Dear Everyone,
Well, I did it. I have completed one year on the mission. Crazy to think about. I am now more than half way through with my service to the Lord. Everything is going great here in Mariló. We are working really hard to baptize people. We have a lot of candidates who have baptismal dates. We are really working so that they keep their commitments. We have the goal in the mission of baptizing someone on Sunday the 10th of October (happy birthday Marcos) because that day is 10/10/10. Pretty cool no? If I repeat myself from my last email, act like it’s something new ok? Jaja.
So Wednesday was a pretty cool day. We got challenged by our zone leaders, who live with us, to see who could teach the most lessons in the day. So we went out and just started going crazy with finding people. While going crazy looking for people, we both got bit by dogs. My comp got bit on the hand by a rottweiler. The dog stuck his head outside the fence and bit my comp. It was so scary/weird. Then about half hour later we reached a dead end where we had to turn around. (Way to go Elder Pickett, didn’t you know you had to turn around on a dead end?) Yes, yes I know, I know. So when we turned around there was the dog. It was kinda like those movies where the terrorist dog corners the person and then tries to kill them. The dog stopped in front of us and I went to pass/kick the dog just like any other dog but no, it’s not like any other dog. As I go pass the dog, it starts attacking my pant leg and actually grabs my leg. Let’s just say that it hurt really bad and that the dog was hurting worse. JA! I kicked the dog so hard that I thought I killed it for a second, but then it got up and whimpered away. Oh the life of a missionary. Oh, anyway, the competition, so we went just teaching like crazy. We ended up with 13 lessons that day. And the zone leaders… 10! JA! We won a pizza napolitana from them. It was so good. I love pizza from here. It’s better than the states. I am very convinced that the food here is better than the food there except for Mexican food.
So the mother-in-law of one of our investigators is Paraguaya and she knows how to speak Guaraní, Portuguese and castellano. I am trying to learn Portuguese because I want to go to Brazil in 2014. I have a lot of phrases down but still a long ways to go. It is starting to get really hot. It’s like 75 degrees…. Ja ok that’s not hot but it’s hotter than it was before. I have to pull out my short sleeves again. Time for summer. YAHOO! We are really happy with the progress of our investigators and we have a lot of faith that they will reach their baptisms.
Thank you Mom and Dad, Abu y Grandpa, and Grandma and Grandpa Packard for your emails. I love hearing from you all. And for the rest of you who have sent me letters and stuff, I have no post office to send letters so just accept this for now. Thank you mom I got my package. I’m just having a blast here in Argentina. Loving everything about it. And don't forget General Conference this weekend! Until next week, SEE YA!
Love,
Elder Pickett
Monday, September 27, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
ONE YEAR!!!
Dear Everyone,
Here we are, another week and a new companion. My new companion is Elder Hart from Las Vegas! He is a hoot. He is so much fun. We have fun everyday and we work like crazy. He and I are very similar and we can get a lot done because we understand each other. Thank heavens for one of these companions. Well, last week, we just got to work. We went out and went sacking [note: Spanglish from the Spanish verb "sacar" or to take out] fecha happy. In the week, we sacked out 4 fechas with investigators. After the week was over, we still have three of them. We are just rocking right now. He brings the energy that we lacked in the area. We are having a lot of fun.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett and Elder Hart with Luana]
Wednesday we went to Ramos Mejía for something very special. I got to eat lunch with Abuelita y Grandpa. That was a lot of fun. Abuelita was herself. JA! She was crying and was really happy and Grandpa was like “hey buckwheat!”. It was really great to talk with them and eat a lot with them. We ate some milanesas caballos and some pizza. A lot of food but it was really good. Other than that, the week was pretty normal.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett's surprise visitors]
It has been getting hotter and there has been more sun so that means the brown skin is coming back. I am starting to get my watch tan line back so that definitely means its getting hotter and more sunny. So we have been helping one of our investigators try and quit smoking. Missionaries have tried for 2 years to help her quit. We are bound and determined that it is going to be us that will baptize her. So my companion had an idea that he heard in the MTC and so we are going to try it. It is where we make fake cigs and put scriptures on the fake cigs. We put five fake cigs in a pack of ten. Every time she goes to smoke, if she pulls out a cig, she can smoke. But if she pulls out a fake cig, she has to read the scripture and pray for strength to stop smoking. She said she hadn’t tried this idea before so we’ll see how it goes. I hope it works because we want to baptize her. The best of the best missionaries have past through and have not been able to baptize her.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett and Little Luana]
We have this goal as a mission to have every area baptize on the 10th of October. The reason is because it is un día de diez!! The date is going to be 10/10/10 and that is the only time in our life that it is going to happen so we want everyone to be baptized on that date to remember it better. We have a lot of work ahead of us in this grand work of the Lord. I am having a great time serving the people of Argentina. For as much as it gets hard and uncomfortable to do some things, I am very grateful for the opportunity to learn and grow. I know that I am becoming a better person by serving. I hope that you all are doing your part and are sharing the gospel with your non member friends. Invite them to come to church. Be friends with them so they will want to know more.
