Letter Dated July 30, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well, just so you know, somehow they didn't cut our light.  The Lord blessed us, ha ha, fortunately that actually wouldn't affect heating.  Since its 100% gas heating, no electricity necessary. 

That's cool you got to watch the Olympics, I must admit I was slightly disappointed to learn that we can't watch the Olympics.  They really aren't very big in Argentina.  They didn't even send a soccer team to play :(.   I think the biggest thing for them and the Olympics would actually be Basketball.  I guess they play pretty good.

It would be pretty interesting to be a missionary in the states right now with Mitt Romney running.  I bet that it really helps them to find people to teach, ha ha.

We had a pretty good week in Argentina.

Monday, we found 2 new investigators, Irma and Ruben.  They are really good, just hard to find in their house.  But they said when we passed by later that they had read and wanted to talk.  We get to pass by them again tonight.

Tuesday, we found another new investigator.  Liliana, well really she found us.  She like yelled at us from across the street.  So of course we went and talked to her, ha ha, honestly I thought she was realllllllly weird at 1st.  But after talking to her, she is a pretty good person.  And on Sunday she went to church. Hurray!

Wednesday, we talked to Juana who was the really good reference.  She is doing good, but wont be able to go to church this week.  NOOOO.  Next week for sure.  She actually wants to get baptized and everything.  So we are pretty excited for her.  Then we found 3 new investigators, Maurio, Fredriko and Gonzalo.  They are younger guys, 28,20, 23.  But they were actually smart, and interested, with some good questions.  And they live right across the street from the church.  They didn't go however, ha ha.  But we only could talk to them 1 time this week.  They apparently were awfully busy, since they were never home.

Thursday, we talked to Liliana again. Teaching the plan of salvation.  Went super well.

Friday, we visited Oscar, our recent convert.  He is doing super well.  Then we talked to Juana again, then we had a District activity.  Which went super well.  Lots of people went.  Even a few people I don't really know to well.  So that was great we were a bit excited.

Saturday, we invited LOTS to church, of course.  Liliana, Juan (who said he was going to go this week with a friend, but they never came, and he never answered his phone), then Fernando.  Fernando said he would go with us to church this week.  We just have to go get him.

Sunday, well Sunday, early we went looking for our investigators.  Fernando was actually waiting for us!  We were very surprised since we have been trying for over 2 months to bring him to church.  He finally went.  We were excited.  So our 1st class in church for 5th Sunday, was, uhh, interesting.  A hermana gave a how to do genealogy work lesson.  It honestly didn't go to well for Fernando, he was pretty confused....well just cause she was talking to an experienced audience, and Fernando was noooooot experienced.  She went into some, uh, deep doctrine that we don't usually talk about... O well.  Fortunately I think Fernando kinda just forgot the 1st class.  But just so you know.  One of the missionaries nightmares is when classes and talks are to difficult and don't explain any of the simple doctrine.  For the 2nd class Liliana came which was great.  The rest of church went well.   After church lets see, we talked to Owaldo.  He had 3 fiends over.  So the lesson got really interesting really fast. But we gave out 2 Book of Mormons.  And they said they would read.  So it went alright. 

Well that's more or less what happened during the week.  Minus a lot of details.  So yea.

Anyway this week we are just going to keep working good.  We have transfers this week.  President better not send me to another area, we got some good stuff coming up here in Tres Arroyos and I kinda wanna be here for it.  I think we should have like 5 baptisms in August.  So lets pray it happens.  We really have enough people who are ready to listen and get baptized.

So Guillermo wasn't home all week. we don't know what happened to him.  He just disappeared... Which was pretty sad.

Oh hey, I have two questions.  What happened to the legos and the Nintendos?  Well I guess that's one question.  But it has two answers.  I am kinda worried about those ones.

I don't think I have much else.  I'm going to try and send a photo or two.

Have a good week.

Love,
Elder Obray. 

I can't wait for summer!  WOOOT!   Warm weather and less darkness.  Way better work conditions.  Ha ha.

Letter Dated July 23, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well I'm glad you all had a pretty good little week. Sounds like things in Tennessee are pretty good. 

We don't all go to Bahia, just he went, but we still have to get up and take him to the terminal so he is not alone. but on the bus he is by himself, then he gets met by the Elders in Bahia when he arrives.

