January 7, 2013

It's getting harder every week to read these emails and stay focused. It's great. When I first started my mission I carefully looked through all of my ties and choose a different one everyday, depending in how I was feeling that day. Some days I wore one tie for the first half of the day and another for the second half. It was a big deal. Now, I usually wear the same time for a week or more and when it comes time to change because someone comments on the fact that I have been wearing the same tie so many day in a row, I grab one randomly off the tie rack. I am looking pretty good with dirty ties, yellow shorts, holy pants, and moldy shoes. I guess its all part of the experience though. I welcome it.

Today was a special day. I forgot to tell you all last week, but today, all of the missionaries from the BAS mission went to the temple. It was the first time I had been to the temple in about 22 months. The missionaries can only go to the temple one time a year or if one of their converts is going to the temple to do their own work. The reasoning for the rule is that missionaries are here to do the work for the living, not the dead. I guess that's right. It looks like a family that I taught and baptized in Longchamps, the Acuña family, will be going to the temple before I go home with them. Also, all of the missionaries get to go to the temple the week before they get home, so I will be going yet another time before I come home. I might soon be translated. Naw, it will be real good. Walking away from the temple today I felt real good and ready for the next few weeks.

Everything is going pretty normally. Elder Reynolds and I are teaching a part member family right now named Familia Sanchez. They are all super well-behaved kids (hard to find in Argentina) and love when we come over. Two of them have baptismal dates for the 19th of this month. Should be b-e-a-utiful.

Remember how strange people always sneak into the church if the doors are left open?  Welllll.......the other day Elder Reynolds and I were teaching English classes in the church with a few youth and the Hermana missionaries from the bordering ward. Elder Reynolds was teaching when I noticed a guy walk by the door with a big plastic bag. I recognized him right away as these cheesy, and usually drunk or high salesman who walk door to door and sell super random things from plastic bags. I went out of the classroom to talk to him and usher him out of the church, as is custom. I asked him if he needed any help. He right away started pulling electrical cords, highlighters, cd booklets, paperclips, and a punch of random stuff out of the bag to sell me. It was obvious right away that we was pretty drunk and I told him I didn't want anything. It was at that point that he pulled out a knife, pointed it at me, and asked me if I wanted to buy the knife. I think he was showing me the knife half as a solicitude and half as a threat. I said, "Sure! How much is that highlighter, I was just needing a highlighter." I gave him ten pesos and he left. Lesson: Always lock church doors.

All is well. Life is good.