It's been a week

So this week may or may not have sucked the eggs of a grand chicken. I think it was thursday we had like 12 citas set we called them they all said we could pass by we had members set up to come with us and everything. And literally every cita fell through. We were walking around the entire day the only type of lesson we had was 2 prayers in different houses we squeezed into before they shut the door. It was horrible. I was so depressed like i just went home we planned a little bit I ate some pity pan and I went to bed. It sucked. 

But saturday was super cool like we stacked a poop ton of wood for a lady in the campo then like chilled in her house basically planning for an hour then she took us to our almuerzo. It was awesome literally her couches were the comfiest thing I have sat in since before my mission. It was awesome. So that was a beast day. Don’t think I told you though our ward boundaries changed so all of our campo is gone and the sector where we live is part of the other ward. So that’s weird. We still live there though. 

We have a kid in our ward who sent his papers in for his mission this week! The kid is super cool gunna be a great missionary he wants to go to the states for his mission so he is working like a boss to learn english. Gunna be interesting next week probably when he gets his papers. 

Elder Thompson is super cool. He introduced me to incense. He is super hippy like holy cow but he is super nice too. Really chill and smart. Having a pretty fun time together explaining how no we aren’t from Washington dc yes from the same state and no we didn’t know each other before hand its a big place. Literally every house. Pretty fun stuff. 

Spanish is definitely still there. I can communicate everything i need to and can understand pretty much everything. Still working on learning more. I have taken to translating the PMG for language study then seeing what i need to work on. 

The mission is super hard. But its awesome and I am gunna keep on pumping. The Mission President just changed our rules so we have more rules to follow and be more obedient. Gunna be hard its a lot of stuff. Here we go!

Love 

Elder Galbreath the 6th

Last week-

ok what the heck hawks. My comp is from Washington to so we are going to be a disappointed sector this week. Dang it.

So cambios happened. Elder Sanders is now in Temuco which is down south of my mission. It was weird seeing him get on the bus and leave. But yeah that happened. Then i was waiting in the terminal for Elder Thompson when the phone rings and it is Elder Thompson. He was letting me know he wasn’t going to be there until wednesday because he had to help finish the cambios with everyone. So I was like oh ok. So I worked in a trio with Elder Haynes and Elder Langeveld for a day. That was super weird, none of us were used to the others teaching styles or working in a trio. So we just kinda did it. It worked ok. But then wednesday came and Elder Thompson is here. 

He is from Washington! From Kirkland or something like that by Seattle/Lake Washington. He is very west side. Super hipster. Big glasses, plays the guitar like a boss. Just is kind of super hipster, but he is a super cool guy we get along pretty well. He scared me though at first we went to get him at the terminal and he said to me the first thing was "I have entered into a covenant with God to only speak spanish" in spanish obviously. I was like oh freak what on earth did i get myself into. But its pretty cool we just talk in spanish all the time and its cool. But i was frightened. Nice guy

So his first day we had a couple citas and took a member with us and it worked really well we put a fecha with a kid named Sebastian, this kid is golden. I think i have mentioned him before, but we stopped by and he hadn’t read the book of mormon because his sister took his but he is searching for it. That’s cool. And he accepted the baptismal date really fast and stuff. But he was going to Santiago this weekend and we have a rule in the mission if they don’t attend then the fechas falls. But he was like i have seen a chapel up there i’ll just go to that one. And he did! He attended up there by himself for the first time. Was awesome. Super pumped for him.

Another cool thing that happened was with MJ. So we were talking with her and she never reads or prays so she isn’t sure if baptism is right for her yet (duh) so we were talking and i just told her listen if you want to know you have to read and you have to pray. If you pray every day and read you will get an answer. And her parents don’t support her at all but i told her that its important what is gods will not her parents and she is going to read about nephi and his family. So Then i challenged her to be baptized the 14th of february. And she accepted.  It was awesome i have never felt the spirit as much as i had in that lesson. So here is hoping.

