Josh's first week in Chile!

¿Qué tal todos?

It´s so nice to type on a Spanish keyboard and be able to type all of the spanish characters that I want. But it´s tough at the same time cuz I am trying to talk in english and it keeps correcting me to spanish. Hhaaha! Just so you know, our P-days here are on Mondays but it depends when we write our emails. Wow, there has been so much to get use to here that I don´t know where to start. I don´t remember if I told you about our house but it´s nice. It is just the two of us in our sector so we are only two living in our house. We live in a duplex in the back of a cul-de-sac. Overall, the house is nice for humble conditions. I have a greater respect for the Chilean culture here. Out here, the houses aren´t amazing to look at but when you go inside, the people really make their houses look quality nice. The work is awesome here. I won´t lie, I have had a rough first week with working with Elder Abrams but it was exciting and so worth it. I love the gospel and having the opportunity to share with every person we walk past on the street or their house. The first day we were here, we had a district meeting and I got to meet my Zone and district. My district leader is Elder Alvarez from Argentina and he is a really good teacher. We learned about making effective contacts and how we can share the Gospel mor short and powerful. That is what President Resek wants in the mission: that we make our lessons no longer than 30 minutes because if they are short and powerful, then we can leave when the spirit is the strongest and have them wanting more.
The people here are very friendly as I have been told before the mission but they have about 10 excuses that everyone uses when we want to share a message…. “I´m Catholic or Evangelist”(popular), “I work all the time.” “I´m never home.” “All religions lead to God.” “Estoy Ocupado ( I´m busy).” That´s the most popular one. Anyways, we have a baptism date coming up for two investigators on June 20th with a father named Juan in Lo Miranda and Sergio who has been active in the church for 3 years but does not wanna get baptized yet cuz he´s not ready for the committment. It´s not the best excuse cuz he´s 72 and wouldn´t really have any responsibilities in the ward. We´re visiting him today to see if he prayed about the baptism date that we gave to him. We are haveing the privilege to here from Elder Tallin H. Oaks of the Twelve Apostles on June 16th at our Mission Conference. I am SO excited!!!!!!
The language is a DEFINITE struggle fro me right now cuz all of the Chilenos speak so fast and it´s almost like I learned nothing in the MTC but everyday I am progressing and my companion is an AMAZING trainer. Elder Abrams is so supportive but he doesn´t baby me. I am so grateful for his hard working nature and wanting to progress and set goals like me. This is going to be a great first companionship of my mission. I feel like we are going to work amazing together. He knows spanish very well and I want to learn spanish very well, so I feel like with time, I will get better. I have more to tell you so I will write a letter that will go with this email. I love you all and thank you for your support. Thank you again. No vemos.

Con Amor,
Elder Boaz

P.S. Next week I will send pictures and give you a big list of emails to forward all of my emails to so I am being obedient. Lol. Thanks Mom and Paps!