If someone new comes to church we for sure know.  The branch only has from 40 to 50 people usually, and at this point I know who they all are.  So that makes things pretty easy.

Sometimes we are the first, I would say, if they are investigators we know, then yes.  If they are a surprise no, probably a member talks to them first.  Sometimes we get to church right when it starts, cause in the mornings we go out and look for investigators to bring them to church.  So if someone we don't know shows up at 9:20 for church a member will talk to them first but we always talk to a face we don't recognize.

Well it's good news the house in Idaho Falls will be sold, it will be good for you guys to have a house, ha ha.  And I think you better give me your cell phone just in case, I don't have it noted, and I don't remember if the mission has it. Just in case. But whew it will be expensive to get a call from Argentina to a cell phone I would think.

OK, well. this week was a pretty interesting week.  We had pretty decent amount of success.

I'm just going to tell you the big things that  happened.

On Tuesday, we found a less active family that has 2 little girls, ages 11 and 9 that could get baptized if they go to church.  That was good, I tell ya what that day, we didn't have ANYTHING good happen till 8 at night when we found them, ha ha.

Wednesday, we found a guy named Oswaldo.  He almost got baptized 10 years ago, but was living with a girl so it didn't happen.  Well he is alone now, so he could get baptized.  We are helping him to get started reading the Book of Mormon again and such.  We also, ha ha, reference for a lady, so we passed by and she is super nice, and a good person.  Listened really attentively and wants to go to church and everything.  She couldn't go this Sunday, but we hope this next Sunday she will go.

Thursday, we didn't have much honestly other then some problems with our lighting bill, its kinda a hassle paying bills, eh?

Friday. I had a nasty little cold, but we had a lot of things to do, so we worked.  We had 8 lessons this day, in comparison to the 3 or 2 we usually have every day, ha ha.  Which was good for me, I don't like walking when I'm sick.  Hopefully I didn't spread it to much, ha ha.  Actually you couldn't really tell I was sick.  I bought some drugs to clear up the symptoms.  It worked pretty well.  Anyway, we passed by Graciela, an investigator I talked about a while back.  She had been reading from the Book of Mormon, but still says she just can't go around getting baptized and changing churches all the time (shes been baptized in like 4 churches), ha ha.  But we are trying to convince her its worth it.  We passed by Oscar our recent convert, Juana again, Guillermo, Fernando (he still doesn't go to church. Hmmm, we are still trying to come up with a way to help him go) and we passed by a few more families.

Saturday, we passed by Oswaldo to invite him to church.  He didn't go this week.  Next we he will.  I was still sick. Then we passed by Juan.  For Juan we worked it out with a member to pick him up for church.  Not sure if that was good or not since the members went by, and he didn't answer or something (maybe knocked the wrong door who knows) cause Juan said he was waiting. And I guess I wrote his phone number wrong, cause I tried to call it but it was a dead number,  He corrected it Sunday when we passed by.  So that was a bit frustrating.  He almost went to church.  I think I talked about him last week.  He is great, and I have really high hopes of baptizing him in a few more weeks.

Sunday. well we went out early in the cold and we got Guillermo to go to church with us, Hurray. So we had 1 investigator in church. that was good.  We were pretty satisfied.  I'm not sure Guillermo really enjoyed church, it was hard to tell.  He said he did, but he would say he liked something just so you don't feel bad.  I guess we will know if he goes next week.  I'm just not convinced he enjoyed it.  He didn't really say much.  After church, we met a less active member.  He doesn't go to church, cause, uhh... ,he is a paintball addict... ha ha.  I thought it was kinda funny.  He travels and paintballs with his friends every weekend.  Poor guy.  He spends alottttt of money on it since they have to import it all from the States.  I think he paid like 500$ on his gun...which is a lot of money in Argentina.... O well.  He hadn't gone to church in like 10 years,  He lost his Book of Mormon so we gave him a new one, he said he would read it.  I hope he does, ha ha.

Today, well it might be the last day we have light in our house.  The office is sending us money to pay for it.  It was suppose to get to my bank account today, but as of right now it hasn't, and they cut lights tonight... o well.  We all have flashlight, ha ha.  I for sure should have it tomorrow.

Alright, well there you have the week., Pretty interesting. ,We hope things keep going pretty good., We have 3 or 4 people that should get baptized in August.  So we really hope to have some pretty good success here in a bit.

