Called to Serve - Osorno, Chile

Elder Keenan Robertson is serving in the Osorno Chile Mission as a full time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Elder Robertson left on July 16, 2013 and will return sometime around July of 2015. Missionaries have a limited time to respond to all the E-mails and letters they receive so we will include here some of his letters home so that friends and family can keep up to date on how things are going for him and his ministry among the wonderful people of Chile.

Monday, November 25, 2013

November 25th, 2013

Hey!!!!!!  Punta Arenas is awesome!!!!  Super cold at nights and pretty cold during the day because of the wind; the wind is freezing!!!!!  The sky is massive here!!!!!!!  It is so cool.  The sun is blazing when it's out!  So bright you can't even look up!  The package was awesome!  The beef jerky was great!...so it was gone really fast..  Punta Arenas is great, it is so beautiful and its right by the ocean! 

My new sector is massive!!!!!  All the wards have two companionships except ours and I'm pretty sure our ward is one of the bigger ones!  It's crazy, I don't think I've seen half of it.  It would take 45 minutes to an hour to walk from one side to the other!  haha  It's awesome though, I love it so far.  The ward is awesome, it's pretty big I think around 70 people! 

Elder Sanchez is awesome!  He is a really good elder!  I realized this week I don't speak Spanish at all.  It's coming along, we can communicate mostly. ha-ha.  We carry a dictionary around though.  He is from Columbia but not the same mission Wensel is going to.  He lives on the west side of the country.  The name of it is really long and weird so I don't know it!

The food is really good, it's super similar to Valdivia.  Chicken with chicken with some bland chicken sauce without flavor.  We eat a ton of chicken.  I eat a lot of cereal too :) haha some of it is American too!!!!!!!!!!  The food is normally pretty bland with about a gallon of oil.  I wouldn't be surprised if they eat their cereal with oil instead of milk!  I have all of my winter stuff.  I usually wear my big coat and a beanie, it's not bad.

(Answer to a question about getting his hair cut) It's pretty expensive and it's not that long! haha 

I left my card reader in the house, sorry, lots of pics next week :)

I talk to Aaron quite a bit he is doing really good!  Tell Kraig Congrats!!!!!!!

Dang, crappy week for football!  Lame!!!!

It will take two weeks to a month for my bag to get here.  It's shipped through a bus company.  They ship it over land.  It's the same for mail and packages too, I think.

Don't put off what you can do today until tomorrow or it will never get done! :)
Tell Dallin I didn't leave the house haunted, I promise.

This sector is awesome, it's so big we have tons of investigators.  We are always sprinting around.  Yesterday we got a family to church.  They are really cool and we're hoping they get baptized on the 21st.  Things are super awesome here, I love it!  The people are so friendly its wierd! 

Tell everyone I love them tons and miss them!  Tell Nana I didn't have time to write her again so sorry and I love her tons!

Nos Vemos!
Elder Robertson

Monday, November 18, 2013

November 18, 2013

I got your package!  With the beef jerky!  Thank you so much!!!!!!  It was all great... was.... its all gone now:)

But I have bad news, it's going to take a long time for packages or letters to get to me for awhile....


This week has been good.  I feel kinda bad because Elder Parsons, I think, was pretty sure he was going to leave but it turns out he is training again here and I'm leaving!!!!!!  It's crazy, I am going to Punta Arenas!!!!!!!!  I'm so excited, I can't wait.  I have heard only good things about it.  I fly down there Wednesday!  My new companion's name is Elder Sanchez, a native from chile! Guess I have to learn spanish now.
 
Mom, in your card you asked about bon o bons.  Yes I have had them... imagine eating heaven :) that's a bon o bon they are so good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I love them a ton.
We do a ton of contacting and we find a ton of people but usually we can't find them home or they aren't really interested when we go back.

That's crazy the bishopric is changing!  Bro. Glover will do awesome!  Glad everything is good in the ward and home.  That will be cool learning the piano!  I don't think I could learn to play an instrument, Ellie is going to learn them all it sounds like! :)

This week was good we found some new people, that will turn into something.  We had a super awesome lesson with A______ so I think he will start to come around again.

