Week 39: Trio Baby!

Hey hey everyone!

This week has been super crazy, a few changes coming along now, this last tuesday we had a quick last meeting with our Mission presidente Thrugood and his wife! It was so amazing they have served and loved us so much!! Presidente Thurgood and his wife are from Idaho, but I think they are going to live in Centerville Utah after the mission, I don't really know. 

As well, we started off strong on Monday with our Zone activity, where we prepared a song to sing for Presidente Thrugood, created and directed by yours truly. My companion and I we put together this great song this past week it was a mash-up of Señor te necesito (I need thee every hour in spanish) Brillan Rayos de Clemencia(Spanish of Brightly beams our fathers mercy) And then we sung the last verse in English I need thee every hour with the melody of Brightly beams our fathers mercy. It was so great!!!

We had another week full of interesting Inter-cambios, I think they are called Exchanges in English, I'm not sure. But I went with Elder Phillips from here in our district, we live in the same pension, so that's pretty easy. And then later in the week I went with one of the zone leaders Elder Tipaz from Ecuador! That's was a really cool experience. After everything what I really learned from all of it was that as a leader, a lot of the time I have a lot of freedom. If I want to motivate and inspire the people to be better missionaries or to perform better, I have to think of the way to do it, there aren't a ton of guidelines, it's just like they throw me out here and are like "Go for it son! I know you can do it!" A little like at the start of the mission! Haha! But it is super great!! I love it!!

As well My companion and I we were able to cook up this delicious Brazilian food this week, it's called Stroganoff, it's like this curry, but you put cream of milk and tomato sauce and we made it with chicken, then you put it all over rice. It's soooooo Good! I think I've learned how to cook more Brazilian food than Argentine food while I've been here! Haha!

This week I've been thinking a lot about how none of our efforts are wasted. That as we work and as we invite the people to know more about the Gospel, it's really their choice if they will accept it or not. Our job as missionaries is to do our best and to find the people that are prepared for the Gospel in their lives! I'm so grateful to be able to be here and serve with 100% of my time in Argentina!

We've got transfers coming up in two weeks, if things go without a surprise I should be staying here and my companion should be heading out, he's been here for 6 months now. So we'll see how things work, but just last night we had quite the surprise!

We were doing our daily planning and we received a call from one of the assistants, he tells us that one of the elders from our district has his arm broken and has to end his mission 2 weeks early so we'll be in a trio for the next two weeks with his companion! Whoo!! Elder Cordeiro and I will be working with Elder Torricella these next two weeks! We're pretty excited! 

But as all good things do, my time here has come to an end. Investigator update, this past week was a little discouraging as none of our investigators that we had planned came to church, but we continue working hard and improving! WHOOO!!! I'm so happy to be a missionary and full time servant of the Lord! I love you all so much!! Keep it all real!! Chau!! 

Elder Slack

Ps. No photos this week, there's no time, I'll send some next week. But lot's of cold and rain here! 

Week 6: When your plane leaks, just tape it!

Hey Hey! I´m alive!!

Sorry this computer is a little bit hard to use, because some of the keys on the keyboard are moved around. But I will try my best.

Anyways, I had a long flight last week, it was crazy, we went to the airport in the morning by trax and we hopped on, it was a short 3ish hour flight to Atlanta, and then we had essentially no layover time, which was nice because we didn't have to wait. We got off at the airport and hurryed over to our next flight and got on. The next flight was pretty interesting. We all boarded, then when one of the flight attendants went to shut one of the overhead packaging things, it started spitting water out of the handle, and this was right before we were about to take off. And so she shut it, and it's spitting water everywhere, and people were getting wet, so she reopens it and it stops. Then to fix it? What do you do? Well just tape it of course! It´s a several million dollar plane and we´ll just tape the plane why not. So the flight attendant put some paper towels and tape all over it and it held the water for the rest of the flight, very interesting solution I thought, but it worked I guess.

Over that 9 hour flight, I slept for probably 2.5 hours or so. I was pretty tired all day the next day. But we got off and I met my mission president, his name is President Thurgood, and he´s from Idaho. And we met the rest of the new missionaries going to our mission who all already spoke spanish and had gone to the Argentina MTC, because they were all from around south America. We ate some interesting pizza and some amazing empanadas and interviewed with the mission president, each one individually.

