And you thought you had crazy sacrament meetings ha ha

I stayed here in Alberdi with Elder Heaton. Elder Taylor left to Formosa with Delgado. Elder Soltelo stayed and is training Elder Medina. Elder Medina is from Lima Peru (same as Elder Soltelo). He is cool, a little reserved but that is probably because he just got here and is fresh from the MTC. 

This is a long story, haha. The baptism didn´t happen :( We went to church and it was fast and testimony meeting because we had stake conference last week. Right after the sacrament had finished and the testimony meeting began one of the members (we will say john for his sake) got up to share his testimony. As he went up to the stand he was very excited and walked briskly up to the stand. Once there he laid down his prepared discourse with his scriptures in hand. He started off by telling us how he had been studying fervently in the Doctrine and Covenants and he wanted to share with us in section 121 verse 41. It talks about how no one should have power by virtue of holding the priesthood. He then whipped his head around facing the bishopric and the first councilor from the stake presidency who happened to be in attendance in this meeting. He repeated the verse to them focusing that they should not exhort power over others through virtue of the priesthood. (I thought that he just wanted the bishop to let the members have more activities in the ward because he doesn´t allow it and I was all for it, but it goes farther than that) He then went on to relate to us that it doesn´t matter if we are the bishop or the janitor if someone in the church throws garbage on the ground we don´t say, well I´m the bishop so pick the garbage up. We should persuade them with scriptures and say no this is the house of god and it is a house of order and we have a garbage bin, so will you please throw it away. Then he started apostatizing.... He then started telling us how the local leader’s aren´t inspired of god and how no one can make him get down from the pulpit like the bishop did the last time (apparently this happened a couple years ago as well) and that not even a general authority or an apostle or President Monson could make him get down, that not even an angel could. He declared, I have been baptized in the name of the Lord and I have been called by him to deliver this message. At this point the first councilor of the stake stood up and started talking to him asking him to please sit down. He replied saying, No I just got through saying that no one can make me get down. One of the women from the ward stood up and said, I think that this is just a personal problem that you have with the local leaders and this isn´t the place or time for this. You should schedule an appointment with the bishop and talk to him. We would all appreciate it if you got down. At this time members of the congregation started leaving. The first councilor pointed this out to him and he replied back that it was the first councilors fault that they were leaving because he scared them when he stood up. They continued bickering back and forth for a time while more and more members left. Then the only investigator in the church stood up and walked out and the first councilor said, look now you have made a nonmember leave. At this point he asked all of the Melchizedec Priesthood holders to gather and for the congregation to leave. He had all the priesthood holders kneel in prayer. He prayed that we/he could be forgiven if he didn´t handle the situation correctly because he has never faced anything like this before then he asked that we could all have love and forgiveness for one another. He asked for special blessing for John. Then after the prayer everything was calm again. A few members started to hug John and he got mad and said, No I don´t need your hugs I need you to listen to me! Then the first councilor, the last bishop, the first councilor of the ward, and various ward members tried to get him to stop and just be calm. Eventually twenty minutes later after agreeing to meet with the stake council he calmed down a little and we were able to go on with the remaining meetings. He just sat in the back and didn´t say anything. Unfortunately during that time Joel and his family left so we went to visit them and the baptism will be next week. haha long answer

On a sad note Santiago doesn´t think that he can progress and he said that we were wasting our time so we have to drop him for now. I am sure that a little while down the road that he will get picked back up again and it will be his time.

I don’t mind that I didn’t get transferred. We don´t have a lot going right now but it is better staying here than going to an area that is worse or changing for a comp that I don´t like. It wasn’t a bad transfer, I am sure that it will pass quickly. I just want us to be able to find new people to teach we are lacking on that and it is my least favorite part of missionary work. The thing is that it doesn’t matter where I go.

 I love you guys and I can´t wait to hear from you next week!

P.S. I don´t think that I am the best cook, haha I can cook a few things but the food that you and dad cook still is a ton better.  I remember that we always ate really good food! Even all my friends who came over would always comment on how good it was! But it is time to go so I will write you guys next week! Love you very much!

Why are you going to Resistencia?

We are getting ready for the baptism of Joel this coming Sunday!!! Now just to see if I will be here or not, haha I think so but you never know with transfers. It is really cool because even though he is only nine years old he really loves learning about the gospel. Really all of the kids (there are eight of them, haha). They are always fighting over who gets to pray or who gets to read and they are sad if it isn´t their turn, haha. They are all really awesome. The mom of this family is the half-sister of Hna Lugo. She hasn´t gone to church in a while and had been thinking about going back but it was just a small thought. She said when we came to visit her that inspired her to go and she has gone every week since! 

Santiago we are working with him right now... He is more just playing around right now. He is always laughing and not taking a lot of things seriously. It is ok if we laugh but he only will talk about how he isn´t getting an answer from god and then take the answers we give him as jokes. We will see how it goes.

As far as tourist locations in Argentina there aren´t really any here in my mission. There is Iguassu falls that is out of the mission in Misiones. That would be a must see. Also I think that there are some ruins over there as well. The other thing would be visiting members and converts like the familia Lugo, Lopez, Barrios, Junco, Rosa, Puladas, Fletes, and a few others. The biggest thing would probably be visiting them because this area isn´t known for tourists. If you arrive in Buenos Aires and tell them that you are going to Resistencia they would ask you why? And tell you that there is nothing there, haha that happened to a lot of the missionaries here: P

We don’t have furnaces in our pensh just an electric heater. It is a little smaller than a square foot. It works pretty well for now but when the winter comes in full force it will still be cold. I don´t know anyone here that has a furnace I don´t think...

