January 28, 2014

Hello Family!

This week has probably been the best week here I've had so far. We had another transfer today so it kinda sucks because one of my good friends that I've made here was leaving in the transfer because he was in the group ahead of mine. I don’t remember if I've mentioned him before in any of my previous emails (i probably have) but his name is Elder Meaker. We have a lot of stuff in common and the nice part is that he lives in Washington so we are already making plans of the cool times we are gonna have when we get home. Yesterday was super crazy though because it was the last day before a transfer. I got a little emotional when I was saying goodbye to the district ahead of mine who was 2 elders and 2 sisters because we have all become super good friends. I’m going to try to write them as much as i can though. They have done a lot in the MTC to bless my life and they feel like my brothers and sisters. I also got to give a blessing of comfort to Elder Meaker though which was pretty cool. That guy is like a spiritual feast. He always has these really cool messages that make me feel better whenever I’m down or am having a really stressful day. We call it Meaker moments whenever he talks because of how good his messages are. We all decided that he is going to become an apostle one day. Me and my companion have also been made the zone leaders for this last two weeks as well.

 The week was so good though because it started with THE TIE Ceremony. So basically there is a tradition in the CCM where the group that’s leaving passes down the ugliest tie I have ever seen that looks like it’s been made out of a 70’s sofa. Anyway it’s been passed down 10 generations of elders and each time the elder who gets it writes there name and mission on the back. The ceremony is basically a bunch of random questions where you get points and then there is a scenario. I don’t have time to explain the whole thing right now but I’ll explain it to you later. Well my companion won and he is actually wearing the tie in the pictures we took with the sisters.

On Friday we were out all day in Lima Central for our visas. Lima central is really beautiful though. It’s the more touristy part of Lima so it looks a lot nicer than the outer parts. There are a ton of old buildings everywhere because it’s basically like their version of Washington D.C. We also got to go eat at Burger King and I did not realize how much I missed American food. It was a really good day and on the way home it was dark outside so the whole city was lit up.

The next day we went out proselyting for the second time and my companion was one of my Latino roommates so that was really nice because we already knew each other really well. We were able to do a lot more this time than we did the first time. We taught 3 lessons and had 2 contacts. The first lesson was to this inactive family so we just taught a boy in front of his house because his parents were gone. The second was to a hair dresser who we talked to on the street and she wanted to hear our message. We also taught to an old lady in front of her house. We also gave 2 blessings to a family, one to a mom and the other to her baby. It was a really good day and instead of coming back an hour early we were out for the entire time.

Sunday was also crazy spiritual because we had some good classes taught by the branch presidency. At the end of the day the district above us came into my district class and bore all their testimonies to us. It was sooo good and I could feel the spirit really strongly. It got pretty emotional in that room though. I don’t think I've cried as much as I have here in my whole life. Anyway after that all the gringos sang a really cool rendition of God be With You Till we Meet Again to all the Latinos which was amazing and also super spiritual and emotional. Anyway I’m having an awesome time here and I only have 2 more weeks till I get out in the field so I’m super excited.  I love you all.

Love, Elder Halverson

 Elder John (left) and Elder Meaker (right) who left this transfer.

 My district, the sister to my left had to go home this week for health problems.

 My roommates for this last week.

 This Latino was a really cool guy and he spoke really good English

 Me with Elder John and Elder Meaker

 Sister Neilson who also left in the transfer. She reminded me a lot of Whitney.

 Sister Sisson, She is a really good drawer and I'm jealous.

Yea we are cool!

January 21, 2014

Hello Everybody!

Everything here is awesome, I'm having a really fun time with all my classes and missionaries. As far as my schedule goes it's wake up, breakfast, class till lunch, lunch, personal and companionship study till physical activity at 3:00 then after physical activity it's classes again till dinner and then more classes till we have our planning meeting at 9:00 then prepare for bed then sleep. It´s like that everyday so days seem to fly by. The only time it's different is when we have our p-day, Sunday and then every 2 weeks we have a proselyting day. My siempres are finally gone. I wasn't sick either for that long either which is good but there is a sister in my district who got a bladder infection so her legs swelled up pretty bad and her knees have been hurting so the doctors think she may have arthritis which is pretty worrisome especially because she is going to the Cusco mission and she wouldn't be able to walk very far so I'm not sure yet what's going to happen. :\