Hey ma. 

So the food here is pretty just kind of there. At times its really good though. We eat a lot of rice and chicken or potatoes and meat. And bread. The bread here is heavenly. Like holy cow. Great. Its horrible for the body but great for the soul. 

I  teach the plan of salvacion. To people who know something about it it is a lot easier but to people who have never heard about it it is much harder. But we use 1 Corinthians 15 to help and they are usually like oh its in the bible its ok then. So that cool.

Favorite lesson to teach is either 3 or 1 Gospel of restoration. Both are good. Super fun stuff. 

I love you mama.

Elder Bubba

I love you guys muchly have a great week!

Elder Galbreath XI

Cambios

Ok so big news of the week cambios are in! Elder Sanders is going to leave me after 3 cambios. Elder Thompson is coming. I’m pumped he worked in the office before this and is a really smart guy so I am hoping to learn a poop ton from him. It’ll be cool. Sanders is going to temuco to work with a guy from my district in the ccm actually Elder Pulsipher. Thats cool. And Elder Haynes killed (that means he went home after his two years) his comp Elder Baez who right now is probably asleep in the office but the elder that is coming to replace him is Elder Langeveld. Thats right my comp in the CCM. It’ll be interesting because elder Haynes and Langeveld are extremely similar, like its a little weird so they will either mesh and become one person or completely hate each other and destroy the house. For all of our sakes I'm hoping for the first one. So that will be interesting. 

But this week was good just worked super hard, got quite a few lessons this week. We had 2 lessons with a new kid we found named S. THIS KID IS AWESOME! He is super receptivo and listens and asks questions about everything. When we taught the restoration lesson we got done and he was like I don’t quite understand the priesthood part can you explain that again. You bet your two left boots that we can! It was awesome. Only catch is the dude runs cross country hardcore (saturday he went to compete in Concepcion to qualify for the national level) so he can’t come to church a lot. That sucks but we can work on that. And he will be baptized! We are working on some other people now to but he is kind of my sunbeam through the dark clouds now. I decided I was tired of sowing and I am going to reap this cambio. Its gunna happen doesn’t matter gunna happen I decided. So excited for that. 

We sent Baez off with a raging fire of his clothes and the appropriate tombstone. We aren’t gentle about dead people here in the Mission Celestial. (that translates into Celestial Mission if you didn’t know.) But it was weird seeing him die. I got a new pair of shoes from him, and a bag. The shoes are kinda like oh cool they are nice ecco shoes pretty much just like what Garrett bought in good shape and everything to. And the bag is for my crap because I have 14 pairs of pants and no room in my suitcases. But luckily it doesn’t matter how many bags you have during the mission. Baez did that and I thought it was smart. 

It is super fun to hear about you guys and the house. I loved your letters this week they are awesome. The address you should use does have Bio-Bio in it because that is the region which is like the state, that we are in. I got a package from Grandma I think I told you that though. 

I would definitely still be cool with a spanish childrens songbook if you could send one or i can just buy one and it will come to chile for me. That might be quicker actually just on lds.org. And cheaper. But tell me what you would like me to do. I am going to reteach myself piano so I'm gunna start on that again.

Love you guys muchly. 

Elder Galbreath XI

This week

So this week was super fun and a couple key points

1: So an elder in our zone bought a scale and so i was interested and I have lost approximately 30 lbs on the mission so far. BOOM yeah pretty happy about that.

But yeah the mission activity was awesome played some different games and some stuff with the mission. We all got mission t-shirts and mine was huge because apparently I am not even kind of a 2x or the shirt sizes here are weird. But it was super fun. We watched meet the mormons! It was super good the mission mom part was funny couple guys had wet eyes. But when they showed him going to mr mack for his stuff like every elder from Utah went Hey I went there that guy helped me! Then the airport scene was the same Hey I went there awesome. Friggin Utahans. But it was funny. We all wanted to know how he got his name tag already though. Something fishy. but yeah. then we finished it with all of us singing Called to Serve which in my mission is sung more like a war chant than anything else its awesome. And it was all 220 some odd of us it was powerful. but it was awesome.

