reading Jesus the Christ and it is such an amazing book. I´m only like 20 pages into it but it is soo great. If you want to learn more about Jesus Christ and a lot more I would read this book. Also another cool thing this week that happened last Wednesday is that we had the opportunity to listen to Elder Bednar. He talked with all the missionaries in the south of the South America. So Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay. He talked to a total of 6000 missionaries, which is 8% of all the missionaries in the world. He talked a lot about faith and having the faith that everything will come with time. One thing that he said that I really liked was that the Lord hastens his work we don´t, so if we are doing all that we can and nothing is working out not to put our heads down. I have learned so much from being a missionary and my testimony has grown so much.

Yeah we had the Baptism this Saturday. It was a baptism of an 11 year old who my companion taught before I showed up. She was baptised by her Grandpa and now we get to reteach the lessons to her after the baptism which should be good! I´ll send some pictures of the baptism and everything. One crazy thing, a miracle, that happened is that the other ward had a baptism before us at 3 and our baptism was at 6. They told us that they would keep the water in the baptisimal font for us so we wouldn´t have to worry about it. So we showed up at 5:30 to set up things and what not and there wasn´t any water in the font. Normally it takes about 2-2 1/2 hours to fill the font. It was filled and ready to go in an hour. Was pretty crazy for us but everything worked out!

Still haven´t gotten your package yet, I expect to get it next Tuesday. So how mail works here is that we recieve mail every second Tuesday of the month. The zone leaders on Thursday of the first week go and get mail for us and when we have meetings with the zone, which is every second Tuesday, they give us the mail. This is how it works in Antofagasta, I don´t know how it works with other areas of the mission but I know that it works like this here in Antofagasta. I´ll figure out if it the same in other areas as well and let you know next week. But that´s how it works here!

Love you guys a lot!

Love

Elder Newkirk

Elder Newkirk and his companion Elder Villegas 

Week #8 -- 2 months into the mission!

Well it´s buenos tardes for me right now, we usually email from 5-7ish and remember I´m 5 hours ahead of you guys haha. But this weeks been good, mission life definitely isn´t easy but its been good. The baptism actually didn´t happen this Saturday because the family couldn´t do it. But this next Saturday it is 100% happening and should be good.

I´m definitely learning and understanding more and more everyday. But I still am having a hard time understanding the Chileans. Especially the ones who don´t pronouce anything and it sounds like they are just mumbling. But I do understand more and more everyday. It´s funny, sometimes I will get compliments on my Spanish and sometimes people won´t even understand what I am saying. My companion speaks a little bit of English but not too much. But he definitely knows some English. Even though he knows a little English it is all Spanish all the time right now. What he usually did with his last companions is for one or two hours a day speak English so that he can learn more English. The Latino missionaries are encouraged to learn some English on their mission so we´ll probably start doing that soon. 

The people down here are really accepting of everything but they never keep their commitments. That is the one thing that every missionary here has is their investigators keeping their commitments. But God has given everyone their agency to do what they want. As long as I do my job by teaching and inviting the rest is up to them to follow through and actually look for an answer from God. I can´t transfer what I know to be true to others, they have to learn and recieve an answer from God themselves.

It is definitely interesting not having a ton of people at church like I´m used to. But we don´t have to prepare lessons or anything which is nice. There are teachers and whatnot still. I wish I could play the piano or something, it would definitely help keep us in tune and on the right speed. Another thing about Latinos is that they sing really fast and have a hard time staying on the right speed.

Yeah our mamita is a member of our ward and everything. The mamitas have to be a member of the church. The food sometimes changes but it is a lot of chicken, rice, etc.. It isn´t terrible but it definitely isn´t the best things that I have eatten, just a little bland. Sorry I probably won´t be coming home with a lot of recipies of any delicious things.

That´s awful what happened to Grandma. That picture doesn´t look to great. Hopefully she will be good to still go to Portland with you guys. I will definitely be praying for her and hoping that she gets better. 

One thing that you can tell Brother Cluff and the Young Men´s that I forgot to mention while in the CCM. But I wore the sunflower tie one day and I can´t tell you how many compliments that I got on my tie that day. I have never gotten so many people complimenting a tie. It was pretty funny because it was meant to be a funny/ugly tie but turns out it´s not.

Honestly there isn´t a lot of time to do a lot on pdays. They go by really fast and there really isn´t a ton of time to do stuff, but there are stuff to do. There are some hikes that we can go on that we plan on doing one pday. There is centro where there are a ton of shops and a mall and whatnot that I still want to go check out which we will probably do when we recieve more money in 2 weeks. But there is definitely stuff to do. I don´t know if I have mentioned this or not but there is a rule that we aren´t allowed to play soccer at all. Reason being is because there have been a few missionaries that have broken their legs playing and had to be sent home so the mission president put a rule. Everyone is hoping though once we recieve the new mission president that we´ll be able to play again. But we are allowed to play volleyball and non-competitive basketball, but there really isn´t a lot of time to do a lot. We´re also not allowed to go down to the beach during summer because you know temptations, but any other time of the year when there aren´t people there we are allowed. 

So how laundry works down here as well is that the mamitas do the laundry haha. So we really don´t have to do too much! There is usually one mamita for cooking and one mamita for laundry but our mamita does both. But yeah the mamitas do all the cleaning and the ironing and everything. We just give her our dirty clothes every Saturdays and Tuesdays to our mamita, which is really nice that there are muliple days of laundry.

