Chile - Villarica- Week 17 - #GraciasaqueÉlvive

¡Hola!

We are still in Villarica. We have no idea when or if we are going back to Pucón. It´s kind of a  bummer, but I really like it here in Villarica too! There are a lot of great people and there is a lot of potential to find new people to teach! 

This week is the Semana Santa, so it is a perfect time to talk to people about Jesucristo! I love talking to people about the resurrection of Jesus Christ! Even better the church came out with the video Gracias a que Él vive (not sure what its called in English.... Because he lives or somethin like that.) and its super good! We are sharing it with everyone and I hope you guys are too! Post it on facebook and share it with EVERYONE!!! Also check out Youtube 5 of April, the church is taking over the home page! Super cool!!

Take the time to remember Jesus Christ this week and all that He did and still does for us.

".....No está aquí.... HA RESUCITADO...." 

¡Yo se que Él vive!

Hermana Segura

When the volcano has a "hat" it means it will rain.. and it did. - Pucon

Sunrise in Villarica

Sunset in Villarica

Bus Station in Villarica



Welcome sign from the Sisters in Villarica.

Chile - Pucón - Week 16 - Escape to Villarica - Part 2

Hola,

   Bueno, we are in Villarica......again...... Wednesday morning we got up, did our studies, and headed to Villarica so that Hermana Wyatt could do some paperwork for her Visa. On the way we saw that the Volcano was releasing a lot of black smoke again. I said to Hermana Wyatt "5 bucks says we are gonna get a call from someone telling us we have to evacuate to Villarica again." Elder Biggs told us a few days ago that if anything changed with the Volcano, we would be taken out of Pucón faster than you could say "Panguipulli". Sure enough, a few hours later we got a call from our zone leader telling us that the Volcano alert was on Orange and that we needed to pack our bags again.

We would be in Villarica for at least a week, or until the Volcano explodes.....So we´ve been here in Villarica since Wednesday night with  the other Hermanas here  in a different sector than we were in last time. The Volcano is still smoking like crazy every day so we have no idea when we will be able to go back to our sector.....pucha...

    It´s been good though, I´ve had the opportunity to improve my Spanish a ton! We are with Hermana Torres de Argentina, y Hermana Marinho de Brazil, so the only way to communicate with them "obvio es en Español!"  I´ve been Hermana Marinho´s comp for the last few days. She is awesome! She´s been out one more cambio than I have but her Spanish is amazing! I feel like Portugues is kind of like Spanish so maybe that´s why? I dunno but I want to speak Spanish like her! But the poor thing has been sick the whole time we´ve been here. She has problems with low blood pressure and has had to go to the doctor a few times this week for some tests. Because of this she hasn´t been able to go out and work, so I´ve been in the house with her all week while Hermanas Wyatt y Torres are out working. I´ve just been hanging out there while she sleeps. I´ve had the chance to read and study A LOT (and maybe sleep a little myself....). One of the days we just talked for like 4 hours, that was super awesome for my Spanish! She went to the doctor again today to do some more tests so hopefully she will be feeling better soon!

     Other than that, nothing to exciting has happened. We left all of our investigators in Pucón so I have no idea what´s happening with them....I´ve been able to call a few of them and talk with them a little bit, but not much. It´s a little frustrating, but I´m sure we are here in Villarica for a reason...Hopefully we will be able to pick up where we left off when we go back....whenever that is... 

      Pray that the Volcano will just explode and get it over with so we can go back to Pucón!

¡Chaopo!

Hermana Segura

Chile - Pucón - Week 15 - No blog letter this week..

Hna. Segura and comp are back in Pucón safe and sound.  Still a little nervous, but ready to get back to missionary work.  She mentioned that it was exciting working with other missionaries while they were out of Pucón.

We got this picture today as they go out and about during their P-day..




She is doing so well, she already opened up her own "Tienda".

Chile - Pucón - Week 14 - Back in Pucón.

Volcano Story...

March 4, 2015 3:15am 
 

    Something woke me up, I could hear voices outside "Vamos, Vamos!" Sometimes our neighbors are kind of loud so I figured they were just goofing off. Then I started to hear more voices outside, more yelling. And then a car with a  siren of some kind drove past super fast. I never get up in the middle of the night, but for some reason this time I decided to see what was going on outside. First, I looked out our bedroom window. I could see our neighbors packing their car with food and other random things. Next, I went and looked out the kitchen window. The street was full of people walking with backpacks, bags of food,  bottles of water, walking their pets, and pushing babies in strollers. I thought "what is going on?" "Volcano" was the first thing that popped into my head, but I quickly ruled that out. Just then the phone rang, It was the Elders:  

          "Hola?"  

          "Hola Hermana. Como esta?"

          " um...bien? Que esta pasando?"

          "Mire el Volcan."

           "No...."  

 

I ran out the front door and could not believe what I was seeing.  

 

Pause Story.  

 

Fun facts about the Volcan Villarica:  

1. Volcan Villarica is the 3 most active Volcano in the world.  

2. Volcan Villarica is the most active volcano in South America

3. I live 15K (around 9 miles) from the Volcan Villarica

Continue story:  

I felt like I was in a movie. Lava was shooting out of the Volcano into the air. There was a plume of smoke like I have never seen before.  It was seriously one of the scariest things I have ever seen.  

Phone conversation with the elders continued... 

        "Oh. my. gosh." "What do we need to do?"  

        "Does a member live close by?"

        "uuuhh Yeah the Salamancas! We are going to the Salamancas'!"

