Letter Dated April 16, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Glad everything is still going pretty good at home.

Well I haven't knocked all the doors. I've knocked lots, ha ha.  But there are some I haven't touched yet.  Give me another 3 months and yea, I think I would knock all of them. Some doors I've knocked twice though, ha ha. They sometimes tell me. ¨you knocked my door a few months ago.¨ ha ha. Well if they would just change there minds.

Oh and thanks a ton for the chocolate chip cookie recipe. I'll get to work cook'n up some of those delicious bites.

So I meant to ask you about Riley, but well now I know. I'll be getting back when he leaves.... how terrible. Oh hey and I want to know how Tyler and Bracken are doing if possible. I would think they would be going back out soon?

Anyway so we had another good ol interesting week.

Tuesday I was sick with another cold. I don't like colds. But this time I went and bought some sort of drug. I went and asked a member, and they got me some sort of vitamin c boost thing. Worked pretty well. I didn't really feel the symptoms anymore. I was just really tired, ha ha. And we went home teaching.  I don't  remember if I told you, but we home teach here. That was cool.

Wednesday, we actually found 2 newbies. Yea! They were an older couple. They had talked to the missionaries before. They liked everything and said they would read. But when we asked them to get baptized they just couldn't understand why they would have to get baptized twice. We talked about it for 10 minutes then I figured we would work on it after they read the Book of Mormon, ha ha.

Thrusday, we had district meeting in Pico. Oh hey and I got a package.  But not from you.  Jessica Heart sent me one for my Year mark?  Bit late but o well.  It was a t shirt that says Argentina Bahia Blanca mission, and a cool picture on the back side, I'll send you a picture when I take a picture of it. Its pretty sweet.  Then after district meeting we did divisions.  I went to Castex with Elder Roberts who is a new guy, he has like a month here.  So that was fun, he is still working on speaking, ha ha.  But he is new, ha ha.  So we visited Antonia and Nerina.

Friday, we worked, lots, ha ha.  Good details huh? We visited Pedro, then at like 4 when we JUST entered Pedros house it started to POUR rain, whew, Lucky eh.  But then we left it was still raining.  Oh NO. So we got soaked pretty good.  And the streets were underwater by a few inches. UGH.  We got lucky again though. We were on our way home to change and let Elder Roberts pack to return to Pico, when we got to a large river street.  Under like 6 inches of water, when a taxi guy offered to give us a ride through the river. YEA! So we took that. Only bad part of the story was that he didn't want to get baptized. Yet. ha ha. Then we changed companions back.

Saturday, we worked lots, like on Friday.  We knocked one door and talked to a older guy.  He was really nice, almost let us in.  But he decided not to. So we fixed a cita for another day.  Then we were walking away when we heard his wife yell at him for talking to us.....whew...poor guy.  That old lady sure knows how to destroy ones self esteem....I felt pretty bad for the guy... We also talked to German. who was not drunk today!  Yea!  We had a good chat.  We just gotta help him go to church.

Hemano Melchor who they ate lunch with everyday

Sunday we had stake conference in Santa Rosa. So the church rented a bus and the whole ward went on the bus to stake conference.  A seventy was there, uhh named....I'll telll you next time I can't remember.  Really good guy . I shook his hand. TWICE. Once when he entered, and once while we waited to get interviewed by the Mission president afterwards.  He is a cool guy.  So yea, we had interviews with the president, as well.  Those went well.  Then we left for home.

Monday, today we shopped. I had to buy new jeans, my old ones are destroyed with holes everywhere.  So I got some without holes. Good thing, huh.  Then we relaxed cause it was p-day.  So that was our week.  Good stuff.  We are still struggling to get some investigators.  We will see what happens this week.  We work, just haven't had gallons of investigators pouring into our cup.  I cant think of anythings else.

So have a good week.  Talk to you next week

Love Elder Obray

Letter Dated April 9, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well hope you had a good Easter.  Easter here is kinda weird.  No basket of candy or eggs hidden everywhere :( O well.

I did learn something I didn't know, ha ha.  Catholics did not eat meat last Friday.  They only eat fish.  I learned that the other day.  Cool eh.

So let's see what happened this week

Monday, we were still in Pico.  I went out on division in Pico with Elder Roberst who just got to the mission.  So he can't speak a lot.  It was fun.  We did a little family night with a member family.  It went well.  We taught the plan of salvation.