Not much else has happened this week I've been packing.  I just dropped one of my suitcases off.  It will be shipped down to Punta Arenas, so that will take 2 weeks to a month.  We talked to a lot of drunk people this week. ha-ha  We were contacting this house and a naked drunk opened the door, that was surprising.  We didn't stay for very long!  I'm excited today I'm going to a little town on the beach that has a big fort.  That should be fun. 







(FYI - As far as we know, Punta Arenas is the furthest south proselyting city in the world!  It is on the Strait of Magellan and is only about 800 miles from Antarctica)

Monday, November 11, 2013

November 11, 2013

This week has been good.  We taught a lot.  Saturday we had a family night set up with _______ and _______ (the young couple with 3 kids).  They are really cool.  The family night fell through and we weren´t able to teach them.  We just thought they had not really wanted to share with us anymore.  But we went over yesterday and found out it was ________ mom’s b-day so they weren´t home because of that.  So we talked with the wife for just a little bit and we were leaving and we just said we will stop by later. We started to say bye and leave but she just said, “Wait, when are you coming back?”  So I’m pretty sure they are really interested we just have to get them to church!  We taught a lot this week but didn´t find anybody too interested.  Yesterday a menos activa came to church we have been working with since I got here!!!!!!!! I was happy.  The guy we helped with his field, we haven´t talked to him since then.  We are going to try again this week.

Sunday is elections so that should be interesting; I’ve heard it gets pretty crazy.  It’s hilarious how many posters and stuff there is for all the candidates.  It’s people running for office :) every couple of feet on the streets and sidewalks and everywhere!  Something I forgot to tell you the past couple of weeks is that in Chile people just throw their trash everywhere.  And so the city has a company thing and they just go around picking up all the trash.  They have been on strike for the past 3 weeks so I’m pretty sure there is more garbage then ground ha-ha gross!!!!!!

Spanish is good, I’m learning.  I can speak ok and it just depends on the person how well I can understand.  Chileans pretty much have their own language; they have their own slang words for just about everything so understanding is really hard.

I don´t really know what I want for Christmas ha-ha, maybe American food!:) like super buttery popcorn :)

I hate the Rams (they beat the Colts on Sunday).

The Philippines sounds crazy!!!!! Did you know Nathan Watson.  That’s where he is!

The weather was really nice but the past couple of days have been super stormy!  I’m bummed :) I like the sun.

Ok, now funny/cool story.  About a month ago I left my umbrella in a collectivo.  Collectivos are how we get around, they´re a mix between buses and taxis.  When you leave stuff in them it’s gone forever!  Elder Parsons left our phone in one when I first got here ha-ha.  So we were walking back from a doctor’s appointment when a collectivo pulled over and waved us down.  We were kinda creeped out ‘cause that doesn´t happen.  So we walked over and he was like, “Hey, I’ve been looking for you.  Did one of you leave this in here a while ago?” ha-ha  It was my umbrella.  He has been carrying it around looking for us!  How awesome is that!!!!! :)  I’m still laughing about that!  This week has been really good.  This is my last week of training.  I can´t believe how long I’ve been here already!  I’m really excited if I stay here for another cambio (transfer).  I’m pretty sure I’m going to have some baptisms! Thanks for everything and keep doing what you’re all doing!  I don´t have time to write Dallin or Ellie so tell them sorry.
Love you tons!!!!!!!!!!!
Élder Robertson

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

November 4, 2013

This week has been awesome!  We taught 30 lessons!  We count investigators as anyone who wants us to come back.  I've been talking about progressing investigators.  They are people with a baptism date and who are keeping commitments and stuff.  This week has been busy.  We had a specialized training all about stress so I got to hear from the mission president, it was good. 

I did an intercambio (exchange) with the zone leaders, that was really fun.  I also did another one with the other elders in the district on Saturday.  But I ended up getting a migraine so that ended fast.  It was a pretty bad one too!  I couldn't see and my arm and mouth went numb.  I have the weirdest migraines, ha-ha, oh well it went away I'm all better now.