 

Oh I forgot to tell you this but when I got here I was made district leader for the first 3 weeks which was pretty sweet but just yesterday it got switched. The new Americans got here last Thursday and there are 9 sisters and 5 elders. We had to split our temple session today because there are so many of us. I'm starting to do better in the language. I can understand more than I can speak because Spanish grammar is weird especially with all the feminine and masculine stuff. I'm getting really antsy to leave the MTC though because I keep hearing how great the Cusco mission is but I know I still need to learn more but I'm already half way through my time at the MTC which is crazy to think about. There is another transfer next week on Tuesday then after that we are only here for 2 more weeks and then we leave. There hasn't really been anything super interesting happening though. Oh however our MTC president finished his mission today and headed home and we got a new mission president who is from Columbia which was pretty cool that I got to be here for that change. Also there is a guy here named Elder Meaker who is an American in the group above my district and he is also from Washington but he is near the Canadian border on the west coast. He is a really funny and cool guy though so I've been making plans with him of what we are gonna do together after our missions. This guy is obsessed with sushi and food and for those who watched "How I met your mother" he sounds like Marshal when he explains food. It's super funny and awesome how passionate he is and how he can make a spiritual message out of anything.

 

Anyway sorry if this is a bit short but there wasn't all that much stuff that's happened. It's great to hear how everything is going back home and I love you all lots! Until next week,

 

Love Elder Halverson

January 15, 2014

Hello family!

I’ve been having a fantastic time here, once again I’m writing in English so I can do this faster. Anyway every day has been the same but I do feel like I can understand the language a lot more now than I thought I would be able to. I’m having a hard time remembering how to say words though so my companion has to help me out when we teach our fake investigators but they tell us that it’s more important to teach by the spirit than trying to speak Spanish which is very true. Also my companion has 3 years of high school Spanish on me. I’m 3 days behind in my journal though and not because I haven’t been writing, it’s actually the opposite. I write around two pages or more about every day so I feel like I don’t have enough time at night to write. Anyway I’ll let you read it when I get home so you can know more of what my MTC experience was like.

We had our first proselyting experience last week where we were paired with a Latino companion. We would go out to get contacts and teach inactive families. It was a really cool experience except I couldn’t understand what was happening in our lessons. All I did was say the prayer and bear my testimony but that’s all I expected to be able to do. The family we taught though had this little girl who would come take my scriptures and look at them and then give them back to me.  It was super funny. I was a little disappointed though because the Latino companion I was with and the member who came with us just wanted to head back to the church building and wait for the others instead of doing contacts so hopefully I will get that chance next time. The days here feel long but I can’t believe how long I’ve already been here. They say days feel like weeks and weeks feel like days. I definitely remember how fast it felt like it went by for Tara back at home.

Anyway we just had the first transfer since I’ve been here which was kinda sad because I lost all my Latino soccer buddies and we had to say goodbye to 3 elders who were the only ones in their district so we called them the 3 Nephites. They say that there usually are more English missionaries that come and have even had more English missionaries than the Latinos before and that this has just been kinda a dry spell for Americans. However we are supposed to get 15 new missionaries tonight, 9 sisters and 6 elders.

There is a ton of poverty here though, the houses are tiny and a lot of people live in them, there’s garbage everywhere and everything is gated or walled off and has some form of barbed wire on the top, however I still love it here. If the missionaries that come in are from poverty, you wouldn’t be able to tell unless you asked because of how clean they look. Also on our P-day yesterday (sorry I couldn't write you yesterday because the internet was down), we went to the temple again.

I can’t wait to get into the mission field though especially because people keep telling me that the Cusco mission is the best. I was wearing jammies because I was doing laundry so all my shorts were in the wash. Anyway I love you guys and I´m so thankful for all the work I can be doing here and I’m excited to hear from you next.

Anyway that's all for now, Love you all!

Elder Halverson

The "Gringos"

 Roommates

 Lima,Peru temple

Grenedia -- like passion fruit.  Chase says "so good but looks disgusting"

January 7, 2014

Hello Mom and Dad!

