Week 88: Crazy Story & Service Sanctifies

April 30, 2018 (transcription from Audio letter)

Alright, This is week 5 of transfer 14. Elder Olson here. And this week I've got a story for you guys.

So this Tuesday we had quite the little adventure. It started actually with P-day and our trip down to Curico. The man I sat next to on the bus on the ride down I ended up talking with him a little bit about how we were missionaries and what we do and I got his phone number and a little bit about where he lived to be able to go and visit him. And we decided the next day in the afternoon we would pass by his house to give him a visit. We knew he lived kind of out in the country a little bit, about 10 minutes in bus from Licantén, but from what he told us, he lived pretty close to the bus stop and it'd be pretty easy to pass by him. So we called him and he was like, "yeah you just get off here and you follow a little dirt road and my house is at the end there." And we were like, "great." So we wait for a little while. We finally find the bus. The bus drops us off there. First we call him and we were like, "Alright, so what's the dirt road like?" We saw this one dirt road that had a sign from the city government there like talking about a construction project so we asked him if it was like that road and he was like, "yeah." And so we followed it and we got to the end and like asked some people if they knew him and nobody knew him there and we called him and he was like, "No no no. It's not that one. It's this other one at this other bus stop." So we walked about 5-10 minutes to this other bus stop and started walking down this dirt road and we called at one of the houses there and talked to one of his neighbors and we told him that we were looking for Guillermo and he was like, "Oh yeah, you guys are going to go walking though? He lives about an hour from here walking." And we were like "WHAT?" We did not sign up for that. So we started walking a little bit. We called him (Guillermo) and he said it was like 5 minutes walking. And so that's a pretty big contrast from an hour to 5 minutes so we thought maybe it was a mistake by the first guy. So we talked to another neighbor who was like, "Nah it's about 25 minutes from here walking." And so we really had NO idea how far his house was. 

And so we walked a little ways down this dirt road and it was super pretty out the middle of NOWHERE. And we get up there and my companion started getting a little bit worried, haha, that we were going to get robbed or something just cause there was NOBODY around and so he went and hid his bag in some bushes and we kept on walking there. We finally, well we made it a little ways and we saw this little house and I was like, "Alright, we should be getting pretty close here. Let's see if somebody here knows where he is. So we walk up to the house, this one little wood shack. And on a mattress on the ground outside of the house, there was a guy drinking a can of beer, this little man. He was not wearing shoes. His shirt was open. And he's got this nice little mustache. And we're like, "Hey, do you know where Guillermo lives?" And he come up to us and he's like, "NAh, I'm just drinking a little bit of beer." And we're like, "Yeah, we can see that. But do you know where Guillermo lives?" And he was like, "Yeah he lives close. You know what? I'll take you to his house." We're like..."Oooookay." So he goes and he puts on some sandals and he goes into his little wood shack and comes out holding a slingshot and with something tucked into the front of his shirt and a bulge in the front of his pants. And you could see just under his shirt, and he pats it and he was like, "I never leave my house unarmed." And so I assumed that he had a gun there, that he had a little pistol. 

So yeah, we've got this guy, super drunk, can barely walk straight. His name was Humberto and he's got a pistol in the front of his pants. So I'm ready to tackle at any moment because he seems pretty crazy. I was a little worried that he was gonna pull out the gun. And he's like, "Alright. I'll take you to his house." And he starts just walking through the forest up this side of the hill. There was KIND of a little path, but not really anything. And it got to the point where there was no path. And he stopped and tried to shoot a bird with his sling-shot and breaks his sling shot. And so we are going and walking about 5 minutes up there, just following this little drunk guy, talking to him. And we get up into this clearing and it's just this beautiful little spot on top of this hill. It's really pretty there. And we like jumped a barbed wire fence and there was a little like mud shack out in the middle of this clearing. And he was like, "Alright. This is where Guillermo lives." And he goes over and he hops another fence. We follow him and he's like "GUILLERMO!" He's like calling for him and he goes over and there's some boots like in a bucket of water just floating around and he just kind of like looks at them and he picks up one of the boots and just like throws it at the house. And we look for Guillermo and he's not in the house but there's like a fire going and we're not really sure what's going on. So we call him again because we finally had cell reception again because we were back up on the top of the hill. Surprisingly. I was really surprised we had reception there. So we get up on top and we call him and he answers and is like, "Ah yeah. I'll be right there." And he comes out from like behind the house and he's like putting on his belt. I'm pretty sure he was peeing just back behind the house because I don't think he has anywhere else to use the bathroom. 

