Wow! I heard so many good things from you guys this week! I'm happy :D
This week was packed, and really interesting...
Week 1 in the office was the routine: Goodbye dinner to the retornos, welcome to the newbies, and new leadership training. President Salerno wanted me to lead most of the trainings, because he wanted Elder Singh to see how we do things in the office, so I still had to carry the load, and it was like all other week 1's... TIRING!
It was extra weird because Sage Beesley, a high school friend of mine, came to the mission! She looked pretty shell shocked! It was cool to talk to her though, and I think she'll be fine. She went to Ushuaia, so I'll be seeing her soon! We totally forgot to take a foto though (sorry Mom!)
At the end of the week, we had booked a flight with LADE, the trashiest, sketchiest airline on the planet, so that I could get down to Rio Grande. It's cool though, because instead of 19 hours on a bus, you have 2.5 hours in a flying garbage can that actually costs less :D However, Friday night, as I was halfway through packing, and getting ready to go to a dinner with Daniel y Maria (my investigators when I was a LZ in Comodoro Norte), the airline called me (at 7:45 PM) and cancelled the flight! I was MAD!!!! So I threw everything in bags, ran to the terminal, and took the last possible bus to Rio Grande. It was a close cut!
So yeah, I passed almost all Saturday on a bus that almost left me in Chile! I've become a pro at sleeping on busses though (I use my suit coat as a blanket, and I'm gone) During the trip, I met Jennifer from Italy who speaks English, she told me all about her travels (and gave me a ton of travel tips fof the Europe trip that I want to do with my #OfficialBestFriend Elder Austin Ramsey) and I met Guillermo, a petrolero that transits between Comodoro and Rio Grande for work. Guillermo didnt really want anything, but Jennifer was super cool and accepted a pamphlet of the Restoration. I hope she reads it!
When I got to Rio Grande, EVERYTHING CHANGED! Right before I came down here, President Salerno decided to make a few more changes... He assigned me to Rama Chacra de Rio Grande, as the new Lider de Distrito of Distrito Chacra! My new companion is Elder Lees from Mesa, Arizona (2nd companion from Mesa #Farabee) and he's in his 2nd transfer in the field, which means that on top of DL, I'm a trainer!
I'm beyond pumped for the new asignacion! Elder Lees is a capo, and he already speaks spanish well. Plus, I got to speak with the district last night, and they have a lot of potential! Deep down, I feel like the Lord knew all along that this was going to happen, and I feel like Chacra is the place thats meant for me!
I'm happy for all these changes because the truth is that I was feeling a bit bad when I first got here... I couldn't believe that I wasn't assistant anymore, I don't have a car, I'm far from my family away from home (President, Hermana Salerno, Ekblad, etc...), and on top of it all, IT'S COLD DOWN HERE! It's really, REALLY, cold! Plus, I don't regret extending, I really don't, but the thought did cross my mind that I would have been hugging Mom this Wednesday, and for the first time in my mission, I actually asked myself "What am I doing here?". In Tolhuin, maybe I felt that way sometimes, but I always knew deep down why I was there, but this week, I actually didn't know what I was doing on this freezing island without my minivan.
So I prayed. I asked God to show me why I'm here, why I felt like I needed to stay. And on Sunday, as I was in Priesthood, we read these scriptures in D&C 64:25,33-34 -->
25 Wherefore, if ye believe me, ye will labor while it is called today.
33 Wherefore, be not weary in well doing, for ye are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of small things proceedeth that which is great.
34 Behold, the Lord requireth the heart and a willing mind; and the willing and obedient shall eat the good of the land of Zion in these last days.
So that's what I decided to do. In that moment, I said inside myself "Father, I may not know what I'm doing here, I may not know what my purpose is, but I'm gonna do what I always do, from Tolhuin, to Gallegos, to Trelew, to Comodoro, and back to la Isla: I'm just gonna do what's right" That's been my whole mission! I haven't been perfect, and maybe I haven't always had a clear vision of the work, but I just keep working, and keep trusting in the Lord, and keep giving until the last drop. So I'M PUMPED! I think the Lord wanted me to figure all that out, and now He's revealed to me his real plan: CHACRA! We'll see how it goes!
