May 2016

May 2, 2016

They havent had a game at the stadium near us for a while, they are in the process of building a new belgrano stadium. But always buses full of soccer fans going to the games, and been lots of games lately. Havent seen any parrots, there are some very different birds here though.

G got baptized but in a different ward close by due to living situation, but he invited us to his baptisim that was this last saturday. It was great, really went through alot of trails up to his baptism. really stayed strong and faithful. We are teaching another H who is amazing. read the whole joseph smith pamphlet and last friday he was in 2 nefi. Hopefully he'll come to church this coming sunday. meeting with him wednesday.

May 9, 2016 TRANSFER TO CATAMARCA

It was GREAT to talk to you all yestarday!Transfer went pretty well long bus ride with on and off sleep but i slept a little bit this morning and feel great now. Elder Lopez is going to be a great companion. Sometimes its hard/sad to leave but i havent had really big problem with transfers. Its sad to leave the members and people your teaching then a comp in my opinion. I traveled with one elder and a hermana

Valle viejo Catamarca! i'll try to take alot more pictures 

I feel like trying to find people that honestly have the desire to listen and some of the very humbling thing seen or experienced are the hardest things of the mission.  

Best part of the mission is seeing the change and happiness the gospel brings to peoples lives.

Love you and miss you

May 16, 2016

First week here was great!! Lots of success and plenty of work to do here in catamarca. Adjusting very well. The people here are very tranquilo and very receptivo. We are very close to the mountians! Ate some more locro sunday, was so good. Probably one of my favorite foods here in Argentina now. The apartment is a lot better from day one here, we´ve been cleaning little by little and it is making a huge difference.

Got a mom who is getting married and then she is going to get baptized with two of her daughters. Also we are teaching this amazing kid who wants to get baptized, has a very sad story. 

May 23, 2016

Loving the area more and more each day! Always ending the week and days very tired, lots of work :) It's more green now because its winter, but usually its a green brown. The mountains had snow on the peaks this morning. 

We baptized last night, L is a a amazing and very smart kid. We have been working with him a ton the last past 2 weeks. He was so excited for his baptism. Very sad that his mom didnt come, but it still was a great night for him. And we have another one planned for this saturday or sunday. In two weeks the our zone of 10 missionaries has 11 baptisms and achieved zone sion (each companship has baptized)

                                                        I dont know why but the computer is reading my camera, i have a ton of amazing pictures to send.... :( 

I'll try to send the soon as possible if not next week for sure.    

May 30, 2016  1 YEAR!!  

Finally got to send those pictures. 

Lots of missionary work going on here. We had the baptism of S this past saturday! We traveled to La Rioja wednesdy morning at 5 to have a conference with President Alliud. Was a great conference even with only 28 of us there, so different from the conferences that i have had in cordoba. I loved it though lots more one on one and i learned alot. 13 of june we travel to cordoba to have the departing of President Alliud... going to be a bitter sweet moment. 

Covering a ward and a branch is very draining sundays but i love it at the same time. We refferals here and there but mainly we work with part memeber families and people we talk to. But we love refferals!!

We went to a lost old village that was found last monday and wednesday 25 de mayo was a huge holiday in Argentina and we ate lots of locro.   

 

April 2016

March 28, 2016

¡Feliz Pascua!

Favorite part of the week was Easter, Loved Easter. Wonderful talks sunday in church and we had our missionary choir concert last night. The stake center was packed and i got to see members from arguello! The songs sounded great and the spirt was very strong. We had tranfers and nothing really happen me and elder brinton are staying.

The rest of week was pretty good we had fun walmart run before a zone meeting and really great district meeting. We also found this reaqly yummy italian icecream place and some great choripan with the elders quorum the other day.

I'm very excited for conference this coming week!!

April 4, 2016 10 months

WOW what a wonderful general conference!!Kevin R. Ducan, Mervyn B. Arnold,  David A. Bednar, Christopher Wadedell, Dieter F. Uchtdorf, and Jeffery R. Holland were some of my favorites talkers during conference! Especially loved the talks by Bednar and Holland!!

We had a amazing miracle reference from the Easter concert. G who is 17 almost 18. He has been to a different ward 2 times where his parents live with a friend who is a member. But he lives in a apartment behind his grandparents house in our area. Very smart and nice guy, is in his first year of medical school and knows english pretty well. He has read 3/4ths of the Book of Mormon and has been reading lots of articles on the church website and app. We are now teaching him, He has a amazing testimony already and is taking things very seriously. He had a dream that has built his testimony of the church being true. He is waiting to turn 18 at the end of this month so he can get baptized with out signed content,  because his mom is super evangelical and is against his decision. His dad is pretty catholic and his grandparents are ultra Catholics. He is demonstrating so much faith in his decision to be baptized even though his family doesnt like the idea to much. 

Love you all and hope you enjoy sunday's talks!

