Los Conquistadores #3

11.29.10

This week was awesome and super fast!  I HAD MY FIRST BAPTISM YESTERDAY!!!  His full name is Victor Hugo Garay Sachez and he is from Peru.  He is an awesome little guy.  I have some pics from my comps camera ill send in a little bit.  So since we are opening a new sector we havent had anybody to teach.  It has been really hard because we have no plans and we just get rejected by everybody everyday.  Saturday I was with elder Diaz for the day and we found an old guy and a family that let us in and wants to get baptized!  The family is super cool too they have a Shelley haha and they have a 2 yr old named Amanda.  It made me miss Shelley a lot haha.  We found another lady yesterday too and we are finally teaching a lot of lessons. 

We have been having a lot of fun here.  Time is going by way fast already and I hear it only gets faster.  The members here are awesome too and they love Elder Kanahele and me.  They are always giving us tons of food and drinks.  Our lunches are always huge too from the members.  We eat a lot everyday but work it all off walking around in the hot sun.  The food here is really good too.  Its hard not having American candy though and I havent gotten the package yet but mostly likely tomorrow. 

I dont really have anything else to say other than we have been blessed a ton already!  Im learning a ton and I love Chile!  The people here are crazy and I love all of them! 

Love Elder Peck

Questions we asked:
1.        Do you have to email your mission president every week?
Yes we email him every week

2.        Do you get to email friends and other fellow missionaries?
ya we can email pretty much anybody

3.       Are elders Larsen and Clark in your district/zone? 
larsen and clark are in different zones and i have only seen them a couple times

4.       If so, how often do you get together as a district/zone and do you get to talk to them?

5.       Is there a chance you will get transferred before Christmas?
 i could get transferred before Christmas but not likely since I will still be getting trained

6.       Do you eat more than 1 meal a day?  (Elder Larsen’s mom told me her son only eats 1 large meal a day and it’s been hard for him to adjust to that)
We eat a lot everyday

7.       What did you do for Thanksgiving?
 for thanksgiving I made fried rice and we bought some chicken and had a huge feast

8.       What do you want us to write to you about?
just write about whatever

9.       How often do you write in your journal?  Do you need another one sent to you within the next couple of months?
 i write in my journal every night so I might need a new one in a few months

10.   Are you able to get pictures developed there so you can write on the back people’s full names and the places you were?
We can get pics here but we can send them via email to

11.   Did you get your Thanksgiving package?
I haven't got my package yet but I will tomorrow

12.   How many items have been thrown at you so far?
 I haven't had anything else thrown at me yet

13.   Are you going to send Sam some souvenirs for Christmas?
 I'm buying everyone stuff here for Christmas

14.   How many cats have you eaten?
 probably 1000 by now

15.   How much money do you  get a month for food, etc? 
 we don't get much money but it's enough for food and we all share it usually and we haven't eaten out yet but there is a member and her husband isn't a member but he is a chef here in some really fancy restaurant and he loves us so he is going to make us a meal and stuff soon and we are going to call home from their house for Christmas. I guess how it works is you guys call their house so it doesn't cost anything for them but we still have to plan it all out so i'll let you know. (side note from amanda: longest run on sentence ever ;)
16.   Do you share what food you buy with the other guys?