And so, then we had a little lesson there. The drunk guy wanted to stay for the lesson. Which was kind of messy for us, kind of hard to have the spirit. I got after him actually during the lesson and told him to stop swearing because it was SOOOO much. He started talking about one of the old Dictators named Pirochet that took over the country back in the day and how he was so happy that Pirochet went to prison and well he said a lot of really awful things actually. So we got him to calm down a little bit after I got after him, he stopped swearing til the end of the lesson so that was good. He still talked about a lot of stuff that had nothing to do with anything but we were able to kind of go with the lesson a little bit. The other guy was really interested. Guillermo, the other guy. I don't know...He was really interested but doesn't seem super willing to act. For our next visit, he comes down to Licanten sometimes to work, so we are just going to meet up with him here in the chapel. Our chapel here is right next to a Liquor store. He works in the liquor store.

Oh. Hold on. (SMACK sound in the background). Spider on the wall.

And so hopefully we can organize it that right before he goes into work or right after he'll come over to the chapel and we'll teach him a little lesson. Because it's not worth the hour trip to get to his "house" to teach him up there. And so yeah, we finished the lesson and we started going back down the hill and Humberto, drunk friend, is talking to us. Invites us to go get a drink with him. And we cross a araña pollito, which means "A little chicken spider", which are the tarantulas around here. They're pretty common. I've seen quite a few. Like 4 or 5 in my mission. But my companion hadn't seen one before. And the guys up there, the ones who live out in the campo, the little drunk guy, and Guillermo, they started playing with it. So we got some pictures of that and some other pictures of the little clearing where Guillermo lives. And on the way back down, the little drunk guy was like, "Yeah, I'm gonna go run and grab"...he was going to a little shop down by the bus stop "and get some more wine." And he was like, "But oh, I can't have this down there." And he reaches under his shirt to pull out his weapon that he's had hiding there this whole time. And he pulls it out and it was just this huge knife. Like a normal kitchen knife, you know, one of the big ones. Haha. And it was just super random. I have no idea why he carried that the whole time. But he was like, "Yeah, I never leave home unarmed." So then he throws that off into the bushes and he just CHUCKS it as hard as he can off into the trees. Haha. And he's like "Yeah, I know where it fell." And then he walked us down to the bus stop. So that was quite the experience we had on Tuesday. Something a little different. I was glad to have a little change of routine. I thought it was pretty fun. Definitely NOT going to do it again because it was a LOT more time than we expected. But it was a really pretty place. 

Then on Wednesday, we had interviews with President (Harris). We went down a little early and ate lunch with the Zone Leaders and with a member. And then we went and had interviews, which went really well. I think it gave my companion a little bit of ...it encouraged him a little bit to work, I think. Got him kind of excited for his last couple of weeks. It didn't last super long but...  but it was good. 

We also had Stake conference on Saturday night and on Sunday. We had just a general session on Saturday night and then on Sunday morning we had a priesthood session with the priesthood and relief society presidencies. We talked about ministering and then new priesthood quorums. It was really good. Our mission president gave a little bit of training I guess like how he would do the interviews and the other meetings. And then in the afternoon session, he talked about how we are sanctified through our service. He shared an awesome experience about how, I think it was while he was stake president, he was assigned to home teach a man who had a lot of problems with alcohol and tobacco. He was a convert to the church but just came from a really tough lifestyle and fell back into that lifestyle. So he was abusive with his family, ended up getting divorced and President Harris just tried so hard. They'd go over and read the Book of Mormon with him. They'd invite him to Family Home Evening, just go over, pass by and see how he was and do all kinds of service. When they were having problems in the family, his family would take care of the other family's children and so those kids lived with President Harris's family for weeks at a time. And just really did everything he could to serve this man and his family. And while he was doing that, the man got remarried and for a while it was fine. And President Harris, since he was the stake president, he was a minister, he was the one who performed the marriage for them, you know a civil marriage. But then after a little while, it ended up in the same way. More problems with abuse. And the man ended up in prison. One of the kids as well. And president Harris would go by and visit him in prison. And he was still assigned to home teach him right up until President Harris was assigned to come serve in this mission. And this man, never changed. And President Harris talked about how even though that man never changed, how President Harris was sanctified through that experience and how it made President Harris a better person. That's probably, I think, the reason that God has us serve. He has us serve in part to be instruments in His hands, you know, to accomplish his work. But He could accomplish His work himself. But the rest of us, by being those instruments and by allowing God to work through us, we can obtain a remission of our sins by keeping our covenants. And also that service is a part of making restitution in the repentance process and it helps us to develop charity and hope and those Christlike attributes that we really need to become like our Heavenly Father. So that service sanctifies us.