Then we met our trainers!! My companion is named Elder Tolentino. He´s from Peru and he´s about 4´ 11´´ I would guess, he´s awesome though, really great missionary. And he only knows a little bit of English, so I´ve been learning spanish amazingly fast. Legit, the gift of tongues is so real. I can understand so much spanish, it´s easier to understand than to speak. But I can understand the majority, I´d say probably 75% of what people are saying, or if I don't know the words I can fill in the blanks usually. And I can communicate with a lot of the people pretty well, no where near perfect, but well enough. I usually only talk if I have something directed at me, or if it´s my turn to talk in a lesson. But all is well!

Turns out, my mission is about half as big as I thought, apparently back in July they split the mission, so now there is a Buenos Aires East mission that was 6 of the stakes of our mission, and we got 2 stakes from the West mission, so we don't have the ocean in our mission, which is alright I guess. But bonus, We have the Buenos Aires temple in our mission!! So our mission president said that we'll get to go there probably 4 or 5 times during our mission, which I´m super excited for! Temple in spanish!

Here in Argentina is completely different than I thought it would be. My mission is Buenos Aires South, but majority isn't in the city, they've got a lot of cars and buses and public transport and stuff, but also, in the area that I´m in they've got a ton of dirt roads. Only the main streets are dirt. Also, there are a ton of "wild dogs" that run around. They aren't like rabid or whatever, they are just a bunch of strays. They have no owner and kind of go and do what they please, so many of them. They'll travel in packs of 5 or 6 sometimes and kind of just run around looking for food or other stuff, they usually don't bother you even if you come up and try and pet it, they'll just run a way. But the other day, I saw this sweet dog, It wasn't a stray dog, it was in someone's house, but it looked like a lion almost, it had like this huge mane, and was all tan, and it´s face looked slightly feline, but it was a dog it was the strangest thing!

Also, the music here is interesting, sometimes I'll hear american music, and I'll be like, "Hey I know that!" but majority of the time the Argentines listen to their music, and it's kind of like polka music with some interesting bongos and lots of Spanish. very interesting indeed.

Also, I´ve found it a slight benefit to being a white boy around here, there are a few people who want to yell at me as they drive by. Either by yelling at me "White boy" or some other things, it´s kind of cool. I almost feel like I'm a celebrity here in Argentina! And I´ve had one person tell me, that after they met me. "Wow, I´m going to be popular now, I know a person from America" needless to say, that made feel pretty cool. 

My spanish is progressing amazingly fast, but I'm struggling hardcore with rolling my R's, I can buzz my tongue and make noises, but I can't for the life of me use it in words. Whenever we're walking I keep trying repeatedly to say the word "perro" which is dog. And my tongue just doesn't want to say it. It's quite disappointing. But I continue to work on it. On the other side of things, they want all of the Latin missionaries that speak spanish to learn English, and my companion is struggling with the words juice, and jewish. He can´t say his J´s.

Something I found out the other day, apparently in spanish, a rooster no longer say´s cock-a-doodle-doo. Apparently it´s kí-ki-di-ki. Just a little fun fact of the day.

But other than that the work is going great, I really love it here, the people are very nice, but the conversations are a little different. They talk a lot about where they are from, which country, because there are a lot of people from Paraguay here. And they talk about the different accents of spanish, here it´s castellano. Where the ll makes a zsh sound. kind of. It´s interesting. But all is well, we are fed lunch almost everyday, which is way nice. And we walk a ton. But I love it!

The driving here, just crazy, we ride in buses sometimes and when we ride around I get a bit afraid, because people essentially just do what they want. In our bus the other day, this light had been red for 5 seconds and he just felt like going, so he did.

It´s fun, all is well! But, I´ll see you all next week, hopefully those who want this are getting it, Paz Fuera!  (peace out) 

Elder Slack

Just tape the plane

Again, me with my trainer, Elder Tolentino and President and Sister Thurgood

Living in Argentina

(Headed to Argentina)

(This post is written by Elder Slacks mom, Jennifer). Elder Slack flew out on Monday and I (his mom, Jennifer) was able to talk with him on the phone while he was at the airport. He is doing great and is so happy! He said to tell everyone: "Just be happy. Life is so good. Don't be sad that I am gone. I am so happy! I can hardly wait to share the gospel with the people in Argentina".

We got an email from his mission which included a couple of pictures of him (below). His p-day will now be Monday. We look forward to hearing more from him on Monday.

Elder Slack with President and Sister Thurgood

Elder Slack with his trainer Elder Tolentino, Sister Thurgood, and President Thurgood