Week 18: Ciudad del Este

Holaaaa everyone!!

Hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas. It was pretty cool here. The people in Paraguay and most of South America celebrate the 24th more than the 25th. They all get together and make tons of food and eat it Christmas Eve and at midnight they all light off tons and tons of fireworks and it's actually pretty cool. It's like fourth of July but practically everyone gets fireworks and lights them off. We spent some time with some of the members and hung out with them, spent Christmas with them and it was actually pretty fun. I figured I was going to be homesick but it really wasn't too bad. I think im starting to realize that happiness really depends on us, ourselves. That if we are in a bad situation we can think that life sucks and that life is hard and yeah life is going to be hard. But if we take the bad situation and look at the postivies and look forward to other good things it really gets a lot better. 

I think I've said it before, but I'm not really sure if would ever like to live in Paraguay because it kinda smells bad and it's kinda dirty and super hot haha but it's cool; I like it. But I'm happy to be here because I can focus on the job I have to preach the gospel to people and if i just think about that and do that, everything else seems to go away and not matter and then I'm just happy haha. I can't explain why, that when I get home every night I'm exhausted and wet from sweat but somehow happy as can be. So it's been really cool to learn that and learn that really when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. 

But also, I'm headed to Argentina tomorrow!!! I got my visa, I guess, and I'll be heading to an area really close to Posadas. So that will be super cool. I'm excited to experience Argentina and I've heard good things about the people there. so it should be cool. Anyway, have a fantasic new year and good rest of winter break everyone. 

Love, 

Elder Ben 

Weeks 16 & 17: Ciudad del Este

Holaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa everyone!!! 

Feliz Navidad!!

Hopefully everyone is enjoying this awesome time of year. It's a little different here in the heat and the culture is just a little bit different. The people here are all pretty excited; there are a lot of fireworks and Christmas lights and stuff, but for me it doesn't really feel like Christmas haha! It's just different in the heat. But it's all good; I'm having a pretty enjoyable time.  

There are ups and downs. I've been eating rice and chicken and some rice and some more chicken and some burnt rice and some burnt chicken and then some rice and sometimes pasta, but this week I'm hoping to eat well haha with Christmas coming. But it's continuing to be a really cool experience for me, really humbling and eye opening. It's tough to see little kids hop on the bus I'm riding with no shoes and dirty clothes, and they are selling a big basket of apples or little candies, and this is so that they can live. Kids that are 10 or 11, and it's tough to see. 

But this will be my first Christmas away from home, and I don't think it'll be as bad as I thought it would be haha. It's cool to be here in the mission because basically all we do is teach people about our church, about Jesus Christ, and since Christmas is all about Christ, I think I'm kinda in the right mindset to be able to really experience what Christmas is about:  being like Jesus, serving other people and I really think that's what can make us happy. I didn't really think about it too much till this past Sunday when I was in church and not too many people showed up because they were traveling and the bishop came up to me and said, Elder.... can you give a talk today? haha I was like uhhhhh....hm..... I'll try, haha.  How long? Oh just like 15minutes... Oooo was I scared. But I just got up and started talking in Spanish and talkig and talking...and for 20  minutes I went on about Christmas,and Jesus and I think I learned more while I was up there talking than all the people who were listening did haha. It was pretty cool. 

But really I invite any one who is reading this to think about Jesus this Wednesday, whathe did for us andhow that hasaffectedour lives. And I think we will enjoy Christmas more. But also, enjoythe break,time with your familesand especially the food!!!!! Sorryif alot ofthe wordshere are attatched together but the keyboard im using isnt the greatest. anyway,have a fantastic christmas everyone!!!!!!!

Elder Ben Roberts

Week 15: Ciudad del Este

(Portions of a letter from Elder Roberts to his family) 

And I think we are going to have a Christmas party this 19th of this month. And yeah on Christmas, I thihnk we are going to be a ble to Skype. There are cameras and my comp and I are going to test them out; I think it will work. And can you figure out if there is a time difference. I'm not sure if there is and all the other missionares are from Utah or other countries and aren't in our time zone. So I'm not really sure how much it is.

…and today, we went shopping  I bought some ties and a little stereo where I can put a little pen drive memory in and it sounds a lot better than our portable dvd player we use. So I can put all the music on the pen drive from the cds and then practice the song we are going to sing with our district for a Christmas devotional thing we are going to have with the president. I didn't get to see the church's Christmas devotional however. 