17.   Have you gone out to a restaurant for a meal yet?

18.   Amanda wants to know what the hypotenuse of the pi of the root of 6 is? 
HOW RUDE he didn't answer my question!!

Los Conquistadores #2

11.22.10

This week flew by.  I had a lot of fun learning and gettng to know people in our ward.  We have been visiting a lot of people in our ward because we need their help getting refrences and such.  We have been working with them a lot like doing service and helping them with everything so they know they can trust us with their references.  Our ward is so awesome (except the bishop, he doesnt really do much).  The bishop is actually kinda rude here and doesnt want to put forth the effort to help us.  Anyways, I have another crazy story haha.  So this week we went to a members house for lunch and she was some old lady.  She gave us some bowl of soup or something that was ok tasting but there was a lot and it filled us up.  Then she brought out a second plate filled with mashed potatoes and these werid meat pattie things.  Kanahele tried one of the patties and said it was like tuna, meat, and garbage mixed.  It was undercooked and disgusting.  When the lady left the room we  wrapped them up in our napkins and put them in our backpacks.  After that she brought out the dessert, which is usually really good because its like fruit with whipped cream on it.  We took a bite and the cream was sour and old and the fruits tasted like they had been sitting in the fridge for years.  When the lady left the room again, Kanahele took out a ziploc from his bag and we threw it all in there and hid it.  By that time I was feeling really sick and I told him we should leave.  We started getting up and then I got really really sick.  I was about to puke but the lady wanted us to pray with her.  Kanahele was saying the prayer and he forgot her name and had to pull out the phone to look at her name haha.  He finished the prayer and we quickly shook her hand and walked outside and I puked everywhere!  It was nasty haha but it made me feel so much better.  We have also been gettnig these desserts that are like these dried peaches sitting in this weird juice with soggy oatmeal around here and everybody loves it here.  Its sooo gross.  They have it for us everytime too and it sucks.  There is one family though that loves us and we had lunch with them yesterday.  They make us some roast beef and potatoes and this super good salad.  I think I mention their son Freddy last week but he is 17 and is super cool.  He has been playing music for us on his computer when we get there haha and I showed him FTS and he really liked sad sad day and turn right.  He brought it up at churuch yesterday and said he really liked it.  We are slowly getting famous down here in Chile.  So I guess they dont send missionaries to Easter Island anymore because of the way they get treated there so they just send senior couples and their is another island in our mission that doesnt have missionaries because the island had a tidal wave during the earthquake.

This week has been a week full of miracles.  We have been trying to get into this house of an inactive lady but she wouldnt let us in for the longest time.  She finally let us in the other day and after we shared a little message with her she broke down and told us she was embarassed to let us in becaue she doesnt have any electricity, running water, or money. She hasnt eating very much the last week and her life was a mess.  On top of that her 17 year old daughter is with this 35 year old guy and they had a baby.  The dad took the baby´s milk and sold it for drug money.  We decided to go buy her a little bit of food and gave her the bishops number to ask for help.  We have also been teaching a guy named Hugo and he is getting baptized this sunday!!!  I get to baptize him so it should be super cool.  My first baptism and Im only a month in. 

Last week for P day we went shopping and I started my Christmas shopping.  I bought some things for Amanda and for Braden so far and we were going to go today but the zone leaders called us this mornng and said that we are having a zone activity today so I probably wont be able to shop. 

Well, these last couple weeks have been an awesome adventure.  I have been learning a lot and I feel the Spirit everyday.  I decided to start the BOM over again but this time Im writing down every single question in there.  The first question is ¨why do you smite your brother with a rod?¨ Haha anyways Thats all I have this week.  Adios!

Love Elder Peck

ADDED LATER:
My mom and Ty emailed back and forth a little bit, she asked him if he wanted pepto bismol and this was his reply:

I´m fine with medicine I was just sick that one day because of the undercooked food but other than that the food is awesome here.  We had empanadas our 2nd day here and afterwards I found out it was cat meat inside haha but I didnt care it was wayy good.

MTC Flashback

I was asked to post this photo on Ty's blog. It's Ty with Haley Pratt and their companions. Our family and the Pratt family have been friends since forever starting with my dad and Steve a loooooong time ago. So when Haley got her mission call we realized Ty and her would be in the MTC at the same time for a couple weeks. Haley is leaving the MTC at the end of December to serve in the Naga, Philippines mission. It was really cool that they were able to track each other down a few times and talk to each other. I bet seeing a familiar face in the MTC was nice for both of them.

(please note: Ty is wearing the tie that I picked out for him and everyone here scoffed at me but he said he wears it the most out of all his ties. Plus, it was on sale for 4 bucks! shhhhh)

Los Conquistadores #1

11.15.10

Wow, its hard to believe Im in a whole other country right now.  I mean I can believe it because I dont understand anybody but its crazy.  I´ll just tell you everythnig that has happened so far I guess.