Tuesday, we had District Meeting.  Then we came home from Pico.  We visited a less active named Pedro.  They promised to go to church this week.  Hurray!  Then we stopped by and visited with Gaby and Natalia.  They are doing great.  We are going to start to go over the lesson again with them.  Then we visited Antonia.  She is doing great.  Just keeps truck-in along.  And we bought food, since we weren't home on Monday, ha ha.

Wednesday, we visited Nerain, who also promised to go to church.  We knocked millions of doors and did contacts and such fun old stuff, and visited another less active Flia Barrionuevo.

Thursday, we had weekly planning in the morning.  Then we knocked and talked lots.  Then we kinda had a lesson with Gaby and Natalia, but they had to leave early, like after 10 minutes. So we planned to finish thiis Friday. Then we went and wished Hermano Rico a happy birthday and ate cake and pizza. Yum.  Then we visited Yessid.  Who was doing pretty good.  But still just doesn't want to get baptized arpeggio.

Friday. We met a new menos activo, German. He said he would go to church. And we finished teaching  Gaby and Natalia. Then we knocked and talked. Honestly we do that all day really, ha ha.

Saturday, we did service and ate a Asado with Hermano Rico. Which was fun. Then we had a small adventure.  We did a contact and we got a direction for a house in the boonies. So we went. We found the house, but she couldn't attend us at the time cause alllll her family was there....i thought that would be a better time to get in ;) but she didn't, ha ha. So we go back another day. Then we visited Antonia. She was doing great, still.

Sunday, we had 45 people  in church.  Which is a good number.  Pedro and his family went, and Nerina went.  And Yesid went.  SO that was really good. Then we ate lunch with Flia Ferias. We gave the kids a bunch of pass-along cards.  Apparently they have been handing them out everywhere, ha ha. Little kids are AWESOME.  Then we had a chat with Yessid.  Unfortunately he told us he doesn't want to get baptized, mainly cause it would cause a rift between him and his wife. So we dropped him for a little while.  He is going to keep reading and going to church though. We tried to have a chat with German, but he was super drunk, so nope, ha ha.  He didn't make sense. Then we had a bunch of Sunday meetings. Then we made a final stop at another menos activos families house. It was the 1st time I'd passed by.  Apparently the guy Raul stopped going cause his wife (nonmember) doesn't want him to go cause it takes to much time away from her. So he stopped. LAME. Then we came home and slept....yawn.

And today, was fall cleaning. EVERYBODY, well all the msiionaries had to scrub the houses down. So we did that alll day for p-day. SO yea. We had an intersting week. Still just out looking for newbies, ha ha, but well get them. They hide, but not forever.

So anyway have a good week and I'll talk to you guys next week. Have fun in the sun. Stay dry and don't fry, please.

love
Elder Obray

Oh hey you should find me a good chocolate chip cookie recipe. They don't have those here. Weird eh?

Letter Dated April 2, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well I am glad you guys had a good little week.  Lots of time with the family that's pretty important.

Yea so I think my visa stuff is all done now.  Shouldn't need to worry about that for the rest of my mission. Hurray.  

This week was a pretty decent week. Pretty fun, interesting and such things.

On Monday, we ate stuffed pumpkins for lunch that a member cooked up for us.  The pumpkins were a lot smaller then our Halloween pumpkins, but they were pumpkins, ha ha.  Then we had a lesson with Melina and her family.  We are going over the lessons with her again.

Then on Tuesday, we had district meeting, then we went out and worked all day with our mission leader.  We didn't have a whole lot happen.  He showed us/we tried, a bunch of old investigators and people he knows, but we didn't get any new investigators.  Sometimes that's just how it is.

Wednesday, well, we found out a kid in our zone went home :( so we were a bit sad, I didn't really know him.  But still, can't say I know a whole lot more then that.  We went and visited Antonia and gave her a few church books. They have a ¨new member kit¨ that we bought and gave to her.  So she has lots to do now ha ha.  Then we went and talked to Gustavo and Alberto, we dropped them, so we wont really visit them anymore cause they wont progress.  Then we visited Nerina. She was doing alright.  She said she would go to the baptism of Gaby and Natalia.  So that was good.

