On my way to Pablo Nogues

Me and Elder Damitz

This week was a little crazy. President Ayre called me Tuesday night and told me I am going to Pablo Nogues. Its the area right next to La Cabaña. My companion is Elder Damitz from Huntington Beach California. He is super cool. He reminds me a lot of Jimmy Carter. Its kind of funny. He is my first companion from the states.  My ward has like 40 to 50 members every week. It is really similar to La Cabaña but with not a lot of active members. Also Austin Collie served his mission here in this mission and this was one of his wards. I live with a family of members and they had a byu hat signed  by Austin collie and they told me all about him. There is a hermana in this ward that works with us every single day from like 2pm to 9pm. She is waiting for her mission call and loves helping us out. She is awesome. Saturday Argentina had another game in the world cup. The streets go empty during the games. They only scored one goal but it was super quiet and when they scored I felt like I was in the stadium. It is so crazy. The work is doing good in this area. We worked a lot with the members this week and we received quite a bit a referrals. Your summer sounds awesome. Trek sounded fun. This ward has horrible luck with trek weather. Thanks for the letters and pictures. Love you all!

My Shower!!!

The River between Argentina and Uruguay

Happy Father's Day

Happy Fathers day Dad!!!! Yesterday was a huge day here in Argentina.
It was fathers day and Argentina had there first game in the world
cup. The world cup is huge here. During the game the streets were
empty and quiet but when Argentina made a goal every one went crazy.
Every house would start screaming GOAL and then they would all light off
these fire works that just make super loud sounds. It was super fun.
And Argentina won so that's pretty good. Yesterday was stake conference
and it was really good. Elder Viñas of the seventy came and talked to
us. Something that I really liked is he said in all things we do,
without real intent, it doesn't work out for the lord. I loved that. I
love being in la cabaña! The work here is doing pretty good. We are
finding a lot of people but not a lot are progressing much. We are
working really hard with the less actives and recent converts and
finding through them and we are finding people but not a lot of them
have progressed. We are trying to get the ward more involved.
President Ayre talked in our stake conference and he talked a lot
about the members visiting people with the missionaries. President
wants that we have a member with us from 11 in the morning to 9 o
clock when we go home. Its so much better when we have members with us
so we working a lot more with the ward. Have fun at trek. Enjoy the
summer. Enjoy the weather because here its pretty dang cold at times.
I miss and love you all!

Transferred to La Cabana

Today was transfers and  I got transferred to la cabaña! Its it provincia and its super different than capital. I am with elder Martinez from Mexico! He is super cool. His older brother served his mission in Guadalajara Mexico like 10 years ago. I will miss my old area a bit but I am excited to be here. I loved being with Elder Florez! I had a blast with him. Sunday they divided my old stake. President Gonzalez and another member from the Seventy came to do it. The church was full of people! They had to put a TV in every room in the church so everyone could watch. The new Stake President is Chinese! Its kind of cool. President Gonzalez talked a lot about the Book of Mormon. He said we need to always read this book even if we don't understand it. He said we need to pay attention how we feel when we read it. 

Is school out there? I am all backwards right now. It is pretty cold here and all the members are giving us hot chocolate when we visit them. I feel like its Christmas sometimes. My new area is so different from where I have been. La Cabaña means the cabin in English. There are like two log cabins in my area also. Sometimes I feel like I am in the mountains. There are pretty much only dirt streets and and little houses every where. Every night people put little fires in front of their houses and burn there garbage or yard work stuff. I come home at night smelling like camp fire. My ward has like 70 active members. In the chapel there is only like 8 rows of benches. Its super small. There is a member here that lived in Utah for about ten years and was a member in the branch where I served in Kearns! It was super funny talking to him about that. My companion is awesome. He is from Chalco, Mexico. He doesn't have a lot of time in this area so we are working on getting to know the area and more people. I already love the area. I feel like there is a ton of potential here so I am super excited to be here. Pray that we can find families here in this la cabaña. Thanks for everything. I love you all!

Went to the Buenos Aires Temple and Saw the Eberhards!

I cant believe you guys are boating already. That's so crazy. Here its starting to get really cold. I use my coat or sweater everyday. Here there are no heaters in the pensiones so we have to use portable ones, but my pension has a little fire place that works really good. It's so nice! This morning I went to the temple!!! It was awesome! I didn't see the Eberhards in the temple but right when I was leaving I saw Elder Eberhard walking around the temple so I ran and talked to him for a bit and then he brought me outside his apartment and I talked to Hermana Eberhard for a bit. It was fun seeing them. I will send you some pictures. This week we had interviews with president! They went really good. I have learned so much from president Ayre. He told us 6 things we can do to be a successful missionary. Be completely obedient, Do every thing with love, Teach a lot of lessons, Always strive to improve my teaching, Be bold, and Use my personality! This week the work went pretty good. We have been working really hard with Sergio. He is doing everything really good except for giving up smoking. We are trying to a lot of different things with him but he has not progressed at all with giving up smoking and he does not have much confidence. Right before Sacrament meeting yesterday he stepped outside to smoke. It was kind of funny but we weren't too happy about it. We found a few new investigators this week but a lot of them are like what Sam said - here no one is married. Its kind of frustrating but we found a few people that have a lot of interest. Yesterday was my companions birthday! He turned twenty four years old! Its so crazy. We didn't really do anything special but it was a fun day. Have fun boating! I love you all!!!!

