Letter Dated January 30, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like a pretty good week for you guys in Texas.  Sounds like a lot of fun up there, ha ha.

Cool to hear that Drewbee is going on his mission in four months to Italy.  A lot of guys are going over there right now.  I think that makes 3 in Italy, ha ha.

So we had a pretty good little week in the little town over here.  First off, we had interviews with the President on Tuesday.  Which are always good.  We went to Santa Rosa for the interviews in the morning, and we ended up spending most of the day there.  President got there and we had an hour and a half chat as a Zone with the President where he explained some things and taught us.  It was really good. Then we all got like 5 minutes with the President.  So it was pretty cool.

We also cleaned a water tank.  I think I sent home pictures of them.  They are big tanks above the house, they are full of water.  Well we cleaned one out.  And it was disgusting.  It took us like 3 hours to clean....and I'm still not convinced its clean enough.

So lets see, the things that happened with people this week.  Well a hermano in the ward.  Hermano Abromavich.  He is Elders Quorum President, and active right, but we were on our way to a cita with someone, and he stopped us in the street and told us his 10 year old daughter isn't baptized and he wants to baptize her..... ha ha, me and my companion were in shock cause we thought she was baptized since they have been going to church since my companion Elder Stutz got here.  So he then went to Buenos Aries for a week. So the 5th of February we get to start teaching her.  Kind of a surprise, but cool as well.  It will help us to connect with the family really well.

Then we have Yessid.  We taught him a few times this week.  Some really good things happened with him.  First we had a lesson Thursday.  And we focused on church since he hasn't gone yet.  And at the end of the lesson we had him give the closing prayer (which up to this point he wouldn't do). He asked God if he needed to go to church.  We all felt the spirit.  After the prayer I asked him if he would go to church with us, and he said yes.  So Sunday, he and his wife went to church.  We were pretty excited about that.  Church went alright.  I gave a talk.  Pretty decent.  They have problems with the Word of Wisdom (they like coffee) and tithing.  But we are still working with them.  We just put our confidence in the fact that every question they have they can talk to God about to find out if its right.

We also were put in charge of the Ward Family night on Friday.  So we prepared a lesson using 1 Nephi 17 when Nephi builds the boat and some of the things that happen, and then for the kids we made paper boats.  So that was cool.

We also found 2 reallllly good investigators yesterday.  Gustavo and Alberto Sosa.  They are great.  They are friends, Gustavo 23 and Alberto 71, they hang out everyday.  So here is the thing.  Gustavo just started changing his life, he stopped drinking and smoking pot.  So that great.  But he still wants to stop smoking cigarettes.  Oh just so you know, we found him and he was wearing a Jesus shirt, or a shirt with a Jesus picture.  Which I thought was interesting.  When we taught them, they both liked it.  Said that they were going to read and pray and go to church and get baptized.  So yea.  What else can I say. They seem golden.  We talk to them again Tuesday.  But I wont be there.  We have divisions this week and I go to a city called  General Pico up north I think.

So that's pretty much the success we had.  Pretty good week if you ask me.  I liked it.

Anyway we will keep working over here. You guys can just keep working over there and its all good.

Today we visited the only tourist attraction here in Castex.  They have a dinosaur park!!  Yea.  It's actually kinda cool.  I guess.  I was expecting a bit more.  But  I'll send the pictures sometime.  I have millions of pictures still to send of Quequen.  The ones you got this time are of Jaun and his sister Rosio, Jaun is getting ready for the mission he went out with us sometimes.  Then just pictures from the streets of Quequen, I got plenty more coming in a few weeks.  The internet is just slow here, so, yea.

Anyway enjoy your week.

Love ya

Elder Obray

Letter Dated January 23, 2012

Dear Mom & Dad;

Thanks for your email.  Sounds like you guys had a interesting week.

well I had an email being sent....but it died....so I'll have to explain things faster.  Sorry.

I am sorry that so much stuff happened at the house, makes life a bit harder, maybe more exciting, ha ha, but harder.  Hope you like Texas.

Ok so, Castex is super Catholic.  Which would be my 1st area of super Catholics.  There are other churches here, but the Catholics are strong.  Kinda interesting.  Castex is like half the size of Quequen.

My Companion is great. He speaks Spanish pretty well.  Lacks a bit, but he is still pretty new.  And he has a desire to work so that's good.

We did have some success this week.  I'm just going to tell about one guy.  Yessib, he has read a lot of the Book of Mormon and says he is praying, but he still wont do a pray with us, or attend church.  But we got a baptism date with him.  We hope he decides to go through with it.  He is studing and such. And he has a desire to know.  He just has to do a bit more.

Most of the rest of the investigators are in the same spot. We found a few more new ones and just taught Lesson 1 a ton.

We did tons of contacts though, ha ha.  It's fun to watch the people try to avoid us.  But there is no escape from two young missionaries.  What can they do, but listen right?  Right,

So yea I'm sorry that I can't write a ton.  I don't know what happened to the other email.

So Mykal Thompson wrote me.   HUGE surprise.  I thought about writing to him, but I didn't think he would reply.

I am Glad Paige is finally getting married.  I expected to hear that like months ago. So that's really good for her.

Yea just tell me when Tyler and Bracken leave and where they are going.

We have some super great members here who are helping us out a ton.  It's great to get some help.

Right now in the mission we are focusing on finding 2 new investigators everyday.  So we are trying really hard. We only got 7 last week. This week we will get the 14.

