Week 27: Adventures of winning the Olympics

Alo everybody!

I hope you all have had a fantabulous week. Zach had a super fun time this week in Chile. Sounds like he is hardly working... Just kidding, he is totally working really hard with Elder Gibson. But really, it sounds like a fun time over there :)

Originally Elder Van Pelt did not write a letter this week on his given p-day (monday), which probably would have totally freaked my mom out, if she hadn't looked on her Chile missionary mom support group. (She is 111 days sober of Zach, congrats mom!) Anyways, he ended up emailing us on Tuesday, which was a fun little mix up.

The work has just been pushing forward with these two guys! They really do seem like the dream team. From what it sounds like, they will be splitting up this week to have new adventures. Zach will be getting a new companion that (I think) he will be training. So pray hard that this new companion is not a meany pants. We don't want any of those! They had a baptism this week for a 9 year old little gal, named Mirca, who loved learning all the lessons from those awesome missionaries. She read and accepted everything that they gave to her, (which is probably more than most members of the church do) so she sounds like she will be a great contribution to the Church in Chile. Her mom was a non-active member, but has recently been re-activated, and her father has nothing to do with it. He went to Mircas baptism and was moved to tears seeing her make that commitment, Zach said it was so tender.

Elder Van Pelt and Elder Gibson also received a surprising call from a man they had been teaching and had a baptism date set, whose name is Jose. I guess they met Jose at a local park to talk to him after receiving a call with a panicked Jose. Just recently Jose was kicked out of his house by his wife, who was referred to as "crazy", and threw something at his head that left a gnarly bruise. He expressed that he was forced out of the house, leaving his 3 kids with her after telling her that he wanted to get baptized. He told them he tried to go to church but the wife would have him stay home and take care of the kids. Well of course most of you know, or should know, that Zach is not a marriage counselor. That is a given because he is an 18 year old missionary. Anyways, the elders sat with him and tried to console him with scriptures and encouragement of love. They later bought him some breakfast, (which was super nice of them, since they have such a tight budget as missionaries, it amazes me how selfless he is.) and he hitchhiked back to Uruguay with some money that another member gave him, since all the rest of his family lives there. His plan is to get a stable job and fight for his kids, then find the missionaries in Uruguay and get baptized by them. Now, this guy is either really down on luck and Satan is really trying hard to keep him down, or he REALLY doesn't want to get baptized and made up a crazy elaborate story for Elder Van Pelt and Elder Gibson, to get out of his baptism commitment. Either way, keep him in your prayers!

So the reason Zach was not able to email us on Monday, is because he was going on a fun little 3 hour trip on a bus (with no air conditioning) and stayed at a house a little closer to where they would be having a mission activity. Zach ended up sleeping on the cold, hard ground, with no blankets, so he slept for about 2 hours. (let me tell you, the Van Pelts do not do good without sleep, it is a prized priority.) They got up at 5:30 AM to go to Traiguen (which is about 30 minutes outside of Zachs first area in Victoria) for a mission activity. The activity ended up being a missionary Olympics, which is soooo

dope. Can you imagine? The most honest, holy Olympics in the world! All the different zones competed against each other and they all had their own little flags to represent their zones. Zach competed in two games, ultimate frisbee, and dodge ball. Jokes on them, our family had a large stint, where we played dodge ball against each other every night in our backyard for like 2 years, so basically he was trained well for this activity. So that was that, and they CRUSHED all other zones. Because we are winners. That sounds cocky, but whatever, we totally are. After that, they had a yummy, delicious lunch of all-american hamburgers and hot dogs, then watching "Meet the Mormons" (which I haven't seen yet, but totally want to because of Zach's mention of a kick boxer, uh, hello, that's awesome). Well they left that activity on Monday at about 6 PM and didn't get home until about 8 AM on Tuesday, which is when we received his weekly letter. So basically he didn't sleep two nights in a row.

Zach ended his letter with him trying to get us to promise to not go to Disneyland with his two neices, because he wants to go with them for their first time. He must have not heard about the Disneyland Measles epidemic. Either way, there are no promises. Measles or not Disneyland rocks. Thats totally off subject.

Keep your prayers coming for Zach, he is doing so good and loves to hear from every one of you! Again, handwritten letters are the bomb, they make him so happy!

HASTA LUEGO!!!