...and my companion is good. He's a really good teacher, and we are finding people to teach. The people here are probably a lot easier to talk to, like we find people on the street really easily and people let us into their houses really easy but they mostly just want to talk, not really fulfill commitments. Tell the missionaries in Hagerstown that they can bring a little stool in downtown Hagerstown and stand on it and preach to people! hahaha! I'm sure they will find a bunch of people. But it's hard here because there are no addresses, so when we contact someone in the street and they tell us, yeah I live 3 blocks down to the right under the mango tree, it's kinda hard to find their house. But it works, and we have a few good investigadroes but it's constantly teacfhing 3 or 4 lessons and then dropping them because they never do anything and finding new ones. 

My memory stick in my camera has a virus I think and right now I can't send anything, but I'm going to try again. I can see all the pictures on my camera but can't load them on the computer. So I'll use the other memory I have and send some next week. But if you can, can you send a letter or something with some more pictures of the family, and one of me when I had really long hair haha?

But thanks for everything!! Love and miss the fam. 

Ben 

Week 14: Ciudad del Este

Hola everyone! 

     This week was pretty good. Definitely missed out on Thanksgiving, but it's all good; there are many Thanksgivings in the future that I´ll be able to participate in. But lots of heat, and lots of rain here in Ciudad del Este. I did have the oppurtunity to go the Zoo here and then Pizza Hut, which was a great experience and Pizza Hut today was somewhat of a replacement for missing out on the Thanksgiving meal haha. But yeah lots and lots of rain; we got stuck in a storm last night and the streets were basically rivers so we were kinda were walking through a flowing river in the streets and our shoes and pants and basically all of us got completely soaked. But it felt good, a lot better than 105 degree weather. 

     But also, my companion got pretty sick this week and we had to stay in the house for about 2 days, but that gave me the oppurtunity to read the Book of Mormon a lot in those two days. And that was actually a good experience for me. Before my mission I read it but I didn't really actually read it. I read it but never got a lot out of it. And thus far on my mission I've been able to read a majority of it and really take a lot out of it and learn a lot as well as help other people learn about it and how it can help them. So it's been a cool experience for me. Anyway, I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving! 

Talk to you soon

Elder Ben

Week 13: Ciudad del Este

Hola everyone!

This week was pretty good for me. I got a new companion, Elder Aguilar, from Argentina who is really cool, but he's pretty new to the mission like me. But we are doing really well actually. I've been eating some more wild meat and some other interesting stuff and also been meeting some interesting people. 

We are teaching a lady that has schizophrenia... and she's really nice but really interesting. The last time we visited her, she came and gave me a giant bear hug and kissed me on both my cheeks...so I really enjoyed my first hug from a female in 5 months being from a 300 pound schizophrenic lady.. super fun! Haha! But we had a conference with a mission president yesterday which was fantastic, a really really awesome guy our president. But anyway, I don't have too much time, but hopefully everyone is doing well!

Love, Elder Ben

Week 12: Ciudad del Este

Helloooo everyone!! 

Hope everyone is doing well! This past week was pretty good for us. It's getting pretty hot, but it's not terrible. 

We had a lady get baptized on Saturday which was pretty cool. Anddd my 12-week training period ends this Wednesday, so I'll just be a regular missionary. So I'm kind of scared but not really. I feel pretty comfortable now, and I can communicate with people in Spanish haha, so yeah everything is going well. 

Well except for that we don't have a light in or bathroom at the moment; it burned out, so we have been showering in the dark and going to the bathroom in the dark... but it's not too bad haha. It's…interesting! 

But I also had the awesome privelege to eat cow heart this past week which was...not terrible but I don't really want to have it again haha! And some lady offered her daughter to me and asked if I wanted to marry her.. which was kind of awkward.... hahaha, but pretty funny. I declined...just for the record though. 

But yeah, other than that, nothing too exciting is happening. Hope everything in the States is going well!!! Miss everyone!

Elder Ben 

Weeks 10 & 11: Ciudad del Este

November 4, 2013

Hola everyone,

This week wasn't all that exciting, more rain, more sun and more teaching. Halloween wasn't all that exciting because the people of Paraguay don't really celebrate it; it's more of a superstitous thing here and they call it the day of the witch. And a lot of people think it's kind of evil. But all I did to celebrate was eat cake and drink fanta for breakfast which was pretty awesome. But anyway, I really don't have too much to say this week. Hopefully next week will be more exciting. Aside from the food, I've also been receiving some very tasty drinks like lots of carrott juice with lots of carrott pulp, tomato juice, and some other weird stuff that I honestly don't even know what it is. There was one that was green and smelled like grass and kind of tasted like grass... But it's always nice when we have something gross to eat and get to wash it down with some thick carrott juice. Haha! Fun times. Anyway, talk to you all next week!