Thursday, Elder Wagner cooked us up some spicy tacos for lunch. They eat spicy in Texas apparently.  Well at least he does.  We talked to Pedroa who is a menos activo.  He was doing better.  He read some from the Book of Mormon at least, but still struggles to go to church.  Then we had good little lesson with Gaby and Natalia to help get them ready for baptism.  We talked about what would happen step for step.  So that they would feel a bit more comfortable. Then we went out and got the clothes ready for the baptism.  So that was good.

Friday, we spent almost all day getting things ready for the baptism.  We made a cake for it, and had to fill the font and such, so we had lots and lots to do, ha ha.  We did spend a few minutes out with the ward mission leader again, with the same results as before.  Then we had the baptism of Gaby and Natalia, which went well.  I can't send pictures to you yet, but you'll get them soon.  Gaby had a really long dress, well it's just cause she is really short, ha ha.  So when she was getting baptized I had to do it several times cause her long dress would bubble up, ha ha.  But really the baptism went super well.  They both liked it a lot and felt the Spirit. Then we had a noche de hogar with our barrio.  They young women were in charge.  They did skit practices.  They had everyone practice passing a pass along card.  It was a really fun little activity.  Especially for us missionaries.

Saturday, we went to General Pico to watch conference by satellite.  In English yea!  So conference was really good.  They had some awesome stuff.  I really like Elder Nelsons  comparison thing.  Where he said something like, You can't have an explosion in a workshop and get a dictionary.  I laughed good when I heard that one.  They had some great talks about the need to get baptized and lots on families which was great.  I really liked it.  I forgot to bring my notebook to the cyber so I don't remember very many things in specific.  But Conference really makes me want to try harder, ha ha.

Sunday, we went to conference again.  Yea!  It was great.  Then that night we ate an asasdo with member family in General Pico. Which was super good.

And today we are still in Pico with the other Elders, we go back to Castex tomorrow.

So that's our week.  It went alright.  We learned lots.  I must say, at this point we are just out looking for investigators.  So far without much success, but sometimes the people just like to harden there hearts to challenge us a bit more, ha ha.  So we will keep working hard.

Have a good week.

Love

 Elder Obray

Letter Dated March 26, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like you guys had a pretty good week.  My week was interesting, ha ha.

So I look tall in some pictures cause lots of people are really short, ha ha.  And my companion is as well. Really I think I am the same height.

Gaby and Natalia get baptized this week.

So I'm pretty much going to go through my week with you since it was a bit crazy.

Monday, was a normal P-Day till after we emailed, because we got on bus and went to the city Santa Rosa, so that at 10:30 the same night I could get on a bus to Bahia Blanca.  So that's pretty much what happened there.  My Companion stayed in Santa Rosa with the Zone Leaders and I was on the bus sleeping alone, kinda weird.

Tuesday, I did a bunch of Visa stuff.  Don't ask what, cause I don't know.  I probably signed my life into slavery.  Who knows.  Just sign here, and I signed.  Wait an hour, sign here, get a picture, wait a long time again. So yea, fun stuff.  I did get to talk to Elder Howard (who was my companion for a week) so that was cool. Then I took a bus back to Santa Rosa from Bahia.

Wednesday, well I slept in the zone leader house with my companion.  We then all went to Zone Conference.  Which was good.  President always says some really good stuff.  He talked a lot about not getting comfortable in the mission.  There is always a way we could improve.  Then we talked about how to work with the members.  We also broke a record this month.  We have 106 baptisms this month in the mission, which is the highest we've had in like 15 years.  Which is awesome.  After Zone Conference we went to the Doctors office cause my companion was having a foot problem.  But it seems to be fine.  Then we came home to Castex.

Thursday.  We went to district meeting in General Pico.  Whew.  More traveling.  I was tired of traveling at this point.  Then we came home.  And finally started working, kinda.  We had the interviews with Gaby and Natalia (which were crazy) just cause they want to get baptized but, well Gaby at least (the mom) doesn't remember anything.  She passed though, whew.  Anyways then we had  meetings with the ward, like ward mission leader and with the ward council.  We had a good lesson with Yessid, we pretty much ¨dropped cane¨or told him how it was, since all he lacks is the actual ordinance of baptism.

Friday, we did weekly planning, then we seriously knocked doors for the rest of the day, whew.  We had no visible success, ha ha.  We did chat with Antonia for a few minutes, she is still doing great.

