From today...

Pictures.

One, I took a shot of a road I had never walked before that I thought looked pretty cool. It just goes off into the distance... and finally reaches some houses.

The other picture, this is what happens when your companion calls someone on the phone in spanish during daily planning time, and you don´t understand what they are saying. I didn´t even know he took a picture.

This past Friday I went on divisions with someone in my zone. He´s a big guy from Washington... Spokane actually. His last name is Workman. Red hair. He said he didn´t recognize Heather and Darren´s name, but I didn´t know what specific area they lived in. anyways, we went to visit this inactive member, and his exwife was there. They had 5 or 6 people living in a very small room, about half the size of my room at home, and it had a stove and 3 beds, tv, and tons of other stuff. Such a small room with so many people was really quite humbling. Apparently she had had bad experiences with past missionaries, and how they seemed trucho (fake or crappy), and we were able to talk to her a lot and she opened up to us. She ended up really liking us, which is bad for me since I probably won´t ever see her again, since she´s not in my area... Oh did I mention that E´ Workman has only been out a transfer longer than me? And he can speak spanish pretty good. He lives in an apartment with 3 native speakers, so he has been kind of forced to speak spanish, but wow I was really surprised. One of the people we contacted was catholic or evangelist or something. I don´t remember, those are the only 2 religions we ever meet down here. Anywho, he was actually able to carry on a conversation (the lady was more arguing with us, saying the same thing repeatedly) about the godhead. She thought it was all the same person, and we obviously didn´t. But it was interesting to see how adamant some people can be. We decided not to bible bash (since neither of us had bibles with us... hah) but it was interesting none the less. We ate lunch at this members house, and we were talking a little bit of english when there was nobody around. Well the daughter walked in, who was 10 or 11ish, and she asked if I understood english. I told her I could only speak it, but I couldn´t understand it. She actually believed me, it was pretty funny.

Oh, here´s a good story. Thursday we had to go to the offices so that I could start my Argentina papers or something like that. We went to Capitál and did all this stuff, had to wake up at 530 to be there at 730... but anyways, the story is our ride to the offices. In order to get to the offices we have to take a bus and a train. Well, the bus was pretty full, as it was the working class traveling to work and stuff. But when we got to the train station... wow. I mentioned a few letters ago that the train was really full and we couldn´t get on. Well this time, we had to get on. We were the last people on the train... and there were people like football player size pushing and shoving people into a train to get more people on. People were literally packed like sardines in this train. Ok, so we got on. We literally have our faces against the train door, and we can´t even put our arms down because the train is so crowded. Well, we need to get off in 2 stops. Bad news? The train stop at that location is on the other side of the train, and the doors on our side don´t open. So it comes to the stop, and we need to get off. So we start yelling "permiso" which is basically saying excuse me, let me through. Well, needless to say, with 100 people between you and the door, and nobody got off on our stop, we were only able to pass 1 person (which moved us about 3 inches closer to the door) before the train took off. Well, we decided we would get off at the next stop. Nope... station is on the same side of the train, and nobody got off. We actually ended up going out of our mission before we could get off the train... it was ridiculous. So we just boarded another train back to the stop we needed to go to. It was fun.

At lunch on Wednesday (we eat lunch with the same people every week) they spent 5 minutes trying to tell me the correct way to say ´colgate´ in castellano. Oh, did you know they call their language castellano and not spanish? and they pronounce it cast tay shawn no. I just kept saying it the way we say it in the states, even though I knew what it was in castellano. that was pretty funny as well.

That night we also visited a more or less inactive member. She is divorced, has 4 kids. 3 of them have kids of their own, and only one is above the age of like 20. Anywho, she told us she had started smoking and stuff to relieve some of the stress in her life. Things like her gym teacher being a pervert to her (she works out a lot... she looks like she is 30ish and is really like 45). Anywho, we talked with her for awhile, and she ended up coming to church on Sunday. I thought that was pretty cool.