So this week was hot as heck. I was dieing all day. We have taken to just asking for water during contacts because waterbottles last like15 minutes before empty now. So it works well the people here are all super nice and only one guy has said no in the 2 weeks that we have been doing it. So thats cool. But yeah very hot and all of our citas have been falling so we have had like a lesson a day and a whole lot of contacts. Not an ideal day. But yesterday we had a cita that was there and they were like yeah come in and we almost didn’t know what to do. So that was fun. But yeah.

And yeah we have just kind of been going. Sanders' last week here in Las Americas cambios are monday so we will find out who my new comp will be. Interesting and fun!

So fun thing I got a package from Grandma Galbreath! She sent me 4 killer ties, socks a calendar from Ag northwest and a little tractor keychain.

Super awesome the ties are amazing and the calendar has a bunch of pictures of home, different fields and stuff. Its amazing every since I got out here Ag is like all I can think about home. After the mission and stuff. I do miss the fields. It was beautiful back home. Enjoy it

for me. And the tractor I have literally shown like all of my investigators I'm like hey check this out! It’s awesome right? I am super pumped about it.

But yeah i love you guys I will try and post pictures but this internet is horrible so I don’t know if I can. Next week definitely.

Love ya

Elder Galbreath

Dads email:

Ok so first

1 Hi dad

Ok now that the important stuff is out of the way

There is a guy here who sells scripture cases here of leather hand carved stuff with pictures of what you want. Super cool stuff about 20 mill a piece which is about 40 bucks a piece. Which is expensive i know. I have been looking at them not sure if I'm sold but they are really cool. Ill send you the email and you can google translate it to see what you think.

And if you could compile a list of dates like birthdays anniversaries and such for me that would be awesome now that i have the calendar for the year and stuff.

And this is the cool part for you

So the other day we were talking with Jose who is an investigator and he had a ton of stuff go down, he lost his job, his wife was in a car accident and his son got scraped by a car kinda bad. Luckily no one is hurt beyond some scrapes though. So he is kind of at wits end dealing with everything and he kind of unloaded on us about his son who basically is a really nice kid and all this and is super selfless. But just the show of love for his son and his story made me miss you

pretty bad. I realize how much you do for us and how difficult it is for you sometimes and i just wanted to tell you i really do love you and appreciate you. I probably cant understand everything but I felt like I got a little glimpse and I was really humbled. Love you muchly

old man.

Your son

Elder Galbreath XI

Tranquilo

Last week we had two hours from 11 to 1 to do everything we needed to do and we were in the campo doing fencing stuff until like 1258 so I was technically not even supposed to email last week but I didn’t want presidente to have to deal with and angry mom. Sorry but it happened. 

So I am writing both of you because I have to fit two weeks worth of stories in 1 email. And the videos won’t upload they are to big sorry when this card gets filled I will send it home and you can watch it then. Sorry. 

Ok so christmas was legit like we went out to the campo with a couple families from the ward and had a huge asado (bbq) we had lamb. Slow roasted for like 3 hours over a fire. It was so tender it was amazing.

 Matching Christmas Jammies!

 They got socks from some members

And tomatoes and potatoes and sopapillas (basically a scone). Super good meal. Then we played soccer missionaries against members and with 3 gringos and a chileno against all chilenos I’ll let y’all figure out how that went. But I did score once so that was my proud moment. It was all luck but still. We had to be in the casa at like 8 that night so I went to bed at like 8:30. It was heavenly. Then yeah. 

So the day after christmas sucked cause no one was home. Then the rest of the week was boring.

