Another week down.

  Well it's another Monday here in Los Platanos. It was my first week of being back to work, and boy was it nice haha. Being in the pension was great and all, but I really started to miss working. But this week we had to face the harsh reality, that we were starting from scratch.

  So that made the week a pretty difficult one. We knocked a bit this week, tried going by a bunch of contacts and references, and things like that. We only found two new investigators, and we've yet to see if they'll progress. We still have hope, but honestly it's hard. This has really been a hard few changes because this is a hard sector. But we did see some great things and some little miracles from the Lord along the way to help us get this sector, and us, back on our feet.
  On Friday we had lunch with this one family, and the hermana told us that the other day she had been talking with a friend, who has a 3 month old baby that has been sick. The hermana then suggested that the missionaries could give a blessing to the baby and she accepted. So at lunch she gave us her address, and later that day we went. The lady received us al tiro, and we explained the blessing, and gave it. We then left her with a restauration pamphlet and she accpted an appointment for another time. We also got a few other references from members (finally), so we're working on contacting those.
  Saturday was a really bad day for me. The day was terrible, no one wanted to talk to us, contacts we had done earlier lied to us, people were home and said they weren't, it was just a day full of failures. Saturday night I sat on out the patio, frustrated with this sector and all the lack of success we've been having. In my nightly prayer I begged Heavenly Father to give us something to work with, to give us some hope. I decided to go to bed early, because I was just done haha. So I'm laying there, and at around 11, we get a call from an elder in our zone, who had a reference for us..........I said a quick thanks to the big guy and went to bed. Haha. I think that refernce was Gods way of telling me, "Elder Mayberry, just quit complaining and do your job" haha. It was a cool little experience though.
  So this next week should be a good one. We have a bit of potential that we're hoping works and we get to teach and find some new people.
  So. The weirdest thing happened this week. We're in February, the middle of the hottest part of summer. This past week, it rained.....something unheard of at this time of year. And it was still hot out when it rained. It was so weird!
  Today for PDay, me and my comp headed down to the south of the mission, cuz there's this member that hand tailors suits. So I went to go get one to celebrate having a year and a half in the mission. So we went down there and he took all my measurments and stuff, so it should be really good. I'm excited, I'm going to pick it up the 7th of March. Then we came back, went shopping, and I made myself tacos for lunch. And here we are.
  The work goes on. Despite the trials we've had here in the sector, life goes on, as does the work. God will help us, I have the faith. I'm looking forward to having a great week this week. It's also the last week of the change, so we'll see what happens with that. We think that my comp is gone, but we'll see. You'll find out Monday.
Love you all, hope you have a great week!

Back to work!

Hey everyone!

  Well, there's not really much to inform again this week. We stayed in the pension a majority of the time on doctors orders. We did however, go out a little bit, to go to the lunches in the week, and yesterday we even worked the whole day. So the good news is that starting this week we're gonna be working in the sector again. Hooray!
  Of anything interesting to report in the week, there are a few things. On Wednesday, we had a meeting of the leaders of the mission, the zone leaders, the district leaders, and President spoke to us about how to make the mission better. So, obviously, that was really good. There was a focus on this talk that was given to us by Elder Corbridge of the 70, called the fourth missionary. It's an amazing talk that reflects about the different types of missionaries there are, and why we all need to be the fourth missionary. Reading that during my "hiatus" has really given me a lot of animo to go out and work, so I'm excited for this week.
  On Thursday I went back to the doctor, he took out some stitches, and I'm going back tomorrow to get the rest removed. So that was good.
  Church was good on Sunday, we saw a lot of things that could be potential for us to work with. So we've got our work cut out for us this week, being two weeks back and short of investigators. Should be fun!
  And the big news.....18. Thats how many months I have now. I honestly feel old in the mission now-haha. Pretty crazy. Very weird. It seems like that before I know it, the missions gonna be over. And I'm pretty sure that's how it'll be, cuz the time is flying "on the wings of lightning" as our President says. It's the last hurrah, and I'm gonna finish strong. I got all the rest I could ever need these last two weeks haha, so I can just work super hard these last 6 months.
  I'll talk to you next week, and hopefully have a good report of success here in the sector. Love you all, have great weeks! Church is true, that's why I'm here.

