Week 029 - I Have Recently Mastered The Steak... You May Be Doing It Wrong

Hey Fam! 

This week has been nutz! "We have no food, we have no jobs, our pet’s heads are falling off!"

We started off this week fantastic with a zone conference, pretty much announcing to us from the president that we are the only mission with a siesta, so take it! Vamos! I was just commanded to take a nap! Vamos Santa Fe!

After 6 months, I have come to know what some missionaries may not learn until the end of their missions; that the Argentinians have this magic power where they can change subject through a conversation without you knowing. For example, Mr. Gaucho Man; he’s the worst of it, and he doesn’t have any real point to what he is saying. He’s the girl you wish you hadn’t started a conversation with at a party (SNL). I’ll be like "Dario, do you believe in God?" Dario: "Ha, there are millions of kilometers from the earth to the sun. And the sun will be over there in 5 hours, and there are people who don’t get the sun living in igloos. How can they survive in igloos?" Me: "Well maybe they adapted to their surroundings.” Dario: "Ha  there are people that can climb palm trees picking off coconuts as high as buildings. How could there be enough to go around?" Me: "Wait why aren’t there enough coconuts?" Dario: "Ha coconuts. They don’t need coconuts, they eat dogs and their own kind." Me:"Wait, are we still talking about people?" Dario: “Of course, they are all over Africa." Me: "Africa?" Dario: "Claro! It’s unjustified what happened." Me: "What happened?” Dario: "Do you know who ended slavery?" Me: "Abraham Lincoln?" Dario: "JOHN F KENNEDY." Me: "Oh, alright Dario." Dario: "But that Jorgito Bush, now that is a power family, father and grandfather were presidents!" Man… at least he gives us mandarins.

Check it… since I don’t see a dentist anymore, I thought it was appropriate to try out...The Floss. So I totally floss twice a day. Dr. Lan would be so pumped.

One of the worst things about the dogs here is that they go after all the trash, especially the baby diapers, way gross. But we also thought it should be appropriate to give it a name, Second Harvest. Lots of second harvests going around.

As for the investigators, this week we found a new guy named Mario. He’s totally Italian. We had a great moment where he was visiting with Mirta, and we had asked Mirta if we could come over, and he asked if he could stay to get to know us. He talked about the rough life he has had, and we promised blessings and happiness in the church; and he wants to learn. So this is super cool.

We had a funny lesson with Manuel, where he went off on how everyone can have guns in the US, and I have hundreds of guns. One of the perks of being a U.S. citizen I guess. He was just going off on all the racks of guns I have. But I was like, "I don’t even own a gun. Let alone many guns that would necessitate an entire gun rack!"

Hermano Pujol was telling me some crazy story he had the other day; he was pretty pumped to tell us the story. I guess he was on a bus that stopped, and the door wouldn’t open, and everyone was kind of in a struggle of what’s going on. So I guess he decides to go up to the bus driver and say, "Do you believe in Jesus Christ?" And the bus driver said, “Yeah.” And Pujol pointed at the door and said, "Then by the power of Jesus Christ open that door!" And it opened. I was like wow. And he just smiles, lifts up his head, closes his eyes and says, "Estos la fe yo tengo," shaking his head. Sweet Hermano.

I believe I have recently mastered the steak. Why? Because I talk to many people with asadors. I get the best tips from the best. And I will be willing to release my secrets. First you will go to the carneceria (bring money, it may be essential). You choose your steak; not too fatty or it will be too gross. If you choose without fat... YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Now you’ve got your steak, and you are going to eat it that day; not tomorrow or yesterday. Or… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Bring it home and put it on the table if you’re having it for lunch; in the fridge if for dinner. If you’ve put it in the freezer… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. You leave it out. Room temperature. If it’s too cold… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Now you cook, sprinkle some salt on it; nothing else. You will not need any kind of rub if you are doing this right, or else… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Now it is time for cooking; you are watching the sides, not the center, Ecoli can’t go to the center. If you are watching the center… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Now you should notice, once the sides are cooked that the steak is neither too red or without red, or else… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Now if you have black pepper you may sprinkle a bit. Take it off to the cutting table. Did you cut it?... YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. Let the juices settle. Now you can take your steak knife. Wait… did you just go for the steak sauce… YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. If you followed my instructions right, you won’t need anything. Now this only works if you’re getting some dang good Argentinian meat.

