September 15, 2014

Hola!

So what happens when you and your companion both run out of money for the month and literally have no food? You make a deal with the missionary from Peru who wants American money. So really the dollar is worth 10 pesos but I'm getting a deal for 12 pesos for every dollar!  But wait! We just found out that we can sell the money to the bank and get 15 pesos for every dollar.  I'm selling $20 for 250 pesos! Thank you grandma Romeril for sending me money!

I love Sundays. For a couple reasons – because I really love going to church and also because it's almost P-day! Saturday we had a really busy day– We had members with us all day after lunch – one's name is Javier and he's awesome! He was with us for lessons from 3 o'clock to 8 o'clock. He was only scheduled to be with us for three hours but he wanted to stay with us longer. He is in his 20s. We had Julio with us for a while too. He's a recent convert and he was to come with us to a lesson with Luis, a new investigator, but Luis wasn't there and his daughter told us to come back another day. So we went back to the chapel and waited for our other member – Angel – the guy I talked about a while back and he was telling me about his worries with his kids and whatnot. Three members we had with us are awesome! We went to visit Marta and Renee but Marta is really sick and when we visited her, she didn't look good at all. She is so sick that she can't even walk and she has to stay in her bed all day. She is so awesome. She lives with her "pareja" Renee. I don't know the world word in English but it so when you live with without being married. Renee is hilarious – he owns a lottery place – which isn't like a lotto place that you'd think of. It's his little lotto – house place and he just kind of sits there all day doing whatever you do at those places! It's kind of a mutual understanding that he can't understand me and I can't understand him – but we try to understand each other anyways, it's good though! It's a little bit harder to understand him over other people because he doesn't have his four front teeth so his letters sound a bit different!

Funny experience in church! We were in church today and this girl who is 13 years older so she knocks on the bathroom stall I was in and I finished using it and open the door and she entered and close the door and opened it again and was being totally serious and said hola. She smiled kind of really creepily and kissed the air and kept smiling so I was like… A lot! And kissed the air back, thinking maybe that was a normal way here in Argentina because I don't know, they do random things here in Argentina but I guess it was weird she did that so Hermana Rivera was busting up as I was standing there a little freaked out.One day last week our power was out for a whole day because one of the hermana's in my pension forgot to pay the electricity bill… So that's been great :-) but we're not home too much during the day so it's okay – but we still need to pay the bill ha Ha. Last PDay we went on a hike as his own and when we all got to the top we had a testimony meeting and all of the missionaries bore their testimonies. It was really cool actually.

I only have one week left with my companion… It'll be weird having another companion. I never want to leave Catamarca. I'm going to be so sad when I have to leave. Next Sunday I will have been out on my mission for four months. It's kind of sad to think that when I hit my four-month mark I'll only have 14 more months left of my mission. It's crazy how fast time goes here. Four months doesn't seem like a long time, but when compared to 18 months it seems like I only have a short amount left. 

I've almost completed a whole journal. This is the journal that I have all of my experience since literally day one, May 21, 2014. When I end this journal I probably won't be a greenie anymore… I'll have finished my 12 weeks of training. Weird!   Why am I feeling all sentimental right now? Don't even know! Seriously though, I am loving my mission. My name badge has become a part of me and every day when I put it on, I think of who I'm representing – Jesus Christ and my family. My plaque doesn't say Kelby. It has the name of my family. The person I am, the actions I do and the words I say are all in respect to my family and Jesus Christ when my plaque is on. Really, I'm standing as a witness of God at all times, in all things, and in all places. Do I want to stand as a good witness or a bad one? I think I now know why am feeling all sentimental today!

We got a new investigator this week – Kinda. Her name is Lucy. I'm pretty sure she's not interested at all in our church – she told us various times that she's really Catholic and it she's not looking to change, but she excepts us for who we are and that she wanted to know more about our church. So we are going to visit her on Tuesday! We visited that girl Pilar  that I talked a little bit about… I know who she reminds me of. She is in Argentina version of fat Amy from pitch perfect!  She's the best! The only thing Pilar needs to do to be ready to be baptized is to move out of her boyfriends house. Or get married in a week… But I think that option is probably not going to work. I have faith though. We are going to be very busy this next week with our new investigators

Oh! I got to tell you something! I was in the bathroom when I first woke up and I blindly picked up my retainer case to put my retainers away… So I feel something crawling on me so I was like oh what's that? I looked down… It's a flipping cockroach! No, I didn't scream – just on the inside!