We are going to try really hard this week to have a baptism at the end of this month so I'm excited for that.  It has been so hot!!!!!!!!! it's crazy.  Today or next p-day I think we are going out to this small town on the coast so I'll take lots of pics.  I bought spider spray and I took extra money out just because it costs to do it, I wanted to make it worth it.  I sprayed a lot and I haven't seen any spiders.  Except one we have as a pet, ha-ha, it's between our sink and oven.

I can't believe I have two weeks and my training will be over and I'll probably have a new companion!  It's weird, I'm pretty sure I just got here yesterday.  Spanish is coming along alright I guess.  My Chilean isn't though :)  This has been a super busy week so i don't have a ton to write.  It's been work work work!  For christmas I want to buy a couple of study manuals from store.lds so if you could make sure there is a little money on my card that would be cool. Not really sure what to ask for, you could send me some short ankle socks, I miss those!  What did you guys ask for for christmas?

Glad your work is going good mom!  How is teaching going, dad?  Thanks for the updates on football, now I'm almost positive the Colts are going to win the super bowl!  Sorry dad, there is always next year for your Broncos.  Well, things are good here thanks for all you do.

October 28, 2013

This week has been great!  Something I forgot to put last week was that I’ve given a couple blessings!  It’s really cool, I love it so much.  It was really a neat experience!  We did even better this week then last week.  But it’s still frustrating, we don´t have investigators!  But we are teaching a lot so that’s good.  We have so many citas with people but they usually fall through.  We do have a couple that we teach, they are really cool and I’m positive they are going to get baptized they just need understanding and time!  The husband works everyday so we can only teach him Saturdays.  They are 22 and have 3 kids!  So super young but really good parents just trying to figure the world out still.  They read the book of Mormon everyday it’s just hard for them and they don´t understand it.  Good thing we have the truth and we have the spirit!  I don´t know how you´d teach someone sin el espiritu (without the spirit).

This week should be fun; I’m doing two intercombios (working with a different missionary) on Tuesday and Saturday. I’m excited they are really fun.  Yesterday was funny, we had a meeting with a ward leader but at those meetings he just messes around and doesn´t get anything done so we just figured we could be late.  So we went contacting on a street and got swarmed by 5 or 6 dogs, ha-ha, it was funny.  We went to the meeting, I took it as a sign.

I didn´t feel the earthquake, still waiting! ha-ha Thanks for the updates I love hearing about football! 
The package thing doesn´t matter a ton, it’s expensive.  Some elders get a lot others don´t get any.  You can send stuff whenever you want but don´t feel obligated.  That’s a word right?  You don´t have to though.  Things of the world are awesome and really nice but don´t matter. 

Funny story; I need money to buy spider spray.  Earlier this week we were getting ready to go chop wood and it was pretty early so it was chilly.  I was wearing my shorts and I had my Utah State sweater on and, just to be safe, I threw on another jacket.  So we were ready to leave and we were by the door ready to pray and I kept feeling something on the back of my leg.  I just thought it was my shorts but I looked down anyway..... ha-ha  It was the biggest spider I’ve seen in Chile so far!  It was about the size of a 50 cent piece!!!!!  Then I realized the giant web all over my jacket.  During the night it had made a web all over my jacket and when I put it on it crawled all the way down me!!!! ha-ha I’m proud to say I did not scream like a little girl :), I waited patiently for it to crawl off and elder parsons brought it outside (he did let me kill it). I’m pretty sure I had a heart attack and a stroke and all of the other major trauma to my brain and heart that’s is known to man.  That was scary, so I’m going to buy spider spray and spray our house!

It’s a bummer grandma is so sick. I’m glad she is doing better though.  I’m excited to send you pics!  I hope I get the SD card reader soon.  Just put pictures of Mary and baby Jesus on the package, I’ve heard people won´t steal it if you do that.

Me and elder parsons get along great.  We work really well together.  We’re good about talking about stuff and not keeping it in.  My training will be finished November 16, I think, and the next combio is November 30 so he should leave and go to a new sector and I’ll get a new companion but you never really know it’s all different.


Last p-day was really cool, we went down to the river and saw sea lions and walked through this huge open market with fish and all sorts of things it was really cool!  To email, there are a couple internet places we go to, it is super cheap.  It’s about a dollar and a half for the hour I’m on.  It’s really weird, I have no idea where October went!  It’s crazy.