Oh and with Josefina, well we couldn't really talk to her this week,  She was ALWAYS busy, there were always people in her house and lots....and they didn't really want to talk to us.  But she did tell us she could probably go to church in a bit.

Oh hey, and keep me updated on Tyler, it will be fun to hear where he could go now.  He probably wont go to the same mission if I understand things correctly.  But hey, who knows.  He could come down to Argentina right? Ha ha.

Anyway keep enjoying the heat from Tennessee.  Sound like lots of fun exploring the mountains down there.

Do you get to feed the missionaries lots there?  I would think since its a companionship for your ward you could feed the missionaries a lot.  I know the Elders like to eat, the Sisters I don't know, there really aren't many sisters in Argentina.  Or at least I haven't been in a city with sisters since Mar Del Plata when I started.

Have a good  week.

Love ya

Elder Obray

Letter Dated July 16, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well I'm glad you guys made it to Tennessee safely.  Sounds like a SUPER long drive, ha ha.  And sounds awfully boring.  I think you guys might be in the same time zone as me?  But off because Argentina doesn't do daylight saving.  They used to, but only half the country obeyed it, so they stopped.  It caused problems if only half the people do it, ha ha.

Well I guess I can give the secretary your new address, I guess it just depends on if you think its probable that you will move again before I get home, that and I guess a phone number that I could give would be the best, when you have one.

Lauralee is funny,  We will see what happens, at one point I'm sure we will visit them.  Kinda just depends on school and such.

I sent some photos of the baptism.  We had to heat water from a gas heater, since our font was broken.  So I have a picture of us heating some water, then Oscars baptism and a few of Elder and I.

Well sounds like you have a fun little ward.  But that's great they have 2 now.  That's kinda fun.  It's a lot like Tres Arroyos then.  Since we have 2 branches.  I hope you have a few more members, ha ha,  We have like 40 in ours and another 60 in the other.  You should have some good chances to share the gospel there.  Too bad they aren't Elders, if I got home and don't go to school I would want to go work with them.  Oddly, I can't really go out to much with the sister missionaries. ha ha.

We actually had a pretty good week here in Tres Arroyos.

Lunes, we taught Fernando a lesson.   We reaaaallly are trying to get him to go to church.  This week he works Sunday, so it wasn't very likely he would go and well he didn't, ha ha.

Martes, the Zone leaders came and worked with us.  I was with Elder Clegg from Jerome Idaho. He is a super awesome missionary. Probably one of the nicest missionaries I have ever met.  Anyway I enjoyed working with him a lot.  We found 2 new investigators.  Monica and Roberto.  They are nice and liked the message and read and prayed, BUT, Monica is a nurse and works 3 of the 4 Sundays every month.  So its going to be difficult.  But we are for sure going to keep working.  I also almost got eaten by a 200 pound Rottweiler. Here they have gates around all the houses, so we sometimes don't enter the gate to knock the door, we clap (weird, but its normal here).  So we clapped this one, and well I thought the gate was closed. well really it wasn't closed.  But the huge dog ran into the gate.  Wham, then the gate, uhhh, opened a bit.  Well I didn't want to die from this dog, so I closed the gate on his nose and he almost bit my hand off, fortunately the owner then came outside, ha ha.  So good news.  I'm still in one piece.

Meircoles, we found 2 newbies as well, Josefina and Fernanda.  Well Josefina is an old investigator.  They had been trying to pass by for weeks, but was never home.  But we found her.  Fernanda is her sister.  Fernanda almost got baptized like 10 years ago, but didn't for a reasons not known.  She didn't tell us.  So we are going to try again. ha ha.  Josefina really likes the Book of Mormon,  BUT can't go to church cause she was a drug addict and as of right now cant leave her house....:( we will see, I think we can get permission for her to go to church, but I'm not sure.

Jueves, well Elder Pino went to Bahia at 4 in the morning and we had to take him.  That was, uhhh, fun, ha ha.  Four grumpy missionaries, ha ha.  Then we did weekly planning, that night we passed by Fernando and Flia Montenegro.