The weather down here is pretty hot. But we do get to wear our short sleeves everyday, kinda wishing that I got some more short sleeves. We only have to wear our suits to important meeting with the mission president and on Sundays during church which is nice. But it is always hot down here but my companion was saying that during winter that it can get pretty cold so I guess I´ll find out when winter rolls around.

Scripture wise I am in 2 Nephi reading the Book of Mormon with just one question. The question that I´m reading with is how can I become a better missionary and lose myself in the work. I have been learning a lot with just one question in mind while reading. The one thing that pops up all the time in the scriptures so far is keeping the commandments of the Lord. Blessings always come after you have kept the commandments and after a trial of your faith. Not a lot of cool stories right now because I hardly understand any Chilean right now. But one thing that happened to me and my companion this week is while we were walking a guy stopped us. He was telling us how Joseph Smith wasn´t a prophet of God and showed us a scripture from the Bible and stuff. We just stood there and when he was done talking we just shook his hand and left. My companion actually knows a lot about other religion and has scriptures to tear apart every other religion from the Bible. He doesn´t bring his Bible anywhere so he won´t bible bash with anyone. It´s really funny, in his Bible he has notes of a ton of different scriptures for a ton of different religions. I honestly don´t know what my favorite scripture is, there are a lot of good ones that I love but I don´t know which one is my favorite. I really like D&C 84:88 and I guess you could you use that one for the plaque but I honestly don´t know. 

I love you guys a lot and think about you often!

Love 

Elder Newkirk

Just some dog on the streets of Antofagasta

Gets to watch these sunsets over the ocean every day!! How cool!

Week #7

Well everything´s going good. Starting to get used to everything after being here for a few more days. The Spanish here is pretty crazy but I understand more and learn more every single day. But one of the members of the ward said that I spoke Spanish really well and understood a lot more than another missionary she knew that had 3 months, so I´ve got that going for me. Hopefully in the next couple weeks I´ll be better and actually understand what they are saying. 

My companion is great, he is an amazing missionary. The trainers are always the best of the best of the missionaries. He has been helping a lot and been giving me a lot of opportunites to improve in Spanish. I´ve have been able to get 2 people with a baptism date on the 12 of March. But the thing about the people in Chile is that they never keep their commitments and usually are never ready by the date you set. Like for this Saturday we have 5 people with a date for Saturday. But only one will be ready for that date. So we´ll see what happens.

The flight was pretty good. Didn´t sleep a whole lot and there was a little jet lag but everything´s good now. Yeah I made a purchase at Cinnabon in the Santiago airport, but I actually didn´t have any luggage fees which was nice. I was able to bring two suitcases of 50 pounds. But yeah an over night flight is not all that fun.

Living conditions are alright, different but it´s good. So how feeding works in this sector is actually really nice. We have a mamita who cooks us breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We live above here and just go down grab food and go back up to our house. The breakfasts and dinners are pretty small. Just bread and something called Echo, which is pretty much coffee. It smells and everything like coffee but instead of coffee beans it is made from wheat so we can drink it. But I have to drink it with a lot of sugar in it haha. And for lunch we have sooooo much food. My first time having lunch we had the first plate then my companion said you ready for the next plate? It was pretty funny but for lunch they always have two plates of food. And if you don´t eat every single thing off your plate they think that you didn´t like it. So it´s definitely a little different. But on the weekends we get meals from the members, so far from this last weekend the members cook a lot better and feed us really good, but there hasn´t been anything that I havn´t liked. All the food here has been pretty good just a little bland.

With transfers here no one knows. There have been missionaries that have only stayed in an area for one transfer period or in an area for like 7 months. It is all just called from the mission president and wherever the Lord wants us at that time. So it all just depends but aparently it is usually longer.

I actually really enjoy the 7:30-11:30 shift. We are out at 10 usually till 12 in the morning. Then head home and do companion study, eat lunch, and then language study. Then after that we are out of the house again around 4 and out till around 10. We go and meeting with whoever. Members, less active, investigators, or whatever. We usually don´t just go knocking on random peoples houses, either references or people who we know live there. But how it works here is that you knock on their gate and yell out "¡Halo!". Most of the time people don´t come out and there have been times where we have seen people and they just don´t come. I have even had someone yell out "Ninguna persona aquí", which is "No one´s here." It´s pretty crazy but it is a lot of fun.

Still haven´t gotten the package yet. Probably will take longer than you expected but I will let you know when I get it.

I was able to meet a lot of the members yesterday. There were 62 people who attended sacrament meeting. We had 5 of our investigators there as well which was cool. There really aren´t a lot of people. We had like 5 people in Elder´s quorm including me and my companion. And then there is the Bishop and one councelor. We don´t even have someone who can play the piano... It´s quite different but all the members are great! And the baptism is this next Saturday!

I love you guys all so much!

Love 

Elder Newkirk

Elder Newkirk, Elder Wild, Elder Jennings at the CCM

Leaving the CCM for Chile

Elder Newkirk and his district/trainers

Elder Newkirk and his district/trainers

Elder Newkirk and his companion Elder Villegas

Where the studying happens

Bathroom area --- not sure why the pop bottles? Need to find that out! haha

Apt area

Elder Newkirk and his new Avenger sheets!  :)