And that reminds me of something else. Last night, we had our schedule all set up... and we decided to change it and go to someone elses house for a few minutes before going to the rest of our appointments. Well, we ended up staying for about 35 minutes, and right as we´re about to leave, one of their friends walks in, and was actually interested in what we were doing. she was asking us all sorts of questions and things... so we gave the first lesson and gave her a book of mormon. So hopefully something comes out of that.

We visited another inactive member whos mom lives with her, nonmember. I shared 1 Ne 7:8. She thought I was totally bashing her, but then she started laughing when I turned it around and said her mom needs an example like her. That was pretty funny as well. This week has just been a funny week, I guess.

On Tuesday, we normally get our mail at zone meeting. Well, they never showed up. We found out the car was in a mini accident (the elder swerved to avoid a car that cut in front of them, and ended up popping 2 of the tires). So we just sat around waiting, since they said they would come when they got the tires fixed. We got a call about 15 minutes later. He said "I have good news and bad news. Good news - i just saved a bunch of money on car insurance by switching to Geico. Bad news - You won´t be receiving your mail this week". None of the natives really got it, but all the stateside missionaries were laughing. But then I just ended up getting my mail on thursday when we went to the offices.

And then there is yesterday. Yesterday, I gave a talk in sacrament meeting over missionary work. Not sure how well that went.. but whatever. we talked to mario (the guy with the huge blue torta cake) and he said he was getting his marriage papers this wednesday, so hopefully we can get him baptized before this transfer is over! and then we had a drunk guy start talking to us... and i´m not sure what it is... but I don´t think i ever talked to a drunk person in the u.s. this guy was weird... we tried getting away, but he kept talking to us, and he kept saying the same thing over and over again "im catholic. i believe in jesus and the virgin mary" anywho, he wanted to buy us a drink to show that he didn´t want to hurt us (lol...) and so he went to a kiosco. Well, he got frustrated for some reason or another, and he tried a different kiosco. as we were walking off, the lady looked at us and gave the "crazy" sign, pointing to the guy. it was funny. Well, we needed to get away, since we had other appointments, so we´re both hoping a bus drives by. What do you know it? A bus that only comes once an hour drove by right as we were passing the bus stop. So we took it and drove off, waving at the guy.

Today, I bought hair clippers. The electric kind. Yes, I am going to cut my own hair. I didn´t want to pay 30 pesos for a stinking hair cut, which is what my companion pays. He goes to this professional place... what a rip off. Anyways, the clippers were only 119, so it pays for itself in 4 haircuts. And its cordless too :) so hopefully I don´t ruin my hair, as we have interviews tomorrow with the mission prez. Wish me luck... haha.

Other than that... I think that is about it.

Til Next week, I suppose...

Collin's Email from 4/19

Hello again...


That´s interesting that it has been raining a lot over there. This past week it has rained quite a bit. Tuesday and Wednesday I think it was, we had a pretty good rain shower, which left the unpaved roads all muddy. That was fun. We had to go to a house that was in a little more countryish area, and it was dark and muddy. I had fun doing that. It´s been pretty cloudy and things, and dark, even a little chilly this whole week. And then last night, as we were walking, a lightning storm started. Lightning every 2 or 3 seconds, and one of the times the entire sky was lit up with huge streaks of lightning for a good 6-7 seconds nonstop. It looked really neat. So we decided to go to the bishops house real quick, and as soon as we walked in the door (literally...) rain came pouring down, and it was a violent rain for about 30 minutes or so.

Routine - Basically we wake up at 6:25 every day, exercise, shower, do study, and then leave about 10:35 or 10:45. We hardly ever come back to our apartment for lunch (I think we did it once. Our lunch appointment was cancelled, and our appointment we made the night before decided to not be there when we stopped by). The members here love us. There are a few families that just cycle feeding us, we have the same lunch appointments every week, and we have dinner 2-3 times a week or so. But often when we go to appointments the members feed us something even if we don´t have an appointment, so that helps when we´re a little hungry. Here, dinner isn´t a "real" thing, if we have it, we have it. if not, we don´t. One of the missionaries who was in our area a while ago said he gained 20 pounds in this area. Other than that stuff, the schedule is mostly the same. Nothing odd. Except today, there was a conference for the new missionaries, that we were just told about last night. We had to travel all the way to the offices for it. takes about 30 or 45 minutes by bus and train, and a bit of walking. So most of today I didn´t really have a Pday. We barely got back an hour ago, and then came straight here.