So new years eve we would have dinner with a member but they cancelled on us so Sanders and I bought some pan and cheese and just did a little thing that was super good but Baez and Haynes were like heck no we need meat so they bought stuff to do their own asado. So they had churripan which is like a brautwurst thing and some pork. They shared and it was pretty good. Stayed up till midnight then out like a light. Not to exciting but Haynes and I chilled outside for a while just kinda talking so that was cool. Then morning rolled around. I am pretty sure almost none of the meat was cooked all the way cause we couldn’t really see the meat with the flashlight so I was super sick. Not fun but I got over it by like 9. and then we had an awesome Zone activity! Everyone from Los Angeles (minus Haynes and Baez because they didn’t want to pay) so two zones got together and we played real football (well two hand touch) and frisbee and did some volleyball stuff and some fun like relay races stuff. WACHITOROS! We definitely probably almost won I dunno. But if we didn’t we should have. We had the only candadian on our team. He is a really cool guy name of Duroscher. Built like a hockey player. Nice guy. We dominated the wheelbarrow race together. But anywho. Yeah so super fun activity. It was basically like just hanging out with a bunch of friends again back home. But you know, different languages. But still super fun. I wore my america socks!! Everyone was impressed.

So this week we had one day where we got like in every house we contacted and challenged people to baptism and it was awesome killer day. Then we had the next day where it was blazing hot and we couldn’t drink water cause we were fasting, and had 41 contacts (read as a lot) and almost no lessons. We figure we where in the sun for about 5 hours. Horrible. But on the way back home we were just dieing tired feet hurt thirsty when a member who drives a collectivo (basically a taxi but on a fixed route) picked us up and took us home. It was a tendermercy from the lord straight up. He takes care of the missionaries. 

But yeah sorry again about the email last week but stuff happens. Got super busy and yeah. But we got the fence put in out there. Looks good. Thank you for teaching me how to work.

Love

Elder Galbreath XI

this neighborhood is protected by guns.

Alarmas are alarms and Armas are guns. Thought this was hilarious

Oh esta semana. Fue genial!

Ok skype first. We get to skype anytime from 11-well later I guess on christmas. Before that it is basically a normal day. So I will talk to garrett about when and then talk to yall. I miss saying yall. Anywho so yeah we will do that I’ll talk to Sanders about when we will come but I’m thinking about as soon as we can so thats in your morning. But sanders and I are saying like 1130-12 our time so like 5 or whatever Garrett time. But here is the catch,. We get 40 minutes to talk. That is all. Not even the proper hour. Sorry but thats what presidente is saying and thats what we have to do. Just letting you know now. But next week I will try my connection with dad to seal it all up. But we will be using a members house so I don’t know what all is gunna go down with that stuff. But next week I will know. 

Questions

Literally everything i have learned in my mission has changed me and my testimony. I am no where near the same person I was and its only 4 months in. But one HUGE thing I have learned is about how important families are. Everything about the evangelio is about families. Everything we do from baptism to temple work is basically so we can live with our Heavenly Father together again, and be with our families while we do that. Like obviously there is other stuff but thats kinda of it in a nutshell. Families are so important and I was blessed to be raised in the best of them. (You have permission to sniffle but not cry here).

Blessings. Once again like everything. But I remember dads job thing was a big thing I remember and yours to. Also I feel just like the Lord is trying me and growing me and all the time I am just receiving the blessings of the Lord. The fact that I haven’t got hurt, just everything. There is no way I should even have half an idea of spanish yet but I’m doing pretty well. Umm but yeah little tender mercies of the Lord are what I see the most. We found a house when we needed it. We get  into a house when we feel like we are gunna die and need a drink. So on and so forth. My God is awesome. 

Serving is helping me grow so much. I love the Lord more than i ever realized possible but i know how little i understand about everything. The moment we start to think we have stuff figured out i realize i know nothing. 

Tell everyone their to help the missionaries out. lessons with members are something to kill for out here so help them out. Love them all.

Ok padres. So Skype thing im gunna try and get on at like 1130 my time. Please tell Gare-bear what time that is for him I think its like 530 but if not please tell him. This is the earliest I can get on. 

