Emil received on September 29, 2014 @ 12:17pm

Read all about it. I'm gonna send some awesome pictures right now, 

so be ready!

Here's me working in the Chilean Vineyards with Memo. He thought it was funny that we were the same height while he was standing on the little ladder. We helped him out for like 3 hours, and he was super grateful. He always asks me things about Napa Valley, and how they do things vineyard wise up in the states. Of course I have no idea, but he still likes talking about it. 

So I might sound stupid right now, but my companion and I just figured out this week that sheep have tails, and they look really awkward. Here you go. 

I didn't think Chile had a bug problem, and then we found this. We don't know what kind it is, but spposedly it's almost time for the brown recluses to start being more active and whatnot. SO there will be a lot of shoe checking in the near future. The 50 peso coin is a little bigger than a quarter, if I remember correctly. SO that's fun. 

Oh, and we think this is a dog. We saw it chillin on the sidewalk a few days ago. There are like over 9,000 dogs just roaming the streets, and apparently it's like that all over Chile.  

Here are some pictures from Amelia Jerez birthday. SHe was so happy when we walked in with the cake. She just turned 10, so we thought she should get something special for making it to double digits.

I asked about the dad because I haven't seen him in any of the pictures………… No, they have a mom and a dad, and the dad is actually getting interviewed for the Melchizedek priesthood on wednesday, and then they're planning on preparing to go to the temple! He works in a vidrieria, which is like a glass place... Not a lot of work, but there's nothing else, so he's got to stick with it. That lady on the left is the wif'e sister. They look nothing like each other.  They've got 2 kids, and her sister, who's not married, has two kids, they're pretty awesome. I asked her if she would teach me how to make Chilean bread, and she said totally. Chilean bread is better than any other bread I've ever had. SO I'll totally make it when I get back. 

Email received on September 22, 2014

This is in the house of the familia Jerez. They're one of the coolest families in the branch, and on the 18th, we went over to their house and made empanadas. Everyone always told me how good they were, but I didn't expect them to be this good. I'm gonna come back to the states and make empanadas for everyone and you're going to love me even more. 

Let me just show you how gorgeous Chile is. I took this literally 6 feet from the front door of our house. When it's a cloudy day like this, the clouds spill out from over the top of the mountains, and it looks amazing, as you can see.

Here's my big letter that you will hopefully enjoy. A lot happened this week, and I'll send pictures to explain everything!

Here's a caballero on a really pretty horse.

And here's a little caballero sitting with a big caballero.

Here's a fraction of all the caballeros that came out from the campo for the 18th.

And here's me, elder munoz, elder valdivia, monica, her two kids, the taxi driver, and my companion in one little taxi on the way home from the Jerez house last night while it was raining! I don't know how we all fit, but it was pretty crazy!

Here's me and my companion with Memo Lira at the branch barbecue that lasted like 12 hours. 

Here's some of the crazy spurs they use to keep their animals under control!

Here's some pictures from the big parade thing. Here's some oxen pulling a cart. And some caballeros looking cool.

This is about one third of the meat we grilled on Saturday. It was sooooo good.

I'm doing good. There was a whole bunch of drunk old guys the past few days because of the whole 4 day party thing. They all asked me if I'm from Russia or the states, and they laugh a lot, and smell bad, but that should be over for the most part!

Nancagua is relatively small, you can look up everything on the internet, because I have no idea. We're pushed up right against some mountains. Everyone has fences around their property, so we have to yell alo! instead of knocking on their gate. 

Love,

     Elder Hamilton

Emails received September 15, 2014 7:42am

I decided to write out a lot this morning to save time so I could respond to everyone else's emails. We'll give this a whirl and if it sucks I'll go back to the old way.

Now for the requests.

1. Can everyone send me a whole bunch of recipes that I could make in a short amount of time? The members here can't really afford to feed us very often, and we end up feeding ourselves a lot of the time. That would be AWESOME.

2. Send me LETTERSSSSS. Letters are the best because they just are. Thanks. 

Love,

     Elder Hamilton

Here's me almost hitting my head on our ceiling just by standing. I punch the ceiling at least three times a day as I'm getting dressed, so that's fun. 

Here's our living room, but it looks more like a dying room. It's where we spend most of our time while we're in the house.

My comp had a recipe for crepes, so we made a buttload of crepes the other night. Half of them were filled with jelly, and the other half with some Manjar that I bought. Now let me tell you about Manjar. It's really good. Basically it's like spreadable caramel, and it's diabetic ally delicious. 

This is where the kitchen goes, but as you can see, we just put our little fridge, oven thing, and microwave in this room. It's hardly a kitchen, but we make due. 