That’s it for today. You guys are awesome.

Love your girl’s camp stories and good times!​

Photo: The gauchito gill mobile...

Week 028 - The Path To Be Clean

Whoahoahao! You guys are just too awesome right now, I am too jealous. Girl’s camp. I’m usually jealous about it, and I’ll get over it, but Pokémon Go, that’s a whole other level of jealousy right there. I’ve been talking about the concept with my friends for like the past year, and now it sounds like it is exceeding expectations, by the fact people playing stop traffic and are running off cliffs to catch a Pikachu. It’s so funny because Elder Hill, who is right next to me, just got an email about this as well, and just ten minutes ago I heard, "NOOOO WAYYY! WE MISSED IT!" And then ten minutes later I get an email from you guys talking about the same thing. It’s revolutionary.

I just got an email, from The Matt Simmons. He said all the missionaries got fired in Russia over some kind of new anti-terrorist law, so they can’t proselyte anymore; except talking with the members. Crazy.

Galvez is great.

Mom said she wanted a good service story… so I’ve got one. This one comes from the man, DO-NA-TO! We were just talking about this in church about service and Caridad and the President asked Donato if he had any stories about service and how he felt. And Donato is like the story king; you just have to be a little patient because he´ll pull out the old "si, si muy bueno si Jesus Christo muy Bueno." But after he said that, he said that the other day he was making lunch when he saw Pablo (my body my body Pablo), who has some money issues and asked if he could eat with him for lunch. He said he liked that because he felt clean. I think that is totally on point. And that is the kind of knowledge we all need. The fact that being good people makes us clean. I think some people just think that Jesus Christ came to teach us how to be good-doers, which is not the fact; but he came to teach us how to be clean, and provided the path to be clean. So when we do service we are clean, and when we leave out service, we are not clean. Like it says in the Book of Mormon, we will be judged for our bad works and for our good works. So that’s our little lesson from Donato today.

Check this, thanks to Elder McKell (clutch king), right now we have a basketball hoop in the apartment. He has one of those door basketball hoops; pretty sick. Just got to hit a three pointer before I went out the door.

Also check this, I don’t think these things exist in the U.S. because there are too many idiots and they might fall and die but… there are these chocolate eggs you can buy for like 75 cents, and inside are cool little toys. So that’s the cool thing right now. And they are all Ice Age toys because I guess there is a new Ice Age movie. Who would of thought?

So I’ve been thinking of some ideas on how we can teach in these other towns that are around us. As I was lying in bed I recalled the words of Patrick Star when Bikini Bottom was trying to flee from the "Alaskan Bull Worm” (Sponge Bob Squarepants reference). And in the words of Patrick, he suggests, "Why don’t we take Bikini Bottom and push it somewhere else?"... And you can fill in what my great idea was.

We got to teach this guy Jorge last night. Actually we were trying to teach his whole family but they got a little sidetracked. We asked if we could start off with a prayer and they agreed. But it turned into me saying the prayer, and everyone else repeating what I was saying in a loud whisper voice, while also saying, "si si si senor, simpre sonor." But with so many people in the room, it just sound like a bunch of "pshpshpshpshpshshshshpsh." It was awesome. But this guy is a member of Principa de Paz (our rival church here in Galvez). Not really. But they are teaching a lot of anti-Mormon stuff, because our investigators that go to their church dipped out and never want to do anything more with us. Lame. All the young families go to that church because it’s a “fiesta."

We had a lame moment where we could not find Matias, which is totally weird because we talked to him that morning. He saw us in the street, but when we called him to see if he was in his house, he just hung up. So a little lame. But I bought a cake after so that was good. Hopefully he’s doing alright.

We had an awesome lesson with Mr. Gaucho man, who has been really having a rough time searching for faith. But when I asked him to pray at the end of the lesson, he did, and really said a prayer that totally touched my heart, at least as he asked god with sincerity to help him have faith. He doesn’t really understand faith, and we are helping him with that.