Where I am at now it is very different from Formosa for a lot of reasons. First of all is that now I have a lot more experience as a missionary. When I was in Formosa I didn´t have any experience and I didn´t really ever have a trainer to teach me what to do. I had to learn everything for myself. So now that I have gotten things figured out it makes a lot of difference. Also the area is very different. In Formosa the people are a lot more receptive than here. We still have people that accept us but not as much as Formosa. At that time I didn´t and couldn´t understand the difference because I had never seen anything else. Now I can see what it is like in the rest of the mission and I would like to go back to Formosa capital! Haha We will see if that ever happens. 

I like the Mormon Message that Dad did! It was awesome! You´ll have to send it in to the church and get it put on Mormon.org I didn´t get to see the end though because it wouldn´t let me for some reason....


I love you guys very much and can´t wait to hear from you next week! 

Grilling like an American

Our American meal was very delicious! There are pictures in drop box. We set up our oven rack suspended on two pots over the gas stove to make our grill ha ha. It worked perfect. It wasn´t even very hard to clean up either. That was the first steak that I have eaten in over a year. And both me and my companion felt like we were in heaven eating mashed potatoes, THANKS GRANDMA.

Joel who had his fecha date for the 31st but that is stake conference. Because of that we had to talk to the bishop to see if he would let him be baptized and confirmed the same day. As usual his answer was no. He wants the whole Ward there so we have to wait until next Sunday the 8th. The biggest problem with that is that he is excited to do it now and it is transfers the fourth. So we will see if I will be here for his baptism. I probably will end up staying here with Elder Heaton, but you never know.

The other person with a date is Santiago. He is progressing slowly but surely. He has started boxing training again so his days are full again. The good thing is that they aren´t on Sundays. His date was for the 7th but because no one could go to church the 25th of May, they all had to go to the plays about the argentine revolution that the schools made mandatory, it is very likely that it will have to be pushed back one more week, we will see.

There are no hot water tanks here unless you are rich. We just have these little electric heads that heat the water when it comes out. The problem is that it was burnt out because Delgado tried to fix it but it was burnt. We were just waiting for the money to come from the office to buy a new shower and now we finally got it then I installed it. We finally have hot water (first time in seven months)! Just in time too because the cold has hit. It has been freezing here the last couple days. It wasn´t this cold when I got here a year ago. It got this cold later but that isn´t for another month or two. I hope that doesn´t reflect how this winter is going to be. I will soon though have to buy another blanket so that I can keep warm at nights. It isn´t bad yet but soon it will get to the point where you can’t sleep even with the heater at full. For that reason I want another blanket this year, haha

We have zone conferences every month, well here really every week because our district is our zone. But in zone meetings it is really always the same thing. We go over the presentation president Heyman gave on one of a couple things, what are liders, How to follow the Spirit, and Watchmen over the watchtower. Then we will have different Little practices that we do and sometimes share about what is going on in our área. That is about what usually happens.  

We found out that one person that we were teaching has Schizophrenia (or however you spell it) and she always tells us lots of crazy things. I wasn´t sure if she was crazy or not at first because of how detailed everything she said was and also she would tell us the exact same details more than one time. She would tell us about how she was a Jew who came from the Middle East to live here in Argentina. She really missed her people and knew that they were waiting her return. She told us about how the people here would miss treat her and they forced her to change her name from nariu to Maria.

I did use the magic tricks you sent me until they were stolen. I thought I told you that the magic tricks were in the bags that i had when they were stolen. The first one had the thumb and the second had the coins that change color. But we use the origami for things like family home evenings. The kids really love it because we do things like read the story of Nephi making his boat then they make their own boat. They really like it!

You know you are an Argentine if:

Your plastic bags only have one whole it them.

You didn´t drink matte this morning and now you have a headache

Your grocery list comprises of: noodles, oil, and bread.

The family vehicle is a moto.

If there is a football game going the rest of the world is on hold.

It rains and the world shuts down.

The only options of drink you have are: lemon-lime, orange, Apple, or cola.

You want more oil on that.

Salads consist of lettuce with a lot of oil.

I love you guys very much and can´t wait to hear from you next week!

DOG WHISTLING

Our investigators are doing pretty good. Right now we have two that are progressing pretty well. We have Joel who should be getting baptized within the next two weeks and we have Santiago who has a fecha for the sixth of next month. I think that they both will make it to baptism! If I get transferred though I won´t be here for Santiago´s baptism. Oh, I found out that president doesn´t leave until the 1st of July so he won´t be leaving right at transfers. 

It hasn´t been raining recently but I am sure that it will start to pick up soon. But it could be different here in Chaco I am not sure. I just know that in Formosa at right about this time when I got there last year it was really rainy. 

We don’t have hot water in our apartment yet we are still waiting for it to be approved.... apparently president hasn´t been approving anything lately so we have to wait for that to happen and then we will have to wait another five days to have the money get to our accounts then take it out and buy it and find someone to install it, haha Hot water is still a ways away I believe. 

I sleep good at night, I haven´t really had any problems sleeping at night. Even during the really hot time I didn´t really have much troubles sleeping. I am usually really tired and fall asleep, especially recently, I don´t know why. 

I love the dog whistle that Grandma Peterson sent me, but I am still trying to make it work better. It has to be tuned correctly to the different dogs so I am trying to find which pitch works the best for the majority of dogs, haha

This last Sunday we asked the Bishop for a list of the members (something that ALL the missionaries have and it is part of our training from president that we should) and he said no it is my decision and I´m not going to give it to you but since president isn´t over bishops he can´t make him do anything. He is really hindering the work here. The majority of the less actives tell us that they are less active because of him. It is very frustrating to work with him. Oh well we will keep trying ha ha.

Not a ton to tell about, haha just working a lot like always, haha I hope that all has been well at home. I love you guys and can´t wait to write you next week!