So the plane ride was extremly long but fun.  I didnt sleep at all the whole time, I was sitting near Elder Larsen and Hermana Stevens so we just talked the whole time plus we were too excited to sleep.  We landed in Chile and we went through all the airport garbage and finally met the Pres and his wife.  They are both super cool and nice.  We went to the mission home which is like a mansion here and its super old too.  We hung out there most of the day and they let us take a little nap but I was still exhausted.  We had a really good lunch and then later around like 6 we met our trainers.  My trainers name is... Elder Kanahele.  He is from Hawaii and he is super cool.  We get along really well too.  He has been in Chile for 10 months and is just about halfway done with his mission.  We got to our apartment a little later after a long metro and taxi ride.  It was a new area for him too so we had to pick up some of his stuff from his old apartment.  We are opning a new sector too which is crazy hard.  We have no investigators and we dont know anybody around here so we have been going door to door everyday.  The first day was so confusing for me.  I didnt understand anybody at all and I could hardly speak.  We only had a few hours of just contacting people and we got into two houses and taught about prayer.  The people werent in our sector so we havent seen them since.  We have two other missionaries living with us named Elder Roth from Washington and Elder Diaz from Honduras. Its cool living with another guy from WA.  Ive updated them on all the sports and stuff because they havent heard much.  The next few days we were doing more contacting and getting to know the members around here.  There are like 1500 members on the list of memebers but only 80 are active.  We have gotten to know most of the members pretty well already and there is one guy named Freddy who is 17 yrs old who is super cool.  We were helping him with his english and after he was showing us his Red hot chili peppers collection.  We got to listen to a few songs and I was soo happy.  Around the 4th day I actually started understanding people too. I dont understand everything they say but I know it for the most part usually..  I have learned a ton too from my tranier.  He is super cool and chill.  We talk a lot about our lives before and stuff and we have gotten to know each other really well.  His job before the mission was dancing with fire in Hawaii.  Its weird though being the oldest in our apartment.  Im like 6 months older than my trainer but oh well. 

The last two days were crazy.  First, we were walkng down the street at like 830 and some kid threw a rock at me but it hit me in the backpack.  Elder Kanahele got pretty mad at the kid but we didnt do anything.  Later that night we were walking down the street heading home and some fleites (wanna be gangsters) threw a beer bottle at me and it hit me in the head.  It was plastic so it didnt hurt at all but it was gross.  Then, yesterday I got attacked by a dog.  Haha its crazy here.  There are thousands of stray dogs everywhere and our sector is super ghetto.  I was told its one of the poorer parts in our mission but its better than most parts of Chile.  I have taken lots of pictures and stuff and hopefully I can put them on here.

Well, I guess thats about it.  This is definately an adventure and I love it.  I cant wait to be able to communicate with people here fluently though.  Para siempre Dios este con vos!

Adios love
Elder Peck

A few things i forgot to mention.  We have one investigator atually named Hugo.  He is going to be baptized sunday!  He had been taking the lessons before from my comp and he is ready to be baptized.  Our second day we were asking for directions from some guy and he took us to his house and we taught him.  We taught him a couple tmes but he is a little crazy and has problems with the WOW just like everybody else here.  His girlfriend is crazy too and we might go back sometime but we cant do anything with him until he gets married.  A few things i want in my package would be a new long sleeve white shirt.  My sleeve had a tear in it and it got a huge stain on it from something.  I dont know how it happened but it did.  And maybe just some snacks.  swedish fish for sure though!

Edit:

There might be more to this post a little later, I am emailing him back and forth right now. He is going to try to send some pictures but I don't know if he'll be able to. I'll also update the title with whatever his area name is.

Missionary Board

A lot of wards have missionary bulletin boards and our ward was no different. It needed an update in a bad way, not only did we have new missionaries out and one missionary return it was just kind of boring and plain. (Hey I can say it I was the one who helped do it last time :)). So I made up a small design of how I wanted it to look then the Pratt's and Peck's (and Rags;)) got together for an FHE activity and did this:

 we have missionaries all over the world and all are in different time zones (cool huh!?) The missionary who just got home also would have been in a different time zone. I have a few things I still want to change a little bit on it. I want to change the "Called to Serve" banner on top just so it matches better. Also I think we are going to add a small caption by each photo saying when they left and when they'll return.

this one is just for you Steve, two can play! hahaha jkjk.

-Amanda

INTERESTING FACT:
Do you know why time zones were created? Well I'll tell you. It was all about the trains. Back in the olden days when the trains didn't travel as far it wasn't a huge deal but when they made the transcontential they had to do something because the train would leave New York at say 8am but then it was supposed to be in another state further away at the same time. So they had to create time zones so the trains could be on time. Small fact. Thanks Bro. Walton for the facts. I hope I explained it right.

1st Letter from Chile!

