155 Days To Go...

¡hola familia! > it was a very fast week for me. very busy. i love neuquen! it is > like a combo of all the areas that i have been in and i`m very excited > to be working here. my companion elder cortès is awesome too. i like > the way he teaches and we get along very well. he is very talented > with music and has plans to study in byu after the mission. he is > from valdivia, chile and it is very likely that he is going to finish > the mission with me. he has 2 transfers left. i am learning a lot of > things and it has been a humbling experience starting here. > neuquen is kind of a complicated area but we are having more success. > my zone consists of the east half of neuquen, towns outside of neuquen > called cipolletti, catriel, and 25 de mayo. there are 4 districts in > our zone, including the missionaries in the mission office. the new > district leaders in our zone are very cool as well so our zone will be > picking it back up very soon. > my area is downtown neuquen. it is similar to downtown denver and > things move pretty fast. lots of cars, lots of stores, tons of people > in a hurry. we live in a nice area, on the other side of a private > school called morning glory. we don`t have very much in this area. > when i got here, we literally only had 4 investigators, but now things > are getting better. in the last 24 months, the ward only had 4 > baptisms... we are contacting references and i can tell that we are > already gaining more confidence from the members (which is the key!!) > surprisingly, i already knew quite a few of the members here and the > members are really cool. i swear that the first counsilor in our ward > looks just like viggo mortensen. wasn`t expecting that one... but > everything is going well. we set some fechas with florencia and doris > for the 9th of june and they are looking pretty solid. tonight we are > going to have a noche de hogar with them and we invited a member to > come along with us. we found some other people to teach, but we are > going to meet with them again and put the fecha. one man is named > horacio, and the guy has the potential of being a stake president. i > am pretty sure that he is prepared to be baptized, but he made a > comment that made me think that he isn`t married right now so we will > check on that. > the members are anxious to work with us too so we will see the fruits > very soon. i`m so excited! it is very overwhelming to start in a new > place, so busy and fast in neuquen, in addition to all of the new > responsibilities that i have been given, but i know that i am > receiving a lot of help. these next few months with elder cortès are > really going to help me grow as a missionary and i`m ready for the > challenge!! i found one scripture that helped me a lot this week in > d&c 68:6. i know that our savior is always there to help us with our > trials and problems. everything is to help us grow stronger because > He knows our potential. > i loved all of the pictures this week! i`m glad that caden`s birthday > went well, and annie`s pictures were very cute. i will talk with pte > peterson about the ecclesiastical endorsement. everything is going to > turn out very well. you guys can look me up in neuquen! my address is > rìo desaguadero 647, the church is on la rioja 134. > my boundaries are from salta to illia, from the top side of neuquen > until perito moreno below on the other side of mitre and a huge park. > there are tons of things in our area, and we are working on > publicizing are english classes we teach every saturday. we are > getting some good results from that too. we also have a few more > neighborhoods outside of neuquen that we visit called parque > industrial, 14 de octubre, barrio copol, rincon de emilio, and nueva > españa. it is a VERY large area, but we can reach those neighborhoods > in 10-15 minutes on a bus. its very expensive here!! > but the great thing is that i can see walmart when i leave the > apartment, and we have 2 mcdonald´s in our area. even though they are > trucho, it makes me feel good for some reason knowing they are so > close :). are apartment is very unorganized. we are going to > dedicate a good few hours today to clean. we have tons of space and > we have 2 floors!! living the life in neuquen. i love it. > being here as a missionary in neuquen means everything to me. i am > very grateful to have the opportunity of serving the people and the > other missionaries in the zone. thank you for supporting me on my > mission and keeping me in your prayers. i love you all and i hope > this week goes better than the last!! > con mucho amor y ànimo, > elder summers

