Goodbyes and Farmers Market

 Alfred Yanez and his sons Ignacio and Nicolas at our house for dinner.  Alfred is now meeting with the missionaries and has committed to go to church.

 Mark Reddick, his wife Maria Gomez, Margaret, Martha and Rodolfo Gabrielovich.  They invited us to their home for dinner.  We had a very fun evening.

 Martha Gomez and her long black hair.   Margaret wanted me to take a picture of her.  She is helping us with our Spanish.  She and her husband are coming to our home for dinner tonight.

Margaret with Christian Ramirez and his mother Blanca.  He is going back to Cali, Columbia to school and stopped in the office to say goodbye before he left.  More in the letter.  This is the shopping cart contact.

Christian Ramirez and his mother Blanca.

 Saying goodbye to Christian Ramirez who is leaving to go back to school

This is the package we received from Julie Grant.  It cost $100 to send, but arrived in about two weeks.  Julie had picked up for us a n umber of things that we needed.  We were grateful to her for her work and getting that to us.

 A Picture inside the farmers market.  Mom is in a black dress just past the oranges purchasing some vegetables

 This is Selcia, who showed us around the farmers market.  We invited her for dinner, but she declined indicating she was not ale to leave her son who has Aspbergers and is afraid of crowds.  We gave her name to the missionaries, as she was so nice and helpful to us.

 Another dog enjoying life on the street in the farmers market at Antofagasta.

Dear Family,

It has been another busy week in Antofagasta, but it is  only going  to get worse.  We have new missionaries coming, old missionaries leaving, and missionary transfers between sectors.  We will be picking up missionaries, and shuttling them to various locations and dropping off their luggage in the office and at hotels.  Also we begin Zone conferences again, which means we will be traveling to the north and south of the mission again unless the mission president feels sorry for us and does not have us try and do all of that again.  We also have leadership council coming up.  We had a little bit of a lull in our work, but now it is going to pick up again.

We were pleased to have Christian Ramirez and his Mother come to tell s goodbye.  They are the shopping cart couple we met at the grocery store.  We had them over for dinner twice and had the missionaries come the 2nd time.  Christian was able to go to the church with the Elders and loved it.  I think he is well on the way to baptism, but unfortunately has now left and is in Cali, Columbia.  We have given all of the information to the mission there, so we hope they will  pick things up and we can get a report of his baptism.  His Mother Blanca also invited us to her home and wants the missionaries.  It seems she is very interested in the church as well.  We were so pleased that they would take the time to walk to our office just to tell us goodbye.  It was very special to us.  I think the Lord led them to us.

We are having Maria and Mark over for dinner this evening.  She has been helping us with our Spanish.  She is really a fun lady and wants to help us without pay.  She has given us an assignment, so we are really going to have to study to be ready for her this evening.  They are Evangelico, and are religious people.  We have explained some about the church to them, but it will probably take some time with them.  They seem to be pretty steeped in their religion.  However, they were friends with Martha and Roldolfo Gabrielovich, and we felt the Lord Led us to them, as they are the watch repair couple.  They too, are very religious, and they all go to the same church.  We have invited them both to our house for dinner on the first part of September.  We will have to wait and see what happens with them.

We have a good friend in Edward Gandalmes.  He has helped us and given us some lettuce from his farm.  He is 22 and has no religion and has not been at all interested in religion.  He plays rugby, so today we plan to go and watch him play before we serve dinner to Maria and Mark.  Edward is very cordial and nice to us.  Without religion, he certainly has a high standard of integrity.  He said his parents were not religious, but taught their children how to be good to other people.  he has invited us to his home for dinner with his family, but we have not been able to find a time as yet.  We really want to go.

It was surely fun to see Hunter come home from his mission.  We thought we were going to miss that, but Jennah and Julie made it possible for us almost to be present. We could even see him come down the stairs.  I am certain there are some happy times at the Klein home today.  We will be anxious to get all of the news about that.  We are surely proud of Hunter, as from all I could gather, he was an outstanding missionary and has set a good example for all of us.

We were excited to learn of a new Grandson that will be coming on my birthday (?).  We shall see.  I thought we were stopping at 32, but I guess there will be more.  Amy is such a good mother, that I am certain the Lord would like to see her bring a number of his children to live in her home.  I am certain Landon is excited to have a son with his name as well.  What an exciting time.