Yeah, this recording has gone a little long. But I know that those things are true. And I know that our Heavenly Father loves us and He calls us to serve because it makes us better and I've seen that a lot as a missionary. 

I love you guys. Hope you're all having a good week. Take care!

Elder Olson

60 cm completo

I made a perfect pizza.

Aventuras en la selva (Adventures in the jungle)

One of the many dirt roads we walked

and we walked and walked and walked

The drunk guy, Humberto, and my comp, on our hike

view of the clearing

araña pollito

Guillermo playing with the spider

Look for Humberto's concealed weapon

week 87: lots of meetings

April 23, 2018 (transcription from Audio letter)

Hey everyone, This is week 4 of transfer number 14. It's  been a pretty good week. We did not have a lot of time in the sector for work. We had meetings and meetings and some more meetings.

On Wednesday, we had district class and then after the district class we did divisions with the District leader here in Curico. So we were both in their sector working. So we stayed the night. And we had Zone conference the next day. Which was cool because it was together with Talca where Elder Haar and Elder Lee and Elder Hiatt, where my good friends are all at, so it was cool to be able to see them. And that was good. We talked a lot about the Gospel of Christ, the third Preach My Gospel Lesson, about working with members as well. They're really trying to crack down on the members taking dinner here (giving the missionaries dinner). They don't like the missionaries eating dinner (with the members) here. We just eat lunch and that's it. So yeah, we talked a lot about that. But that wasn't really a problem for us in our sector either.

Then afterwards we had the busride back to Licantén. We had a lesson with Darling. We talked a little bit about her baptismal date and she's pretty set for getting baptized on May 5th. We talked to her about how that is pretty quick. She's going to have to make sure she comes to church every week. She came on Sunday. She's gonna come to Stake Conference on the 29th and that should be good. I'm pretty excited about that.

And then on Sunday morning, the Zone Leaders called us and said "Hey we have a meeting with the mission president and all of the branch presidents and mission leaders and area 70 in the afternoon today." So that was kind of a surprise for us. We ended up driving down with the Branch President to the meeting in the afternoon and it was really good. Talked a lot about the quarter mission meetings and the Branch Council meeting. 

So that's about it. 

I'm doing good. I'm feeling a little better. I've been feeling a little under the weather the last couple of weeks. But I'm back to being able to exercise in the morning. My comp's not too big on the idea of going to the gym but that's okay. 

Today we had an activity in Curico. We just played football or soccer and that was pretty much it. It was solid. 

As far as a spiritual thought, I was listening to a BYU devotional, I think it was from 2012. It's called "Optimism and Joy (in the Gospel of Jesus Christ)" which was really good. It had some shout outs to Snowboarding there so I really enjoyed it and I enjoyed what it said about keeping a diary and about how that'll help us to be more optimistic in our lives. 

So I hope you guys are all having a good week. Love you all. Take care. Bye!

Elder Olson

(Elder Olson forgot his camera when he went to the Cyber Cafe today so he apologized for no pics. Elder Haar's mom posted this one of Jacob though. Looks like he stole Elder Haar's camera for a stealth selfie.)

week 86: Building a House & Changes of Heart

April 16, 2018 (transcription from Audio letter)

Hey everyone, Elder Olson here. This is week 3 of Transfer number 14. Here in Licantén this week, it's been a pretty good week. A lot of work.

