Week 9~

SO my pdays will be on mondays from now on so I am writing to you today! This past week was a lot better than the first! I am starting to get into the swing of things a little bit even though its still super hard. Especially waking up haha.. its basically the hardest moment of my life.. except I have to make it every day.. But I am starting to enjoy it and love the work! The more I focus on how cool of an opportunity it is and how lucky I am to be in Argentina the better it is. çMore about Elder Saez. First of all his first name is Nacho!! Haha he knows about Nacho Libre

so we can laugh about it. I told him how I love that movie and how you guys would think that was super funny. He is from southern Chili and started his mission when he was 18 and he only his 3 months left so I am going to "kill him" thats what its called when your someones last comp. He is the first person in the mission to be a branch president and train someone so hes basically a total stud. I dont really know what that means for me, but he has a tough job. I am trying to help him out as much as I can but theres a lot to do as a Branch president. That has been one of the toughest parts because we have days where we only get to do like an hour or 2 of actual missionary work because he has interviews and meetings with members to train them as leaders and what not. And also activities for the youth or whatever. So its been a unique experience for me because I am definitely not having the normal mission experience. 

The language is still coming along. Its a little better every day. My progression was kinda put on a hault for a little while there because I had an infection in both my ears for like 10 days and I literally couldnt hear anything so that was honestly super frustrating. You cant learn the language if you cant hear anything haha, but I found a creepy guy in an alley that said he had just what I needed so I took that and everything is good now! Just kidding I got some antibiotics at the store.. Not as cool.. 

I am starting to like the food more lately. I am getting used to it and elder saez has started to tell people that I dont like mayo so thats nice haha. We have eaten some really good pizza and pasta lately which has been sweet. 

Right now I am in a bigger city, la paz for zone conference and tomorrow we have like mission conference training for leaders and new misssionaries in parana which is like a four hour bus ride tomorrow but I will see elder howe and all my buddies so that will be fun! 

Everyone in feliciano rides motorcycles all the time with like four people on them and babies and theres no stop signs and like kids drive the motorcycles so its prettty crazy haha but theres never really accidents which I dont really understand.. 

It has been a little less hot lately which has been super nice. I dont sweat like crazy when I sleep like before. 

Well I dont have tons of time, but the thing that I have definitely learned the most while I have been here is how lucky I am to live in the United states. We have so much more than we realize. The people here have so little. I just know that we are put in certain places at certain times for a reason. I am super grateful that I have this opportunity to experience the world and gain a greater appreciation for what I have. I wish everyone could have this opportunity. Okay thats all for today, but I hope you have a great week! Please apologize to everyone for me for not writing back to the emails, but let them know that I really do appreciate them! Even if I cant respond it is awesome to hear from everyone. The church is true. Send everyone my love