162 Days To Go...

¡hola familia! it was awesome being able to talk to you guys yesterday! today, i`ve been pretty busy and we are getting ready to go out to lunch with a family in cinco saltos before i head off for neuquen. right after talking to you guys, we went to visit a family that made me a delicious cake. we took some good pictures. now i am downloading my pictures on a dvd so i will have more space. i finished packing everything this morning and i`m feeling good. a little nervous thats all. i talked with elder page on the phone and he told me that he`s looking forward to seeing me again at a leaders training meeting. he is one of the assistents to the president and i will have a lot of contact with him as a zone leader. i also talked with elder cortès, he is my new comp and he is from chile. i am going to meet with him at the bus terminal in neuquen at 6, so i have a bit of time. it`s all going by so fast but i know that everything is going to go well. i got an email from president peterson and he told me that he is going to interview so i can renew my temple recommend, and i will be attending the temple in buenos aires before going home!! that will be very exciting. i loved getting all of the pictures today! there is going to be a special zone conference in a few weeks to say goodbye to president peterson and we are going to have a pure testimony meeting. it is going to be great and i`m excited for it. i am very grateful for president peterson and his wife for all of the things they have done for me, helping me along the way. i`m excited to start as a zone leader today. i`m ready to go! now i`m running out of time, but thank you for writing me today, i will have more time to write next week i think. i love you all and i wish you the best this week. ¡hasta luego! ¡chau! con mucho amor y ánimo, elder summers

169 Days to Go!

¡hola familia! this week has gone by so fast! it was a holiday on monday and tuesday. the president of argentina started ``bridge holidays``, so if a holiday is on tuesday, we have another on monday so we can have a longer weekend. on tuesday, we ended up going to the ward activity in centenario for lunch because our ward didn`t do anything until saturday, and then we helped the elders move out to another apartment. it was a good day. oh! and monday night, we ate the pig head. it was mostly skin what we ate with some little hairs (good protein), but i can proudly say that i ate everything on my plate. victor made a salad of the pig, tomatos, and cebollas (i don`t remember how to say it in english), and it was alright. not something i would want to eat again because it didn`t have much meat. it was like thick pieces of uncooked bacon. on wednesday was the birthday of elder gomez, but i don`t think he did much to celebrate. we are going to neuquen today to go bowling, and we are going to celebrate with him. i`m pretty excited. we went searching for some calling cards this morning and we are very excited to call our mamas on sunday :) friday, i had 2 interviews for baptism in centenario. everything went awesome and i loved being able to talk with them before they were baptized. they had some neat experiences. juan villar is a guy that has had it pretty rough but he has a strong testimony. this week was great for our investigators, and they are progressing a lot. the only thing is that they have some obstacles they need to overcome before they can be baptized. carmen is waiting for her leg to heal, because she can get an infection in the water. horacio and carolina are doing great too. they are getting married in june, and jorge and marta are planning to get married this month. we have a fecha for ema to be baptized on the 19th and she is also very excited. she invited her daughter to see her baptism. i took pictures of my shoes but something happened with my camera and they aren`t showing up! i will take more. here are some pictures of when i ate a kilo of ice cream with my comp, and our victory lunch. i cooked an asado! and a picture of my pancakes that i make for my comp. he loves them, and i`m sure he would love them even more with maple syrup instead of pear jam :). es rico igual pero no es lo mismo... we are happy. everything is going well and we are staying on top of it. the bishop told us that he is happy with how things are going and is glad to have 2 elders that are more ``spiritual and serious about the work``. ¡vamos arriba! asì me gusta escuchar. it makes me very happy to be here with someone that wants to work as much as i do and we are accomplishing a lot. we stay very busy everyday and we are visiting tons of families. we just need to get them to church... fa! pero bueno. the scholarship sounds awesome! the reference from mr. hire would be great. this year, he won`t be at chap anymore? i wanted to visit him at the school... i`ll be thinking about what i will write to send in. how are dad`s piano skills doing? i haven`t received any more videos. now, i am able to watch on this computer. i love seeing fotos as well :) elder guillen cut my hair this week too. nice and short for the coming winter. it`s starting to get colder. today it is pretty nice outside, so i am ``aprovechando`` with some short sleeves. i am so excited for mother`s day! i am really looking forward to talking with my mama. i will be calling from the church here in cinco saltos around 5-7 my time. i think that`s good for you right? at that time? i was reading in alma 57:21 and it made me think of my mama. 21 Yea, and they did obey and observe to perform every word of command with exactness; yea, and even according to their faith it was done unto them; and I did remember the words which they said unto me that their mothers had tau

ght them. mom- thank you for everything and i`m excited to talk to you on sunday to tell you how much i love and admire you. today, i send 3 letters filled with fotos :) jajaja i hope you get all 3 parts. i love you all and thank you all for writing. jacie was the only one that didn`t write me anything... :( but next week for sure :) con mucho amor y ànimo, elder summers