Elder Andrew Mendenhall

April 11, 2016

Been Washington weather this whole past week, lots of clouds, rain, sprinkles, and overcast. Haven't seen the physical sun all week. The weather is still continuing and its actually pretty chilly. Little rough with the missionary work this week with the weather because nothing happens here when its cold and rainy. No one comes out for anything here when it rains even just a little. Best part of the week was when we helped a member move to a different apartment in the area, loving doing service in the mission. We had a fun P-day today, we played pool and went bowling. We have interviews with President tomorrow. 

April 18, 2016 

My week was really good. This older couple that is refrence from a member are progressing a ton, however H is a state of bad health and is waiting for his kidney transplant. Sadly he got pretty sick saturday niht so they couldnt go to church. been reading the book of mormon, We are going to invite them to be baptized tuesday. Friday it got really hot out of the blue, close to 100 degrees, we took advantage of the good weather and contacted a bunch. We found some cool people that have some potential. Back to cold and rainy weather now, i bought new sweater today.

I talked about the sacrament. 

Tips on prayers:

-be specific

-express your feelings and thoughts

-explain your desires/goals and how you plan to accomplish/achieve them.

-pray outloud in a private place

April 25, 2016

We find people by talking to people in the street or contacting houses. We've been talking to alot of people daily and found some new investigadores and others who have intrest to hear our message.  The investigator family is doing good, he is doing a bit  bettter. 

Yes Argentinians take siestas daily, lots of places are closed during this time period of the day and not too many people are out. For that and also it being the hottest time of the day we had a hour nap  during the siesta in our summer schedule. 

We take the bus around everywhere, there are a few areas that have bikes

The next transfer is in two mondays,I believe I will transfer.

Have had a small head cold since Saturday but i'm already getting over it. Had intercambios twice this week once with the zone leaders i was with Elder Price my trainer in my area which was fun to work with again, we taught a guy in a park. The other one was with our district on saturday.

Really good peru food, this small green squash that is pumpkin shaped and it is stuffed with meat and cheese, and then you have rice on the side. Reminded me of stuffed peppers. 

Love you!

March 2016

Feb 29, 2016

We just lived without water and power for a while, but then when the elders (Kelly & Mikesell) that are close to us had power we slept and showered there. We looked pretty rough after one day of hot heat and any form of personal hygine. 

This week was alot better, got a little head cold but it wasnt anything bad. Had a really great brodcast from elder Bednar this past wednesday. Was a little hard finding new people to teach this week which was a bit disapointing but we had ton of people in church sunday (130). We made banana bread for the relief society  and gave it out sunday to thank them for all their help and lunches. They loved it and want to know our recipe. 

Tell them to email any question they want about argentina or missionary work. may be a little hard to reply with time but i can do it.

March 07, 2016 9 months

starting get chilly here, been really cloudy and windy today. Been doing a lot cooking lately. We had a pretty decent week, we went to the temple tuesday and then we had really good pizza with peporoni from the states. A members daughter is visting from the states for a months and she brought a bunch of american stuff here, we had lunch with them. we are going over friday to cook them banana bread and wash their dog. We have a baptism coming up this saturday we are trying to complete a family.  usually for service we clean up and cut yards, stack cynder bricks, paint, and wash dogs now.

Cant wait for conference either, we also have zone conference this friday with president which should be good. 

March 14, 2016

Yeah its pretty crazy to think ive been out that long. Time is certainly flying have to make every moment count here. My week was pretty good we did a lot stuff to prepare the baptism that we had this past saturday.The baptism went prett well we made banana bread for it hahaha we just keeping making so much banana bread. We are doing a missionary choir for Easter here and we've been practicing every sunday and monday, coming to well very nicely. That sounds pretty intresting, and that would be really cool to see all the handpainted eggs. Ooo i want to see the tulips fields!! Yes we are going into fall now which means winter is just around the corner.

There are a lot of great scriptures that explain that we are made in his image and that we came to earth to become like him. We need a body to achieve the purpose to become like him, also it shows us that we are literally sons and daughters of god.

March 21, 2016

My week was pretty good. We got a really good refernce and lesson with some new investigadores, been through some hard times but im happy that we can help with our messages. Also we had someonme show up at church and said he wanted to change his life. He lost his home and job two days earlier. He has quite the past but we found a job and are excited to help him out. The choir is turning out great we sing this sunday, the songs sound really good. Elder Brinton and I gave talks in church sunday. We also had really good food from columbia y Venezuela. I dont thing they do anything specail they do for Easter, they have little candies and eggs but thats about it.  

February 2016

February 22, 2016

Well Monday night we had a huge storm that destroyed some stuff; lots of trees, roads, power lines, cars and some houses got really flooded. with the floods we were without power or water for three days and then there was a street riot outside the third day burning trash and rubber and blocking the street requesting water and power. That was quite the interesting event. 

