Wanted: Paniahue Mormon

Hello all!

So I sent you all the recording already!  In the recording I give you all the updates on the investigators that I have to give, and I'm going to try to take time to send photos, so I have only a few thigns to write about in the email!

First I helped a member butcher a lamb.  Wasn't the best thing I've ever done, but everybody has to do weird things on their mission!  Nathan defeathered chickens, if I remember right.

Quote of the week:

''But he plays tennis.... soooo.... he's not gay.''

     -Elder Barbosa

Also!  I found salt and vinegar potato chips this week!  I was so happy I almost cried :')  First rootbeer and now salt and vinegar potato chips!  I'm practically in the states again!  I also found ranch salad dressing!  Another rare find.

Also the Branch President informed me of a show on Discovery Channel he watched where a guy named Bear Grylls was in the mountains eating smore's with President Barrack Obama.  I'm very interested in what this is.  I'm assuming it's Man vs. Wild and a special episode where he does it with Obama... but how can that possibly be?  I'm very interested to know exactly what happened, so if someone could do some research and let me know that would be appreciated :)

The rest of the time I'll devote to the wallet story!  Yaaaaay wallet story!

At the end of everything I lost 29,000 pesos, got my wallet back, and accidentally became famous across the whole region!  And here's how it happened...

So we were in a colectivo (like a taxi but it has a set route that it repeats over and over and it doesn't leave the route unless you pay extra, so kind of a bus-taxi kind of thing,) when I took my wallet out to pay the driver.  We had an awesome conversation with the driver on our way, and we became instant friends with him.  We had found out that he was friends with Alan and his family, and that he was a man of faith but without religion.  I honestly have no idea what happened after that, but I think that I neglected to put the wallet back in my pocket.  I have no idea how that happened.  But 10 minutes later I found myself in the dry cleaner's without a wallet.  I immediately called the assistants and got permision to email you and cancel my cards.  Despite the circumstances, I was pretty calm.  I knew that everything was going to be fine, and it wasn't really the most horrible thing that could happen to someone.  We also had met the driver pretty well and we could get his number through Alan, so I thought it would be likely that I'd find it again.

BUT Alan didn't answer his phone.  So after doing the things that we came to do we took another colectivo back to the house and waited for the same colectivo to pass us again so we could look in the car for my wallet.  Miraculously, the same driver passed after just 1 minute of waiting.  We called him over, explained what happen, and we all looked for my wallet together.  There was nothing.  We looked under and over every surface, and we couldn't find it.  It had been stolen.

Hahaha..... woops.

At this point I was glad I had emailed as soon as I did, and hoped that none of the cards would work for the person that had stolen it.  The colectivero felt really terrible, and I told him not to worry about it because it wasn't his fault, but he still insisted on buying us a coke at the store nearby and also a big thing of juice to take home and drink as a part of lunch.  It made me happy that there are such kind people out there.  Even though I knew it had been stollen, I was still pretty calm.  I had lost my Chilean I.D, my drivers license, my health insurance card, my mission card, my two personal credit cards, and 29,000 pesos.  But I knew that in the end it wouldn't be a big deal, and I said a silent prayer in my head asking that everything would be alright.  We went back to the house and started eating lunch.

One hour later!  We got a call from the Hermanas in Chepica (same zone but different city about 30 minutes from Santa Cruz) who said that they had good news.  They started off the conversation with ''Elder Fox lost his wallet right?''  To which we replied affirmatively.  They then told us that somebody in Santa Cruz had found the wallet in a curb on the street, and posted a picture of my Chilean I.D. on a website.  Then an investigator of the Hermanas in Chepica saw the photo online, saw that it was a foreigner Gringo with a tie on, and thought that it had to be a missionary.  So she found the address and number of ther person that posted the picture and called the Hermanas in Chepica immediately.

All in the space of an hour and a half.

The Hermanas passed us the data and Elder Barbosa, being super excited that it had been found, called the colectivo driver and told him that someone had found the wallet and that we were on our way to their house.  The driver then told us to wait right where we were, and he came and picked us up and drove us to the address of the person that had my wallet for free!  He's super great.  Best colectivo driver ever.  Anyway, I yelled at the gate, the woman came out, gave me my wallet, and we were off!  It was a miracle!  When I looked inside the wallet I saw that my 29,000 pesos that were inside were missing, and that my personal credit card had been moved to a different place.  It appears that somebody had stolen it, taken the money, tried to use the card, failed, then threw the wallet in the curb, where the kind lady found it and put my I.D. online.

All in the space of an hour!

SO that's my miracle of this week,  After that happened I emailed immediately saying that everything was fine.  Luckily nothing was missing but the cash.

Now here comes the funny part.  5 minutes after that an Hermana from the branch called us and asked about my wallet, saying that she had seen my picture on the internet.  We explained the whole story.  A few minutes later, another hermana from the branch called us about the same thing.

Odd...

Then the English Classes started.  Everybody who came to the English classes had seen that I had lost my wallet on the internet and had seen a picture of my I.D.  Apparently, people had taken the post from the original site and, wanting to help out if they could, had put it on facebook.  In the space of two hours it went viral in this whole region of Chile.  The girls in the English class told us that people in Santa Cruz who recognized me were commenting saying that I was the ''Paniaue Mormon,'' and people had started to call me by that name.  The Paniahue Mormon.  A half an hour later I got another call from the Elders of Paralillo:

Elder Santini:  ''Hey did you lose your wallet?''

Me:  ''Yes... but I got it back so it's all good!''

Elder Santini:  ''Oh good!  You know your picture is all over the internet?''

Me: ''Yes......''

Elder Santini:  ''They're calling you the 'Paniahue Mormon'''

Me:  ''Yeah I heard that...''

Elder Santini:  ''Yeah everybody seems to be talking about it.''

Me:  ''Yeah I have no idea why.''

Alan called from Rancagua saying that he had seen it too, and the next day at church all the members said they had seen it.  Today in our P-day activity the other missionaries were saying that a post was flying around facebook with a picture of my carnet saying ''Wanted:  Paniahue Mormon.''

And that is how I became famous for being a dork and losing my wallet.

So that's my week!  I learned that when we do dorky things, God will always help us out anyway and grant us a miracle, but if he can he'll also throw a little humor in the situation, just to teach you a lesson.

The only sad thing is, my Chilean I.D. picture is terrible.

So that was my week!  I love you all!  Have a great week!  Make good choices!  The church is true!  Hang on to your wallets!

Love

Elder Fox