Elder Aaron Mayberry

Recuperandome!

Hey everyone,

Things are good here. Honestly there isn't much to report at all, because we have done absolutely nothing since the last time I wrote. We've just been sitting in the pension, resting on doctors orders...
  Things have gotten pretty boring, there's not a whole lot to do haha. I've been tearing through Jesus the Christ from the beginning, so that's been good. Scripture study is also doing good. I've also destroyed my sleep schedule, so my body doesn't know when it's tired anymore haha. Oh well.
  There's nothing too important to report really, just that I'm doing good, I'm feeling a little better everyday, able to walk around and everything. It's been good. I feel like I'm recovering relatively fast. I'm still not ready to go out and work and everything, but here in a week I'll be ready to go.
  So yeah, sorry for the chanta email, I don't got much else to say. But like I promised I'm gonna attatch the pictures from the whole hospital experience, hope you enjoy!
Best of luck in this week, thanks for everything!
Elder Aaron Mayberry.
P.S. OH. This week theres a big milestone coming up...........18 months.....1 year and a half..........I can't believe it!

P.S.S. Fotitos
1. Waiting for the metro to go to surgery...

2. Me in front of the hospital

3. Before surgery

4. On the stretcher about to go to the surgery room

5. After surgery

6. When the assistants visited us(one of them was my comp, elder saenz)

7. Me standing up in the room

8. The view from my room

9. Checking out!

10. Today at the zone activity, with one of my comps, elder deaver

 

Surgery in the Mission!

Hello all!
I'm here, you can all stop worrying now haha. I'm doing just fine. I´ll go into more details later though so don't worry.

  The last week was actually better, finally. We had success knocking! We decided to knock a street, and we got into one house on Thursday. With that we were already more than happy, it was a big morale booster. On Thursday we decided to finish knocking that street, and the first house we knocked we got into. It was crazy! So that helped us a lot with our animo. We can't say if they'll be investigators that progress or not, but we´ve found people.
  Then on Saturday we had a big missionary activity in our sector. We had a bunch of elders from the MTC here in Chile that came to the sector and we our zone of missionaries, did divisions with them and all worked in our sector for a few hours. So that was a big help for the sector. We got a bunch of contacts and stuff to go by the next week, so hopefully we´ll get a lot of new investigators from those.
And that was essentially our week last week.
Now...I'm sure you're all dying to hear about how things went Monday.