176 Days To Go!

¡hola familia! another great week. the hi-light, was definitely the baptism of noemí. everything went very smoothly and were really excited for her. she was very prepared and we are very happy for her. we got her a triple combo and we wrote our testimonies in the front pages. we are going to give it to her this week as a gift. for my 18 month mark, our lunch failed us so i bought us an asado to celebrate and i cooked for my comp. then we ate a kilo of ice cream. i was very happy and we took some good pictures. it was kind of an ugly day but we enjoyed it. it rained last wednesday, and that´s how i found out that there are some holes in my soles. fa... but i have another pair of shoes that i´m using. i don't know how much time my other shoes have because i think i´m burning them out faster. we are walking a lot. i´m not sure how much but somebody told me this week that each block is 100 meters, so we must be walking at least 6 or 7 kilometers a day. it never seems like we walk that much though... i´m trying to send pictures but the computer isn´t uploading anything. i wanted to send 2 from the baptism, one of the awesome asado that i prepared, and another of my shoes with holes in the soles. maybe next week. i´m getting a lot better at cooking. i can now make a good guiso and i have perfected my pancakes. elder guillen loves them. they are nice and puffy, and i am excited about how much i have improved. the only thing is that we don´t have maple syrup to make it complete. i only wish i could show my pictures!! i have some questions- have they started the temple in fort collins yet? when are they supposed to finish it? who all is in the new avengers movie? i would like to watch all of those movies too before i watch it on dvd. how is mitt romney doing? what are the requirements to work at the mtc? are things getting more expensive there? i heard that the dollar here is worth 5 pesos right now. when i started it was worth 3.92. when was the last time you ate a chipotle burrito? i miss it... anyways, the zone conference this week was incredible. i loved it! president peterson talked about what his vision is for the mission and we talked about how we can all get there together. he talked about what he wants from each of us as missionaries and how we can help improve in our areas. i think my mission president has two transfers left before going home. that´s crazy how fast everything goes. it´s going to be interesting to see what happens. i am really grateful for him and all the things i have learned from him. everything is going very well here in cinco saltos. we aren´t sure what to do with ema because she told us some things that make us think she might need to talk to president peterson before getting baptized, so we will see. she was there at the baptism on saturday, and we are going to see her tonight. we found another woman named carmen and she has a ton of faith. people go to her and ask her to pray to God for them because they know He answers her prayers, but she tells them that they have mouths and they can do it themselves. she is really cool. the doctors cut off her leg a few months ago, i think she has diabetes. she is now the third person that we are teaching that is missing the same leg. we taught the plan of salvation and she felt the spirit very strongly and accepted to be baptized on the 12th. it was an awesome lesson. it made me think about my patriarchal blessing that says on my mission i will be able to teach many people about where they come from and the purpose of this life. lately, that promise has been coming to my mind a lot. i really enjoy teaching the plan of salvation because i like to know what they truly believe, and then we help them understand their eternal potential. it´s one of my favorite things to talk about. jorge is doing great too. he went to church on sunday and says that he felt very good. he really wants to be baptized and we are very excited for him. he is getting married soon, and then he will be ready for baptism. the members are starting to give us more references and it is an honor for me that they are starting to trust us more with their friends and family. this week, we have a lot of work to do. i have been thinking a lot about the scripture found in st john 15:16 16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. i feel like we were chosen to work together here in cinco saltos specifically at this time. we have lots of fruit and we are very excited! i am very grateful for all of the blessings that we have been given and i feel as if everything gets better and better as time goes by. tonight, we were invited to eat dinner with a less active family. we are going to eat a pig´s head. it made me laugh to see the head in the fridge and i took a picture. scouting with brother rydalch helped me prepare for my mission because i remember trying to eat a pig´s head at one of our campouts :) jajaja. i love you guys and i´m thankful for all of your letters. some of you have been more ´´flojo´´, i´m not going to name names but you know who you are. it would be awesome if you make it a goal to write me every week for the next 25 weeks (that´s all!) and think of all the awesome blessings you will receive! i hope this week goes even better than the last for each of you! con mucho amor y ánimo, elder summers