Elder Ben Roberts

November 11, 2013

Holaaa everyone!

Hope everyone is doing well! This week was pretty good for us. I'm having a good time and starting to enjoy everything more. It kinda hit me that I'm in the mission. I mean I always knew I was, but now it's more real. Don't really know how to explain it haha but it's cool. And I'm also starting to enjoy it more because my Spanish is getting better and I feel pretty comfortable talking to people. I'm not where near perfect and I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to perfect my Spanish, but it's coming a lot. 

I also had a good week because I found a Burger King last Monday and had a strawberry milkshake. Which was awesome. And also received a package from my wonderful parents and grandparents with some candy and such in it, so it was nice to taste some stuff from America. But yeah, it's really hot here. Really hot. I bought a sombrero which helps and we basically sit in front of a fan any time we are in our house in the morning and when we come home at night. But no weird foods this week, well possibly because a lot of times I don't really know what I'm eating, but everything tasted pretty good so I can't complain. And I'm still alive so I can't complain. 

But we have a lady that is going to get baptized this coming weekend and we are really excited for her. It's cool to see the progress people make and how they change for the better after we have taught them all of our lessons and they read the Book of Mormon and stuff. It's been really cool to see her progress and how happy she is to be able to get baptized and become a member of the church. 

And I also gave my first talk in church in Spanish in front of everyone, which was... interesting haha! I think everyone understood what I was saying. Well I can only hope. But yeah, also something that I always took for granted was not having to get our water from a well every time we needed it... totally take that for granted and seeing people do it is pretty humbling. And when we come to their house and ask us if we want water and then run to their well and scoop some out I feel bad, but it's really been pretty humbling. Anyway, hope everyone is doing well and hope everyone has a great week this week.

Elder Ben Roberts

Week 9: Ciudad del Este

Hollaa Everyone,

     This past week has been pretty good. It rained a lot. We got caught outside twice while it was pouring and got totally soaked. But it was fun haha. The weather in Paraguay is so weird though; we wake up and it's hot and cloudless and then 6 hours later we are walking around and this huge storm rolls in and the temperature drops 30 degrees and it pours and there's some crazyy lightning and thunder. We were teaching a lesson on Friday and there was just lightning flashing all around us like every 3 seconds. Cool stuff. 

     But I was lucky enough to eat some wild meat this week. Not really sure what they mean by wild meat, but I guess it's just meat from different wild animals? haha I just don't want to eat it again, that's for sure. We had it once and it wasn't bad, and then I found out what it was after my companion threw it up... and from then on I wasn't too fond of it. So I wasn't really excited when we had it again this past week. But hey, I'm still alive. 

     And on Saturday we were coming home, and there was a guy whose van got stuck in the mud. So we ran over and helped him and were pushing it from the back and the tires starting spinning, and I just got attacked by a tonnn of mud. Haha,  it was pretty funny. Just a hugeeeee streak of mud up both sides of my pant legs. Came home super dirty, but it was fun! Anyway, hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Roberts

Week 8: Ciudad del Este

Missionaries of the Argentina, Posadas Mission serving
in Paraguay, with Elder Gonzalez of the Seventy and his wife

HOOOLLLAAAAAA

     What's up, everyone? I'm sure it's starting to get cold in the States and here it's warming up aloottttttttt. I'm kinda dripping sweat right now writing this haha. But it's cool. Sweating is a lifestyle in Paraguay when you have to wear dress pants and white shirt and tie all day everyday. Buttttt this week was actually pretty good for me. 

     On Monday I found out that I was going to Asuncion at like 645 and that I would be leaving at midnight that night and so we did, got on a bus at like 1000 and arrived in Asuncion, the capital, at about 6ish in the morning and went to get our visa paperwork finished and all that fun stuff. But it was really good actually, got to talk to all my friends from the training center and we have a good time hanging out that day taking a little break.  

     But the rest of the week was good as well! Found some good people that we are teaching and everything is getting a little bit easier and little bit more normal haha! I'm adjusting. But I am sleep talking in Spanish, so my companion says. So I guess that's a good thing! Haha I guess I sleep talk allottt. 

     And it's reallly funny, sometimes we will go up to people's houses and clap, which is like knocking on the door in the US, and a little kid will run out and then run back in, and then run and tell us that his parents aren't home, without us asking. And then we ask him, "Well, can you ask your parents when the best time to come back would be?" and he runs back in to ask them........ so obviously they are home but they just told their little 5 year old to come out and tell us they weren't. hahahaha It's pretty funny.