Ok so this week was crazy and honestly not gunna be able to tell you everything because it was crazy and my time limit is short. So ok here I go. 

Cambios were this week. We got a call from the assistant which usually means someone is training or being made a zl. So Sander is now a DL! And we are both staying here. Which is weird they usually separate the dad and son after the training. But so he and I are still going strong. And he gets the pjs now for sure!! so thats cool. My entire house is the same still Haynes and Baez. 

Umm Christmas program thing. It was...interesting.I The missionaries sang. WE sounded legit as heck. Booom. 

So one of our investigators se llame N was giving us a ride back to a members house when she asked Sanders if because we thought he was leaving if he would be able to go to her baptism. And we were like umm que? because she didn’t have a fecha. And then she was like yeah if possible like this year does that work for you guys??? So We are pumped to see what goes down with that because I have no idea what happened there.

WE offered a lot of service this week a bunch of members bought wood to be stacked so the first people they call are the jovene missionaries. So thats been fun. Cool story the shirt I am wearing over my button up in the picture is a large. Boom. Ok so it was still tight but still. No preguntas. But so yeah. Stacked a lot of wood. Then ate pan de pasqua to make up for it. Its like fruitcake or whatever that stuff is called that has like the gumdrops in it. That cake noone likes. Its not bad. Not many gringos like it but i do ok, i do. 

I love you both muchismo and will email the 22 and talk to you soon. 

Love you

Elder Galbreath

what a week.

Ok sorry but a couple things: 1 who is allie engaged to?????? Did not see that one coming but hey it happens she is cute. One down. And Bailie is engaged as well? Crazy with who?

2:Presidente Blueth is awesome it was good to hear it from him. He was very reassuring. 

So this week was good. We had a Grand inter-cambio on tuesday. This means all the companionships in the zone got mixed. I worked with a native named Elder Dominguez. I did pretty good I could understand everything except when he got excited and started like laughing in his sentences. Then I was lost. But other than that I was good so that made me feel awesome. But geez he is a good teacher. Like I have been focusing on my spanish and my knowledge just thinking that teaching would come but man that guy can go. Like seriously I was blown away. We taught the gospel a couple times and one time I was like yeah I want to be baptized where can I sign up for that? Dude is crazy. But yeah so that was a wake up call. So Sanders and I stepped it up this week and got like 171 contacts this week. Which is a lot. So that was cool. 

So I forgot to write about this last week but last week was the primary program! It was awesome they don’t have all the kids say something so that was different but they still sang songs and it was cute. A little girl was going to say the prayer but she got scared so she ran crying over to her dad who is the stake president. So like the entire barrio went awwww.... and then another girl said it but she was older and loves being in the spotlight so it worked.

Sorry your week was boring. But about great grandma, that was hard. Pres called me and he was super reassuring. He is a great man. But after we hung up I said a prayer and just forced myself back to work. That night I started to remember stories about her. I remember when John moved in to the downstairs part of her house and I was super mad because that meant Zoe and Taylor would get to see Great Grandma all the time. Just little things like that. But I’m sorry I’m not there. But now she can go through the temple so thats good. Families really can be together forever I know that here on the mission more than ever. That is basically all we are trying to teach and do in the church. Be together with our eternal father forever and as a family together. Its really all it is. But its good that she is in a better way now. We will love and miss her though. I love you dad.

Thats awesome about Eliza. That girl is gunna be good. Just tell her to be careful about her feet. Didn’t John mess up his like ankle or something? Or was the world just not ready for Big John. What are the other munchkins up to? Here school is getting out but its still going strong up there isn’t it? Christmas vacation right? I don’t remember. Geez its hot down here by the way. Like wow. 

So ask the other uncles who is gunna have a baby in the next two years because we have a record of babies being born while someone is out on the mission. Garrett while Dan, Me while John, and Cade(?) while garrett right? Ok whats Johns youngest named? Geez I’m bad I cant remember. Oops. 