We keep all of you in our prayers, as we know life can have its struggles.  Even here, we have had some big challenges that we have had to deal with.  We are working hard to learn Spanish, but trying to learn Spanish words for every word we know in English, is no small task, particularly at our age.  Bryan has been kind enough to call us and give us some help with Spanish.  We are amazed that Bryan could still remember so much Spanish after all of these years.  He has a gift.

With much love,

Mom and Dad

New Watch Battery leads to New Contact

Mom wanted me to take a picture of this little girl.  Chilean children are adorable

 There was a flood in Tocapilla because of the rain.  We drove the mission truck to Tocapilla to help members of the church who lost a lot and some most everything as a result of the flood.

 This is the city of Tocapilla.  The canyon in the center of the picture is very steep with only rocks and no green.  As a result, when it rains it floods.  Water came down this canyon and id a lot of damage.  The road south was washed out in several places and people had to be removed by Helicopter.  The Branch President appreciated our delivery.  It took us all day.

 This is the church in Tocapilla where we delivered the supplies.

 I thought you would like to see some of the beautiful scenery we passed on the way to Tocailla.  This is the Atacama Desert.  The driest desert in the world.

 Last week let Elder Erickson look at my camera and he took a picture of me with it, which i included last week.  He did not know that I took this picture of him taking a picture of his name tag in the desert.

 Dinner at the home of a member family.  The girl standing  by mom is Purimisa.  She is engaged to a non-member.  She is a returned missionary but is 28.  The boy she wants to marry is not a member of the church and doesn't seem to be too interested.  This is a big problem for her.  Her boyfriend was supposed to come tonight, but did not come.

 Jamie, Purimisa (mother) Estela, Drew, and Purimisa.  It was a lovely dinner

 Our new watch repair contacts.  Mom, Martha, Rodolfo, and Gustavo.  We go to their home for dinner on Sunday.

August 14, 2015

Dear family,

We have an appointment in a few minutes, so I will likely have to finish this e-mail a little later, and it may be tomorrow.

We worked on normal things in the office, but continued to work with investigators in the evenings and on Saturday and Sunday.  We have turned a number of investigators that we have found over to the missionaries.  We have still tried to keep in touch with them and fellowship them.  We had the missionaries come over and to teach Blanca and Christian on Wednesday.  Blanca was not able to come because her little boy was ill, but her son Christian came.  He was very interested in the church and is a student at a university in Calli, Columbia.  He will be going home on Wednesday, but is going to go to Church with the missionaries this next Sunday.  We got his new address in Columbia and will try to have the missionaries pick up with him there.  He is really a fine young man.  Hopefully his mother will be able to go to church with him this Sunday.

We picked up another contact we will call the watch battery contact.  The battery in my watch died, and so I had to go to a store and get a new battery so I would know what time it was.  The lady owner of the store was very nice, and while we were there, her husband came in and he was equally nice.  We left the store and did some other errands, and then Margaret and I talked about how nice they were and we should go back and talk to them more.  They were quite busy in the store while we were there, so it was not convenient the first time we were there.  When we went back, they were just leaving so we talked some more and invited them over for dinner that evening.  They willing agreed even though they could see our missionary tags, so  we had them over to our apartment that evening.  She was from Brazil and he is from Chile.  As you could guess, we eventually started talking about the Book of Mormon.  Margaret reached over and picked up some two copies of the Book of Mormon that she had brought back from the office to give away as we had people in to our home.  She thought they were all Spanish Book of Mormons.  Fortunately, she gave one to Martha, the wife, and she said, "Oh, you have the Book of Mormon in Portuguese."  We were shocked, as we thought they were copies of the Book of Mormon in Spanish.  They each took one home, one in Spanish and the other in Portuguese.  As we explained about the Book of Mormon, he commented, "I have never heard anything like this before."  We invited them to read some in the Book of Mormon and they invited us to their home for dinner on Sunday.  They want to invite a brother to their home as well to meet us.  We had a fun evening and will look forward to  being with them again before we turn them over to the missionaries.  Rodolfo and Martha Gabrielovich happen to live in the sector of the the office missionaries, so they are very excited to get an opportunity to teach them.

