Hermana Jones

Argentina Buenos Aires North Mission

lunes, 26 de julio de 2010

Hola!
This week was even better than the last! It´s still cold, but I am getting used to it. The weather here thus far seems very similar to Seattle.

This week we found a ton of new investigators. Like 20. There isn´t enough time in the day to teach them all! We need to work on getting our investigators to church. The past 2 sundays it has rained and I think that prevents some from going.
This week, there was a conference with the President for leaders, and my companion is the only trainer who is an hermana right now, so I got to go too! It was 3 days for about 4 hours each day. It was great. I learned a ton.

We have set baptismal dates from a few people this week for August 14th, so hopefully they attend church 3 times (requirement) so that they can be baptized! The field is truly white!
This week, we stopped to get a snack, luckily, because we wouldn´t have run into Meri. She is golden! She is from Peru and had LDS friends there. She came to church sunday, and everything. She said when we first met her that the day before had been bad, and she had been praying a lot for help from God, and then she told us that she thought we were her answer! It was a cool experience.

Lots of people here are from Peru and Paraguay, and most are Catholic. I have also run into Evangelicals, and Jehovah´s Witnesses quite often.
The food here is really good! Lots of pasta, bread, and meat. Most of our lunches we eat with members and they feed us well! Breakfast usually I eat cereal and yogurt or fruit. The cereal here is weird. But it´s cereal. They have some great pastries called facturas, and also these brownie things called alfajores. Look them up, they´re delicious.

Yesterday we were eating lunch with a couple of families. They asked where I was from and I said WA. Then one was like, oh one of my mission companions is from there, do you know John Rex?! It was funny. They know the Rexs and still keep in contact with them it sounds like! They are the Roy family. I think. Then later, Hna Tejada and I were walking to an investigators house, and she said wait, do they have a daughter named Jessica and have they lived in Florida? So my companion also knows who the family is, from a long time ago! Crazy stuff, small world.

Thanks for all the emails! Courtney, Kasey, Grandma, and Family! I love reading from everyone! Sounds like life is good!

Courtney - let me know when you get back, and your address and I´ll write you a real letter!
Hna. Payne, I hope you get your visa soon! Also, it´s cold here. Bring your yoga pants, I changed my mind. You can wear them under your skirt. Also, survive the first week in the field, and you´ll be fine. The first week was much harder than the second I thought.
Kasey, I will try and write you today, I should have time. Hope works going well!

I hope everyone has a great week! Things here continue to get better and better! I love this work, and I see miracles all the time! We only receive mail when we have zone conference, which we have this coming week. From what my companion has told me, she has gotten all the mail she was supposed to, packages included, so that´s good news!

Love,
Hermana Jones
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lunes, 19 de julio de 2010

Hola!

I am still alive! haha. This week was good. I have been really tired all week trying to catch up on sleep, and I have never walked so much in my life!
Our area is called Vicente López. The mission home is in our area. Some parts of the area are very nice, and some not at all. From what I hear, it is a fairly big area, and we use the train and buses to get out to areas. We also walk a lot.

I am learning a lot. It is hard to understand the people here sometimes, because of their accent. It gets better everyday though.

Today, we got to go to Capital! I saw where Evita took place. :) Us new missionaries had to go to do something with our visas. I´m not sure what, but we did it. We also got to go to McDonalds, as there is a McDonalds in Capital. It was fun.

The weather here feels quite chilly. Our apartment is cold. we have a couple of small space heaters and thats it for heat. We aren´t in our apartment very much though. Showers also are my least favorite time of day... No heat in the bathroom and not even luke warm water. :) I am getting used to it though. I will have to take some pictures of our apartment.

Hermana Tejada my trainer is awesome. She is from Miami FL, but her dad is from Ecuador so she knew spanish before. She is a very hard worker. Some nights, we have to run home to get home in time, because we work up to the very last minutes. She is very obedient and very diligent. It´s great. I couldn´t ask for a better trainer. But, I do miss my MTC companions :). I hope Hermana Payne makes it to Argentine sometime soon.

We have a lot of investigators. More than I expected we would. We spend a lot more time teaching than I thought we would too. We try to get new contacts on the buses and on our way to teaching, and spend most of the days teaching investigators, and this week we visited quite a few less actives.

Church on Sunday went well, we had some investigators come which was good. Sunday was like a tropical storm minus the warmness. We came home soaking wet, and we had to go home and change to dry clothes half-way through the day! Today hasn´t been quite so bad, but it´s still raining.

Well, I am just about out of time, but thanks for the emails! I will try and write a letter today, but I don´t know if I´ll have time, because we spent most of the day in Capital and p-day ends at 6.