I love you mama. Keep setting up for christmas!! Here they have the same types of trees we have so I saw a branch with a white strip and I was like hey thats the 2nd row!!

Elder Galbreath the 6th

Thanksgiving, done

Thats right Thanksgiving happened this week. Just kidding we celebrated like crazy! So for almuerzo the lady we had it with, another elder had taught her how to make cheesy chicken rice bake!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So she made it for us and I almost cried. Like seriously it was great. Not as great as yours but seriously it was good. But for thanksgiving we went to a negocio and bought pan and some cheese (which is weirdly expensive) and had pan and melted cheese. Ok so definitely super boring but honestly it was legit. And I didn’t do insanity that day so I got to feel super fat too. Awesome right? But those pictures look amazing thank you. And Taylor and Eliza may or may not have had me tearing up I’m not admitting to anything though. But thats awesome. Thanksgiving with the Galbreaths sounds awesome though. Is there a story with the chickens though?

Ok so this week was INSANE. So started off we moved. Just kidding that was at the end of the week. Ummmm oh yeah I got my package! Super pumped the candy canes are disappearing mysteriously fast though I have no idea why.......Anyway the tree is very proudly displayed in our front window now in the new house. Before it was on my desk. But I don’t have a desk now. That comes later though. But super pumped about the package though. Gunna be great. On the 11th the mission is getting together to celebrate. Well like half the mission. The south half. But thats the awesome half. So look at the blog of Presidente for pictures of yours truly. 

                                        Package received! 

But then we had a bunch of stuff go down with a baptism date. MJ was supposed to be baptized saturday but like she didn’t ever talk with her parents and even though she is 19 we still want her parents to be ok with it. And they are not. Like at all. Her dad was like yelling at us at one point. Like he would say I will respect her decision then Maria would say well I want to be baptized then he would start saying how the family is catholic and such and it was hard. Ehhh people. But she said she is talking to them and we are hoping for the 13th of this month. Super pumped for that because she is basically a mormon she just needs to get wet. And there is a chance I will get to baptize her. In our mission we only get to baptize in our first and last sector so I gotta get going soon. Working on that though :-) and yeah. So then on friday Sanders and I were wrestling but I was in my flip flops so I had no traction so he pushed me and I went back and then I went through a window basically. That’s what those pictures are of. Oops. So we called Elder Pendley (the adult missionary) in charge of stuff for the houses and he was like “oh its happened before just go  get it fixed and we will reimburse you.” So I learned how to put a window in. We measured the window, went down to  the window guy, he cut out a piece of glass and handed it to us. So we went back to the house, took out the old piece, put the new one in, then siliconed it in place. But we didn’t have the little gun to squeeze the tub of silicone and so we made do. My thumb was very sore for a couple days. Yeah I did that. But I felt very accomplished. 

                                            OOPS!

So saturday we moved. That was a hassle and a half I will tell you what. Like it was good because there were 4 boys that can fit everything we own in 3 suit cases but still it sucked. The new house is cool though. It is in the gricco (rich) part of town so thats cool but its like a half hour walk away from our sector. But still cool and more importantly still a house. But the rooms are smaller so we don’t have room for our desks. So we are figuring that out now. But its cool cause now I study in my bed or on the couch. Which is way comfier! So thats legit. Also the Ensign you sent me with the conference addresses? Yeah its called HEAVEN. Seriously we usually get the ensigns pretty close to the beginning of the month but this issue we still haven’t gotten them so I got to read them early though. It was awesome. They translated the spanish guy..interestingly though. A couple points its not how I would have translated it though. Its kinda cool to see how everyone else in the world sees general conference. I love english. It’s great. But yeah. Thats my busy week shoved into a quick letter. I don’t know much about the skype call other than we can do skype. Its awesome. But I will find out more soon. I love you. I want to see pictures of the house though. I will send pictures of people next week. Its Christmas!!!!

Elder Galbreath the 6th