We had another interesting experience this week.  An Elder Preston was to go home, but they had not been able to get his visa processed to allow him to go home as scheduled.  The missionaries in Iquique went to help with the situation and were told it would be ready on Thursday, but when they arrived, they had not processed it and it would not be available until the next Tuesday which made it almost impossible for them to get the Visa processed so that he could go home.  I told the elders of the experience II had in Mexico, which seemed like an impossible situation to solve, as the border agents would not let Elder Senkans and his wife Velga cross the border.  The agent through his hands in the air and left saying he could not allow them to go into Mexico and left.  I was left with the problem of going back to Belize City with them, or leaving them on their own and going with the group.  If I went back with them I would leave the tour group without a director.  I stood there with a terrible choice.  While I was standing there pondering what to do, the man came back out and said OK, I will let them go.  I discovered the women on the bus had been praying that the man's heart would be softened and that the Senkans would be allowed to go with us.  The prayer was answered.  I told the Elders this story and said let us go and say a prayer and asked thee Lord to soften the men's heart in Iquique.  A while later, Elder Hortua came to me and said "you won't believe what happened.  They approved the Visa in Iquique, and now the problem is solved.  That shows the power of prayer."  We were all relieved.

I have written more than I expected.  Hope everyone is well at home.  We miss you all and appreciate the pictures on everyone's blogs, facebook, and those that have been sent to us.  I will have to admit, to see pictures of everyone does make us a little homesick.

Love,

Mom and Dad

First Rain in Antofagasta

Diana Leyton and brother Aviar to the right.  We arranged to have them meet with the missionaries.  Elder Estraca from Bolivia and Elder Allred.

 Went to the home of Raul and Jennifer Merino for the second meeting.  This time we took the Elders with us.  Elder Cordova (from Chile) is on the left and Elder Fakahafua from Tonga is on the right.  Elder Fakahafua is going to play football for Utah state

I let a Elder look at my camera, and this is what I got

 We invited this folks for dinner.  Diana Leyton is next to Margaret and her brothers are on the right. The first is Aviar, who is a member and Camilo on the far right and is not a member.  Diana is not a member.  Elder Erickson and Elder Maki are in the center.  We met them when they helped us at Liders.  We are going there tonight for them to have the lesson with missionaries that are in their sector.

 Elder Gonzalez on the left and Elder Hortua next to him.  Blanca Ramirez and her son Christian are on the right.  They are the grocery cart family we met at Liders (Walmart).  They will now be meeting with the missionaries in their sector next week.

 We met a young couple at Liders who are talking marriage.  The boy is not a member, but  (He finishes writing about them below) :)

First rain we have seen in Antofagasta

 First rain in Antofagasta.  It hardly ever rains and people are not prepared for it, as their roofs leak.

The storm has caused the Pacific to be very active

8 August 2015

Dear Family,

I accidentally touched send before finishing writing on the one picture.  What I was saying is their daughter is looking at marriage to a non-member even though she served a mission in Paraguay.  Her parents are really concerned and invited us to their home for dinner.  The people in front of the office with me are her parents.  Their names are Jaime and Purisima Vera.  We had invited the daughter and her finance to our home for dinner, but with my name tag on, being a missionary, he was afraid to come.  We will see what happens next Wednesday.

We have had it somewhat quiet at the office this past week, but have made up for it by having investigators for dinner in our home.  It seems we have had something going on every night.  We now have six families or people that we have met now meeting with the missionaries.  Five of he six we met at the Walmart grocery store.  It seems way beyond coincidence that we would be able to meet that many people and have them interested in speaking with the missionaries.  We have the credit card contacts. the cake mix contacts, the shopping cart contacts, the father whose son wanted to practice english on us contact, the eye glasses contact, the needing english contact, the social visit contacts etc.  Hopefully some of them will be sincerely interested in the church and we can attend their baptism.  The are meeting with the missionaries, so we will see what happens.

We seem to be doing pretty well, although Mom has been under the weather a little  for the past couple of days.  One of the contacts that came to our home had a little boy that was as wild as I have seen.  Mom tried to entertain him so that the missionaries could talk to the investigators.  I think she may have picked up something from him, as he was almost impossible to handle.  Our next meeting is scheduled with them while he is in school.  I suspect that meeting will go better.  They were quite receptive, however.