Okay that's all for this week I love you all!

Celebrating her 18th month mark!

               America and Peru!!

September 1, 2014

Knarly fish that was given to us at the ladies house that I accidentally told her that her "food was ugly instead of good".  AGH!

 At our zone conference!

Hermana Brown rocking a Beatles shirt!

 Mom, you wanted a picture of me in regular clothes--here you go! 

My focus on my mission is to become more like Christ..

Week of September 8th.

Hola! This week has been really good actually! I've been running every single morning and each morning we run to a new house. I've been running with hermana Brown and I like having someone there every morning that motivates me to work out.

Yesterday we had a lesson with Pablo the one who is getting baptized on the 20th if he can quit smoking. We had a member with us, hermano Ortiz. We walked into Pablo's house and it smelled so bad of cigarettes – I walked in and almost had to use my inhaler… That's how strong it was! But we finished the lesson and we experienced a really weird situation with him – (something I don't want on the blog). Needless to say I am glad that we had Hermano Ortiz with us. The lessons that we have with Pablo from now on will be held at the church. After we left we had to go home and wash our clothes because we smelled so bad like deep smoke. We had to come home and shower because the smoke was so strong on us. I feel bad for Pablo I really do. The only thing I can think to do is pray for him and keep doing our part by teaching him. Even though the situation was kind of scary, I didn't feel afraid of him. The only thing I could think of was Jesus Christ. I kept envisioning that picture of Jesus Christ carrying that last sheep on his shoulders. He went to go back to save that one lost sheep back into the fold. And he would do that exact same thing for Pablo. He to sacrifice everything to help Pablo. My focus on my mission is to become more like Christ – in Christ would be that missionary who loved Pablo aside from his differences.

This week we also visited one of our new investigators, Ramon. We had a good lesson with him. He told us about his life and his religion – he's Catholic – but the funny thing was at the beginning of the lesson he told us he didn't want to change his religion and said he knew his religion was the right one, and then later in the lesson he kind of paused and looked at me and said "hermana, what's your opinion of my religion? Do you think it's true?"  I told him there's a lot of truth said his religion – but I told him I've prayed to know which church is true, and I encourage you to do the same. 

One day this week we had a lot of studying to do – like training, language, etc.  We started our studies at 8 o'clock and finished at 1 o'clock for lunch.  In between studies I put my clothes in the washer, and after studies I looked into the kitchen and the floor was filled with water from the washer in the washer clearly was broken. Hermana Brown was helping me clean up all of the water and then we had washed my clothes and hung them up and cleaned up the water – our pension is on the eighth floor and I threw out a cup of water trying to hit the sidewalk and accidentally hit a dog… I didn't realize there was a house down there and the owner came out wondering how in the heck his dog got wet. Needless to say we ended up dumping the rest of the water down the sink like we should've been doing in the first place ha Ha. 

So I'm not going to go into much detail, but they're up in a couple of situations that have been hard with my companion. Yesterday I was really frustrated but I prayed and asked for heavenly father's help to love my companion because I knew I didn't want to live these last two weeks --she only has two weeks left on her mission --like I did the day before--which was a really hard day. Heavenly father did help me to love her and I realize that being mad about it wouldn't help. And I her favorite person in the world? I don't think so – but at the same time I still love her – and she's still my companion. Just like D&C 64:9-11 says… If I expect heavenly father to forgive me and all my imperfections, I need to forgive other people. But anyways we talked about yesterday and I have faith it'll be okay. After we figured everything out we had Javier, one of the members of the ambato  ward came with us for two lessons. They were both de diez. When was Louise, and new investigator and we were able to get to know him a little bit better. He's really funny! He can't actually understand my American accent very well so he just kind of laughs when I speak because he can't understand – and then Javier  repeats what I say so he can understand! My Spanish is getting better – I mean no it's not perfect but I can feel it improving! More people can understand me, I can understand more people – grand really!! Pretty much everybody can understand my accent except for --like older people. Like 60+!  One thing I really need to work on is speaking Spanish more. It's really easy to speak English with other missionaries from the states, but if I do that a lot, my Spanish won't to improve. I have the rest of my life after my mission to speak English! I can definitely speak it here for 14 more months!

