September 23, 2010

Hey estimado familia,

We love and miss you and miss skyping, but we hope to be able to this weekend, maybe Saturday or Sunday night. The Pres. has offered to loan or give us an extra laptop he brought. (He didn´t know until yesterday that ours disappeared from his office.) I t is about five years old and we don´t know if it has a built in camera, but maybe we can talk and text until we can get one. We may call you from his house when we are there for dinner Sat eve. Hope, hope, hope. We want to hear your heavenly voices and see your angelic faces. Booo hooo hooo. Real tears.

I don´t remember where email 5 ended so we may repeat or leave out some things. Please forgive. Our life is a little disjointed right now. We are well and happy and rested. We are allowed rest time the younger missionaries don´t get, so we take advantage of it and are pacing ourselves pretty good. BUT… a big change is in the wind. Don´t tell anyone, but the Stake Pres ( Kevin- Nuñez, our friend) has asked the mission pres and the mission pres has asked Dad to serve in the branch presidency as a silent (non-Spanish speaking) counselor. It´s a mission assignment, not a sustained & set apart calling, but they will probably do that anyway unless someone is there telling them NO. It won´t be announced until Sun. but I think it´s ok to tell my family. Just don´t share this till I say so. That will mean more trips to the church (need a car) and accelerated need to learn Spanish.

Everyone is trying to teach us and it helps. When we are in the car with the elders, waiting for someone to open the church or turn on the lights, or at choir practice or conversation with members, they each add a little to our understanding. If we could just remember it. Today Mom was thrilled to remember and say some things she had been learning. Awesome! She is trying hard and doing well with it, but doesn´t give herself enough credit. She is in the bodega (storeroom) studying as I write. I´m trying too and making slow progress. Yesterday and today we had dinner (midday meal) appointments and got to try our Spanish in a non-important environment. It was probably the best practice we´ve had. We ate with a bishop and his wife yesterday with some other elders. They do food catering from their home and backyard. They make the most delicious Chilean food and sell it to companies having meetings, parties, etc. She delivers it in a little (read minivan) old yellow school bus she bought with her "cookie money" They fed us a feast of barbequed beefsteak, chicken, chorizzo, hotdogs, with pan (homemade rolls), corn, salad, big brown beans, and a popular dessert made with dried peaches and boiled wheat called mote con huesillos. After choir at the branch they gave it to us again. It was sort of good, but twice a day was too much. It felt like it was still growing when we got home.

Today Kevin´s friend/companion/Bianca´s father/mission pres counselor, who has taken us under his wing and is very helpful, to the point of embarrassment, took us to a fancy Chinese restaurant for lunch. It was the best Chinese food I´ve eaten bar none. On this street there are four big Chinese restaurants within a block on the same side of the street competing for the trade. Brother Toledo eats out almost every day with his job and KNOWS THE BEST places to eat all over central Chile. At both dinners we had about two hours of conversation with Spanish and English mixed. Bro. Toledo doesn´t speak fluently, but we could each help each other and it worked just fine. The Bishop´s wife has an old organ in her (little) house and told Mom she would trade Spanish lessons for piano lessons. She invited us to come for lunch (Almuerzo) every Wednesday, but we won´t be able to go every week, and it won´t be such a feast. They are still celebrating the bicenntennial with carne asada (barbqued meat), but that will wear off soon. We haven´t eaten all the groceries we got last week in the taxi.

We are eating lots of ice cream (helado shops everywhere!), so we may not lose any more weight, although mom tried on a skirt this morning that fell off. Not a bad thing. We´re certainly not emaciated. When we get some photos sent you´ll see. Today when we went for the mail we forgot to take our little folding grocery buggy and had to carry back 6 packages and the mail. Two of them were the size of the one Beth sent. Heavy!. We HAD TO stop at McDonald´s for a conovanilla (figure this one out yourselves). We wouldn´t have made it without a little "fuel" boost.

Yesterday after almuerza the assistentes took us to a car dealer the bishop recommended and we looked at little (there´s that word again) cars within our price range. We test drove a VW and a Renault around the parking lot with the salesman inside, and got up to second gear, so we couldn´t tell much about the handling and ride. We liked the Renault better, it was bigger and more powerful, and the VW showed a lot more wear and engine dirt than the odometer showed. The Elder Acosta from Uruguay did all the negotiating for us and afterward said he learned that used car salesmen are not very honest. He said the salesman said that every car we showed interest in was the best car they had and would be the best deal we could every find. Today we may have found a car. Andres Toledo called the church fleet manager to see if he had any cars to sell. Not today, but in three or four weeks, a 2004 Toyota Wagon with about 90,000 kilometers (less than 60k miles) It´s more money than we started out wanting to pay, but we trust Toyota and the church, and think it would resell well in 17 months.

Yes, one month has already flown by, but who´s counting? You are? Count your blessings instead. OK?

Last week Mom noticed the grey returning to her temples and said."When we go to Lider today I´m buying a hair color and you are going to color my hair tomorrow." She did and I did!! Looks pretty good if I do say so myself, so does everyone she tells the story to (everyone, so far). We spent an hour studying the instructions in Spanish with our dictionary so she wouldn´t turn out bleached blonde or bright purple. We counted that as our p-day study time and I guess we understood it well enough. Another day another adventure. It never ends. We will probably soon begin piano lessons in this building where we have a place to keep the teclados (keyboards) and won´t have to carry them about. When we get a car we can be more mobile and start teaching in other places.

Time to go. Love to write to you, but talking is better and Skype better yet. Best of all will be when we can take you in our arms, kiss your faces, and squeeze you really, really hard.

CON MUCHO AMOR POR CADA DE USTEDES (don´t know if that´s proper Spanish, but you get the idea. We love you, all.

MOM AND DAD