Everything is great here in Galvez.

Oh yeah, we had 19 people in the capilla this Sunday, it was awesome for reals, and they were all members. IT’S THE VISION!!

I love you guys! It’s great to hear from you!

Week 027 - I Am A Total Galvense Now

Thank you for that sermon of a lifetime! I’ve studied Elijah’s mission as well during my studies as a REAL MISSIONARY! But it’s very incredible gift given to us through temples.

Everyone here is pretty pumped; we are going to have a temple trip in the next few months so we are preparing everyone for that.

This week was fantastic, it was the end of the transfer, so Elder De La Rosa is now gone and I am still here in Galvez. Whaaaaat! I’m all about Galvez. I’m a total Galvense now. I got a new companion, Elder McKell, I don’t know if you remember but I had an Elder McKell in my district in the MTC. Guess what.... it’s the same one, pretty sick. Now we have three shankeys that came at the same time in Galvez! Cool. We had a really cool activity on Friday. We ate empanadas with the ward so it was really cool for me because I’m a fan of the empanadas. Apparently the branch president thought we were going to have 20 people and each would eat like 5. Turns out 12 came and everyone in the ward is way old and can eat at most two. So Mariel and Mirta made 120 empanadas for the missionaries this morning. There were so many on the table I felt really it was my missionary duty to eat them all. And me and Elder Hill both totally lost count at 15 empanadas. We finished one and we were like why not another. So... too many empanadas happened.

Pablo came too! Vamos! Pablo is Mr. "my body my body my body". He’s totally wack, but was chowing down the empanadas too. But guess what happens when you eat too many empanadas... It ends up like the locro all over again where you are the never-ending joke. But the thing is, I think Elder Hill ate more than me and I was the only one getting all sorts crap. It’s pretty funny though; good times!

Teaching this week was awesome. We found an old investigator from years ago and taught this mom and her family and she’s totally cool and down on reading, and it totally makes sense to her about authority and all that... Sick.

We made our way to Augustine, the son of Gregoria and had a cool talk with him. We kind of disrupted his "Build City” time. I guess it’s a video game where you build cities. His city is Galvez city. How clever.

Mirta invited us over because she had a class to teach on Sunday. So she wanted help. She was very nervous but it was very good. She talks a little too much though.

We finally found Matias after a while, and he had been reading the Book of Mormon and totally has been praying about the word of wisdom. Champ. And he has pretty much committed himself because he wants to "change his life." Really copado. And he and his friend are going to come to church this week. He wants to be baptized on the 6th of August.

I was watching this dog in front of the church the other day and it was really funny because he always sits in front of the carneceria for them to give him some meat, and they do. Then he takes it to his spot in front of the church. Then he places it down and just chills with meat in front of him. Then this other dog came and peed on a tree close by. So the meat dog went to go smell the tree and while the meat dog was smelling the other dog totally stole the meat. Oldest trick in the book. What was so great is that it happened a second time, like 15 min later, when the dog went to the carneceria again! And it was just like 15 min earlier. Dog pees, he sniffs, meat gets stolen.  Poor dog. But you got to learn sometime.

Saturday was the independence day of Argentina. It was totally crazy because it’s Independence Day. Everyone was going around booking it on horses and motorcycles with huge jugs of booze. They were really hyped.

I’m happy you guys are doing awesome. I’m loving the mission, the work is great. And you guys are the best.

Pics: A little with the old companero and a little with the new. And empanadas and Santa Fe

Week 026 - A Crazy Amount Of Contacting This Week

Super cool Times guys. Crazy travel times. Lame to spend 4th of July on the road, but que va hacer.

I don’t know mom, but i think I’m with Claire on this one… all trees are the same! Na... super big trees are super cool. I think the last time i went to Sequoia was when I was 12. 

You guys are awesome and I’m super jealous of your cool summer times.

But get prepared to check out my week… I got to start off this week with some divisions with the other missionaries over on the other side of Galvez. So elder Stoodly was my companion for a day; the CIA kid from Canada. It is funny because I always forget that he´s from Canada, so we have those awkward moments where I act like America is so great, and I’m like, "isn’t America so great" and he’s like, "I’m from Canada" and then the Argentinian guy is like, "yah, the 51st state."... it’s great!

