March and April 2010

Baptisms: Grace Torrez (March 2010) Lucia Rodriguez (April 2010) (that he told us about)

After the earthquake there were 6 missionaires in Matt’s zone that no longer had a permanent residence because their house’s fell down. They all fell over after the initial earthquake due to aftershocks. There were 2 elders on the island Juan Fernandez. The Tsunami that hit there was 25 meters high and hit 3 miles inward. They were ok. No missionaries were killed in the earthquake. They had to be in doors by 8pm due to robbers, but as far as Matt told us, he was not robbed. There was another earthquake on April 4. It was really loud and Matt wondered if it would be as big as the earthquake in February. He was able to listen to it coming, but it ended up being really weak.

At the beginning Matt had a hard time finding people to teach who spoke Spanish. He found people that spoke French and Korean, but not many that spoke Spanish. His Spanish on the other hand was getting better. His main complaint is Chileans speak the worst Spanish in all of South America. They drop letters and talk really fast.

In the earthquake the heater for the font broke, so at Grace’s baptism the water was really cold. The water also overflowed and was all over the hallway.

Matt had the privilege of destroying a house. There is a member in his area whose house had a lot of damage following the earthquake. They took apart her roof, a lot of the floor and took out a couple of walls. A lot of the ward was there to help.

Matt experienced his first conference in Spanish with the April 2010 conference. They had investigators coming to watch every session so he saw each session in Spanish. He was able to understand all of it. It is weird because the mouths of the speakers don’t match their voices, but all that matters is he got the message that they were giving.

Matt’s first Chilean Easter consisted of eating 3 hard boiled eggs. In Chile they have a holiday called Quzimodo. There was a large parade and lots of loud music.

In early April Matt had transfers and was no longer companions with Elder Francia (his trainer). He became companions with Elder Miller. Elder Miller is the district leader, which gave Matt the opportunity to learn a lot.