We got some really awesome investagadores, we had three come to church. Weve also been teaching some english which has been pretty fun too.´

 


February 8, 2016

factoras are like sweet cresants with differnt fillings and toppings. The bakeries here are great! Yestarday it rained like crazy after church and we got caught in the middle of the storm and got completely soaked and then the main road flooded and it was flowing like a river, we were walking up to our knees walking in water yestarday! Was quite the adventure(Elder bravo has the pictures, hopfeully he´ll send them to me soon) today is tranfesrs, Elder bravo left for chilecito which is super north 9 hours away, dropped him off at the bus terminal last night and slept in the pension of the zone leaders. Now i Have elder Brinton who is a great friend from my last zone, should be a great transfer and companionship. This transfer is 7 weeks long because they uped the normal time in MTC from 2 weeks to 3 weeks. Also soon will be having a brodcast from elder bednard for all the missions in south america. 

Loved the package and actually the chocalte was suprisingly alright! The choclates and sweets from germany are super good! Loved the birthday present very much! love you guys

February 1, 2016 8 MONTHS :)

Hi mom! I know right its crazy how fast Enero went by, and im sure Febrero will go by even faster. 8 months yikes!!! Yeah the temps have a lot nicer this week for us and no poweroutages. The city life is great, it very difficult to contact with apartments and lots of people busy or not home. Like that everything is close and you can pretty much find anything you need or any type of store. Really good bakery near our pension always fresh and delcious factoras. 3 of them got baptized this saturday, we are still working with the dad (we have lots of work to do with) and the one of the girls who is really shy and wants to wait for her dad. So this week we are going to help them out and also be looking for more news to teach. 

Also the packages are in the office, im picking them up tomorrow :)

(it took 10 weeks for this christmas/birthday package to arrive, better late then never-Sara)

January 2016

January 26, 2016

Its been crazy hot it got so hot that our power went out in our aprtment complex and our power dint come back on with everyone elses. A cable burnout in our apartment so we were with out power for 2 and half days. We didnt sleep to well those days with the heat. But everything is good now and the air conditioner is working. 

We had a crazy storm yestarday night, started with a heavy winds and a sand storm kind of thing, then heavy rain, lots of hail, and lots of thunder and lighting. 

My week was pretty good slowky getting use to the crazy hotness. We have a baptism this coming saturday!

Fotos:

-a very fun advertisment that we found for a comedy play 

-A young man from our ward getting set apart before he left for the mtc en buenas aires, serving his mission in argentina but more south. 

-Wislon washed up in Argentina

-the sky before the storm hit last night 

January 18, 2016 Andrew's 20th Birthday!

Thank you! Its really weird thinking I'm 20. I hope it makes it soon too, thinking it should be close or its ready to be picked up. It was a pretty great week. Well we had the baptism of N this past Saturday which was great, was a very emotional and spirtual experence for her. Her sister and her family came and we set a baptism date for the entire family of 6(minus one because he isnt 8) for 30th of january. They all came to church this past sunday too. Earlier that day we when we were cleaning and filling the faunt we ran into scorpions the parentes were a decent size and like 5 super small babies. Oh also very exciting news we got a small air condtioner unit for our bedroom, soooo nice! its been so hot and humid here, sometimes 40 

Very pretty picture, miss the cold and snow for a change haha never thought i would say that. 

yestarday it was a members birthday so we had a combined birthday lunch after church!

candy bar for my bday from president and his wife, super good

Transfer time - big city life

12/28/205
​It was amazing talking to you all, miss you guys ton after! Really do love the mission even though a times things can be hard. Yes I transfered, Im in the city now, 9 de julio ( 9 of July). Got another chileno, his name is Elder Bravo! i knew him a little bit before now, he is super awesome and excited to be his comp and work with him. Thank you :) and i look around now that im in the city but im thinking no. We live in apartment complex. we have a elevator but its a bit sketchy, but hey we have an elevator! we cleaned the apartment a bit today and i unpacked, met a member who does our laundry and the we had lunch with other members. Our apartment is super close (1 block) to the soccer field of Belgrano, a team i like here, can see the field from our window.

Thats A LOT of food--pommes, meat and an egg or two

Apartment with a view-Soccer stadium

01/04/2016 7 months
yes the location or the name of the ward. and yup lots of food. the member got mad at us because we didnt eat it all of it even though we were stuffed. she is from peru and its bad manners not to eat all the food presented, means that you didnt like. but there is certain point when you just cant eat anymore and it was super good.  next we have lunch with this family we are either going to have giant stomach ache or bring a tubberware to put the leftovers in. the food from peru is really good, we have lots of members from peru is this ward and area. 

New years was pretty good, felt the same as christmas! haha Loooots of fireworks! yeah we have a entire family that will getting baptized in 2 to 3 weeks. and also a few news here and there. I like the city, just really hot and we talk to and help alot of drunk people in the street. 

New Years

New Years

1/11/2016

Yes there are plenty of intresting people in the city, find them everyday. being in the service of others is something special with a unique feeling. Well we set a baptism date for this up coming saturday, so we have a baptism this saturday. The sister's family of N should be getting baptized next weekend. Also i was able to go to Arguello for the baptism of G and Y. I baptized G. Super awesome to the huge change the gospel has had in his life. Especially their wedding and him quiting smoking. i will send the fotos when i can because i dont have the adapter with me.