Love,
Hermana Jones
Haley arrives at the mission home in Argentina

martes, 13 de julio de 2010

Hola!
I am here! Tired, but all is good. We went to the mission presidents house and had interviews, lunch, etc and then our companions came and picked us up! My companion seems awesome! Her name is Hermana Tejada. She is from Miami, FL. She spoke spanish before her mission, and her accent is very good! She has been out for 15 months! Our area is in the city and includes the mission presidents house, so it isn´t far at all.

Buenos Aires is huge! It is very beautiful. We went past the temple, and it is under construction right now. They said it will be rededicated in about a year, and we will probably get to do the open house and all of that! That will be something to look forward to for sure!

Normally my p day will be mondays, but on transfer weeks, p day is moved to tuesdays. So, today is pday. We are going to go grocery shopping, and then I will start unpacking, then at 6 we go out. We already have some investigators my companion tells me, and a wedding, and a baptismal date! She even set up for us to go teach more to our taxi driver who drove us from the mission presidents home to our apartment. We will mostly be using buses and trains and lots of walking. I feel kind of scatter brained at the moment, lots to take in and lots to learn, but it will come. It is pretty cold here today. Only in the upper 30s I would guess. It´s a nice change for sure!

For lunch, we had empenadas, and fruit salad, and these brownie things. All were delicious. I am going to come back fat haha. They told us that here in Argentina, they eat breakfast, and a late lunch, which we will often eat with members, and they dont really eat dinner.

I´m sure that next week, I will have plenty more to say, but that´s about all I have for now! Hopefully I can sleep really well tonight! I am tired after the traveling. There were crazy storms, so we didn´t get into Buenos Aires until around 10am this morning.

I am excited to be here and can´t wait until I can speak spanish!

Love,
Hermana Jones
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lunes, 12 de julio de 2010

July 12, 2010: Haley left the MTC at 8 am this morning bound for Argentina! She was able to call us from the airport and she sounded great! It was so good to hear her voice. She sounds the same only maybe a little more grown-up already. She was sad that Hermana Payne's VISA didn't come through so she had to stay at the MTC another week or two. The other 6 or 8 elders for her district were with her flying all the wayo Buenos Aires. She is the only sister in the group today so technically she is companios for 24 hours with 2 elders...not every sister can say she was companions with elders! She has a short layover in Atlanta this evening and then on to Buenos Aires where she will arrive at 8 am MST Tuesday morning the 13th f July. We can't wait to get that first e-mail saying she has arrived safely and where she will be serving.

Ann Marie

miércoles, 7 de julio de 2010

Hola!
I found out from the travel office I am all set to go monday morning at 8am! Hermana Wheeler leaves tuesday morning at 3am, and Hermana Payne's visa is delayed we just barely found out! So she is here for another 2 weeks they estimate at least. They sent in a request to have her temporarily reassigned just in case getting her visa takes longer than they expect.

This week was great! Thursday we got out travel plans. Saturday we had a special devotional for Independence Day. It was a musical presentation about religious freedom. It was pretty good. I think it was partially to keep us all indoors and occupied during the Carrie Underwood concert down the street at the stadium of fire. Then after that we got to watch the fireworks from the south parking lot of the MTC. It was pretty cool. That's about the only 4th of July celebrating we did. And the fireworks got done late so we had permission to go to bed about half an hour late. woohoo haha.

So I leave Monday morning at 8am, my flight is at 12pm, and I don't land in Buenos Aires until around 8am tuesday morning. That will be tiring, but I am excited. I'm sad that Hermana Payne won't be my companion when I travel. She was supposed to be on my same flight and everything with me. She and one other Elder in my district are the only two who got delayed. So I'll be flying with the rest of the Elders in my district. I can't believe how fast the time has flown. These two months have gone by fast! I will most likely call in Salt Lake before 12pm MST, but if for some reason I don't, I'll call on the layover in Atlanta. I haven't exactly figured that out yet. Also, since Melina won't be home, and if there is anyone else that won't, I think I can still call her if she has a cell phone with her. Send me a dearelder and let me know if she will have a phone, and what number it will be!

Sunday, we had a mission conference again, so no Relief Society or anything. The fireside Sunday was good. Both the fireside sunday, and the devotional tuesday were about the Book of Mormon and evidences of the truth of it.

This week we committed our progressing investigator Paola to baptism and she accepted. It went really well and we were really happy. We also had our last appointment with Gabriel yesterday, didn't get him quite to baptism, but it was going that direction. This week is teaching week. Meaning, instead of having class almost all day, we only have about an hour of class, and the rest of the time we practice teaching. I like it. Sometimes sitting in class for hours on end gets boring :).