This is our house. And me. Although it may appear cute and homey, don't be deceived. It's basically falling apart. But this mission home has accumulated every Liahona church magazine sine the late 90's, so it's got that going for it. But that's about it.  There's 4 of us in the house

So our bathroom door decided to stay shut and never ever open again while Elder Munoz was using it, so now, in order to get into the bathroom, we have to go out into the backyard and climb through the back window into the bathroom. As you can see, I have developed the ability to perch on the window sill, due to my frequent window climbing activities.

8:14am His response to mom,

Dang, home sounds like a good time. I want to request a few things in addition to my previous list if that's alright. 

1. some slippers (it's freakin cold here)

2. The Europe power adapter attachment for my electricity converter, Apparently Chile uses European plugs.

3. Maybe one more sweater? Something I can wear with my brown and grey pants.

4. A light windbreaker would be awesome, but it should be turning into spring sometime soon, so it's not super urgent.

5. Some Pilot G2 Pens on 0.7 would be great. I brought 2 and they're getting used pretty fast. I'm saving fountain pens for letters on good paper.

6. And just fill up the rest of the box with whatever else I'm missing out on food wise.

Thanks so much. 

Love,

Elder Hamilton

Sweet, sounds awesome! Just throw whatever you think I'll need in there! I'm in a little tiny pueblito, and there's only one pharmacy sized store here, so I don't think I'll be able to find any slippers in my size. But I can just wear socks with my sweet Mexican sandals. That's what I've been doing.

Email received September 9, 2014 2:55pm

I'm here

Hey mom, I got here without any problems, and I have to be quick because we're going to buy food, do some tracting, and then go to a chilean birthday party. I'm in Nancagua for the first 6 weeks or more, and my trainer is a stud. His name is Elder Pistorius, and he's from West Jordan, and he's been out for about a year. P day is on Monday, so I'll talk to you then.

     Love,

          Elder Hamilton

Emails received on September 8, 2014

6:46am

     In less than 24 hours, I'll be in Chile, with like 30 other missionaries. It almost doesn't seem real, and we're all freaking out. I'm most of the way packed, and I am about 75% sure that my luggage is going to be too heavy. I'm about 100% sure that if all my clothes were in normal human sizes, my luggage would be a perfectly reasonable weight. So here's my plan. I'm going to leave some stuff behind, but if it turns out to be worth more than $50 of stuff, I'll just pack it all up and pay the $50 for an overweight bag.

     Also, I have concluded that the missionary force keeps the Tide company in business. Every Elder I know has a few Tide to go pens, and the CCM keeps feeding us food like spaghetti, so we're always using them. If anyone is going to send me a package anytime, it would be awesome if you threw in a few of those. Also, I made it 6 weeks before I tried putting my pen in my pocket while it was still clicked out, but luckily, Tide to go pens can get out pen ink. I honestly haven't found anything they can't remove.

     So I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to call from the airport. I'm definitely going to try to, but I'm not 100% sure. I'll be able to email you once I get to Chile though, at least that's what everyone's telling me. We're leaving the CCM at 4:00 today, and our flight departs at like 8:25 or something like that. We're scheduled to land at like 6:00 am Chile time, so tomorrow is going to be a really long day.

I should be able to get back on the computer after lunch today, so I'll talk to you again before I leave Mexico City.

     Love,

          Elder Hamilton

Elder Kerr, Elder Madsen, and I all had ties with blue tails, so I taught them the Elderidge knot, and we decided to grace your presence with our matching manliness.

And this is Hermano Martinez. We're the last district of missionaries he's going to get to teach. His father just opened up a big real estate company, and he's gonna go make bank working for his father.

And this is Elder Suh. He's in a neighboring district, and his family is from Korea. He's learning his third langyage right now, and he wanted to take an "asian picture" with me. 

Last night all the elders in my district went into one room and we ate a sickening amount of junk food. We all woke up this morning and vowed to only eat leaves from now on. And then they had pancakes for breakfast, and of course we ate them. And then we felt even worse. But it was worth it. 

This is Hermana Nava. We were her first district of missionaries that she's ever taught. She's pretty cool.

And this is Hermana Velazquez. She was our teacher, and she taught Hermana Nava how to be our teacher. 

11:30am we told him to just take everything and not to worry about paying the extra.  Just don't want him needing something he left behind.

Ok cool. I'll take everything with me if that's what you want me to do. It's gonna be $60 for an overweight bag, so I should have enough on my card. If I do get a chance to call I'll call on your cell phone.

From Brother and Sister Jones at 3:23pm

My husband and I are Senior Missionaries at the Mexico MTC.  We have enjoyed getting to know and love your wonderful missionaries.  We miss them already!

I thought you would enjoy seeing their district picture.

September 8.pptx