It is supposed to be winter here, but I see people out in their shirt sleeves.  I seldom wear more than a long sleeved white shirt and seem to be fine.  Mom wears her light coat she purchased, but is often to hot with that.

It is time to go with the missionaries, so will say goodbye.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Missionary Referral Machines

When we awoke this morning, the Pacific was pretty active.  Probably a storm at sea.

Leonel Nunez is the owner of the furniture store and we took a picture of his work.

Margaret getting everything ready for leadership conference

The chaos in the mail room getting all of the mail ready for zone leaders

 Elder Erickson, Mom and Elder Maki in the mail room getting the mail ready to send to sectors.

Mail on all of the shelves to be sent out with the missionaries.  Elder Erickson, from St. George, is working hard.

 When we awoke this morning, the moon was setting over the Pacific Ocean.  A boat in the harbor.

 Gabriella Villalobos posed for a picture.  Her family came to to dinner.  We discussed the Book of Mormon with them.

Claudio, Monica and Gabriella pose for a picture.  We had them for dinner and taught them about the Book of Mormon.  We made another appointment with them to be at their home with the missionaries.

 Sister Brocq from Lima and Sister Cabillero from Paraguay who will be teaching the lessons to
Claudio, Monica and Gabriella on the 15th of Agosto.

 Edwards Galdames poses for a picture at our home.  He came to dinner but had no interest in religion.  He took us to his vegetable farm.  It was very interesting

Dear Family,

We have had a very busy week, created because we have kept finding people that we can turn over to the missionaries for teaching the Gospel.  We find them, invite them to dinner, tell them about the church, and if they desire to have the missionaries afterwards, we turn them over to the missionaries.  We currently have three that the missionaries are teaching, and have two or three more that we are meeting with.

LIDER -CAKE MIX COUPLE Raul, Jennifer & baby

LIDER - MAN SEPARATED from his wife & TWO SONS  Alfredo & Ignosio 'and Nichlas

FIRST LIDER CONTACT Claudio  Monica & daug Gabriella

GLASS REPAIR STORE CONTACT Edward (sge 26)

LIDER - CREDIT CARD CONTACT  Diana & her two brothers (one is a member)

LIDER - GROCERY CART MOTHER & two chikdren  Blancha (mother) and 20 year old son Christian and a younger chid abt age 5

PAZ - APARTMENT CONTACT - Movie Lady - Cecilia

PAZ - APARTMENT CONTACT - Two Helping us Carry Things Girls

OFFICE - STREET SWEEPING - MET a MAN - Marcello and his two dogs

This will be an on going drama trying to tell you about these contacts and IF and WHEN any of them actually are baptized. Our  current operating plan is we have them to our apartment to eat with us, get acquainted, then some how we get into a discussion on the church and then IF they want to know more we contact the ELDERS or SISTERS in their area (where the people live) and then have them over to our apartment and then have a lesson and then go from there.   It really boils down to the fact that we do not know if these people have been SENT to us or if we actually found them. Only time will telll. The biggest story of the week was when we told Claudio and Monica about temples and that they could be married for eternity. They gasp and said they were not even married and they had the 7 year old daug. Actually Monica right now is in FIRST place for being very interested in the gospel. She wants to get married. Her husband does not  appear to want to. But they invited us and the missionaries to their home for dinner in  two weeks. The missionaries for where they live do not speak English so that will prove interesting for us as WE direct what is to be taught and when etc. The word has been getting out that we are  pulling in all of these contacts and the missionaries who are getting them are making other missionaries jealous and now missionaries are asking us to FIND them contacts.. Very interesting since we generally find people who speak some English and that is how we find them. We do not say do you wan to learn about the church.We tell them we are missionaries for the Church ad thank them for HELPING us with what ever they helped us with and then  start talking and invite them for dinner at our apartment.We live across the street from Liders so we show them where we live and then they have ALL accepted to come. This will be a SOAP where you will have to read in future emails what happens as it would take far to long to go into detail at this time, Elder Holland said at the fireside before we left Provo to OPEN YOUR MOUTHS and to be honest it truly is what it takes, but the invitations to our home for a meal has been the real  good part to start some kind of  friendship. Tis is NOT something the young missionaries can do, so this is why we are pulling in so many contacts at this time.

We love you all and hope you have a wonderful week.

Mom & Dad