Anyway.  I'll write more next week (I feel like i say that a lot).

Love ya

Elder Obray

Letter dated January 16, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Glad your week went pretty well.

My week was pretty crazy with a new area and everything. But it was good as well.

For the house I'm in, I don't have a number but its on the corner of the streets Martin Guemes and  Estansil Zeballos so you should be able to narrow it down a lot, ha ha. Our house is actually a house its not a small apartment.  Probably the nicest mission house I've seen. The only thing it really lacks is drinking water, the water here kills people....so we buy water .

I sent some pictures of QueQuen.

Okay, so here are some more pictures. Next email I will write more. I just finished writing the President.

Ok so  the last pictures were more of Quequen, and then we found some knight armor in the church that was cool.

Then some  more of Quequen, me and my kid, then Martin and Noelia Garcia (we ate lunch every Thursday with them) and then Geramias,  A really good kid we would spend some time on P-day with him every once in a  while.  Oh and Adriana and Carlos and their family is a picture as well.          

So in Castex I was hoping to get here and have some way good investigators. And well we didn't have a lot. A   few people to pass by, but we didn't have a ton of luck.

We have Neli, who is someone we found. She has like 70 years. Really nice, but really Catholic, ha ha.  We had 3 Charles with her this last week. And she reads the Book of Mormon, but she is really stuck in the whole I'm  catholic, I don't go to church, and maybe I've done a few bad things in my life, but I'm saved anyway.  So we taught lesson 1, importance of the Book of  Mormon, and Lesson 2.  She reads the Book of Mormon a lot. She likes it.  We invited her to go to church but she couldn't cause  her family was coming to visit her.   But she said she wanted to go.  Which was impressive.  So we will see what happens.

We also found a guy Anabal Raul Garcia. He was really humble.  He can't really walk though. Which is a problem with the whole going to church situation. So yea.

Then Yessib.  He is from Colombia.  He has read the 1st 11 chapters of the Book of Mormon.  Which is good right.  He does have a problem with the whole Nephi killing Laban thing.  But we talked about what is really important, if the book is true or not.  So we talked about how he could know.  I think it went over pretty well. Guess we will see.

And then Enrique.  He cant hear to well.  And he wont take a baptismal date yet. He is a bit difficult. But he said    he would pray about whether he needs to get baptized or not.

Those are the main people we are teaching right now.

We went out with a member, Domingo. The guy is Great. He introduced us as we were walking to citas to people he knows. We  probably got like 4 citas with other people for this week cause of him. Was  perfect.   

We actually have a barrio here, but they meet in a house. They need 60 activos to have their own building.  And we have 34.  They have a great goal of 60 activos by the end of the year.  So we hope that works out.

Ok. So that's what going on. Oh and the Siesta. Or Argentine sleep time from 2 to 5 is terrible here.  EVERYONE sleeps... ha ha, but us. 
 
So we are the only Missionaries here. Our District is in General Pico. A bit North. There are 4 elders there and that's a 6 man district
 
Glad to hear David Titus will probably go back out. That will be good. I'll just hope it's to this mission.  But who knows if he came out here if I would see him now.  It's probable I'll only get 1 more area.

Anyway, I'm  doing good. Its just boiling lava hot that's all.  The people here are pretty good. Oh and yea  they do have  a  giant coo coo bird thing.  But I don't know if it works.

 Have a  good week. 

Love Elder Obray

Letter Dated January 10, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well I'm sorry I didn't write yesterday.  You see, we didn't have any electricity.  It's kind of hard to write an email without electricity. So I am writing a bit to tell you whats been going on.

        1st. We had transfers and I got kicked out of  Quequen. 

        2nd. So I am actually writing you from a different place.

I'm  in a placed called Castex (I think the map will say Eduado Castex, and I don't know how to spell it.)  its in the Pampa.  Like and hour north of the big city Santa Rosa.  It's a small little town of like 10,000 people.  But it's a really nice city.

No I don't yet  know where my house is.  I'll try and  remember next time.

So I have a lot of pictures of Quequen to send home, unfortunately I don't have a lot of time to write you today.

My companion named is Elder Stutz from South Jordan, Utah.  He has 2 transfers.  And Elder Flamm (who was in my district in the MTC) trained him.  And I just replaced Elder Flamm here.  He doesn't speak much Spanish so should be fun.

These last pictures were things that happened just right after we found out I was leaving.  We started to say good bye to people and clean up the house and pack and such.

So yea, that's pretty much what happened Friday through Monday with transfers.

I was on a bus to get to Castex for like 16 hours.  Ugh.

Elder Arriaga has a new companion named Elder Retana from Costa Rica.

So in these pictures you got a bird we found.  Poor guy couldn't fly.  Then Maria Rosa and her Parents Estela and Florentino.

Then some calles.  Picture 6326; in the middle is the house of flia Marteinez.  They weren't home to    get a picture of them.

Then some streets.  Then the house of Flia Fernandez.  Some menos activos.  We never activated them, but someday they will go, ha ha.

These pictures you can see flia Fernandez and their kid, Marcos, in the wheelchair.  Good family.

Then I got some pictures of Quequen so you can see it a bit.

Oh and its boiling lava hot in the Pom pa.  Monday I just about died of heat, ha ha.

Ok, well this is the last that you will get this time.  Enjoy I'll write more next time.  

Love ya.

Elder Obray