I don´t know why the bishop has been bishop for 10 years. It seems like there would be other qualified people, but I have no idea. The members are really nice and dedicated. There are a few families that actually go out by themselves and do their own little missionary work type of things. Yesterday, I went on splits with a member in the ward for 2 hours, and he was an RM. his entire family is very missionary oriented.

Ok so what else has happened this week...

While I was on splits with the member, he had an interesting way of getting contacts that my companion had never used before. He would walk up to someone and ask if they knew where a certain street was, even if we knew exactly where it was, and then say something like, "ok thanks. oh, and have you ever talked with us before?..." I thought it was pretty funny. and then the other thing he did was walk up to someone and ask for a completely random name that he had just made up, just to talk to them. one of them said they actually knew where they lived... so we had to go ask for them. that was pretty funny.

We talked to this really weird guy.. who was really interested in invisibility and things, and says he has seen UFO´s or has been abducted by them or something. He was really weird, apparently he was an old investigator. When he opened up the door, the first thing I saw was his nails. They were painted bright yellow and red. Yeah, he´s a psycho. Then he gave us some coloring book pictures of like... zombie children. Weird. We´re not going back there for a while...

We talked to a lady who owns a little Kiosk in the front of her house. Here, Kisoks are part of peoples houses, and they just live in the back. Anyways, after we were done talking to her, and gave her a BoM and such, she gave us a bunch of free candy, and gave us a few Bon o Bon´s. Are these in the U.S.? They were really good, how come I have never had one before haha.

We were on the bus going to the far area of our area, and these kids on the bus started talking to us. Somehow they found out I knew english, and wanted me to speak some. I said something to the effect of "even if i spoke english you wouldn´t be able to understand a single thing i said", and they all flipped out that i actually knew english. it was quite entertaining. when I said that, my companion just busted out laughing.

We tried to get on the first train in the station today when we went to the offices, and people literally sandwich in the train. I didn´t think so many people could fit in there, they just keep pushing everyone in until no more fit. Anyways, there were so many people, we didn´t fit. So we waited for the second train. I was just way surprised how much they push and shove to get in. It was WAY packed.

I found out one of the members in our ward wants to become some sort of a doctor something or other, something I didn´t understand in spanish. Anywho, she has a real human skeleton named Jorgito. That was a little bit strange.

Remember that priest I talked to... like in the first week or something? We saw him again... and he called my companion a liar for not showing up to his house. It was pretty funny.

One of the sisters in the ward bought us a ton of facturas (know what these are? basically french pastry things full of goodness, sugar, jelly, etc.) randomly. It was really good. This same sister, we eat at her house every Tuesday lunch and every Sunday breakfast. She really likes us.

Anything else... I can´t really thing of anything else. We don´t have any gold investigators or anything, and apparently my companion hasn´t had any baptisms in this area since he´s been here, which is 2 more transfers, or 3 months. But I won´t let that stop me.

Until next week I suppose...?

Collin.

oh i forgot to describe the pictures.

One if of a kid named Marco Arasha. Very cool family, he didn´t know the best way to tie his tie or something... so that is my companion doing it for him.

The other picture is of some of the campos kids, the Bishops kids. There is another kid that wasn´t in the picture.

Week 2

Collin feels his Spanish is starting to get a little better.  He's meeting/contacting interesting people and dogs!
There are a few pictures included.
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Hello everyone...

Dad, you wanted the address of my apartment (pensión). Im not sure what it is exactly.  The bishop lives 2 blocks north of us. Yes, he has been bishop for 10 years. I was quite surprised to hear that myself. I didn´t know that there were no branches. At Church, we probably had 100ish people there, and apparently there are usually a lot more.

Mode of transportation... we walk and take the bus. Personally I think we take the bus too much, we spend a lot just going back and forth. The mission mom said that one zone or area uses bikes, but they are in the country. Nobody else uses them. I have probably taken the bus 30 times already.