This is Ty and President and Sister May who are in charge of the Santiago North Mission. This is a letter from them:

Dear Peck Family,

            It was a great pleasure to welcome your son to our mission.  He arrived in good health, is enthusiastic, and anxious to begin missionary work here in the Chile Santiago North mission.  I have interviewed him carefully and find him well prepared, with a strong testimony, and a good beginning foundation in the Spanish language.  I feel honored to be his mission president and know that the Lord has prepared many people here to receive the testimony of the restoration he bears.   Sister May and I will treat him as our own son. 

            Your son will look forward to your weekly letters of encouragement and support.  E-mail is a great way to communicate with him as he communicates with me by e-mail weekly as well.  If you prefer to send letters, the church pouch system is the safest method.  The pouch mail comes several times per week and is delivered to the mission office, where we either carry it ourselves, or send it with missionaries to your son as soon as possible.  You can also send letters directly to his address but the mail system here is unreliable.  The address of our mission for the pouch system is as follows.

Chile Santiago North Mission

MP-Chile Santiago North Mission

Salt Lake City, UT 84130-0150

            Thank you for all you have done to prepare your son for his mission.  Sister May and I will do everything in our power to help him have a wonderful and productive mission.

Sincerely yours,

Michael E. May

President, Chile Santiago North Mission

Michael.May@ldschurch.org

Ty has left the Building

Ty left the MTC yesterday morning. He had to wait a little bit at the SLC airport so he called home then and my mom just happened to be home between church meetings to get part of my lesson I had forgotten at home so she got to talk to him for a little bit then. He arrived at the Huston, TX airport around 6 (4 our time) and we got to talk to him several times during his 3 hour layover. He sounds like he's doing well and he said he's nervous but excited to get to Chile. He arrived around 9am (6am our time) in Chile and met his Mission President and hopefully he's adjusting to Chile well!

MTC #15

11.2.10
Dear Family,
So I'm sitting here in the devotional waiting for it to start. People are saying it's another Apostle. I just saw Haley earlier and talked to her for like 20 minutes in line. I heard the band is doing awesome. So Elder M. Russell Ballard just walked in, I'll write more later.
Alright, now I'm in my room. I got your dear elders and you sent me a story from Jeanie and Joe's thing but it's the third time I've gotten it. So, the devotional was way good. He talked about being a "master communicator". I actually let Haley and her comp. into line next to us or else they probably would have gone to the overflow in another building.
Mom challenged me to finish El Libro de Mormon by the end of the year. I guess I could start over because by the time you get this letter, I will be finished. I have like 25 pages left. I've learned so much from it and I can't wait to read it again. You guys should read Hebrews 11. It's a whole chapter about faith and it's way good. Especially verse 34. Verse 34 mentions armies of aliens.
So the last couple weeks have been hard. It's crazy that we are leaving in 5 days! No puedo esparar!
I feel like I will be so confused when I get there. It may seem like I know the language but I still have tons to learn. We have super good teachers though and I feel as prepared as I could ever be. The days have been getting longer and it's hard to stay on task during our hours of study time. My favorite time of day is personal study. We get an hour to just read/ponder/study. I usually just read LdM (BOM).

Pues, estoy muy cansado. Tenia un dia muy largo. Yo se gue la Iglesia de Jesueristo de los Santos de los Ultimos dias es verdadera. Se gue Jose Smith tradujo los planchas de oro. En mi vida, yo tenia muchas pruebas pero mediante oracion y fe. Yo vencia mis pruebas. Yo se que Jesucristo es nuestro Salvador y Redentor. El murio para nuestros pecados. Estoy muy agradecodo porla Expiacion. Jesuersito es nuestro hermano y dios es nuesturo Padre Celestial. En el nombre de Jesucristo Amen.

Love,
Elder Peck

(again that Spanish might be typed wrong, it's hard to read his writing in another language)
we also got some pictures that I scanned:

 Caption on the back: Elder Larsen carrying me after I hurt my leg in softball.

 no caption

Caption on back: Me emailing during laundry time

Here are bits and pieces from the letters he sent Sam and I yesterday:

11.1.10

Dear Amanda,

Thanks for the letters/pictures. Written letters are better than dear elders. So we leave the 7th I am way excited. I can't wait to get out of Utah. The weather has been rainy/snowy/sunny.

BTW darth vader would kill charizard. I don't know what else to write.