Mitch!Hey bud!! I just wanted you to know how much I love you. I talk about you frequently and how you´re my best friend and the hermanas in my apartment even call you Mitch haha. But I hope you know that even though I´m out here in Argentina, I´m still here with you. Not literally, but you´re in my thoughts and prayers I think more than you know it.  Sometimes in high school things get hard, and believe me when I say I wish I could be there with you to talk to you, but I know that you are so strong, and I know that you are strong enough to handle any kind of adversity that comes your way. I´m so lucky to have you as my brother and best friend. One thing I´ve really come to appreciate more and more on my mission is our family. Because, friends come and go and other people in our lives come and go, but one thing that will always be constant is our family. We´re together for eternity :) With that said, 14 more months is nothing when compared to eternity!! :) Know that I love you and I think you´re amazing, and I will never ever forget you! I think about you on the daily, yo :) Have a great week, make sure to say your prayers every night!! 

One last thing.. you asked if i was getting used to the food..haha well we don´t eat with members anymore but well we do every tuesday and so ya it´s good I don´t get super sick from it anymore!! i´m pretty nervous to get a different companion. I´m nervous to have to start the whole getting to know them thing over again! I hope it´ll be okay! It will be okay :) But we didn´t have time to print emails today because we had to be at the terminal to take a colectivo at like, 7 am and got back at 2 our time so I´ll print it next week and write back to next weeks email and this weeks :) I love you allllll and i miss you all :) 

Me and Hermana Carrasco

This is the lady that I accidentally told her that her food is ugly! 

Missionary behind bars!

P-Day!

I Don't Know How I'm So Happy, But I Am :)

 My little Peruvian Hermana Carrasco!

 This week I got to work with our sister training leader for a day.  She actually finishes her mission after this transfer.  She's not excited to leave!

 Hermana Barrone!  This was at a relief society activity.  agh! it was so fun.  Hermana Barrone is like our mom out here haha

 Just cuz i'm in Argentina doesn't mean I don't got my eyes on you!

 

I got really sick this week and don't worry, that's definitely booger on my sweatshirt!

Hola! so after I break my fast today I officially start my purification it's for 40 days and I wrote about it already a little bit, but basically during your fast to make a list of all of the things you want to better and change as a missionary and as a person in general. And you end your fast and start your 40 day purification. Every time you do something in contrary to what you wrote down, you start the 40 days all over again. It'll be good. We are doing it as a district but at the same time, it's personal. I'm excited for those changes. It won't be totally easy but I know it will be worth it!

Yesterday I had to spend the whole day in my pension. I had a cold, then a fever, then we called The mission nurse and she told us a bunch of medicine to buy so I'm taking those now and I feel better. Today's going to be way busy! We have studies from 8 to 10 then we have a lesson at 10:30 with Monica and Samantha our new investigators. Monica is the mom of Samantha and I'm really excited to teach them. We're going to teach them the plan of salvation – my favorite lesson to teach by far! telling people that there's this amazing and perfect plan for them – that they have a heavenly father who loves them and really wants the best for them –gah! I'm so excited!  After lunch were going to visit this old man named Juan and he has dentures –. Full set on top, full set on bottom – only his dentures broken now he's waiting to get new ones made. In the meantime he just doesn't have teeth! I thought understanding people with teeth and Spanish was hard – understanding Spanish without teeth is so much harder!!

We have an activity with all of the relief society today – they told us what we're going to do but I couldn't really understand so really I'm just going with the flow. My Spanish is coming along – I can understand more people and they understand me. The people that mostly can't understand me are older people and that's actually my goal! I could do a lot better with how much I speak Spanish. It is so easy to speak English but I just need to be more strict! I need to speak more because my accent will get better, I'll be more confident speaking the language and my vocabulary will expand.

