"Uh-oh, uh-oh, trunky, trunky! Change it! NO one's going home for Christmas!"

Here is Joshua with his companion Elder Barrett

 and the two other Elders that share a pension with them.

And here's the little BBQ he mentioned in a previous post.

Hahaha if you're wondering about the title, it's just what my companion said when we were studying and "I'll Be Home for Christmas" popped up on our Christmas playlist. Haha you probably have to be a missionary to really appreciate how funny it was.  "Trunky" is what we call missionaries who are thinking about home instead of the work or counting down days or something like that. ;)
Well, we had changes this week.  "Changes" is when everybody gets their new orders for the next six weeks- where they're going to be serving, who their companion's going to be, etc. Our zone hardly got touched, so I'm happy to say Elder Mason, Elder Mahoni, Elder Barrett, and I will be spending the holidays together. We've found a lot of really good people in the past couple weeks that I have really high hopes for so I definitely didn't want to leave yet. Then again, change is really good, especially on the mission, and I would have been excited to see more of Chile and learn new streets and meet new people again. :)  It's all good.  Where the Lord needs me is where I need to work.

I'm getting really into the language and having a grand old time.  I think my only complaint is that I'd sure like to be able to take a break from proselyting and preaching when I'm sleeping!  I keep having these half-awake, half-asleep dreams where I'm teaching lessons and testifying in Spanish at like 1 in the morning. My companion's hoping it stops, too, because sometimes I have to wake him up to back me up and bear testimony of Jesus Christ. After all, I can't do it alone! ;) ....Anyways, it might be good practice for my Spanish, but it's definitely not helping my sleep. :P

By the way, I miss milk. REAL milk. I can't believe it's come to powdered milk. :( Saaaad face. And what's worse, I can't decide if it's a good thing or a bad thing that I'm USED to it now. :P My workouts every day have become increasingly more creative, too (water storage for weights, using furniture, etc.). Thus far I've been very pleasantly surprised to see how well we're able to stay fit and healthy. Of course, you have to work. We have plenty of elders who've decided it's just not worth the effort haha.

The work's going well. We had a few struggles with investigators this week hearing false information about our church from others. That makes me SO sad.

Special thanks to Kimi, Sister Krogh, Grandpa, Caroline, and Emily for writing me letters! I'll try to respond through my mom or a letter as soon as I can!  Anyway, that's it for now. Hope you're all doing great! :) I miss you all so much!

Keep the Faith!

-Elder Jones

14 November 2011

These two reminded me of Okinawa --
squating as if it were comfortable and colorful graffiti. 

Hey everybody!  I pray you´re all safe, sound, and finding success in
your work and studies. :)


Things have been going great here!  The weather's been alternating
from being unbearably hot to being freezing cold. And of course, we
always decide to wear short sleeves on days that end up being cold and
long sleeves and suits when it turns out to be hot. :P Okay, not
always.  And when it happens, it gives us something else to laugh
about and keep up our animo (By the way, animo is a great word that
really doesn't have a good English equivalent; it's just better in
Spanish). :)


We found a few solid people to teach this week and we have some good
investigadors right now, but my companion and I are trying to think of more effective ways of finding than knocking doors or stopping people in the street....although we definitely get some good stories out of those methods. :)


The members are really nice and feed us lunch every day. Fun fact: my
companion and I have managed to eat potatoes (in some form) every day
this past week.  It's a conspiracy, I know it.  Don't get me wrong, I
liked it every day....I'm just not sure if our diet of soda, potatoes,
and cereal is 100% in agreement with the food pyramid. Or food plate.
Yeah, it's a plate now, right?


It's funny how much a mission can change you.  I can't believe that
now whenever I have down time, I'm super excited to spend it reading
scriptures or Preach My Gospel. I'm so embarrassed to think about how
much time I wasted with facebook or doing nothing in particular. And
all those hours I called "studying"....I had no idea what studying
was.


Today the four of us had a barbecue.  You'll have to wait for the
pictures to believe how much meat we ate.  And on that note, sorry!
My mom keeps reminding me that the blog is boring without pictures. I
don't take tons (we don't really have much time for stuff like that
and I think we can't actually use our cameras during proselyting) but
I'm looking for a way to print them or make a CD.  SO...with the
super-speedy Chilean mail system we have, you guys should be able to
see them....by next Christmas. If not, I'll just show you all of them
when I get back. ;)


And thank you so much for the speakers, Mom and Dad!
:) I was pretty much the hero of the pension (apartment). Now we can
blast our Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Prince of Egypt music. Or if
we're feeling really cool we'll get some EFY playing up in there!


I should go! Talk to you all soon!
-Elder Jones

5,000 Days Project: Two Brothers
Meet Luke and Sam Nelson, two brothers who struggled to develop a positive relationship in childhood. The Nelson boys are just two of 60 kids documented over a 5,000-day period by filmmaker Rick Stevenson.


I just had to post this link here.  If you have a free hour, I highly recommend you spend it on this show. I especially liked the last half where they followed the older brother on his mission to CHILE!! He's a typical, flawed kid who gains much perspective over the two years. I served my mission in Ecuador. I think this accurately shows the fears, silliness and growth experienced by very young adults on a mission.