Saturday, the same as Friday.  We knocked a million doors with no visible success. So yea. Then we had a lesson with a Menos Activo family called BarrioNuevo.  They pretty much are ridiculous.  Since they went to the temple, know the church is true, and they tell us they want to go to church but they just never go......they understand everything well to... o well.

Sunday, well Gaby and Natalia went to church so they are to be baptized on Friday HURRAY! We had a lesson with Yessid.  He fixed a baptismal date for himself on the 13 of April.  We hope it goes through! Then we knocked lots of doors. And Visited another menos activo, Nerina.  Who like Barrionuevo is a bit ridiculous, ha ha.  Some days I just want to force them to go to church, ha ha.  But I realize that forcing people isn't a part of the plan.  We just give them every reason to obey and give a little big nudge or better said large push in the right direction.

So that's the week pretty much.  Kinda a mixed week since we have few investigators that are doing well, but we have been struggling to find anyone new. So we are going to continue working hard and get some more success, cause that's what we like to do here.

Anyhow, enjoy your week.

Life is good.

Love ya

Elder Obray

Letter Dated March 19, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad; 

Well glad things seem to be going pretty good back home. Sounds like kind of a dull week for you guys. Not a lot happened over there. But sometimes its just like that I guess.

The pictures on the box were...great catholic pictures, ha ha.  We see those a lot over here.

Yea so, Melina got baptized on Friday. Went really well. We shall see if I can get the picture on the computer today or not, cause I am going to Bahia Blanca again to finish my visa stuff. Yeaa.... so I leave here in a few minutes, ha ha.  Always something going on.

This week we are planning on having two more baptisms.  Natalia and Gaby, they both should be baptized.  Which is really exciting. That would mean we had 4 baptisms in a month.  Which is really rare.  Just cause the Average amount of baptisms in the mission is 8 in two years. So we should have 4 in this month. We are pretty stoked. Some hard work is finally paying off in some baptisms eh.

Yessid is still a bit of a problem child.  We had a really good lesson yesterday with him.  And he said he would think about baptism.  He really does know the church is true he just needs to decide to go ahead and decide... But I guess for him it's more complicated then it is for me.  We hope to get him baptized in the next couple of weeks.  Guess we shall see huh.

So we had 45 people at church.  Which is great.  We have to have 50 for 3 months to get a church building instead of renting a house. So we are pretty close.  We are just going to keep working and I think we can get it.

I got bit by a dog this week. :(  on my finger.  It bled for a bit.  But don't worry the dog doesn't have rabies or anything.  Just a mean dog.  I hope it wasn't wrong for me to kick it, ha ha.  I wasn't very happy with that dog.

Anyway so I wont be in Castex again to Wednesday night at like 6 or 7ish cause Wednesday we have zone conference.  We were going to have it this week, but President was sick.  A lot of people and Missionaries were sick this last week.  So wasn't just me.  Whew.  But being sick on the mission is the worst, cause you just have to got out and work, ha ha.  Can't sit still.

So the 1st is a picture of the baptismal font we use.  It's a big swimming pool.  Water is nice though.

The 2nd is Melina and Her dad.  Her dad baptized her.  It went super well. So we are pretty happy.

Have a good week this week.

Love ya 

Elder Obray

Letter Dated March 12, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like you guys had a pretty decent week. I am glad Mitt Romney won, ha ha.

Well I did get my shoes.  I am very content, ha ha.  Some good Reeses and some new socks.  Kinda nice, ha ha. Thanks.

So we just kept on working this week.  Huge Surprise.  We are going to baptism Melina this week so that's pretty cool.  We are pretty excited for that.

We didn't have any awesome things happen this week.  Actually we didn't have a whole lot happen. We didn't find many newbies or anything in that sense it was a hard week.  But we will get some more this week.  With Gaby and Natalia, they are progressing well they should both get baptized not this week but the next.  So that's good.  After that the only other great investigator is Yessib, but he still isn't sure about baptism.

Other then those people hmm... oh Gustavo and Alberto.  We are trying to get them to go to church. Once they go they will be Great.

I'm actually sick right now, ha ha.  Just a nasty little cold....but uh.  I don't like being sick. Weird huh.

Umm.  What else.  Oh yea.  We saw an AWESOME electrical storm.  Actually that's probably why I'm sick.  We had a cita at 8 Wednesday with Melina. So we went.  When we finished we were surrounded by a huge wind rain and lightning storm.  So we have to run through the rain and lighting home.  We were soaked!  100%.  And lightning stuck like 100 meters in front of us.  Pretty crazy.  The storm was cool.  The sky was always bright cause there was always at least one lighting bolt.  Pretty crazy.  We don't get those in Idaho.