Last Monday, sorry for not being able to have a recording ready for you, or for NOT having a recording ready, I probably could have if I had remembered. But we had to take a last minute trip to Talca. They let us know about it the night before. We had to get up at about 5 in the morning to catch a bus to Talca. But it was cool to go. I hadn't been there for a while. That was where I, or the zone where I started my mission. So it was pretty cool to be back down there. And my old companion, my trainee, Elder Hiatt is down there and Elder Haar as well...one of my good friends. So it was cool to be able to see them, and seeing how it was for my companion's visa, he went with the secretaries and I went with Elder Haar and Elder Hiatt and all of them to their zone activities which was fun. It was cool to see people down there. I also got to talk with Elder Lee a bit. So it was a fun little trip. Then we got to come back up to Licantén. The bus ride was different from the normal one. Both the bus rides from Curico to here and from Talca to the area of Licantén are super pretty. So that's something that I like about this sector. 

And then during the week, we helped doing a service, building a house with a younger guy, who's about 25. He's been investigating since the time he was about 14 years old and he really just hasn't progressed. I think a lot of it is the missionaries fault. So he knows the missionaries pretty well and he asked us to help him with some service building this house so we went over there and helped him. We cut styrofoam for the insulation, and then we helped nail in the, or put up the walls. 

And then on Wednesdays we have our district meeting in Curico. Normally what we have to do is we don't have lunch here with members, instead, the mission passes us money because there's no way we'll make it back on time after the district class because of the 2 hour bus ride to get home. So normally we pay and eat at a restaurant down in Curico. But this last Wednesday we came up and just had a later lunch with that investigator. We did a little BBQ there which was pretty fun. And we were going to finish the service but it was raining. And so he still wanted to do the BBQ but we weren't able to help him finish the house there that he was working on. 

Also this week, we had a cool lesson with Darling. We talked about the law of chastity with her, which was one of her only obstacles for her baptism. She has a pretty serious boyfriend. But she talked to him and she committed to live the law of chastity and she's excited to get baptized. 

So, Sunday was kind of a bummer. None of our investigators came to church. Darling was going to come and actually her and her mom, they left their house on time, but they live about 15 minutes by bus away from our church. They left and they were out waiting for the bus for over an hour. By the time they gave up waiting, it was already the end of sacrament meeting. And so they did not make it to the church this last week. Which was a bummer because it'll also mean Darling's baptismal date will need to be postponed because she won't have the church attendances in time. She was kind of worried about that when they called. They called us right after the meeting and apologized and said they'd tried to come but they couldn't. So I was very glad to hear to hear that at least they'd been trying to come. But we could've helped them. If we would've known sooner we could've sent somebody to pick them up. But it wasn't their fault at all either. But we are probably going end up baptizing Darling in May instead of April. But that's okay. She's awesome and it won't hurt to have a little bit more time to prepare. 

Today we were going to go the beach and go try one of the seafood restaurants that there are out there. We cleaned the house in the morning, we got all ready, we packed our Matés. My companion is from Uraguay and there Maté is pretty big. I bought a thermos this week to be able to take my Maté on the go. I was pretty excited about it. So we had our thermoses and our Matés all packed and all ready and we waited for almost an hour for the bus to go to the beach and none came by. It's super unreliable, the "bus system" out here. But it's okay. So we ended up instead, we made Milanesa, kind of a, I guess I would call it an Argentine Hamburger. I mean it's a little different. But it's good. Super tasty. Learned how to make it so I'll probably be making it again in the future. And then we took a nap and now we're getting ready to go "write."

Oh yesterday, we had a really cool experience. We have these investigators who, they just seem to have a lot of things and problems that would impede them from progressing. We taught them once in my first transfer with Elder Hiatt, so quite a while ago. And then we taught them again two weeks ago and then again yesterday. And they've been participating more and more in the lessons. And yesterday, it was really cool, the dad opened up a lot more to us and we found out the reason he hadn't really been participating very much in the lessons and wasn't very willing to go to church, he wouldn't pray at the end of the lessons. His oldest daughter who's 11, she participates and is super excited and she always reads what we leave, but the dad and the mom, are not so super into it. But anyway, the dad, yesterday kind of opened up to us and said that...we were asking him about his experiences with praying and asked him if he'd ever had prayers answered before...and he shared one experience where he felt like he had his prayers answered and he kind of teared up a little bit during that one. And then he was like, "but I've also had another experience where god didn't answer my prayers. My mom was really sick and I prayed and I prayed and I prayed and I asked God to save my mom but my mom died. And I promised that I would never go to another church again." And we were like, "Wow. Ok." We kind of figured out what his difficulty was, I guess. And we left him a scripture from the Book of Mormon that talks about the resurrection and we have a lesson planned for tonight about that. And he prayed at the end of the lesson, which was really cool too. And he got pretty emotional, which was a pretty drastic change from how he was in the beginning. So that was pretty cool and I'd love to see them be able to progress. I think it'll be a lot of work and it'll be tricky, but it would be awesome. I would love that.

