Re: Til-Til

Querida hermana Ibarra.
Me alegro tremendamente de saberte ya en Santiago..
Ya empezaron tus desafios, pero quiero aconsejarte, que esa es la vida de los y las misioneras, y a veces mucho mas grandes que esos, te voy a enviar manana por correo una carta y te enviare undinero para que resuelvas mientras tanto, pero lo que me preocupa es que eso llega a la oficina de la mision, y no se hasta cuando llegara a tus manos, de todas maneras tratare de que esto llegue lo mas pronto posible por Chile Express....
Me alegro que hayas superado la diferencia con tu companera, pues eso es natural, ya llegaras a amarla profundamente, recuerda que vienen de dos culturas muy diferentes. En cuanto a los miembros inactivos hay 600.000 en todo Chile y el trabajo es arduo, pero vale la pena, casi todos se quejan de lo mismo, ese es uno de mis desafios, pues voy de barrio en barrio en todas las estacas de nuestra mision, dando capacitaciones, las cuales atraen muchisimo a los menos activos y regresan a la Iglesia, ya tenemos un testimonio grandisimo de este tool.. Encomiendaselos a mi Padre Celestial y veras el resultado.
Los apartamentos de los misioneros, eso es standard, mas vale que te vayas acostumbrando, son adorados y amorosos, pero perezosos y desordenados!!!! como ellos solos!!, no se que aprenden en sus hogares, y ahora va a ser mas dificil con los bebes que vienen de 18 anos a la mision, no quiero ni imaginarlo..
No llores y se fuerte, solo piensa como salieron los apostoles primitivos a su mision, los apostoles y misioneros de la restauracion, y te dara consuelo; una mision sin desafios es como una navidad sin dulces.. Disfrutala y hazlo todo en amor al Senor, que yo se vas a ser una gran misionera...
Te quiero mucho
Hermana Rodriguez

On Mar 4, 2013 2:28 PM, "Gladys Ibarra" <gladys.ibarra@myldsmail.net> wrote:

Hello family & friends! I´m so happy to be able to write this e-mail to you all right now, I´m literally crying right now its kinda embarassing, but I just miss you all so much! My 1st area is a little town en el campo (in the country) called Til-Til. It is literally the middle of nowhere, but very beautiful in it´s own way. It´s a combination of Honduras and Utah (only with cactuses and olive trees), so I don´t feel so far home. The mountains look just like Utah mountains only not as tall and the houses and buildings remind me of Honduras a lot. The people here are super nice and everyone knows everyone, but at the same time that is the challenge.Challenge #1 There is a huge amount of inactives in this area, and those who aren´t members have already talked to the missionaries and have like 5 copies of the Book of Mormon in their house and they think they already know everything about the church and want nothing to do with it. The Jehova´s Witnesses are our fierce competition here, mostly everyone is catholic or evangelist and are very stuck in their ways. We met the branch this sunday, There were about 20 people there, but we´re pretty sure most of them came to see us, the sister missionaries, because me & my companion Hermana Rodriguez (25 from Ecuador) are opening this area for sisters so we are the first ones a lot of them have every seen, it´s kinda funny, most of the people here didn´t know girls can be missionaries, too! haha. Challenge #2 is the branch. Our area is very vast some neighborhoods are very nice but with very humble towns in between. So the two social classes seem to clash at church and many of the inactives have left because they´ve been offended by some of the more "prideful" members. And a lot of the humbler folk live far and don´t have enought money to catch the bus to the chapel (which is super tiny, probably the size of an apt with just one big chapel and 4 doors sticking out of it that lead to classrooms). It´s funny cause the branch presidency met with us and wanted to tell us what towns are worth visiting, who´s worth teaching and how we should do our job, but me and Hermana Rodriguez are well aware that this is the Lord´s work and that we are only guided by the spirit and not the members of the ward or branch presidency. This week has been crazy challenging, people said they cried their 1st night at the MTC, I was so happy there to me it was like EFY, but my 1st night in Chile is when the tears came streaming down my face. It just finally hit me like a ton of bricks how far away from home I was, how different my life was gonna be this next year, and how much I´m going to have to adapt and change, but I am happy to be here at the same time, I´m excited to be doing the Lords work and to change lives! It´s bittersweet. Challenge #3 I had my 1st tiff with my companion. I had just poured myself a big yummy bowl of granola, peaches, and leche cultivada (which is basically yogurt but more watery) and was going to eat it during my personal study time when my companion said I couldn´t eat while we study & plan...I told her it wouldn´t distract me during my study time and that I´d be quick but she insisted so I had to put it in the fridge, I was so furious & annoyed! What a joke! I couldn´t even consentrate enought to study cause I was so upset, but I´ve come to accept that rule and got over it. I was just more upset that she made it seem like I was being a disobedient missionary and breaking the rules the mission president set, but I was new and had no idea what the rules were or even the daily schedule because here in Chile everything is 1 hour ahead than normal. We wake up at 7:30 and go to bed at 11:30. Besides that though me and my companion are getting along great! Challenge #4 our gas ran out (all our heating is by a propane tank to cook & hower with). Challenge #5  our power went out cause a truck ran into a light post near our street. Challenge #6 we´re pretty much broke. They didn´t give me any money cause our mission is changing credit card company and so they´re waiting for the new cards to come and my companion lost her card so we´ve been traveling and buying food with the little money she had left in her wallet, luckily the previous Elders left a bunch of change in the apt. But we´re getting our new cards tomorrow, yay!!! So I´ll be set then (mom is probably like I told you so! She told me to exchange money at the airport and I didn´t listen) Challenge #7 the previous Elders left everything a mess! They left the apartment disgusting, full of dust and dirt, old clothes, and half their stuff. Ontop of that they were apparently robbed so the area book we use to know about all the previous investigators and people they´ve been visiting and recent converts is missing, so it´s been super hard to visit people because half of the houses here don´t have numbers on them cause they´re in the middle of nowhere so it´s extremely difficult, we´ve been spending more time walking and finding people than actually teaching so that is no bueno, and we´re left to fix all the damage they left. But things are looking up now and we bought some gas and the power came back. But it has just been one challenge after the other here in the mission field and I know that´s just what it´s going to be like for the next year cause missions are challenging, but oh so rewarding :) I know we´re gonna make big changes in this little town, I have very high hopes and really believe that being sisters is going to give us a different advantage here. Love you all and hope all is well in the USA, God bless America, ain´t no place like it!!! hahaha

Also here is my address for any PACKAGES or LETTERS:  

Mision Chile Santiago Norte 

Surcursal Patronato Casilla 60 

Santiago Chile

Peace & Blessings,

Hermana Ibarra

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