We have been teaching lessons, but I´m not sure if it is considered a lot or not. We have a lot of people who tell us to come back at a certain time, and then they are either ´´working´´ or ´´busy´´ or something of the sort, so we dont have too many return appointments after the first. Yesterday, while we were walking to a members house for dinner, we needed another short lesson for the day, so we decided to talk to these 3 drunks on the side of the road. One of them was missing a leg, and he wouldn´t stop talking. The other 2 were trying to be somewhat nice and listen to us, and when the guy without a leg wouldn´t stop talking, they started fake hitting him and things, and he got up and started swinging his crutch around acting like he was going to hit them. He was quite mobile for only having one leg to stand on while swinging his crutch around. It was quite a show.

On friday i went on my first splits or divisions. i went with our zone leader, a native speaker, who doesn´t speak any english. it was pretty fun. they dont live in their own area, they have to take a bus to and from their area to their apartment everyday, which gets expensive. other than that though, their area was more poor than the area i am in right now. within the first 5 minutes of getting off the bus in their area, i saw a dead dog in the middle of a dirt road. nice. we also see a lot of other dog things... one of them (back in my area), we saw a dog walking down the road, and as soon as it crossed into one block, like 10 dogs appeared out of nowhere, and started chasing the dog and biting it and things. this continued on for about 5 minutes. when one of the dogs walked back, it has a bunch of fur in its mouth from the dog they were chasing. pretty neat. good thing they dont attack humans, everybody was just walking past them.

I have given 3 or so annointings in spanish, my comp still has to tell me what to say, i dont have it memorized yet. I also gave one blessing to a member who really likes me. Im not sure she understood what i was saying, but thats not the point of a blessing is it? hah.

The buses here only accept coins for payment, not bills. and coins are not very common in argentina. so we end up asking if people have monedas (coins) in exchange for bills a lot. well, the bishop ended up giving us a bag of 100 1-peso coins. the bag was pretty big. and yet my companion doesn´t know how to keep enough coins during the day, so we still end up asking for change at the end of the day. oh well, he´s the one that does the asking. maybe he will learn to take more eventually.

have i explained the procession i saw yet? we were walking down a street and heard a bunch of music, and found out a procession was going on, so we decided to watch it. we sat on a nice little tree stump. i took a video of it, but it is way too huge to send through email. maybe when i fill up this card, i will send it.

speaking of sending, that reminds me. i want more pictures of family. preferable send through the mail, so i wont have to print them off (the printer is reaaaallly slow here). lots of members want to see my family, and i only have like 6 pictures to show them. Also, if you can stuff my blue backpack ( the one i used during high school) small enough, I think i would like to have that also. we checked out backpacks today, the cheapest were like 45 pesos (13 or 14 bucks) and it was a piece of junk. the price that it started getting good, was 280 pesos, which is like 80 or 90 dollars. i am not paying that down here, hah.

We met an old lady the other day, who said she had never gotten married or had kids, and that all her nieces and nephews and stuff were just waiting for her to die so they could have her house. that was pretty sad. maybe she will come to church next week?

we had an investigator come to church yesterday. his name is jorge. he has parkinsons or something (im not sure if the spanish translation works out or not) and he reminds me a lot of a bobble head. he speaks slower, so i like him because i can actually understand what he says. when we were at the bishops for lunch today, i was talking to the bishop, and he said i am talking a lot more than what i was 2 weeks ago. i guess that is a sign of my improvement.

last night while we were having dinner, at the Salinas´ (whos mom realllly likes me) she brought out the food, and it was really hot. i unwittingly put a bunch in my mouth, and their daughter saw me breathing out trying to cool it down and started laughing. well, the mom saw her daughter laughing, and asked what happened. i guess by this time my face was really red from the food, so she ended up spitting the drink she had in her mouth all over the floor because she was laughing. she laughed so much, i had to control myself. I dont know if it was the hot food, or the pressure from trying to not laugh, but my nose started bleeding. it bled for like 5 seconds and stopped. that was kind of weird. that just added more to the hilarity.

oh by the way, i dont know if i added this picture in the last email, but there are a lot of walls like this. if you look closely, there are broken glass bottle shards stuck into the top of the wall. ouch. i wouldn´t want to get stuck on one of those.

here is a picture of this guy mario and his wife. it was marios birthday. he is not a member, but she is. she is on suspension of membership because she is not married to him, and they have 1 kid with another on the way. he is trying to become a member, but it is apparently difficult to get official marriage papers, and until then he can´t get baptized. the cake was reallly good. it was called torta cake.