      But nothing too exciting happening, just some warm weather and some weird bowel movements. But anyway this past Sunday we were expecting some people to show up to church, some of our investigadores and we had worked pretty hard to find them and teach them and stuff and were really hoping they would come. I was praying they'd come and all that good stuff.  We showed up and waited for a while and  no one came...and I was super disappointed and sad and stuff, but then all of a sudden, 3 people, friends of members, came, just randomly and it was really cool. We just found three new people to teach, and they're all excited to hear the message, which is kind of rare... being excited about it hahaha, but it was pretty cool! 

Anywayyy hope everyone is doing well! talk to you next week!

Elder Roberts

Some photos courtesy of Sister Stephanie Craven and Sister Camille Anderson

Sisters and elders from the MTC group

At the Asuncion, Paraguay Temple

Just waiting

Week 7: Ciudad del Este

Hello Everyone!

     I don't have too much time this week, so I'll have to make it short. Sorry! But hopefully everyone is doing well. The weather was actually superr nice this past week, but it's going to start getting reallly hot.. not looking forward to that haha. Supposedly it gets up to 110 or 115... with humidity. Ahh, so yeah. The seasons are switched around,so December through March is summer. 

     But.. I'm doing well, always learning new Spanish words and phrases and always trying to talk to people. It's pretty weird to go up to people in the street and start talking to them in Spanish but really cool because I couldn't do that 2 months ago. I always feel like I don't know very much but then I compare it to how much I knew 3 months ago and it's pretty weird haha. But yeah same old same old, walking around talking to people, teaching people and helping people. I helped a lady for a few hours this past week build her house, well part of it haha so that was fun. But I'll talk to you all next week! 

Elder Roberts

Week 6: Ciudad del Este

Holaaa, Everyone!

     Hope everyone is doing well. This week wasn't super eventful but still a good week. It was cold and then hot and then cold and hot... the weather here changes super fast; it's crazy. And it did rain allll day Thursday and walking through the mud and rain was... I guess fun in a way haha. Almost slipped about 100 times. 

     But we have some good people that we are teaching at the moment. I'm thinking my current companion is going to get transferred this Wednesday and I'll get a new one. But unfortunately we don't find out till the day of.. So I'll miss him, but life goes on! 

     This past Saturday and Sunday was General Conference, and for anyone that's reading this who is unfamiliar with the church I attend, it's a big conference in Utah where the prophet and 12 apostles and a bunch of other people speak to the whole church and everyone in it about all sorts of things. So that was really cool to watch that through a satellite broadcast. Also a nice break from walking around all day haha! But it was really good!

     But some funny stuff that happened.. so we unplugged our refrigerator to plug in a fan and forgot to plug it back in.... so when we got home that night, our floor was covered in water, and our refrigerator didn't smell so great. And the same night I went to the bathroom and thennnnn realized we didn't have toilet paper.... and theeeeennnnn as I was trying to decide what to do while in the bathroom, I discovered our cockroach problem as a few scurried across our bathroom floor... haha! It sounds terrible, but for some reason it's just kind of funny that all that stuff happened in the same night. I'm convinced that during the mission and while serving the Lord, bad stuff happens, but it's really not all that bad. I'm still having a great time. I feel like if I was just here as a regular person, I would not be enjoying myself, but since I'm preaching the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and helping people develop their faith, it's a cool experience and that's really what the gospel does, makes people happy even when they're experiencing things that are not so happy. But yeah! I'm doing well and hope all of you are as well. Talk to you soon!

Elder Roberts

Week 5: Ciudad del Este

Hola everyone! 

I hope everyone is doing wonderfully in school or work or whatever everyone is doing!  I'm doing well! This week was actually pretty uneventful; nothing too exciting happened. But I did eat some realllly good food.. and some not so good food, but this week was definitely a good food week. 

So yeah, there wasn't anything super cool this week so I'll just run through what we do on an average day. So we get up at 6:30 every morning and pray and work out for 30 minutes. Then we shower and eat breakfast and then study at 8:00.  From 9:00 to 11:00 we have study as a companionship; we talk about what we are going to teach that day and we do role-plays and just study about how we can be more effective.Then at 11:00 I study Spanish for an hour, and at 12:00 we go get lunch. From 1:00 to 9:00 we go out and teach people and find people to teach. 