So we have the best time with Monica and Samantha. At first we were just small talking and then I can't remember how this got brought up – oh I asked her if she was stressed out with all the work she has to do. She runs her printing business basically all by yourself – her daughter Samantha helps her with orders, but as far as all the finances, it's just her. She told us that she was really stressed out and really opened up to us with her feelings and what not. She told us her husband just died this year in February… He was really sick and she told us she's trying to do the best she can with her shop and her family. And then she started to show us pictures of her family on her phone, of her husband and then I showed a picture I always carry with me of the six of us and she asked me if I missed my family. I said I really do miss them, but I love the work I'm doing. Being far away from them makes it all worth it when I get to see people find happiness in their lives. We talked a little bit more this morning. I had written a message for Monica in the book of Mormon we were going to give her and she read it and then looked at me with watery. I was, and kissed both of my cheeks and said "much as gracias querida mija." She opened up the book of Mormon and read my note again. After that we gave her a picture of Jesus Christ and I told her it's incredible that there are so many differences in religions and beliefs, but the one thing that is universal is Jesus Christ and his sacrifice. Today was such an amazing experience. I love Monica and Samantha.

I miss you guys. I miss home and a lot of things from it, but I don't know how I'm so happy up here. Really we don't have a lot. My shower is cold most of the times and there's cockroaches in our kitchen, but I am seriously so happy it doesn't make sense to me :-)

Heavenly Father Trusts Us

Attention! I think y’all should know that I eat tomatoes and onions now! The onions are a little bit scarier to eat than the tomatoes but I eat them (cool right?).

You wanted to know about the other hermanas that I live with so here it is! Hermana Brown is my favorite and is someone who loves everyone! She is from Washington and has like 9 months in her mission. She always has a positive attitude and we talk a lot during the day. I’m really grateful she is here. Her new companion is from Peru and she just got here yesterday. So, I don’t know her very well but she seems way nice. A lot of the time I can’t understand her Spanish but one day I will!!! Hermana Rivera, my companion is a really good missionary and she teaches me a lot. We have a lot of good moments too!

Yesterday I got really sick to my stomach all day and I didn't eat anything… Which is really weird. We called hermana  Silva and she told me what medicine I needed to buy and what to do. Today it hurts really bad too. I'll keep taking my medicine and see what happens. But you wanted to know more about the other Hermanos I live with. I'm really glad I'm out here on my mission. I love being a missionary and I love helping people realize their divine purpose here in this life. Seriously it's the best.

Yesterday my district and  Hermana Brown's district played card games! We played spoons and Hermana brown was always the first one out!  Pobrecita! but after that we played a card game version of Monopoly only there was one too many people so it was a little bit hard. But it's okay I still had a Ton of fun! After that we wrote emails and came home and I rested for a little bit and use the Bano and then we went to our 7 o'clock appointment, only he didn't show up at the chapel so we had a lesson with Dario. Oh my heck he's so funny. Dario told us one time he grew his hair out when he was a teenager and her monitor Rivera and I were laughing so hard, thinking of how Dario looked with that hair!

Fun fact. Elder Ruiz' first name is really elder! And his family were not members that when he was born! How awesome is that? Kinda really awesome if you ask me!

Yesterday we visited a lot of less actives. One that really stuck out to me was hermana b. She's a single mom and has a little five-year-old named naum. Her story is so inspiring… When she was a little girl her dad left her and her mom and her mom raised her. When she was like 11 years old, the missionaries knocked on the door and her mom to be wanted to start taking lessons. Her mom literally wanted nothing to do with it. So every Sunday hermana b would walk to the collectivo stop and took the collectivo by herself… As an 11-year-old and go to church. Eventually she got baptized and she found out that her mom was baptized in our church along time ago. Her mom never told her anything about it. She went in active for a while and she's now coming back. But moneywise, she doesn't have a lot. At all. One thing that really got me was she told us "it's obvious I don't have a lot of money but I've realized in my life that money doesn't make me happy. I find happiness when I have the spirit with me.  I look back at my childhood and it didn't matter that we didn't have a car to get me to church. Money isn't important."Isn't that amazing?! She is such an amazing person. We're going to have family home evening with her on Monday at 8 o'clock :-).

We had a district meeting today and I had an interview with Elder Ruiz he asked me what my goals were specifically for me. I told him a few things and he talked about the purification we're doing as a district where you fast for a day and think of things do you feel you need to change and so, it's for 40 days. Every time you do something in contrary to your goal you have to start all over with the fast and yeah so elder Ruiz  told me "Hermano Romeril, I only want you to focus on three faults at most. I don't want you to overwhelm yourself." I was thinking oh Bueno!!!