Sister Dotson is here! I found her thursday morning. I have seen her almost everyday since then. She seems to be doing great! Her companion seems nice as well. Her companion is white, but a lot of the other missionaries she is with are Asian. It is fun to see her around. I still need to try and take a picture with her. The past few weeks we haven't been taking pictures because we haven't been going up to the temple, we have been doing more personal study instead on Sunday afternoons. I'll definitely have to find her before I leave and take one.

I will send a package home in the next couple of days with some things I don't need. Next week I'll be writing from Argentina! Also, I found out that you can still use Dearelder for my mission in Argentina. I believe it is free still as well. They print it and deliver it pouch or something is what I heard, so send me DearElder's people! DearElder.com. Otherwise, I have no clue what the mail is like down there... I guess we'll find out!

My favorite scripture this week has been: Alma 26:12.

Quote of the week:
"You never make the decision to quit and turn back when you're in the middle of a big hill." -Sis. Elaine S. Dalton

Love,
Hermana Jones

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jueves, 1 de julio de 2010

Hola!

This has been an awesome week as always!
Thanks for all the postcards! Looks like you guys had a fun time!

This week was the mission presidents seminar, and it was cool! There were lots of general authority sightings. We shook Elder Christoffersons hand. We also had a special devotional by Elder Oaks that was awesome! That was friday night, and after the special devotional I got to meet my mission president and his wife! They are so nice and so awesome! I also got to meet all the other Elders/Sisters going to my mission that are in the MTC right now! My mission presidents wife is so funny. She goes "hey girls! I found out today that we don't have to require you to wear nylons, so after the mtc, say goodbye to those!" She was so funny.

Hermana Wheeler got to sing to apostles and/or the Prophet everyday last week since she was in the special choir! We weren't allowed to go, but she always came back so excited!

We get our travel plans tomorrow or friday! I'll know when I can call home and everything! I'm so excited! Still no word on the visas... so hopefully we get those in the next couple days too. We hear that the world cup is slowing everything down majorly and there have been tons of delays. My mission president and his wife even have to go home for awhile til they can get their's.

As for the picture for the plaque, choose any you want, you can pick one of me here I've sent home, or whatever, it doesn't matter too much. I'll try and make a CD of pics and send it home next week too.

Today, we got to go to the outside world! Hermana Payne lost her drivers license, so we had to be driven in an MTC van to the DMV in Provo. It was fun. Then we waited over an hour for them to pick us up. We actually talked to lots of spanish speaking people. Someone in the DMV asked Hermana Wheeler if she could help her because she didn't know english, but Hermana Wheeler had no idea what she was saying. It was really funny.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KATIE!!!! I wish I could be there to celebrate! Just know I will be thinking about you!

So I had the most embarrassing moment of my life this week... This one probably shouldn't be posted to my blog. (Names have been changed to protect the innocent). One of my companions Hna. Longhair, went up to some Elders to practice contacting. We know these Elders pretty well, but luckily they left for the field the next day... Hna. Me, and Hna. Ouch followed suit. Right as Hna Me and Hna Ouch caught up to Hna. Longhair, Hna. Me accidentally let out a disturbing bodily function. It was definitely heard by all, but I don't think the Elders knew which Hna is came from... Hna. Ouch, and Hna. Me started laughing til we were almost crying, while Hna. Longhair tried to finish the contact without cracking a smile. Anyways, long story short, it was embarrassing, and we just start laughing almost to tears whenver we think about it. Now that that's out of the way...


Before I leave the MTC, could you please send me:
-my wax kit thing in my bathroom in a small ziploc bag thing
-maybe some more stamps
-some more knee highs
-my address for pouch and for regular letters in Argentina (I forgot to bring it :) )
-could you print me these talks? -The Atonement and Faith (Elder Oaks), Why Do We Serve (Oaks), and Abide in Me (Holland) I highly recommend them :)

I'll be on the lookout for Sis. Dotson today!

1Nephi 1:20 - Tender mercies are everywhere, keep an eye out for them! Oh, cool story, so Hermana Payne lost her scriptures this week, she loses things a lot, but I had been praying about where they were and then one night I was studying the restoration and wasn't even thinking about them, but I heard a voice in my head say her scriptures are in the TRC in such and such class room and so we went and they were there! It was crazy.

My talk went well, there were no General Authorites at that meeting, but we did see many that day.

Quote of the week:
"Strength and struggle go together. The supreme reward of struggle is strength. Life is a battle and the greatest joy is to overcome. The pursuit of easy things makes men weak. Do NOT equipt yourselves with supreme power and hope to escape the responsibility and work. It cannot be done. It is by following the lines of least resistance that makes rivers and men crooked."

Last night for Devotional, Sis. Dalton spoke and it was awesome! She talked about faith and virtue. Well, I'm out of time.
I hope you all have a great week! Thanks to both Grandma's for the letters this week!

I love you all!

Hermana Jones

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