Apart from all that, I learned to make an asado with President, and Hermano Sielas was way happy to see me, but is going to be heartbroken when he hears that I'm going to another branch!
FAMILY! I'm pumped that you guys are going well! You're all so trunky haha! We'll be seeing each other soon :)
MOM! Congratulations on the new full-time job! I'm proud of you! LOVE YOU!
SOFIA! Capa, capa, capa, capa, capa, capa, CAPA! Bien ahi con el tercer premio, sos una capa pero re capa, sos re inteligente. Felicidades loca!
TE AMO! I love you guys! Have a good week :) - Elder Jimenez
Hey family :)
Sounds like you guys had a good week, so that makes me happy! I had a pretty good week as well!
As you guys already heard, we passed a PDay in Calafate, which was really cool! The glacier was really beautiful! It was huge, and every once in a while, chunks of ice would fall off and make huge splashes in the water. The water of the lake has a Carribean Blue color because of a substance that they call "Glacial Milk" so that's pretty interesting haha!
After going to the glacier, we went to centro, and I decided that it was finally time to buy some recuerdos to bring you guys, and I'll just let yall know, you're going to be spoiled when I get home! I spent a particularly large sum of money with some artisans who are members, named Pedro and Viki. They have a little baby named Jeremias who is literally, and they confess to this as well, the happiest baby on earth. The little guy was so cute! When we went to their tienda to buy some stuff for you guys, he was sleeping, but we woke him up, and he was all smiles. It was muy tierno!
I thought it was a worthy place to buy the bulk of my gifts for you guys because they're members, One of the pictures that I sent home is with Pedro in the terminal of Calafate. He had come to say goodbye to us and had made Elder Ekblad, Elder Singh, and I special pins with our names on them, and also, he gave me a ring, that he called the "Ring of Nefi". Its really cool, and I think I'm going to wear it the rest of my life as a recuerdo de Argentina.
So Calafate was awesome! After passing PDay there, we took a colectivo to Gallegos. On Tuesday it was Elder Singhs birthday, so we celebrated by eating sushi with the local elders, since Rio Gallegos has the best sushi restaurant in the Patagonia. It was really fun!
We had 2 days in Gallegos before the conference. In each of the 2 days, I was able to visit a family per day, los Vargas and los Baier. I was soooooo happy to hear that the Baiers are going to temple prep classes, and are determined to go to the temple to be sealed as a family this November! Those were big news for me!
los Baier
We also used the 2 days before the conference to work with the local elders. It was fun to see my old area, although these days I pass through there so much that it didn't have as much novelty as the first time I had returned.
After the conference, I had learned from one of my weekly calls that Comodoro Norte, the zone in which we live, still wasn't having much progress, so in an effort to help, after giving the conference in Gallegos, we took an 11 hour, overnight colectivo to come to Comodoro and push people to work. On Friday and Saturday, among all the other stuff we had to do, we were able to get out and do lots of divisions, giving our best effort to bring people to church, and progress as a zone.
Overall, it was a busy, but really fun week. We released transfers on Saturday. You all might like to know that Elder Allen, my trainee from a year and a half ago, is going to be a Zone Leader this transfer! I'm proud of him, he's learned and grown a lot, and he deserves it! He's going to be in Ushuaia, so the two of us are going to be in Tierra del Fuego.
However, President Salerno wants me to stay up here for the week to help show Elder Singh how to train the newbies and the new trainers and leaders, so I'm not going to make it down to Rio Grande until Saturday, on a direct flight on the sketchiest plane company of Argentina, LADE, haha! It will be fun to train the newbies though because my friend Sage Beesley from high school is in the group that's arriving on Tuesday. It's going to be weird, but fun!