Week 8~First Week in Argentina~Feliciano

Well a week has gone by already and although it has been super fast.
The days have probably been the longest and hardest days of my life
haha. But no worries, it is getting better each day and I am doing
great! The first three days once I got to Feliciano were super tough
and very humbling. Spanish here is soooo different. And I am pretty
sure that every single person has a different accent. At this point I
can understand like everything that some people say and then other
people (the ones from the campo.. or away from the town in the farms.)
I can literally not understand a single word they say. Its ridiculous.
But the people are awesome! I love them. After teaching one lesson or
eating one meal with them we are best friends. They are so friendly
and welcoming and want to give you everything they have. We get
lunches from the members every day basically and they hardly have
anything, but they will fill your plate and make you eat more than you
want and you cant tell them otherwise.. Everyone says hi to us on the
street and everyone is willing to talk to you so really we have maybe
been rejected like twice since I have been here.. other than that we
have talked to everyone that we have tried. In our branch there are around 30 or
so active members, but I swear like half of Feliciano has been
baptized before and is now inactive. I am pretty sure there are like 2
or 3 hundred inactive members. So our focus is not just getting
baptisms. Especially since Elder Saez is the Branch President.. We
spend a ton of our times teaching members because about 20 of the 30
are recent converts. Because so
many people go inactive, our focus is on strengthening the members and
the branch and then having strong conversion baptisms.. not just
baptisms. My mind has been consumed by how I can strengthen the branch
and contribute to it so I am constantly striving to think of ways to
make the branch better. I have been trying to think of good activities
for the youth that we could have to help strengthen them. If you have
any good ideas for mutual activities or cool american activities that
I could teach them that would be super helpful! Please ask the fam.
The branch is very close to being super strong and growing really fast
if we do the right things but I feel like it could also fall apart
really easily if we dont work super hard to keep building it.
The language is coming along really well though, I am getting better
each day! And Elder Saez is such a stud! He has taught me a ton and I
feel super lucky to have him as my comp. Hes awesome.
More about feliciano: its a super calm friendly town, so we dont have
to worry about getting robbed here which is nice. It is not like other
areas. But it is a very spread out and large town so we do a ton of
walking and it is SO HOT. THe other day it was 104 and the humidity is
definitely worse than Georgia. And the thing about here is that you
never escape the heat because no one has air conditioning so we just
sweat all the time! We have one little fan thats from like world war 1
in our apartment haha but yeah We go to bed and wake up just drenched
in sweat. But I like to sweat so its good! We have a washing machine
and we are like the only area that does so that is sweet and we also
have a really nice apartment.. relatively speaking so i am grateful
for that. We also have hot water which turns out to not matter because
we take cold showers to escape the heat.
We drink so much water all the time so no worries about dehydration.
There are bugs everywhere because doors dont really go all the way to
the ground and windows dont really close here so pretty much
everywhere is free game for bugs. There are dogs everywhere. They are
all nice and not aggresive so its no big deal. The only ones that do
anything are the ones behind fences. They like to talk a big game, but
they are more scared of us.
No one really knows how to sing here so they all think I am a really
good singer haha so last night we were celebrating new years eve with
one of the members, her name is Abuela. Shes our go to member. And
they wanted me to sing an english song and the 11 year old (Javier)
knew some american music and he asked me to ing Hey there Delilah by
plain white ts so I sang that hahaha it was ridiculous. But It was a
fun night. We ate a ton of food and I was actually able to converse
and make jokes with everyone last night so it was fun.

One challenge for me has been the food. Because all anyone ever told
me was that the food is amazing so I just expected to be eating
delicious steaks all the time, but thats not really it at all. Its not
bad by any means but it is jut way different and there is some weird
stuff. The big problem is that they eat mayonase like its air.. And I
despise mayo. But I am getting over it and starting to enjoy the food
more and more. I hardly ate anything for the first three days cause I
had no appetite and the food was weird so I lost a bunch of weight
which was much needed after the mtc. My butt isnt quite as huge
anymore!
Sunday I bore my testimony in church and taught sunday school haha.
That was interesting.. Fortunately it was only five people and I was
already friends with four of them so they helped me out a bit.
Yesterday I gave my first blessing in spanish which was super tough
but it was awesome. It was for a little 1 year old girl in our ward
whos sick.

OKay I am running out of time. Sorry if it sounds like I am
complaining in this whole email or if it sounds like I am miserable
because I really am not. I love it here and am loving the work! It has
been very tough and different and humbling, but I love it! I have
already learned so much. I know that I cant do this on my own so I am
learning to rely on the Lord more and more. I have a lot to learn, but
I have the desire to do everything I need to do so I know it will work
out. When I got here I realized that I really had to figure out why I
was here because if I didn't have a good reason, it would be a huge
joke to be here and be going through all of this hard stuff for
nothing. So I made a list of the reasons why I was here for example I
am here because I know that the principles of the gospel have blessed
me and my family and I know they can bless everyone. I also know that
through Christ is the only way that we can receive all that our Father
in Heaven has in store for us. I have to share this message with
people or else I am depriving them of those blessings. I
really hope it doesnt seem like I am talking bad about anything or
complaining because I really do love it here and I love the people and
I love this opportunity I have. I know that my Heavenly Father loves
me and is aware of me and watching over me. I know that through the
principles and ordinances of this gospel, we receive eternal life and
all the blessings that our Heavenly Father wants to give us. I know
that Scripture reading, praying, and going to church are simple
things, but are the most important things we can do each day and each
week. Those three things keep us on the path. I love this message that
I get to share and I love being a missionary. I hope that you are all enjoying
this holiday season. Lots of love!
I will try to send some pictures real quick if I can.