I made my first real purchase in argentina today. i bought some mouth wash, some more floss, deodorant for when i run out, and i decided to buy some toilet paper, since the bidet´s here.... annoy me. it was like 45 pesos, which is about 11 dollars or so. not too bad if i do say so. by the way, the conversion is 3.8 pesos for every dollar. also, i got the refund for the 131 dollars in the airport. they put it into my mission account... and i have no idea how to get it back onto my card, so i guess i am just holding onto it for now. and my hour is about up.

Until next week, I suppose...

Moron 2 (dos) - Collin's 1st Area

Dad and I thought you might be interested in where Moron 2 is compared with Buenos Aries and the ocean, so here is a map.  If you want to a closer look, you should be able to click on the link.

View Larger Map

Week 1 in Argentina

Collin is doing well in his first area, Moron 2, and really likes it so far.  
There are pictures included with this post, and the last one.
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first of all, yes i have already heard about the earthquake in california. actually, just 2 hours ago, the bishop in our ward told me about it (in spanish!) and i understood what he said. Also, you asked if i had heard about the family that was mentioned during general conference, the one whose daughter went to my mission? i indeed have heard of them. during general conference, there were many missionaries around me, and everybody who had been there for longer than a few months remembered the sister. and i watched the sessions in english.

ok so... ill start off with things that have happened during the week. first off, the people here serve us a LOT of food. almost too much. every time i eat i feel like i am going to explode. its kind of ridiculous. the second day i was hear i ate at a bolivians house. they asked if i wanted salsa, and i said why not, so i added in a very small amount, stirred it in with therest of my potatoes and corn and things, and ate some and my mouth almost burned off. good thing that my companion said argentines dont really like spicy foods.. i dont know how much i could have handled. i also hope that the water members give us is safe... we ask for water, and then just drink it. hopefully it doesnt make me sick hah.

so i absolutely love the buses here. they are very fun. they drive all over the place, hardly ever stopping. very bumpy ride as well. and most of the time there isn´t sitting room, so everybody stands. quite fun. for conference, on sunday at least, our ward rented a bus to get everybody to watch conference because our building is too small. so we had a bus full of mormons. however, on saturday, they didnt have abus to get us there, so we had to pay for our own bus, and then even had to take a train to get where we were going. the train was fun too. quite an experience. saturday night priesthood session ended at 11 at night for us. that was nice. we are supposed to be asleep by 1030. didn´t get to sleep until midnight. in between the 2 sunday sessions, everybody ate lunch, and just sat outside on the lawn of the church for 2 hours. it felt really nice.

this picture is of all the stake sitting on the grass eating lunch between sunday sessions on conference.

its actualy starting to get quite cool down here, feels good. saturday after the second session all of the missionaries went for icecream. during the second session of sunday, a bunch of couples came in with us to the english one, i dont know why. i dont even think they understood english...

there are dogs EVERYWHERE. the first day i had to have passed like 200 dogs. and they all just walk around, i would say 60% of them are just laying on the ground and dont even move when you walk by. everybody here has fences, you can hardly ever walk right up to someones door.

we met ajehovahs witness the other day who said that we didn´t have the spirit with us because we didn´t know if she had talked to mormons before. that was quite amusing. and we had an old guy ride by us on a bike saying go to another country. oh and we also had a priest from an evangelical church talk to us, and at the end he noted how i didn´t say anything... obviously because i didn´t know how. one of the houses in the ward has air conditioning! it feels really nice.