We have investigadores (investigators) whom we teach, but sometimes our appointments fall through so we visit their neighbors or just walk around and talk to people and try to set up more appointments. And most people have gates and fences around their yard, or patch of dirt, because there are so many stray animals that could easily walk right into their house. So instead of knocking on doors we stand outside their gate and clap until they come out. Kinda funny, but it makes sense here. And yeah we just teach people about our religion,  prayer, reading the scriptures and profets (prophets) and all that good stuff.  We just help them develop faith in Jesus Christ and our main goal is to baptize people. But that's not our total focus; we just help people develop their faith and talk to them about their problems or trials and help them recognize that God is really there and that he really can help. 

We are teaching a guy who has a terrible smoking problem, and we are just trying to help him overcome that. We are working with him a lot to help him overcome that addiction, so it's really cool just helping people and as they follow Jesus Christ and begin to live a more spiritual lifestyle it's cool to see how they change, how their attitude changes and the person they become. It's usually not super dramatic, but it's evident and awesome how the gospel can change people. 

And let's seeeee, on Tuesdays we have a meeting with our district and discuss how we can do better and share ideas about how to teach more effectively and stuff like that. On Mondays are called p-days, preparation days, where I get to write to family and friends, relax a little, do laundry, and best of all take naps. I'm a huge fan of naps. Also something cool about Paraguay...the weather is crazy. Like when I woke up this morning it was hot and muggy and not raining; now it's pouring and kind of cold. This past week I saw the coolest lightning storm ever. Just lightning that lit up the sky every half second. Super fun to watch. But yeah, that's my life in Paraguay in a nutshell. Sometimes easy, sometimes hard but always a good experience. So, adios! 

Elder Roberts

Week 4: Ciudad del Este

Hola, Everyone!

     Hope you're all doing well. I feel like there's tons of stuff that happens to me every week, so I'll try to remember all the intersting, exciting stuff haha. But this week has been good. My Spanish is improving and I'm starting to adjust and get into the swing of mission life. 

     I ate some pig liver.... which wasn't a good experience. But I'm still alive so can't complain. And I've actually had some really good food. The meat is really good, and there's this pumpkin milk dessert stuff that's awesomeee!!  And these little cakes that you can buy in packages called alfahors (I think), but they are amazing and they´re only 1 mil guarani! Okay so in Paraguay they use guarani as their money, and one thousand or 1 mil guarani is 25 cents... so 4 thousand guarni is a dollar. It's weird but it works haha!

     I did go to this lady's house and asked her if I could use the bathroom and I really had to go. She told me it was really dirty, and I was like.. okay all the bathrooms in Paraguay are dirty, whatever. So after she took a notebook and ripped out 5 pieces of notebook paper for me to wipe with...... I went in and for real, when the Paraguayos say the bathroom is dirty, oh my!  Literally the most disgusting 6 by 6 square foot room I have ever stepped into in my life. I feel for the people. I decided not to use that bathroom though anyway! 

     It's actually been really cold this week. It's ridiculous how fast the weather changes. Tuesday it was like 85, and then Wednesday it was like 45. When it rains, it really cools off and it's been raining off and on all week. But I think I like the cold better than sweating to death. haha! 

     So we tried to visit one of our investigators yesterday, and there was actually a flood and a river was created, so we couldn't get to his house.... kinda funny. But Friday at midnight all the people in my zone got on a bus and we went to Encarnacion, Paraguay for a conference with our mission. So after a six hour bus ride we got off and listened to a guy speak and it was really cool. I learned a lot and got to see all my friends from the training center. So that was fun. And we ate pizza... that was probably the best part...aside from the spiritualness and stuff ya know. Anyway, there's a brief overview of the week haha, but really something I'm learning is that the Holy Ghost, spirit, is super super cool. We are promised by our apostoles (apostles) that if we listen sincerely to our investigators talk and not try to think about what we are going to say next in our head, which is super hard because I'm always scared I'm not going to know what to say, but if we sincerely listen then when we need to speak, everything will come and we will be able to say what we need to. Which is crazy because it would be one thing if that happened in English, but with Spanish it's super cool when I just listen and then speak and everything kind of just flows out. Super cool! But anyway, hope everyone is doing well! Miss all of you!

Elder Roberts

Week 3: Ciudad del Este

Hola, Everyone!

     Hope all of you are doing well. This week has been good! There are ups and downs pretty much everyday, and I'm still getting used to waking up at 6:30 and walking around a lot.  But it's fun, and my Spanish is getting better, but I'm definitely still not comfortable. So I'm learning everyday and looking forward to the day that I can speak and understand really well. 