Week 7~Merry Christmas~Traveling to Argentina

December 20, 2013~I got a new flight plan today!  We'll see what happens on this one.  I leave SLC on Sunday December 22 and land in Dallas, then I leave Dallas and get to Buenos Aires at 8:30AM onMonday December 23rd.  So that's the plan!  I will get to talk to you all two days later on Christmas, hopefully!  Elder Howe left this morning which was super sad.  We were planning on not saying goodbye until we got to Argentina, so that was a bummer,  but now me and Elder Hansen are comps for a couple of days which is awesome!  He is a stud.  So yeah, that's the plan, hopefully it doesn't snow again!  I'll be in touch!

December 25, 2013~It turns out that my comp and I had to stay at the Mission home yesterday while everyone else left because our mission is really far away and there were no buses.  So we are getting on a bus for about 7 hours at 11:45 here which is 9:45 in the morning your time.  I don't know if I will get to call you when I get to Feliciano, but I can call you here before I leave.  Merry Christmas!! Love you all!

I have to leave in 30 minutes to go to the bus so we are going to have to do it later.  We will get to La Paz around 6:00 my time, but we have a place to use skype there.  So I should hopefully be able to get on for about an hour around 4-4:30 your time!  So be ready for that.  Love you all! Hope you have an awesome day.  By the way, my companion is a total stud.  He is awesome! 
Sorry I am late! The bus was late!  I am ready now so try and call back as soon as you can because we don't have tons of time.

I love you all!  Sorry the skyping didn't really work out as planned.  It was great to see everyone.  I am doing great so no worries!  Life is good.  Have a great Christmas and I will be in touch soon! 

Let it Snow~Back to MTC

Thursday~ I just wanted to let you guys know that I haven't left yet....We ended up coming back to the4 MtC after about 8 hours in the airport so that was pretty apt!  I have honestly no idea when we will be leaving, could be tomorrow, could be in a week and a half.  Since Christmas time is a very busy flying time and  all of Utah is trying to leave and can't we could be here a while.  Elder howe somehow got a flight for tomorrow morning, but the rest of us are just chilling with pretty much no information.  I will be sure to keep you all updated.  I apologize for not letting you know sooner, but the good news is that if I leave before Christmas I will get to talk to you a bunch!  Talk to you soon!  Friday~I got a new flight plan today! We´ll see what happens on this one.. But I leave Salt Lake on Sunday December 22 and land in Dallas  then I leave Dallas and Get to Buenos Aires . So that's the plan!  Elder Howe left this morning which was super sad. We were planning on not saying goodbye until we got to argentina so that was a bummer, but now me and Elder Hansen are comps for a couple days which is awesome! He's a stud. So yeah that's the plan, hopefully it doesn't snow again! I'll be in touch! 

Saturday~Yep it looks like things might work out, the only bummer is that it has been snowing alllll day today so we will see what happens! Elder Howe and I were best buds, We are going to the same mission! He just got on a flight before Elder Hansen and I so we might see him there when we get down there, but if not I will probably see him at zone conferences or something.  Elder Hansen and I don't really have a classroom or teachers so we basically just join other districts or help the teachers teach their districts ( since we are such experts these days) haha.. Just kidding, we know nothing still. But we spend a lot of time with one of our favorite teachers, Hermano Avila. We also study a good bit and do some emailing since we can. 

Week 6~Last week at the MTC

Not a whole lot has happened since I last wrote home. We are basically just studying and hearing stories from our teachers about the mish and getting really excited to go. Sunday was our last Sunday here so our district sang a sweet little musical number which was awesome. We sang Joseph Smith's First prayer to the tune of Come Thou Fount.. Come Thou Fount is like my favorite song since I have been in the MTC. We listen to it every time we study haha. So yeah singing that was awesome, the Spirit was really strong. We took a bunch of pictures on Sunday also and had our departing devotional with the Branch President (Shallenberger) which was sweet. We talked about what we should do on the day we travel and what we should have and all that stuff and he told us stories about his mission and gave us lots of advice. The more stories we hear from everyone, the more we realize how dang hard the field is going to be. But also we realize how awesome and rewarding it will be.  

 

Two of our buddies Elders Creighton and Orton left on monday though, which was sad. They were in the other district that came in on the same day as us so we were super tight. I had a really cool experience saying goodbye to Elder Creighton, he really thanked me for everything that I did as a leader and told me that I was probably the person that impacted him most here in the MTC. I don't really know what I did to do that, but it was really nice. Hes awesome. 