        "Okay pack your backpack with the main necessities and run over there as      

          soon as you can."

        "Okay chao!"

I don´t remember much of what happened between packing up and getting to the house of the Salamancans', but I can tell you it was a serious adrenaline rush.   

3:30am   

We made it the Salamancas'. We stayed there and watched the news as the Volcano continued to erupt. Watching the videos and pictures of the Volcano I still couldn´t believe it. As we waited there for further instruction we received calls from the elders in Centro, the zone leaders, the branch president, the Secretary, and even Presidente Obeso called us a few times to make sure everything was okay. We were fine, just a little shaky.  

 

7:00am  

We received a call saying we could return home and prepare to go to Villarica to have our interviews with the Mission President that we were supposed to have that day. We ran home, got ready like we usually do, and headed for the bus terminal.   

8:00am  

As we were waiting at the bus terminal, we received another call from Presidente Obeso saying that we needed to return home and pack our bags. We were being evacuated from Pucón. We ran home and packed our bags for the next 10 days. The branch president came to pick us up and took us to the bus terminal again to head to Villarica. When we got there all the terminals were closed and we were told that the President of Chile herself was coming to Pucón to decide what needed to be done, and until then, no buses were leaving. Great. We called Presidente Obeso and told him the situation. He said, "I´m on my way."   

 

10:00am  

Presidente Obeso to the rescue! We loaded our bags into his car and  the 4 Missionaries of Pucón were off to Villarica. We had our interviews and went to work as usual in the sector of the Hermanas there. That night I received a phone call from the branch president saying that the president evacuated Pucón and that all the members  of our Rama were coming to Villarica to stay in the Chapel there. I was told to call as many members as I could and to call all of our progressing investigators. That night I spent about an hour trying to get a hold of people to tell them to get to Villarica as fast as possible. Many of our members were either on their way to Villarica already, or had escaped to another city far away from the Volcano. After that night I didn´t hear any more news about the Volcano other than it was supposed to erupt one more time in the near future.  

We were in Villarica from Tuesday morning, until Saturday night when we got news that the evacuation had been lifted and that we could return to Pucón.  

 

Now everything is fine. Many people have come back to Pucón, and many people haven´t. There is still a super kind of eerie feeling here, but I´m sure it will be better in the coming weeks. We are still expecting another eruption, but we don´t quite now when. Either way were are prepared this time! What a Crazy experience.  

 

I know the Lord watches over his missionaries. I was scared in the beginning for sure, but I never doubted that somehow we would be okay. I am thankful for your thoughts and prayers on our behalf, I know they helped!   

Hermana Segura  

 

 

As long as it is breathing.. it is ok... they say..



Crazy stuff...

 

Catch me if you can...

Warning Light - RED

 

Chile - Pucón - Week 13 - Well.. she warned us... Hna. Segura and comp. have been evacuated.

Email from Mission President

Dear family,

 

Overnight there was a volcano eruption of the Villarrica volcano in northern Chile.  All missionaries are accounted for and safe.  The missionaries who were serving in Pucón closest to the volcano have been pulled out to a safer location until further notice.  We are monitoring the situation.  Please rest assured that your missionaries are safe and protected.

 

Email from Hna. Segura

 

Bueno, the volcano exploded at around 3:00am this morning and the Mission President has asked us to evacuate Pucón . I'm  fine but I will be somewhere else for the next 10 days. In case you don't hear from me on Monday, no worries!

 

Talk you soon! Love you guys!

Hermana Segura   
   

 

From my backyard on March 2nd, 2015



Night March 2nd, 2015

March 3rd, 2015

March 3rd, 2015.



 

Chile - Pucón - Week 13 - The Volcano is going to blow..

​¡Hola!

So the Word on the Street is that the Volcán Villarica is getting ready to blow. Every 30 years or so it has a few explosions. The fist one is "scheduled" for the end of this month, beginning of April, the second one in June. They say the first one normally isn`t super bad, but the second one is usually worse.....it has a tendency to kill people.....I live super close to this volcano....Lets just say this week we have been assigned to teach the members about being prepared for an emergency or natural disaster....and prepare 72 hour kits.....I`m hoping I'm not here in June....  

 

These past few weeks have been a Little tough. No a ton of progress with our investigators which is a bummer. Jessica and Damián still need to get married, HOWEVER, Jessica's son Mayco now wants to get baptized, AND her younger sister!!!! We did not see that coming at all. More on that story next time, but now we are thinking we are going to have to wait even longer for them to be baptized because we need to teach Myco and  Jessica's sister all the lessons and they need to go to church.....more waiting, but probably worth the wait. It would be so cool to have them get baptized all together!  

With the "cambios" this week, my new companion and I decided that we are going to clean some things up in our sector, which means we have to drop some people. Tough decision. We had to drop Magdalena. She has a lot of hard stuff going on in her life right now and really doesn`t have time to take the lessons. That was a bummer, but I guess she just isn´t ready now. We are also trying to get out of the routine of visiting the same people over and over, so we are changing things up. I`m excited for that. We were kind of in a rut before so I think this change will be good.  

 

Magali is still waiting for Juan to change so she can get baptized so that's tough. Other than that things around here are pretty much the same. Looking forward to some changes in the next few weeks so hopefully Ill have a more interesting email next time!  

 

Thanks for all the prayers! Pray for Pucòn!   

 

Hermana Segura

 

Volcan Villarica - Pucón - View from my backyard this morning. It is smoking ....

 

 

In front of our house with Hna. Vance.

Another waterfall..

All the missionaries in Pucón and President Wallace