     But anyway, we had our first baptism on Friday which was super cool. A really good experience. And so far it's been a really humbling experience, and I'm really grateful for everything I have back home. Some of the people here live in tiny little shacks and live paycheck to paycheck just to be able to feed their families. And it has been really humbling because they´re some of the nicest people ever even with how little they have. But then there are the people who come up to you on the street or pull over and talk to you that are super drunk hahah! But it's funny. Theyll come up and start praying or asking us to preach to them while they're plastered, so we just kind of give them a little card with a picture of Jesus on it and go on our way. 

     There are these donuts that make my life; they're called bollos and they're amazingggg. I think the water here definietly got to me. The food is good and all the weird fruity drinks we get are good, but the explosive diarrhea that comes with it.... yeah sorry if that was TMI (You can delete that out if you want, Mom!). Haha! But it's all good. Lots of fun, some hard times and some good times, but all in all it's about serving the people, teaching the people and serving the Lord Jesus Christ. And no matter how hard it is sometimes, our purpose is to invite people to come unto Christ through faith, repentance, baptism, the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end, and that will never change. And spreading that message will always be a privelege whether I'm drenched in sweat, freezing from the cold rain, covered in mud or having weird bowel movements. So hopefully everyone is doing well!

Love, 

Elder Roberts

Week 2: Ciudad del Este

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciudad_del_Este

http://globalvoicesonline.org/2010/01/19/paraguay-the-chaotic-ciudad-del-este/

Hola, Everyone! 

     Hope everyone is doing well getting adjusted to school and work and whatever else! I'm doing well down here! It`s definitely an adjustment for me to wake up at 6:30 everyday, study for four hours, eat different food and then walk and teach and speak Spanish for another nine hours. But it's going well! I`m sure I'll get used to it soon. My companion got super sick this week so I went with another elder in our district to teach in his area. So for those who don`t know, there are a bunch of missions in the world for our church, like more than 200, but I can't remember how many (405).  The missions are regions in different countries. So within each mission there is a president who directs the work of 150 to 300 missionaries. The missionaries are divided into companionships and there are about three, four or maybe five companionships in a district. Then two to four districts make up a zone. And then there are several zones within the mission depending on its size and the number of missionaries. So I went with our zone leader (super smart guy) for two days while my companion was sick; he's from Utah, so it was nice to be able to speak in English with someone.  That was fun. I got to eat some horse meat while I was in his area... not my fave. But I have eaten some realllly good food, so it balances out. And I'm starting to like the tree roots that they eat down here. They're called mandioka (mandioca, manioca, cassava, manioc, yuca, etc)...not sure about the spelling on that one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassava

     But anyway we've been doing a lot of walking, a lot of teaching and a lot of finding people to teach... and I guess that`s what I'll be doing for the next 22 months! But it's fun, and I'm excited to learn more Spanish and to get better at teaching in Spanish. It was cool yesterday and rained a tonnnnnn, and the roads here are either dirt, or crushed up rocks with dirt on top of them. So when it rains, the roads are suuuuupppper muddy. So yesterday we walked and walked and actually got lost, and it was really dark and I had like five pounds of mud stuck to my shoes. I was slipping and sliding and all that good stuff, but some guy helped us get back to where we needed to be.  So we went back to our apartment at around 7:30 to drop off some food a member of the church had given us, and we wanted to just sit down and plan out how we were going to find new people to teach...which is not what we`re supposed to do...we stay out till 9 or 9:30 every night teaching. We almost quit early, but we felt a little voice tell us we should go out even though it was dark, muddy and we were exhausted from walking about five miles through the mud.  So we went out and tried to talk to some people and got denied a few times, but we found this really nice guy who was super receptive and seemed excited about learning more and he gave us cake! So that was a plus, and it was a cool experience. So I'm doing well! Still struggling to understand people and I'm still struggling to speak, but that will come. It's all good! 

     So I'm in Paraguay and not Argentina because my mission area covers Argentina and Paraguay, but the temporary visa I have that allows me to be in Argentina actually doesn't let me proselytize (work as a missionary) in Argentina. So I can be there but  can't be a missionary there. So I'll be in Paraguay until I get my real visa, which is I don't know when. But I could still be in Paraguay even when that happens. So I'll just have to wait and see. 

     Also, I forgot my camera at our house... so pictures next week! Sorry!

But anyway, till next week!

Elder Roberts

                                    

                                    Ciudad del Este, Paraguay