At our district meeting yesterday it was awesome. Elder Ruiz talked it and we talked about her calling as a missionary. One of the questions he asked us "why would heavenly father call such young and perfect missionaries to work with his children?" He told us it's because he trusts us. It got me reflecting on my life and it was a super motivating meeting. I feel like I know a little bit better what I'm going to do to better myself as a missionary. Oh and yesterday we found for new investigators! And three of them are family :-) really it was a miracle. It is so hard to find new investigators here – everyone almost is really Catholic and a lot of people don't really want to listen. But we were so humbled to have those for nuevos.

Mitchell has his permit!? I'm glad that I have the white Honda my senior year. Yeah it's old but it felt like a huge privilege to drive it. I mean, it has so much history! 1998 when you guys bought it. That was like close to the beginning of our new family. I'm so glad I drove that over a brand-new car! I can't believe Addison is already home from her mission wow !I'm Thursday I have my three month mark. The time is already going by so fast. I'm 1/5th done with my mission. But know there are days when I really miss you guys… But I just have to always remember my purpose as a missionary.

You are in my heart. 

 Day of transfers

 Elder Barrios from Guatemala

August 11, 2014

Trip to Cordoba

Hola! 

So to answer your questions:

Chango, I don’t know if my bed is super comfy or if im just so tired at the end of everyday because i go to bed and its literally heavenly! cielo en la tierra. wheewwww. And im warm enough!! my area is actually super hot and humid right now. i slept the other night with my pjs wet so i wouldnt sweat to death haha you should try it some time. Hot showers and baths, heck to the yes do i miss them!!! hot water in general haha.

Yesterday was a hard day (31 Julio).  I really missed my family yesterday.  But. I can do this!  Dad, I read your letter 3x before I went to bed.  Even though I don’t have you guys physically here with me, I have your emails and letters!

President Alliaud is coming up to Catamarca to interview my zone today.  It’s 8:30 and interviews start at 10:00.  I’m excited.  It’ll be nice to be able to talk with him about everything.  Well, not everything—I’ll just be nice to talk to him.  The mission president is like my mission dad!  Doesn’t take the place of my dad though.

Anyway, I wanted to tell you about the lunch date my companion and I had last week.  It was with the same lady that I accidentally said yes to her question “Is my food ugly?”  Ok. So. She brings out this pasta with carne and it looked way yummy! I started stirring the pasta after she left the room and ba sically it was oil soup with some noodles and carne.  I kid you not—I have never seen so much oil.  I told my companion—Hermana, no puedo hacerlo.  She’s like ya you can.  Just eat it.  So it took me a while to get brave enough to try it and I finally did and I literally threw up in my mouth.  The bad part is, right as I was throwing up, the daughter who’s like 25 years old walks out and saw..and heard it and she kinda just looks at me and walks out of the room again.  Hermana Rivera was dying laughing because it was so awkward and then she says “ok, I believe you. You really can’t.”  So she ate her food and my food.  That’s not the end of it—don’t worry.  Hermana Martinez walks out and was like “do you want some fruit?”  I was thinking “Perfect!” You can’t go wrong with fruit.  So she comes back out with some of the brownest bananas I’ve ever seen.  Hermana R. and I were like, no way can we do this!  So we hid the uneaten bananas in our backpacks and told her we had to go.  Whew.  Dificil!  The food here is SO hard to eat.  I’m definitely not on my mission for the food. 

Tomorrow night at midnight, Hermana Silva and I are traveling to Cordoba to get my papers for Argentina finished.  And guess what!?  I get to see Hermana Woolley, Hermana Morris, and Elder Royster.  They’re my buddies.  Legitly I am so excited!  I’m a little nervouse to go with Hermana Silva mainly because she speaks no English. 

So I decorated my planner the other day and guess how I decorated it? SPARKLES! My companion told me she’s pretty sure she’s never seen a planner like mine.  Making a Kelby impression in Argentina—one planner at a time J

Good luck with school and stuff everyone!!! Keep in mind how amazing yall are that yall are in my prayers every night and day.  Sorry this is so short! Love you all!

Mexican dinner with hermanas!!!

I got to hang out with Hermana Woolley today!!!

Update on the Cordoba Temple!

My best friend...literally!

my district! the other elders. elder ruiz is the hispanic and elder thaxton!

I made a fresh fruit salad. Well...not fresh but close to it!!!