Friday, we had Zone conference with President Perreno.  They have an interesting accent.  A nice lisp in there voice.  But they are super good.  He was one of the 1st converts in Spain.  When he got baptized there were 2 members in his branch.  So that was cool,  He watched the church grow in Spain.  Good guy.  We had a small conference and then interviews with him.  His wife spoke a lot, she likes to talk, and is a super missionary, Apparently she always worked with the missionaries and gave some really good tips in things we could do to improve.  So we took good notes, ha ha.

Saturday, we passed by Guillermo and Jose. They are doing good.  We committed them to go to church, and such.

Domingo, well we had 2 investigators at church.  Not people we were expecting.  We went and knocked the door of investigators super early in the morning.  It was suuuuupppper cold.  But we didn't have alot of success.  Cause none of them went, including Guillermo and Jose. :( .  But Thomas, a 8 year old kid, went with Flia Gomez, and a guy from Buenos Aires went with Flia Telosa.  He was on vacation.  After church, we passed by Monica, Guillermo, and found a newbie named Juan.  Good kid, he is friend of members, and went to church, but never got baptized.  His reason is that he wants a better testimony before he gets baptized.  So we are going to start to help him and get him going to church again.  Then we went and gave the Sacrament to a family that can't go to church.  Well really it is an older couple.  The father is really sick, he can't stand, has like equilibrium disease or something like that.  But it was cool to give them the sacrament, especially because they were super grateful.

That's pretty much our week.  We had a pretty good amount of success.  We really have lots to do.  Just need more to go to church.  We hope to have lots more success this week.

Oscar is now living with the District President. He is doing good out there. Its far away since the president lives on like a ranch.

Anyway, hope thing keep going well for you and that it rains less, ha ha.  Enjoy your week. 

Love ya,

Elder Obray

Letter Dated July 9, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like you guys are already in Tennessee, ha ha.  Sounds pretty exciting.  I hope the traveling goes well.  Should be fun to hear from you guys from Tennessee.  I Guess I can tell people I'm from Tennessee now?  Since I wont go home to Idaho anymore, ha ha.

We haven't met the new mission President yet.  But we have Zone conference on Friday.  So we will meet him here in a little bit.  So that should be pretty exciting.

The pictures you sent from Sam were pretty nifty, ha ha.

And no pictures this week, honestly your lucky you got an email.  Today, 9th of July is Independence Day, allllllllllllll the cybers were closed but one, whew, and well I can't send pictures here.

So lets see, I'll be honest, we had kinda a rough week this week.  I don't have a lot of time, so I'm going to write really quickly and tell you the big things that happened.  We spent all our time looking for a cyber, ha ha.

So, Oscar has a small problem.  You ll have to forgive me for the lack of ability to explain the situation, I'll give you the information, you can put it together.  Oscar got baptized.  Hurray!  But he lives on his own small territory (lot).  Also his sister lives there, but in a different house.  His sister was sssssuuuuuupppppperrr angry that he got baptized in our church, and destroyed Oscars house.... So Oscar is homeless (he is living with the branch president) fortunately the territory is his, so with the law he is going to get it back.  Unfortunately the sister is pretty crazy and she is threatening everyone pretty good.  So it's kinda interesting.  I hope we don't run into her, whew.  Anyway kind of a sad little problem.

Then we really focused on getter Fernando to go to church.  But he didn't go... sniffle.  So we gotta try again.  He is just super shy and scared of large groups of people.  So we are going to come up with a plan to get him to go.

We found some new investigators, Guillermo and Jose.  They are kinda interesting.  They are like 25 year old brothers.  They are shy, don't speak much, at first I didn't think they were all there.  But they understood what we were saying and such.  So we started to teach them, they didn't make it to church either.

The other news is pretty decent.  Flia Montenegro.  They are a interesting family.  My 3rd week here we passed by them and the 3 youngest boys ages 6, 9, 11, started to go to church, walking 15 blocks every morning.  Really good kids.  But absolutely crazy and difficult to handle.  But anyway, we did a small family night with them.  They really enjoyed it, we played a scripture golf game, to help them read the scriptures.  Well we didn't think it was very effective, but, the mom told us last night (she doesn't go to church) that  they were studying and reading the scriptures we used in the game, so I was happy about that, but even better, the mom said she was going to start going to church!  Yea!  That was good news. 

So yea more or less that's what happened this week.  My companion got pretty sick on Friday.  But he is better now.  Lots of sickness lately.