one day we waited for a bus for 40 minutes... and we said if the next bus that passes us isn´t the bus we need, we would go to a different stop. the next one that passed us was the bus we wanted... however it actually PASSED us and stopped on the other side of a busy road. that was irritating. there were a few processions in the road for easter weekend stuff, some catholic something or other i think. i dont know.

the members that live in an air conditioned house gave me a key chain made of argentine leather. looks pretty cool.

during p day this morning, we went to a HUGE mall in central morón. by the way, my area is morón 2 (dos). we did some shopping in Jumbo, apparently its a walmart equivalent down here. well, my companion did shopping, i still dont have my mission credit card to use. thats quite irritating. then we went to the bishops house for lunch, which apparently we do every monday, and every friday. it was good, it was pasta with chicken, and then arroz con leche, or rice pudding as my companion tells me.

there have been a few foods that i have had to stuff down, mostly because i dont like the texture of them.


this is a dog that made friends with us. we didn´t make friends with it. last night, it came into our little area by the door. we scared it away. when we came back 2 hours later, it was there. we scared it away again. it came back 10 minutes later. scared it away. half an hour later it came back, so we decided if it wanted to sleep there it could, but we wouldn´t be giving it anything. so thats our dog friend that was gone in the morning, thankfully.

another is an easter present one of the members in the ward gave us. its a little chocolate egg and had candy and things inside. pretty good. and she had the cutest little girl, she was like 2 or 3 years old. they also had a big dog, and the kid would hug around its neck and sit on it and things, and the dog wouldn´t even move. it amused me for a bit.

and the last picture is my companion inbetween sessions on sunday. we were tired from the night before, and decided to sleep a bit before the second session, and this was his idea of going to sleep.

my spanish is... not feeling adequate. i understand probably 15 percent of what people are saying. although i am making big improvements in hearing what people say and picking out words. i actually gave a blessing to a lady in spanish while we were waiting for our bus on sunday morning.. and i dont think my spanish has ever felt worse. i´ve given like 30 prayers in spanish, and 10 or 15 scriptures. i feel like i am barely scraping by. so hopefully i will make huge improvements as time goes on.

the area i am in is very city-ish. although a certain part of it doesn´t have paved roads at all. so its kind of like a mix. but i really like the ward. all of the members are very nice, and i already feel like i have a connection with the bishop and his wife, so thats good. we found out today that the bishops wife has a lady gaga song as her ringtone, hah. and she doesn´t even know what it says. thats pretty funny.

i will use email to communicate, and i have an hour every monday to do so. then i have another half hour to use to write the president.

to use the computers we go to a little shop on the road, which charges 4 pesos an hour, which is about a dollar an hour.

during our time in the mall in central morón, a couple of elders found a store that sold ties for 10 pesos, which is like 3 dollars. the ties were a little ugly, but wow 3 dollars is cheap. and my card right now has 322 american dollars on it. thats because i still cant use my card so it just keeps adding on... and i still haven´t heard anything about my 131 dollar reimbursement. hopefully i will hear something about that in the future.

many of the houses and fences here have fences as i have already said. and theyall have sharp spike things on the top to prevent people from climbing over. one picture i wanted to get, but forgot to was of the glass bottle shards stuck into the concrete walls. it reminded me of bourne ultimatum, haha. but yeah, they are very sharp, and i wouldn´t want to get that stuck into my hands, so i wont be climbing over any walls anytime soon.

my dry knuckles have pretty much fixed them selves by now, haven´t had a problem since. and the sleeping bag that bryce got me is quite warm, i slept in it last night. nice and cozy.

did i mention my companion passed out on saturday night? during icecream, one of the elders came up behind him, and had him in a headlock or something. well, he started spitting everywhere. a few of us were trying to decide if he was faking or not. anywho, when he ´´woke up´´ he claimed to have no knowledge of it. so i guess he fainted. interesting huh? i guess thats everything...

argentina is awesome. i love it. the bus rides, the roads, the people, the stores, everything. there are signs for things everywhere, and at least right now, the weather is great. its the beginning of fall, so i wont have to experience summer for a while. other than that... chow.