I think that's all the big news for this week.

The primary president is about to go have a pretty major surgery and she's gonna be in the hospital for two weeks. She's the Elders Quorum President's wife. So they're going to be pretty busy. So she asked us to go by and help her kids study English because she won't be there to help them study. She asked us to go by a couple of times this week. So that should be interesting. But they've helped us a lot. Darling was a reference from her and also it was her daughter, Pamela, that was baptized the other transfer here. So we're more than happy to do what we can to pay her back. And serve a little bit there. 

So this next week, we're going to be out of town for a couple of days. We're going to be doing divisions in Curico and then we have zone conference, which we'll be together with Talca. Which I have a bunch of my mission friends down in Talca so I'm pretty stoked about that. But I hope you're all doing well. 

That's pretty much my whole week this week. Looking forward to hearing from you guys when you write. Take care. Ciao!

Elder Olson

Sunset

Uh...Creepy

My comp from Uruguay, Elder Figueroa

Licantén sign. You don't need much direction in this small town but here you go.

view from the top

Maté in the yard

Making Milanesa

Release date and Travel plans scheduled

Update from Elder Olson's mom:

I received an exciting email today with Elder Olson's official release date and travel plans for his return trip home.

Elder Olson will be released on August 6, 2018 and his plane will arrive in Salt Lake on August 7th.

We can't believe the time is almost here! We have all learned and grown so much in the time Elder Olson has served and his homecoming will be bitter sweet. We've enjoyed the blessings of being a missionary family and are grateful for that opportunity. We look forward to our upcoming Mother's Day call with him and will eagerly prepare for his return at the end of the summer.

Just for your information or planning purposes, Elder Olson will be speaking in our Church Sacrament Meeting Service on Sunday, August 12th at 11am. We invite any and all to join us. The church building is located at 1850 S 2300 East, Spanish Fork, UT.

week 85: Three Changes to go

April 9, 2018

Transfer 14 Week 2

Hey all,

Sorry for not having a recording for you, we had a surprise special trip to Talca today. More on that in a bit.

I'm doing well, I've been a little sick but I'm hanging on. It's been mostly a cough and congestion in my lungs (lame), and the other night I had a slight fever, but don't worry Mom I'm feeling a bit better :) I found some pills at a liquor store that have been helping (there's no pharmacy in Licantén). It hasn't been bad enough to keep me in bed, so we're still out and going 100%.

We've been working hard this week. I don't remember if I've mentioned our Haitian friend Max, but he's still coming to church but having trouble getting his answer and accepting a firm baptismal date. Darling is SUPER excited for her baptism. She and her mom Karen came to church on Sunday and are doing very well. On Tuesday we had changes. 

Elder Figueroa is very relaxed and easygoing, so we get along pretty well. He's not a big fan of the gym, but I got him to come with me once this week (I wasn't feeling great the other days). He's agreed on every other day for now.

Today we're in Talca for my companion's visa. We had to travel on Thursday of last week as well. The secretaries like to do this thing where they call us the night before and surprise us by telling us that we have to make 2 hour trips at 6am the next day. It's ok though, Elder Lee is also doing his visa so I've really liked being able to catch up with him. Great guy. Because today is Pday I went to the Talca Zone activity where E Haar is ZL and my trainee E Hiatt is in, so it was cool to catch up with them as well.

Well I hope I'm not forgetting anything, and I hope you're all doing well.

Les quiero,

Elder Olson

Me and Elder Haar.

week 84: General Conference

April 2, 2018 (transcription from audio)

Eschange 14. Week One. Ok? This is Elder Hiatt.

Hi everyone, this is Elder Olson .