All in all, I'm pumped to get back to the field for my last 5 weeks of the mission. I love Argentina, its people, the Lord, the Book of Mormon, and the mission. I'm excited to have an area where the biggest focus I have is getting out and preaching!
FAMILY! Mom is so trunky! She told me that I only have 45 days left, so that was a splash of cold water for me! I hope you guys are ready for a Star Wars marathon in the basement haha! MOM! You're so trunky! I'm glad you love me though :) I'm proud of you for almost making it through the school year! LOVE YOU!
Love you guys! - Elder Jimenez
Hey everybody :)
I'm glad that you guys enjoyed each others company this week!
This week for me was pretty busy! We gave 2 conferences, one on Wednesday in Trelew and one on Friday in Comodoro, both of which went well. We decided to continue focusing on the plan we put in motion in January, so we're reviewing some stuff in the conferences, as well as refining the plan a bit. It's going really well.
The historic record of the Patagonia for baptisms in a month is 38, which we set last year in July, which down here is always the most productive month. However, last year, President Salerno had put the goal of achiving 45 in a month. It was always there in our minds, but we never came very close apart from when we got 38, and most of the time, although it would have been cool, the missionaries didn't really put it as a real goal.
So this year, President Salerno (<-genious) decided that, instead of putting a super high goal every month that we never achieve, he put trimestral (tri=3, mes=month, trimestral=3 months, o sea, 4 per year) goals of 96 baptisms per trimester. He told us that if we can get 96 bautismos per trimester, even though wed only have to get 32 per month, instead of 45, we would increase the baptisms by 50% this year.
Closing up February, the funniest thing happened. We achieved 25 baptisms in January (which although it's not 32, is way more than last year, and a great achievement considering that we also had a good month in December), so that left us with 71 more baptisms to achieve the trimestral goal. Then, last month, we achieved 26 baptisms (which was really cool because for the first time ever in the mission, we're consistently having good months, with an increasing trend of baptsims), and when you subtract 26 from 71, it leaves you with.... 45.
March is different though. Weve never been so prepared as a mission to reach 45 baptisms. There are tons of investigators that have accepted baptisimal dates, and with the plan we put in place, the leaders have made a huge change, and are leading their zones and districts with a lot more ingenuity and power. I've got a great feeling about this month! If we can get 45 my last full month of the mission, and on top of that, achieve the 96 per trimester the first time we go after it, I will die happy!
Today, I'm writing from Calafate. On Saturday we came down here because President wanted to assist church, which was really cool. We got to do divisions with the elders here and a member. I went with the member, named Nico. We were knocking doors, not having much success, and I was like "Alright Nico, we need to set a goal. What do you want the goal to be?" We decided that we wanted to put 3 appointments for the elders to go to. We said a prayer, asking the Lord to help us with our goal, then, the next door we knocked, a man named Ricardo let us in! We taught a very spiritual lesson, and left him with a ton of interest and a return appointment. We then went on to set two more appointments with the next two people that we stopped in the street as we walked back to the meeting place with the other missionaries. I know that if we let the Lord know about our righteous plans, and ask him for help, we will have success!
President had to go to Chile for a couple days, so now, we're going to pass PDay here, then make our way to Rio Gallegos to prepare my last conference. Today, we're going to go see el Glaciar Perito Moreno, the biggest growing glacier in the world. I'm pumped! :D
To end on a spiritual note, this week, I've made an extra effort to read the Book of Mormon every day, and boy have I seen the blessings! I've been reading every night before I go to bed, and I kid you not, I've been sleeping better than ever! The Book of Mormon has become the keystone of my testimony, and I know that if we read it in a spirit of prayer every day, all the promised blessings from the prophets for doing so will be realized in our lives.
FAMILY: I'm glad that you guys were able to pass some time together this week! SOFIA! BYU! BYU! BYU! Nos vemos muchacha! MOM: You just had a same old same old week, being the hero that you are :) LOVE YOU! Love you guys :) - Elder Jimenez