Around town with Elder Florez

Facturas!!! These are so good!!! Its like 25 cents for every one!

My front door into my building

This is the supermarket by my house

I found the tennis courts!

Above the Freeway

Elder Florez

Hola como estan?? This week was good! We had a few investigators that made it out to church. We found Sergio this week and he is awesome! About 20 years ago he investigated the church and went to church for about 3 months but never found an answer about the church. Right now he is reading and praying but he smokes about 10 cigs a day. We are really trying to help him quit smoking. We know this will help him recognize his answer. Pray for Sergio so that he can give up smoking. He has tried before and couldn't do so, he tells us its impossible but were going to help him change this. This week started to get really cold. Everyone says winter just started so I will see how winter is here. A lot of the people that live in the streets are starting to leave because it is cold at night. I have no idea where but they are not here. In my ward there is an elder from Mexico and he made us lunch on Wednesday! He made hot sauce and we had a ton of tacos of meat and chicken! It was so good! Everything is going good here! I am loving my time with my companion! We are always having fun! He is hilarious! I love and miss you all!

Happy Mother's Day!

May5
Hows it all going? This week was pretty good. It warmed up a lot so I haven't pulled out much of my winter stuff. This week we taught a lot of lessons but we are really struggling to find people especially the elect. Yesterday we had a meeting with president Ayre and our stake president! I learn so much from both of them every time I hear them. President talked to us about how this is God's work and we need to put in our best and a lot of the time we are not going to see the results but they will happen. The Stake President talked a lot about the signs God sends us and how we need to act on these signs. It was awesome! Also we just found out that they are going to divide our stake! It will happen the end of May. I hear it will be crazy. We have heard several General Authorities are coming to our church and Elder Cook! The last time this stake was divided they couldn't fit everyone in our three story church. They had the parking lot on the bottom floor full of people. My companion is a funny kid. He was baptized when he was 15 yrs old. His younger brother is serving in Chile right now. Everyone in his family are members. He loves to talk so he is always talking and I think it will help my Spanish. That's about it for this week. Pray that we can find the people God is preparing in our area. Thanks for everything. Love ya guys!

May12
Yesterday was awesome! I loved talking with you guys. I felt like I didn't talk a lot with Max and Ryan so tell them to write me. Happy Mothers Day mom!!! Your the best in the west! I love you so much! After I called you guys I had bbq pork sandwiches with chips and salsa and then hot fudge brownie sundaes! It was delicious! Thanks for sending me Sam's video. I couldn't hear anything but that was funny he had to talk through a mic. You guys heard most of it yesterday but this week was pretty good. President Gonzalez of the Seventy came and talked to our mission. It was really good! We learned a lot about teaching like Christ did. They said the best way we can learn this is to study the 4 gospels and 3nephi and really observe in how He taught. President Gonzalez also talked a lot about teaching from the Book of Mormon. These are two things that I really want to improve so I was really happy to hear from him. I just got a letter from a kid in my old ward and one of my first investigators here in Argentina got baptized yesterday! I was so happy to hear that. This week we found a lot of new investigators but none of them have really progressed. Pray that we can find families that are prepared for the gospel. Dad thanks so much for the line of authority! Thanks so much for everything! I love and miss you guys!

Staying in Constitucion

Easter was just a normal day yesterday. No one really talked much about it. So today was transfers. I am staying here in Constitucion and Elder Fuentes got transferred. My companion is Elder Flores from Colombia! He is awesome! I only have like 2 hours with him so I don't know a lot about him but I am really excited. He is from Bucaramanga, Colombia. Ask Grandpa Clark if he knows where that is. You need to have Grandpa write me and tell me about Colombia or things my companion might know. Elder Flores's first companion in the mission was Elder Harrison who is Tyler's friend and is from draper. Yesterday Agustin got baptized! He and his family were former investigators that me and Elder Fuentes found like 3 months ago but they did not progress at all so we dropped them. About 2 months ago we passed by their house one morning before church and invited them to church and Agustin decided to come. We didn't really think anything of it and we didn't talk to them for a while but about two weeks ago Agustin found us in the street and said he has been waiting for us to go to church every Sunday morning ever since he came to church for the first time and we never came to pick him up. We brought him to church the next Sunday and taught him all the lessons and he got baptized the next week! He is a funny kid! This week we were working and president called all the missionaries in the zone and invited us all to go to the stadium of the boca and he payed for all of us to go in and we hung out for a bit and he took a picture for our zone. He is starting like a blog or facebook page for our mission so he wants to have pictures and stuff for it. The barbecue last Monday at President Ayre's house was awesome! I felt like I was in the US. We had a ton of hamburgers, hot dogs with soda and chips. There was basketball, trampoline, ping pong and American board games inside. It was super fun. That's about it for this week. One of our investigators his name is Miguel and he is reading the Book of Mormon and praying and really wants to get to know our church so pray that he can receive an answer about our church. Pray that we can find the elect! We have a lot of people that we are going to contact this week so we are super excited for them. Thanks for everything! I love and miss you all!