chau 'migo - August 13th

Hola mi familia,
Hey so we have been having a lot of sit down lessons all week and haven’t had time to pass by all the investigators we have right now. 23 was a lot to find all at once, but usually we find like 10 every week. Luckily it was a lot of families that we found and they are all great. Usually investigators drop off pretty quickly with the exception of a few that you find, but we have a great pool to teach. So that is good, because it is not fun to always be trying to find.

I got sick this last week and kept moving along with my heart, but my enthusiasm was not really working unless we were sitting down and teaching. Luckily we did a lot of that. We had music blaring next door after church and so I took a nap because studying was not going to happen with the stuffed up head that I had. I felt a lot better afterward too. We are now going to probably move to a new apartment that we have found and we will be by all the members, the bishop Rodriquez, and lunch citas. We will have a huge house instead of a one room apartment. The only down side is that we will lose the air conditioning. Oh well, I have lived my whole mission without and I am sure the fans will do the trick just fine.

We do write the mission president once a week as well. A lot of times I don’t know what to say, but I manage to say a little something each week. Harder now that I don’t really know the presidente del Castillo.

So we live off of the little kioskos that are in our area because like you guessed there are no real shops in our area. Pday we can get some things that we can’t find in our area, but I have been doing good with what we have. We have lunch citas most days and so food isn’t so hard right now. I have been making pancakes almost every morning too. A nice change from before. I also have learned to make a few dishes here in Argentina for the days we have to cook. I will have to show you when I get home I suppose. It is good!

Ignacio and Teresa weren’t able to make it to our area on Sunday, but they are the older couple that you should have a picture of. I remember we all cried when I had to leave so I am excited to see how they are doing. I have written them only once in the last year (I should do a little better) but the missionaries told me that justo in that day Teresa was feeling down and the letter just made her day. It is hard to keep in contact with investigators and members and hopefully after the mission I will manage to keep in contact somehow with a few.

I officially got my trunky papers today! I will be coming home on the 15th of January (I think that is a Thursday and so we will probably really fly out the next day and get home Saturday). I thought I had until the 20th so I just cut 5 days off my mission. I can’t believe I have been out so long already! Only five months left and yesterday it seemed like six. Don’t worry I am not trunky though. I need to know if you all plan on picking me up or not here in Argentina. I would love to show you around, but I don’t know if it would be possible to come back in June, July, August next year. Let me know because I have to inform the mission.

Whoa! A lot of people getting married that I know, kind of weird! Not any close friends though yet. Interesting. I got the picture with Jonathan at EFY and all the girls surrounding him blowing kisses at him. I was surprised! Jonathan looks really grown up as well. I don’t think that I will recognize him anymore!

Yeah the package I will get tomorrow in zone conference. I confirmed that it is here and everything. The office Elders need to get their gears going is all. They have had my package for awhile now, but they need to send it to me is all. I am just too far away I guess. A good days journey. You might still be able to send another package and I would get it at the end of my mission. So doesn’t matter much to me. Whatever you guys want to do.

Yeah, I saw the Olympics during lunch a bit today. Didn’t really watch, but noticed tennis was on. I love the Olympics! Too bad I can’t watch. It doesn’t seem to be so big here in Argentina.

Well, what more can I say, we have two baptisms of Sebastion and Julieta this Tuesday along with an already active member girl. The fathers are going to baptize them and it should all be pretty tranquilo for us. Seferino Custodio also still has his fecha for the 6th of September and is very set on making it there. He has some changes to make it sounds like and we need to teach a few key mandamientos to make sure all is well and to help him in his preparation. We are still trying to find the rest of the family together to set another date with them, maybe the same day. We shall see.

So Elder Walker and I are really animated to work, though we have both past through a rough period this last week trying to keep at it (me getting sick and him getting a little disheartened) He is a great missionary though and we are looking forward to zone conference tomorrow to pump us up a bit. We haven’t really talked a whole lot as much as I have in other companionship's. It is like we try to start a conversation and it doesn’t go anywhere. We are still trying to click or something. We played soccer today though and we relieved some stress. Soccer is something that we have in common so that is cool. He played in high school over in Oregon. So we are going to keep working on our relationship.

Well love you all and hope you have a great week!

Elder Aaron McDonald