I don’t think I’m gonna try to write in Spanish for now so I have more time to write you guys. Also I don’t have time to put everyone in my contacts list for now so can you forward this to the rest of the family. Sorry I misheard and my P day is on Tuesday so sorry you didn’t get to write me in time for me to read it :P 

Anyway my flight from Dallas had a 10 hour layover so we left at around 10 and got in around 6:30. The lady I sat next to didn’t know English so I didn’t really talk to her. It was crazy when we arrived in Lima though. I was able to find all my luggage and didn’t have any problems getting to the MTC. However the traffic here is insane. It’s like there are no traffic laws at all and they fill these tiny little buses full of people which we got to ride in today to go to the temple. It also only costs 50 centimos to get where you’re going which is less than a quarter in U.S. currency. We took a private bus from the airport to the MTC which was nice and man Lima is huge. Everything is also super close together and pretty run down. They do have like gated communities that are really nice though. It’s really fun here. I have a sweet companion from Utah and he plays soccer a lot and is really good. (We play like every day with the Latinos.) The Latinos are really nice even though we can barely communicate with each other. My district only has 7 Americans and other than us there are only 7 other Americans here. However the others have been here longer. The MTC is tiny though and only has a few hundred missionaries. The weather is also only in like the 70s or 80s but with the humidity it makes it feel a lot hotter. The food here is really good. We mainly eat rice, chicken, pork, or noodles with some side dishes and though it tastes really good, everyone here gets diarrhea. We call them siempre softies. XD The classes here are really good and even though our teachers mainly only speak Spanish I’m still learning a lot. We gave our first discussion last night to our teacher who was playing as a fake investigator and me and my companion did pretty good even though we hardly know Spanish. Our sacrament meetings are separate from the Latinos so there are only 14 of us in the room. It was nice because it was a fast and testimony meeting and it was cool to here everyone’s testimonies. I’m running out of time and I need like 10 minutes to send pictures but I’ll be sure to write more next week. Also I got a little sick from the food and exhaustion but it’s only a little fever.

Love your little missionary

 Inside the Lima airport.

 The view from the bus going from the airport to the MTC.

 Chase and his companion.

 Lima, Peru temple

 Chase's room in the MTC

 View from a balcony at the MTC

 MTC court yard

 Soccer field (which he has been frequenting)

 Chase, his companion, and another missionary

The two American districts and a couple of Latino soccer buddies

Special Gift

Email from the pilot of Chase's flight from Dallas to Lima:
Hello, just a quick note to let you know that your missionary made it to Lima safely!  I had the pleasure of having this great group of Elders and Sister on my flight.  The plane was late getting to DFW and instead of landing at 12:30 a.m., we landed around 6:30 a.m. Lima time.  They did have a long sit time at DFW but they were in good spirits.  I saw them, introduced myself to them and shared a couple of stories from a friend of mine that returned from serving in Lima a year ago.  Attached are a couple of photos of the group.

                                                                                                Sincerely,
                                                                                                Brother David Eppley
                                                                                                Captain, 767, American Airlines

January 3, 2013 - Arrival in Peru

I can`t talk for long but I got into Lima at around 6:30 this morning and my p-day is on Thursday. Sleeping on the plane was hard but I think i got like 3 or 4 hours of sleep total. I’m also super hungry. I got some cool and funny stories to tell you guys next time I get on and I get more time to talk. But for now just know I’m safe and am having an ultra awesome time here so far. I love you very much and goodbye for now.

p.s. My new name on my name tag is Elder Halverzon lol

January 2, 2014 - Flying to the Lima, Peru MTC

Note from Chase's mom:
Chase flew out bright and early (5:15 a.m.) Thursday morning from Pasco and is scheduled to arrive at 1 a.m. Friday morning in Lima, Peru.  After forgetting to check his smaller bag (that contained all of his toiletries) and having to go through security twice, he boarded his plane with only 10 minutes to spare.  Chase has never flown before so today's adventure was cause for a lot of anxiety for both Chase and me. 

 Last dinner right after being set apart.  Costa Vida was his choice!

 Waiting in the ticket line at the airport.

 Waiting in the security line the first time.  (Note he still has his smaller luggage that eventually got checked.)

Entering security.