 So lets start from the beginning. Monday morning, I woke up at 7, according to doctors orders, and ate a few crackers and some water. Then at 9 we had to leave to the metro and go to the hospital. We get there, I talked to the doctor for a few minutes, then he sent me to admissions, where I got scheduled a hospital room and everything. Then they took me to the room. So there we sat in the room, at like 11:30, while I was waiting for my surgery at 5:30. In the mean time, people kept coming in, doing little tests, making sure everything was all good for surgery so there wouldn't be any complications. They took a little blood and I watched them do everything this time, sticking the needle in and everything. So then at about 4:30ish, the guy came in with the strecher, and that's when my heart dropped haha. I wasn't really nervous up until that point. So then they wheeled me out and I went into the surgery room. There, the anastheseologist put an iv into my hand, then gave me a shot in the lower back, which numbed it, then gave me another shot with a big ole needle (which I didn't feel), which put everything below my waist to sleep. Then she gave me some drug that made me sleepy, and they did the surgery. It was wierd, cuz I was like in and out of consciousnous during the surgery, obviously I wasn't 100% conscious, I was drugged up, but I could talk to the lady and stuff. Twas pretty interesting. Then they finished the surgery, and wheeled me out to a little waiting room, and then took me back to my room. And there I stayed. I wasn't in too much pain, a little, and it was hard for me to move. And my legs were numb for the entire night haha. But it was good. Not too much pain at all. And that was Monday.
  Yesterday was an interesting day too. So after not sleeping too well Monday night, the nurse came in at like 6:30, and told me to stand up and go to the bathroom and clean myself up a little bit. So I stood up, with a little pain and pressure cuz it was swollen, but not with any problems. So I go into the bathroom, shut the door, look in the mirror, then I started to get super lightheaded. Next thing I knew, I heard the nurse saying, Aaron, open the door! Are you ok! I thought to myself, yeah, what could be wrong? Then I realized I was on the floor haha, I had fainted. So I opened the door then went straight to the bed. I then decided not to stand for a while haha. But after some practice and stuff, by the end of the day I was able to stand without any problem and walk around a little bit. Other than that, there was no major problems yesterday, just a lot of resting and stuff, eating a little bit of food, talking to doctors and nurses, and sleeping.
  And this morning I woke up, talked to the doctors and stuff, and they told me I'd be going today. So they got the stuff ready, the assistants came and picked me up, and here I am in the office, writing this email. I'm doing just fine. I dont have pain, just sometimes when I move in certain ways, and now it just bugs a little cuz it's still swollen, but I'm walking around a little if I need to, to practice a bit, and things are good.
  So whats in store this week? SLEEP. Just getting a bunch of bed rest and stuff like that, reading tons of scriptures, etc, and we'll see how I'm feeling at the end of the week.
  So you can all stop worrying, everythings just fine here on my part. I had a successful surgery in Chile on my mission. Pretty cool story o no?
Love you all!
Thanks for all you've done for me, for all your prayers and everything. Hope you all have a great week this week, and I'll talk to you on Monday!
And dont worry, I have tons of pictures to send next week from my experience :)
Elder Aaron Mayberry

Hello All!

Hello everyone!

  To be honest, things are still hard here in Los Platanos. We really don't have many people to teach. But some good things did happen this week. For instance, Jenny got confirmed this week so that was good. We also went to the temple on Wednesday so that was a spritual experience like always. This week we also did a lot of english teaching. It's pretty hard to teach english haha, I'd be a lot better at teaching Spanish cuz I had to learn it, but english just comes out naturally so I don't know all the rules and stuff. But I'm learning and it's interesting haha.
  Something interesting this week. So we had our zone class and everything on Thursday, and while we were there we all got some drain cleaner and some poison to kill spiders, ants, etc, that might be in our pensions. We also got the instructions to clean out our pensions entirely and spray the poison on Friday. So we did that and it was alright, I'll include a photo.
  This next week should be an interesting one. We have interviews with President tomorrow, hallelujah. It seems like it's been a really long time since the last interview, so I'm petty excited for tomorrow.
  Things are going good with me and Elder Russell. We honestly don't know what to do though, in terms of the work. On thursday I was kinda depressed cuz I have no idea what to do anymore, we can't find anyone to teach, knocking does us nothing, the members aren't willing to help. It's been hard. Easily my hardest sector of the mission thus far. We're just gonna keep trying and see what happens though. It's all we can do really.
  But, despite the less than ideal conditions of the sector and things at the moment, I still love the mission. I'm learning tons, growing everyday, and keeping the faith. Love you all and hope you have a great week!

Elder Aaron Mayberry
1. Me making one of my favorite chilean things, a Barros Luco (me and elder russell make them every thursday)

2. The finished product

3. Ready to kill

4. Me with the poison

5. What chilean kids do when its hot outside(open up a fire hydrant and let the water shoot out)

Disappointments, Successes!

Where to start I have no idea. This week was honestly a very very crazy week for me and for us here in Los Platanos.