This week has been good. We found out the changes on Saturday between sessions of General Conference. And so we found out that I am going to be...staying. Elder Hiatt is going to leave me. He's going down to Lircay, a city sector in Talca. And I will be staying here with Elder Figueroa from Uraguay. He will be finishing his mission this change so I that means I'm going to be here another 3 months at least. So that's pretty crazy. Because I'll be here for at least 2 more changes and then after that I'll have one more change. And so I'd rather, well it's possible now that I'll finish my mission here in Licantén or they'd have to take me out for just one change in another sector. So yeah, I'm pretty excited. It's gonna be good. It's a good sector to be staying in. I'm gonna know it like the back of my hand by the time I leave. Well, I already know it pretty well, but it's so small I'll probably know everybody's name before leaving.

But yeah, this week was good. It was pretty normal. Nothing really all that special happened.

We set a baptismal date, actually. THAT was pretty good. With an investigator from Hualañé, named Belen. She's like 17 and she listened to the missionaries before in Santiago. And then her boyfriend, Estevan, is a member who's baptized like when he was 12, so like 8 years ago. He's been inactive for 4 years and I don't think very active before that either. He doesn't understand much about church and has problems with smoking, but they're good. They're good kids and we're excited to be working with them. Belen is super excited about the gospel and about listening to us. And I think she's just really sensitive to the spirit. So that's cool. They were going to come to General Conference. We talked to Belen in the morning, and she said they were going to come to the afternoon session (well they're both afternoon sessions for us, but the later afternoon session here, which was at 5 in the afternoon). And so we waited out for them. They didn't end up coming. So we were kind of bummed about that. A lot of people are on vacations for Easter Weekend. The only investigator that did make it out to General Conference was Max, our Haitian neighbor, who has a baptismal date for April 14th. We're gonna have to push his date back I'm pretty sure. Just because he's not super willing to commit but he's doing good and gets really involved and participates well in the lessons. So I think it's just a matter of time with him. He speaks English and a little bit of Spanish. His English is perfect. He speaks really good. And we're kind of fighting to help him understand everything that we're teaching. 

General Conference was awesome. I was impressed with the number of big changes that were announced this conference. I've been saying that we were going to be having a Brazilian Apostle for a while so I was pretty happy to see that. The changes, as far as the Elder's quorum and the high priests are concerned, won't change anything in Licantén. I think they have to release the Elder's quorum president, but they may call the same Elder's quorum president afterwards. But it doesn't sound like there are going to be any big changes here in Licantén. I think the "ministering" changes will help a lot, as far as the home teaching is concerned. Although, I don't know. I think the biggest difference will be that they don't have the report to make them talk once a month about how nobody does their home teaching. haha. But now it should be "easier" to do this ministering effort, so hopefully that means more people will kind of (I don't know how to say it in English), in Chile they say "put in the batteries," kind of get moving,I guess. So I'm excited to see that. I'm mostly excited to see the differences that that will make back home and maybe in any other, or if I go to another branch or ward in my time here, to see the differences that are made there. We're going to be working hard here to try to make these changes mean something here in Licantén. 

As far as the conference was concerned, I really liked...Oh, as far as the news about the temples in Russia and India...I thought that was incredible! I've been listening to a lot of BYU devotionals on missionary work and a lot of them have talked about China, and Russia, and India, and Africa and the establishing of the Church and the gospel there. And so it's a pretty big deal that they're putting a temple in Russia. I'm pretty excited about that. 

I really loved President Nelson's energy. This conference was just very different from anything I've ever experienced. Not only because of the solemn assembly, but because of the way they explained and introduced the changes. The involvement of President Nelson was impressive. He was constantly either announcing things, or leading the session or giving a talk. So I enjoyed being able to see that.

I think my favorite talk, as of right now (I haven't re-listened to any of them or read any of them yet) but I really loved Elder Bednar's talk on meekness. That's something that (I think I've mentioned before) that I've put in an effort to try to develop in my time in the mission. So that was really good and I think that's going to be very useful for me and I think I'm going to enjoy having that talk to learn from. So that one was really good. I will definitely will be studying it afterwards and I recommend you do the same. 

That's about all. I hope you're all doing well. We're on the bus on our way to Curico right now. We'll be having a little BBQ to say goodbye to a couple of the Elders in our district here in Curico. So we've got the nice little 2 hour bus ride down to send them off. 

I hope you all enjoyed conference. I love you all. Have a nice week!

Elder Olson

This churrasco was bigger than I am.

Maté Movie

Singing time