Anyway, we are trying to get someone to get baptized. I want to baptize every month for the next 6 months. So we are working hard to get that. I know its possible, just difficult.

You have to tell me what the church is like in Tennessee, if your in a ward or branch.  If they have missionaries assigned to you ward.  I'm pretty curious.   You guys are going to find a house there or something right?  Cause at one point or another I have to tell the secretary that you moved and give him the new direction and phone number and alllll that really fun but not so fun stuff.

Just so you know, things are going great here.  Just enjoying the work out here.

Have a good week.  Hope the move goes smoothly.  Sounds like a long drive.

Love ya,

Elder Obray

Letter Dated July 2, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like the move is actually going to happen.  Sounds pretty exciting. 

Yea, I've heard from some members that there is some pretty good tension between the states and Argentina right now.  Lame.  As long as they don't kick me out.

Our new mission president should be here right now.  I haven't talked to him or heard anything from him.  But I guess he is here.  And our old one is home in Cordoba.  So we will see what changes happen.  They now give us more money each month.  Which is great cause the inflation is pretty bad. When I got to the mission, you could buy an alfajor for 2 pesos, now its 4.50.  Ugh.

So I guess I'll talk to the new president about school at in a little while.  See what he thinks.  I just can't come home and sit around.  That would be terrible.

We actually had a great little week this week.  We really just settled down and got to work.  Trying to get some stuff done.

So Monday, we had a lesson with Oscar, and we changed his baptismal date to this Saturday.  He said yes and agreed to stop smoking now so he would be able to get baptized.  So we were pretty stoked.

Tuesday, we gave a Book of Mormon to a lady named Grasiela, and fixed a cita to pass by Friday.   I'll just tell you now, that when we talked Friday, she had read a decent amount and really likes it and believes its true. BUUUUttt (always a but, eh) she also doesn't really want to change religions :( .  So we are going to keep teaching her until she can't deny its true and gets baptized.  Good plan. huh.

Wednesday, we found a family, flia Blanco, they listened really well and the dad said that they were all going to get baptized.  Sounds great! Ha ha, well we fixed a cita to pass by on Thursday, and they weren't home, then Friday we talked to the wife for a minute, but we haven't yet been able to have contact with them.  But we will keep trying.  We also stopped by the church to check the baptismal font, only to find it full of water.....gross water.  And it wouldn't drain, so we had to call someone from Bahia Blanca to come fix it.  We also had a meeting with Elder Fee the senior couple missionaries. Which went well, we talked about trying to locate all the members on the list and such.

Thursday, Ummm we worked.  I don't no what else to say, ha ha.

Friday, the zone leaders came and gave Oscar his baptismal interview!  That went pretty well.  He passed, ha ha.

Saturday, well it was a pretty crazy day.  We invited people all morning.  Then in the afternoon we checked the baptismal font, only to find they left 2 inches of water.... whew, and it wouldn't drain anymore, so we had to take alll the dirty water out by hand, clean the font and fill it up.  Whew.  It was some pretty good work, ha ha.  Hey, but at 6:00 we baptized Oscar, so that was great. :).   We are pretty happy about that.  We actually had a baptism this week.

Sunday, we had the confirmation of Oscar which went well.  He was doing really well.

Well that is more or less what happened this week, cut short, ha ha.  We taught Oscar everyday with the flia Gomez.  So that was good.  I'll get the pictures of the baptism next time, we are in a Cyber without USB ports sooooo its kinda hard to send it.

We have some pretty good stuff actually going on in the branch which I probably haven't mentioned but we got some good investigators coming in, through a few members that are helping us out a lot.  So next week I'll try and write you some details about some other people.

I guess this will be your last week in Idaho Falls, hope you enjoy it. That's a pretty good little town.

Alright well I am sorry I don't have much to say this week, my mind seems a bit blank.  Actually, I just have lots of things going on, so I'm kinda distracted.  We got to much to do in the next little bit.  My companion and Elder Pino go to Bahia Blanca tomorrow for visa problems.  We have some problems with our house light bill, cause its 400 pesos for 1 month, which is a lot.   Since we aren't ever home, ha ha.  That and we got lots of lessons to prepare in the next couple of days.  But busy days are good days.

So I hope you enjoy packing and such.  Have a good week.  Choose the right.

Love,

ELder Obray