Week 30: Posadas, Argentina

Haha! Argentina has climates that are realllly different. There's a place called Formosa that's like 115 degrees in the summer and then in Tierra del Fuego in the south it's like always snowing!. But this week did cool down a lot. I was using a sweater yesterday because it got pretty chilly. It's because it rained Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday a little bit Thursday. So the weather really cooled down but I think it's heating up again and  my companion and I got sick (haha) from the weather change but we are almost better now. 

I'm sad I'm missing March Madness but it's all good. How's Jabaari Parker doing?  And that's good Nathan's soccer team is doing well, but not so great that there are kids vandalizing the church.... haha. The church here is pretty locked up with a huge gate around the whole thing, but all the houses are like that, huge gates around the house with big metal locks because it gets pretty dangerous I think, and the church is a pretty nice church compared to everything else.

I've learned to always have a talk prepared for sacrament meeting in Paraguay when I spoke for 20 minutes on the spot which was interesting but I now know that it is important.. But our investigator is doing well; I'm thinking he's going to make it. He just has a lot of problems with his work always calling him in and stuff. And the ward is doing well, they cook pretty well and wash our clothes but not too many references haha. at lunch we say...... hmmmm wow I heard there was someone that lived around here that was really cool that went to church and almost got baptized or that is really cool and is looking for a church (not knowing that there is someone like that..) and they are usually like.. hmmm oooooohhhh yeah there's that one guy over there, oh there is that one lady down the street haha its pretty funnny when we ask them if they know anyone we can teach and they say no but when we do the other thing they are like ohhh yeaaaaaaaa.

But yeah we received the transfers this morning, Elder Ake is going to Encarnacion to whitewash as a zone leader which is like impossible haha; he and his companion are going to be new to the area; I think in the states they call it shotgunning, but should be fun for him.  I met my new companion before, Elder Arenas from Peru who has about 6 months in the mission so we are both super new but should be fun. I think he's a convert of about a year and a half as well so it will be a interesting experience but should be fun. But thanks for everything!!! I want to go look and buy a little whiteboard and start drawing stuff during lessons for the people because the people here really like nice visuals.

Love and miss everyone!! Have a good week!!!!!

Elder Ben Roberts

Week 29: Posadas

The stake conference we had this past weekend was kinda of focused on hastening the work, President La Pierre and his wife spoke and it was pretty good. We also had a S eventy come to our mission to talk with us and that was also super cool. I learned a lot, its pretty crazy how much they know and how much spiritual capacity they have. But that is awesome Fransisco is leaving for a mission, and that there are some other people in the stake going.  I think by the end of the month the Posadas Stake will have had like 25 baptisms this year so far, maybe more, im not really sure because there are more than one zone here, but our zone has baptized i think 14 since january first. But its a lot less than they expect.. so i think we have a lot of work to do. There is a lot of member support in the food and washing clothes and helping the recent converts get invovled in the ward but not so much finding people to become recent converts..... but its all good hopefully it will improve, and hopefully we will hear even more about hastening the work in general conference haha.  And yeah we have explored every part of our area, obviously not talked to everyone by a longshot but we do see a lot of the people that we taught in the past.  And the work here is going pretty well, there are transfers next week and im prettty sure my companion is going to leave.  But we get along really well. We are teaching a couple of cool people, one that might make it and get baptized in between sessions of general conference which would be really cool, but we shall see. Thanks for the update and hopefully everything is well back home!!!!! love and miss everyone,

ben

Ben was happy to see the air conditioner.

Some of the ward members, and some missionaries.

Missionaries in and around Posadas.

Four missionaries and four new young men that received the priesthood at Stake Conference.  (and the Stake President?)

A member of the Quorum of the 70.

Hopefully he is sharing these tacos.

Now that is a dirt road!

Week 28: Posadas, Argentina

Hi.

Hmmm that's interesting about the elders not being able to find too many people. We are kinda having that problem because our area is super small, and I'm already getting tired of it and passing by the same houses that I've already contacted or seeing people in the street that know me by name haha because we have taught them before.  Presidente LaPierre went to a confernce with Elder Ballard and came back and told us we should be talking to 10 people every missionary, so 20 every companionship every day outside of actually contacting houses and our set appointments. So in the street, on the bus, in stores and stuff like that. And it's kinda working we are getting some people to teach and getting references from other areas. And when we contact a lot and get references from other areas the other missionaries start to trust us more and they start contacting more as well because they are seeing that we are having success so that's cool. 

One elder in my district got a envolope, like a flat rate envelope from the post office that was like 25 bucks and it was kinda relatively big. But thanks!!!!! I'm not sure if I can keep receiving boxes because I think they are expensive to take out. I haven't heard anything but I'm not sure if will be able to keep receiving them. But thanks for everything!!!!!! Are the kids getting excited for summer?? How is dad doing the bishop calling??  Do you have any vaction plans for summer?? 

thanks for everything!!!!!!

Love, Ben 

Week 27: Posadas, Argentina

Hola, Everyone!


And the week was pretty good, we had a baptism and it was pretty nice, our person that was going to preside and the person that was going to give a talk cancelled like 10 minutes before but that's Argentina for ya. But it went pretty well.  The girl,Graciela, was pretty happy. 
And more snow?? woooo that should be fun. But it actually hasn't rained all that much, it's been pretty surprising. Like it rained a lot at night while we have been sleeping and during church, during meetings. But it's been nice.
Hey i actually got the package from Grandam  the office elder had to go home because he got sick and a new one came in and didn't really know what to do so I had to wait a little while. But tell grandmom thank you very much and I enjoyed the chocolate and the music is really really good. I really liked the cds she sent. 
And our invesitgators.... haha not so great, they all bascially just fell away cause they weren't doing anything. We have one girl that is a partial member family but the mom is the only one that isn't a member and she doesn't want to give us permission to baptize her daughter.... but the daughter wants to get baptized... but I'll just say that we will be doing a lot of contacting this week haha. But it's fine; itshould be fun to go look for new people. Our area isn't very big but there are some places we haven't explored too well yet.  
But thanks for everything!!!! love and miss you!! bye!!