Then we met a talking parrot named Coco. That was cool.  He could talk well.  Then we actually talked to the owner, ha ha. Who said we could come by some other day to teach her, ha ha.

And the photos I sent are actually really cool, so you should see one of me and Elder Stutz. Then me and my tie, then more of the tie.  Well come to find out that for P-Day today, I went to the fabric store and bought some material and made a tie.  I'm wearing it right now.  Cool huh? I thought so. That's how bored I was.  I'll probably do it again.  Costs me 2 dollars to make it instead of 20.  So yea.  Not a high quality tie though ha ha.  If you only knew how I did it you would probably laugh.

Bueno.

I really don't have much else to say.  I'm sorry if its short. But I don't feel good (lame excuse i know).  We do have zone conference this week to.  That will be good. anyway.

Love ya,

Elder Obray

Letter Dated March 5, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Hey well sounds like a few interesting things are going on back home.  That's good. Makes me happy.

Sounds like everyone is pretty much out or going out on the mission by now that's good. Hope Sam is doing well. We have a senior couple here that were in Madagascar as mission presidents. They say they eat rice.  Always. rice, rice, rice, rice, rice... makes me count my blessings, ha ha.

I hope Romney wins. That would be cool ha ha.  Sounds like he's doing good.

Yea I wouldn't worry to much about the kids going to mutual. A lot of them are probably like me, don't really like to go just cause they would rather be out with friends or playing soccer, ha ha.  I liked my leaders, really good people just like you guys are.

Well out here in Castex we just continue to work as hard as we can. We had the baptism of Antonia this week. I'm going to try to send you a picture here, but my companion is using my USB converter right now.  Antonia is great. She is really happy right now. She has felt the difference.  So we are really happy for her.  So Yessid, Natalia, and Gaby went to the baptism, which was great. Also All three went to church as well.  Woot!!  Antonia had a lot of trials before her baptism almost her whole family and all her friends are against her and the church. But she went ahead anyway. A great example of faith.

We still are struggling to get Yessid to get baptized.   He is ready but just doesn't feel like its the  right choice yet. I know he has felt and can identify the spirit. Maybe its just a matter of time.  But we are doing what we can.  I think he will get baptized shortly.

Natalia actually bore her testimony (shes the 11 year old) in sacrament meeting which was great. Gaby no, ha ha, but not a huge surprise.  We have a baptism date for the the 24th.  We are just trying to prep them for it. I think they both will get baptized.

With Melina we actually changed the baptism to next week cause they didn't go to church this week :( so we can't baptize her...

We are having a lot of success.  We only had 3 go to church. But that's still really good. Especially since they all should get baptized.  We are excited.

Anyway that's the biggest news of things that happened this week.

We started to teach the mom of Nerina. Her name is Susana. We are going to keep passing by to see what happens.

We did divisions this week as well.  I went with Elder Sterling from California.  Really good Elder, he has like 8 months out, but he is a superstar.  I learned a lot from him. He was hear as well to do the interveiw with Antonia. Which went well.

Oh, almost forgot the baptismal pila is small swimming pool thing.  That they put inside the church. ha ha. We went to the church a bit early for the baptism and someone left the hose on on and it was overflowing!  So we had to hurry and clean up all the water. Fortunately, in Argentina, carpet doesn't exist.  And that's how they clean floors here, with lots of water. So we really just cleaned the floor.

We did service this week as well.  We used a saw and cut down some small trees. It was pretty fun. We did if for Hermano Rico. Super good Hermano. He helps us out a ton and made friends with Yessid and always invites him over for pizza and such. Its great.

So when I went to Bahia, my comp stayed in Santa Rosa and I was on the bus alone (its not against the rules to travel alone).  Then in Bahia, the secretary picked me up and did the visa, and I came back. Great fun ha ha.

Anyway that's like all I got. Well I'll just stay around the South pole and baptize people in cold water (actually the waters pretty good, just deadly to drink) You guys can stay up north in the snow.  I'm good right here for now. Maybe when it gets cold here we could switch. I don't like the cold to much here.

So I will talk to you next week. Have fun.

Love,

 Elder Obray