My journey to Argentina started off with an early morning trip to the airport, then a 9 hour flight to Buenos Aires. We rode in a 787 dreamliner, which had great leg room, tinted windows, a groupchat function on the screen in front of you, and more! Easily the best plane ride of my life. And I flew economy too! First class seats had their own pod of luxury haha
We get to B.A. around 9:00 p.m. local time and received a warm welcome of rowdy soccer chants. Gave me chills to be there! We get through customs no problems, hop on a bus to our hotel for the night (we passed by the temple it was so pretty!) and got maybe 90 minutes of sleep before we needed to leave for our next flight to SANTA FE!!!! Talk about a crazy few hours! Luckily, we managed to get everyone at the airport on time.
So we get to Santa Fe on Tuesday in the morning, and man was it hot and humid! The Paraná River (which leads to the Atlantic Ocean in the south and the amazing Iguazú Falls in the north)runs through my mission, which makes the already hot summers even hotter, but nothing I´m not used to.
In fact, this part of Argentina is very similar to Kansas. Firstly, there are thunderstorms frequently, including two hailstroms in one day my first day here! There are also wide fields of sunflowers, cows, other farm animals, big bugs, you name it!!! It legit feels like home!!
On Wednesday we had a meeting going over the policies and rules of the mission, and I found out who my first companion is and where I am serving!!! My companion is Élder Marcos from Lima, Perú!!! He goes to BYU Idaho and studies electrical engineering, so he knows a lot of English! But we speak almost entirely in Spanish so that´s fun. He has been on his mission for 6 months.
Currently I am working in a town called San Cristóbal, which is in the northwest corner of the mission, a 3 hour bus ride from Santa Fe. The town reminds me of Hutchinson, and everyone here is pretty friendly! Most evenings they are outside of their houses drinking an herbal tea called mate, and they always wave at you just like small town Kansas haha!
As for the work, there are only 20 active members in the branch here, so most of our time is spent visitng families and individuals who are members but don´t come to church often. Our schedule is wake up at 7, work from 9:30-12:30, eat lunch and study from 1:00-4:00, then work from 4:00-9:30. We take a break in the afternoon due to the siesta, but it is nice because that is when it is the hottest in the day
Missionary work is tough, and there are times when the road in front of me seems impossible to travel. But I have felt the love of our Savior Jesus Christ change me these past few weeks, which is helping me learn to live more humbly and meekly before God. All the walking, hand washing our clothes, everything I am capable of doing through Jesus Christ, who strengthens me EVERYDAY to do His work.
I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!! Please take the time this week to tell someone in your family, a friend, whoever, that you love and care about them. I promise doing so will bless you so much!!
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