On the 7th you should have a bunch of my friends come over to the house so I can talk to them too. We will be in Texas around 6 so that would be like 4 your time I think.
Missions are awesome.  You should go on one.  You would love it out here too!

Anyways, I got a ton of letters to write and no time at all. I'll email more stuff in like 20 minutes anyways. Love ya! The church is true!

Love Elder Peck

Dear Sam

Thanks for your letter! I heard you have been playing drumset a lot? That's awesome, Have you been practicing a lot? I heard you have been struggling a little bit. You should pray and ask Heavenly Father for help. I know if you read your scriptures and apply yourself He will help you. I have seen it 100 times here just this week! It's amazing how much He helps us with our trials when we apply ourselves. Well keep doing your best and work hard. The church is true!

Love Elder Ty S. Peck

MTC #14

11.1.10
This isn't a letter from Ty but wanted to post this card from a Hermana (Sister) McKenzie Stevens that came in the mail today:

Peck Family!
Hello hello! err...hola! Yeah, that's better :). I just wanted to take a few moments of your time to tell you what a privilege it was (is) to have Elder Peck in our district. Honestly, I have grown and learned so much from and (and I'm not just talking music and bands ;)) Elder peck has been such a leader to our district. He sets the bar of excellence that we all try and follow. Truly there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Elder Peck is going to do miracles for the people in Chile. I'm so pumped for him.
The thing that I love the most about Elder Peck is his spiritual maturity. I can't even tell you how many little insights he's had and shared with the class, and all the new things I learn from him. I feel so blessed to have had a first-hand opportunity to learn from Elder Peck. At least for me, he's been the example of the type of missionary I want to be when I grow up.
Real quick, there was this one day a few weeks ago that I was pretty down on myself. My companion and I were off, Spanish wasn't coming easy that day, so just not the best of days. But I didn't tell anyone how I was feeling that day. Then halfway through a study block, Elder Peck walks over to my desk and hands me a piece of paper with a scripture from the Bible on it. Needless to say it was exactly what I needed to turn my day around. And all he told me was that he felt like sharing it with me. So that's what I'm talking about! Elder Peck is going to do so amazing. You all should be so proud because I know I am. Thank you for sharing him with us for a few months! <3 Hermana Stevens.

MTC #13

11.1.10

We leave in 6 days!! Last week went by sooo slow though.  We got our travel plans then time just stopped.  Classes are getting longer and it's mostly just review.  The tripan has been back for about a week now.  We dropped off Elder Rouse, the one with the broken leg, on tuesday at the travel office said our goodbyes and the tripan reunited.  Its awesome having elder Clark back.  He is super smart and a lot of fun.  He learned a lot of spanish from E. Rouse too because Rouse was here for 13 weeks! 

 

So we leave the MTC at 11:30 and leave Utah for Texas at 2:35.  I'm not sure if we will have time to call home from that airport or not but we will be in Texas a little after 6 Texas time and we will call from there.  We leave Texas at 9:10PM and arrive in Chile the next morning at 9:50.  It's going to be a looong flight but it will be fun with Larsen and Clark.  We will probably just play pokemon or something.  Larsen got some cards from his girlfriend and we have been battling every night before bed.  I have won 2 times now and lost once. 

 

So I have seen Haley 3 times now.  We have the same P day so I talked to her a little bit today which was pretty cool.  Her companion seems nice even though I didn't talk to her.  We took a picture in front of some sign but I didn't have my camera but she has it on her's.  Tanner Clark from our stake is leaving tomorrow for Bolivia and I got a couple pictures with him too. 

 

I got a lot of letters last week but from people I didn't expect to write me.  I got a letter from Clark's girlfriend's friend and one from one of Charlies friends. 

 

Keep writing me a lot this week.  Somebody tell Eli Braden and Luke to write me letters before I leave the MTC because I'm assuming I wont here from them too much while I'm in Chile.  I got their tape which was cool but when they talked they didn't say much to me and just talked to each other and I couldn't hear most of it.  I recorded 2 tapes for them because I had a lot to say to them and I taught a lesson with my comps to them in spanish.  I'm going to try to find Haley and maybe teach her a lesson in spanish before I leave but we have different meal times so its hard to find her. 

 

Well, I loved the MTC but I cant wait to get out of here.  Going on a mission was the best decision I have ever made.  I'm thankful for all your love and support in my life and all you're great examples.  Tell the ward I say hi and good luck. 

 

Love Elder Peck