We had a great lesson with a man named Mauro, who we went to four times that day because he said come at 8, then at 10, then at 4, then at 8 at night. We did finally get to teach him and he’s awesome. He really wants to learn stuff, and asked a lot of questions. This is totally great.

Later we had some visiting time with Donato; what a stud, like usual. He made us some pizza, but for some reason he didn’t know how to turn on his stove. So elder Stoodly went to go help. But with the stoves here you need a match to start the flame on the gas, so he went to burn a newspaper in the fire, and put it in the oven. The fire wouldn’t start, so he just threw the whole newspaper in and said, "Estamos." So now there’s a huge newspaper flame going on in his stove. Turns out he was turning the wrong gas knob and that’s why the flame couldn’t catch the gas. But he again does the same thing with a huge piece of newspaper, but once it caught flame with the gas in the oven, the whole newspaper went into flames and he threw it on Donato’s floor. So now there’s a huge flame on Donato’s floor, and Donato said "estamos" (there we are), and casually everyone sat down and we cooked some pizza. Even though there were ashes on the floor. I thought it was pretty funny.

I don’t know if I’ve talked about Norma before, but she is a lady we´ve been teaching lately. Actually she was taught by some elders a long time ago, but it’s so funny when you read all the registers because everyone says she’s crazy. I’ve talked to this lady plenty of times, and know the difference between crazy and a little weird. She’s a little weird, but she has a job, and understands, and lives fine. Actually she’s awesome. She just agreed on a date for baptism, so this is great, and she almost came to church, but check this… When we went to get her, to walk with her to church, she came to the door and told us to wait so she could get ready. We are waiting outside when the neighbor from across the street, who is always watching every time we come, starts yelling at us to not bother her because she’s mental and sick in the head. We told him that she wants to come to church, and we are waiting to walk with her. The neighbor calls the son of Norma and tells him that we’ve been bothering her for years (uhh... I’ve only been here for 5 months), but the son couldn’t come, so she calls the police and they come, and we have to explain to them everything, and Norma ended up not coming to church. How lame is that? We called Norma after, and she’s going to come next week though, sweet!!

Man, we´ve done some crazy amount of contacting this week because we are trying to look for a bunch of new investigators, but I swear we knocked at every old catholic guy in town that closes the door by the time you finish… Como Esta? What they don’t know is that I’ll be back next week.

We found this other lady, Sonia. She’s super awesome and has a ton of stories and experiences with her faith. Her husband doesn’t want to participate much, but she wants to learn. And she believes the Book of Mormon is true, which is awesome. And she’s going to keep reading. What a capo.

Oh, another super capo, Zuly.  This lady is an atheist, but she’s read every religious book you can think of other than the book of Mormon. She’s even read this book that the Nazis read; that Hitler wrote about how he was going to take over the world. Well that one fell through. But she’s got tons of questions about the book of Mormon. Actually, I totally talked about this lady last week, but yeah, apparently Hitler wrote a book; I saw this book in the bookstore that talks about all of Hitler’s life in Argentina after the war. Muy interesante gaucho man would say!

We got a new dog that follows us around named Poncha. She’s a girl, so it’s Poncha. We never see both our dogs at the same time, but we are working on it, because Poncho and Poncha would be a sick couple.

Oh, today was awesome. America celebrated Manuel’s birthday, at least that’s what he said. And they even made a movie for him. But we got to go to Santa Fe for the mission birthday. Vamos. It’s been 1 year since the Santa Fe mission opened. So we had a copado conferencia. Bueno discurso. We ate food, and other cool stuff. But it was a little crazy because it’s also the 4th of July, and the American shankeys were getting almost a little too crazy. Que va hacer, it's Amercia. But it was kind of funny when you are in a room with half Latinos, and a bunch of Americans are yelling USA USA USA USA. It’s a great country to be joyful about. Anyway, good day. Now I’m here at the cyber.

Love America! Love you guys, you’re fantastic!

Poncha and one of the best things about argentina is giant chicken nuggets ( the new new alfajor)

 

That note I forget to send last time from Manuel. Campo.

Gauchito Hill