  Well. I'll just address all the issues I put in the subject line haha. So first...
  Changes. I'm still here in Los Platanos, as is my comp Elder Russell. So that's good news.
  Other good news. Jenny was baptized yesterday! The week before, Jenny, the girl afraid of water, practiced with her dad and successfully duplicated going under water for a baptism, so on Sunday, when she went into the font, she was able to be baptized without a problem! So that was really really cool. Me and my comp were actually pretty nervous that she was gonna have a panic attack, but she didn't and everything went smoothly. So we have a little bit of success here in the sector finally, with the baptism of Jenny, so we're super happy about that.
  And now for the other news...
  Disappointments. Well. After the baptism of Jenny, we practically have no investigators to teach. This I think has been my hardest sector of the mission, because we've tried so many things to try and find new people to teach, but nothing has worked. And to top it all off, our best investigators, Victor and Gema, blindsided us and told us not to come over anymore...Turns out that Victor doesn't like commitment. He didn't like feeling like he had to drop things in his life and change his way of life in order to join a church. Which is really just an excuse. He was super enthusiastic about the gospel, he definitely felt the Spirit many times, and he knows that he is supposed to follow the gospel. But, becuase of the difficulty of doing so, he decided to tell us not to come by anymore. It honestly took us by a huge surprise. We did not see it coming. Elder Russell kinda took it hard, being really his first hard rejection, but it was alright. We did our part, and they chose to use their free agency in a different way. Nothing else we can do.
  This morning the entire mission went to the change meething cuz President talked to us about things to come in 2011, our goals as a mission, and what we can do to accomplish them. It was cool.
  Uh-huh. That was the week. Pretty hectic and crazy, but it makes the mission more exciting. I'm glad to be here, glad to still be here in the sector, even though its been rough, but we're just gonna keep on moving forward. Gotta keep looking on the bright side of things. Lifes great, I'm in the mission, we're members of Gods church, what more can I ask for? Love you all and hope you have a great week! Here's some pictures!

Elder Aaron Mayberry
I'm putting like a bajillion pictures cuz I haven't sent any in a while.
1-3. My Sector, Los Platanos

4. Sunset in Santiago

5. Me and my comp at the beginning of the change, when there was an eclipse of the moon early in the morning we woke up to see (that's the Llama sweater Michael mentioned in the Christmas call)

6. The zone picture

7. Jenny and her family at the baptism

8. Us and Jenny

9. Me and my trainer Elder Hastings (and his other kid in the mish). He finished the mission today.

Feliz Ano Nuevo!

Happy New Year to all!

  This week was an alright week really. The new year made it a pretty rough week for work, because everyone's on vacation and the whole world has people visiting for the holidays.
Let's see. We still have very few investigators. Gema and Victor are doing really well. This week we made a plan with them for them to stop smoking, and they're doing well. They're completeing their goals and going down little by little together, so that's really good. Jennifer, the 9 year old that is afraid of water, is no longer afraid of water! She and her dad practiced and now she isn't afraid and goes completely under w/o problems. So she will be baptized this Sunday, por fin. And those are still all the investigators we have at the moment. We are still absolutely stumped on how to find new ones and stuff, we've tried everything, but this is just a hard sector. But we're still chugging along.
  New Years was actually pretty fome this year haha. We had to enter the pension early, at 8, and we sat there and did nothing. Luckily, Victor and Gema brought us some asado, so we had something tasty to eat for New Years. Elder Russell was tired and told me to wake him up 5 mins til twelve, and I did so and then we "celebrated." We said happy new years, and listened to the fireworks going off that we couldnt see (there was a big fireworks show close to us, but our window faces the complete opposite direction....). So yeah, that was new years. Crazy though, cuz my "mission year" is now over. O sea, the year that I'm only in the Mission. 2009 I was home, then started the mish, 2010, mission year, and this year, 2011, I finish the Mission. SO that's a cool feat.
  At church this Sunday, we had a pretty miserable day, it was one of those Sundays where nothing goes right. We had no investigators at church, none of the less actives that said they were gonna come came, and the attendace in the ward was extremely low cuz people just slept in, and everyone there andaba en otra, as they say here. Basically that they had their heads in different places. But it's alright.
  It's the last week of the change, and we dunno what'll happen. Anything could happen really. We'll just wait to see. But we're gonna keep trying no mas in the sector to try and get things up and running. Love you all and hope you have a great week! I promise to take lots of pictures this week and send some next Monday. Chao!
Elder Aaron Mayberry