loca

Hola family,

To start out I guess I´ll just answer some of your questions before I forget. The area I´m in now is about a little more than an hour south of Mendoza. You would think that would mean it´s colder because it´s more southern but it actually has almost been like spring here so far. Like in the morning we only wear a sweater and at night we usually have to wear our coats but it hasn´t been that cold at all. Today was the coldest it´s been, it was overcast and drizzling a tiny bit so I felt right at home haha. Elder Guillen is way awesome, he´s like one of the nicest people ever. He always shares his food and candy with me and I think that´s the best quality you can have in a friend haha. He´s also helping me a lot with Spanish slang because whenever we talk with kids or this one family we have lunch with on Sunday it´s harder for me to understand them because they use so many slang words. None of them show up in the dictionary so it´s hard to figure out exactly what they mean but I´m getting better haha. We´ve got one more lunch now, with the bishop every other week, so we´re cooking a tiny bit less but we still have to cook more than I´ve had to in my other areas. The first couple meals were pretty lame I´m not gonna lie, but we´re getting better. When I get back I´m going to be an expert in Argentine cuisine.

Our apartment right now is pretty interesting, it´s a 4 man pench with two bathrooms and two kitchens. Now I know that sounds like it would be amazing but one of the bathrooms and kitchens didn´t have running water until a couple days ago and well sometimes quantity doesn´t beat quality. Actually, one of my stories for the week has to do with the bathroom. It has character for a couple different reasons. First of all, the shower has no head so the water just kinda falls straight down so your like crammed all up against the wall trying not to touch it because it´s really cold but at the same time trying to get the water to rinse you off haha. Also, the very first time I used it the hot water handle came off and water started gushing out of where it was supposed to be. It was just like a movie or something haha. I panic for a second and was like oh no, what the heck have I done. But I guess you can just screw it back it... Oooo, but, the good new is that the members we´re renting from right now need the apartment or something so we have to find a new one. The Zone Leaders (who we live with) have looked at a couple the are closer to the boundries of our area and more central but they haven´t settled on anything yet. So in a couple weeks here I´ll probably be packing up my bags all over again and moving. At least it´ll be an interesting experience haha.

This week we had some people in the church, which was the first time for me in over a month and a half so it felt way good. One of them is a boyfriend and the other is just a friend of some of the bishops daughters. Seriously, flirt to convert works. When I was in the MTC one of the speakers asked people who were converts in the past two years to tell their story and about 80 percent of them started out with "Well I was dating this girl who was mormon..." or "My girlfriend was mormon..." haha. I´m serious though. That stuff works. So I´ll let you know any updates with them. Speaking of the bishops daughters, he has like 7 or 8 of them and all of them but one are really loud. It was hilarious eating with them on Saturday, it reminds me of when Emma or Madeline have like a billion friends over and they´re all screaming except dinner was probably a bit louder. Elder Guillen doesn´t even have sisters so it was an entirely new experience for him but it made me laugh.

Speaking of crazy girls, we talked to this one girl in the street who was pretty crazy. All we did was say hello and she was like, "Did you go by that house" (pointing to a house down the street) and when we told her no she was like "oh good, because there´s demons there" and then went off telling us all these things about demons and witches and wizards and all these documentaries she´s seen at her church and all the things her preacher has told her and how she knew someone who was possessed and how you have to pay like 20 pesos to touch this thing and then you´ll be healed. Then she told us what her preacher had told her about "Jonathan Smith" (I smiled inside when she said Jonathan) and oh man. It´s just sad seeing people so scared like that and how people are making money off of it. We tried explaining to her what we believed but she didn´t want to listen really, just wanted to talk about people who are possessed. It was quite the interesting conversation.

Welp family, I think that´s all I have for this week.

With all the love of an orchestra,

Elder Lounsbury