We also had in-field orientation last friday for the whole day. Which was basically a giant review of everything we have learned in the MTC. It might have been the longest day ever but it was good. The sweet part was that it was on Main campus and I knew one of my best buddies from my BYU hall had gotten there last week so I was looking for him in the cafeteria and I found him! Chris Pratt, he is going to Brazil. We talked for a couple minutes and then out of nowhere another one of our buddies from our freshman hall showed up too! Mac Wright is going to Dallas, and I had no idea he was there. So we had a sweet little BYU reunion right there in the MTC. I don't know why but it made me super happy. I think just seeing familiar faces is really nice. So that was a highlight. 

Today our main teacher, Hermano Wiest, brought all of his pictures from argentina and showed us those and told us a bunch of stories so that made me even more excited and a little nervous. I have never really tried to picture what Argentina was like until these past couple of days and it's more third-world than I realized I think. My teacher told me there's jungle in my mission? I had no idea haha. So i'm kind of nervous just because I have no idea what to expect, but I am also super excited.

Tomorrow is our last day here, most of it will be packing and getting ready. Probably a couple hours of crying as well.. Just kidding. 

Elder Filikitonga! Yes he's from Tonga

 

Week 5~Visa arrived!

Well I don't think I really have a ton to talk about this week, there's only so much that can happen in the MTC when all you do is study and eat and sleep haha. But it has been another great week! It has been kind of crazy because my original date to leave was November 14th or this saturday, but up until yesterday I hadn't received any word on if or when I would actually leave for Argentina and I was convinced that I would be going stateside for a while because I only submitted my visa stuff like a week before coming in. So yeah pretty much everyone else had their paperwork and travel plans already except for Elder Hansen and I.. So everyone made guesses of where we were going to get reassigned to in the states and we had a little chart on the board with our guesses, but then yesterday morning we got a message saying we needed to go to the travel office and they gave us OUR FLIGHT PLANS. I was so dang excited. Possibly more excited than when I got my mission call.. maybe. I don't know.. Because now it's actually real. I'm pretty sure I did like five really aggressive fist pumps. So yeah.. you know I was excited. That was definitely the highlight of the week. 

We got to hear from another Apostle this past tuesday (Quentin L. Cook) which is always such a special opportunity because their testimonies are so powerful and you just know that they truly know Jesus Christ. I love how they always close their testimony by saying, " I bear solemn witness of Jesus Christ" or something along those lines. It's a lot different to me from saying I know Jesus Christ lives or I have a testimony of Jesus Christ. They are saying that they know him. They lead this church under the direction of our Savior and it's so clear when you listen to them speak and you feel the Spirit that they bring. I love how happy they are. They are not caught up in the problems and concerns of the world because they have an eternal perspective and they know that this life is so small in the grand scheme of things.. Not to belittle the importance of this life. I am going on too long, but I think that is something that has really changed in me as I have been here in the MTC. The more I have gained this understanding, the more I desire to do good and serve others.

I know I have a long way to go and a lot to learn. I also know that I need to be humbled. But better than being compelled to be humble is to humble ourselves, so I am striving to do that. In return I know that Heavenly Father will guide and direct me in all things. 

Sorry I got super preachy, but I guess that's my fall back when I don't have any funny stories. It has been like zero degrees all week here and the weather in argentina is getting as high as 100 degrees so in one day we could be potentially changing 100 degrees in weather, so that will be interesting. I am so excited to go! Life is super good. I am happier than I have ever been.

Elder Herzog

Please tell the Marzarella family thank you so much for the sweet Christmas package they sent me. That was super unexpected and very kind of them. I plan on sending them a letter to say thanks, but just wanted them to know about that. 

Kenna has also sent me some awesome stuff in the mail! She sent me these cute little turkey cookies for thanksgiving and then for Christmas she sent me a super awesome blanket and some cookies! She made little like elder name tag cookies,they're sweet. She has been awesome. 

So yes I am definitely feeling the love and am receiving way more than I deserve or ever expected. So thank you.

They were called "los chicos perdidos" 

The lost boys haha 

Week Four~

Snow Day!
















Elder Orton & Elder Gonzalez

Elder Brazil