Thanks Mom and Dad for your emails. I really appreciate that every week you guys write to me. I am starting to understand when people say that it is crazy that we talk with our family twice a year on the phone. It is crazy. But it’s all good. ONE YEAR YAHOO!!!!!! I love you all.
Love
Elder Pickett
Here we are, another week and a new companion. My new companion is Elder Hart from Las Vegas! He is a hoot. He is so much fun. We have fun everyday and we work like crazy. He and I are very similar and we can get a lot done because we understand each other. Thank heavens for one of these companions. Well, last week, we just got to work. We went out and went sacking [note: Spanglish from the Spanish verb "sacar" or to take out] fecha happy. In the week, we sacked out 4 fechas with investigators. After the week was over, we still have three of them. We are just rocking right now. He brings the energy that we lacked in the area. We are having a lot of fun.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett and Elder Hart with Luana]
Wednesday we went to Ramos Mejía for something very special. I got to eat lunch with Abuelita y Grandpa. That was a lot of fun. Abuelita was herself. JA! She was crying and was really happy and Grandpa was like “hey buckwheat!”. It was really great to talk with them and eat a lot with them. We ate some milanesas caballos and some pizza. A lot of food but it was really good. Other than that, the week was pretty normal.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett's surprise visitors]
It has been getting hotter and there has been more sun so that means the brown skin is coming back. I am starting to get my watch tan line back so that definitely means its getting hotter and more sunny. So we have been helping one of our investigators try and quit smoking. Missionaries have tried for 2 years to help her quit. We are bound and determined that it is going to be us that will baptize her. So my companion had an idea that he heard in the MTC and so we are going to try it. It is where we make fake cigs and put scriptures on the fake cigs. We put five fake cigs in a pack of ten. Every time she goes to smoke, if she pulls out a cig, she can smoke. But if she pulls out a fake cig, she has to read the scripture and pray for strength to stop smoking. She said she hadn’t tried this idea before so we’ll see how it goes. I hope it works because we want to baptize her. The best of the best missionaries have past through and have not been able to baptize her.
.JPG)
[Elder Pickett and Little Luana]
We have this goal as a mission to have every area baptize on the 10th of October. The reason is because it is un día de diez!! The date is going to be 10/10/10 and that is the only time in our life that it is going to happen so we want everyone to be baptized on that date to remember it better. We have a lot of work ahead of us in this grand work of the Lord. I am having a great time serving the people of Argentina. For as much as it gets hard and uncomfortable to do some things, I am very grateful for the opportunity to learn and grow. I know that I am becoming a better person by serving. I hope that you all are doing your part and are sharing the gospel with your non member friends. Invite them to come to church. Be friends with them so they will want to know more.
Thanks Mom and Dad for your emails. I really appreciate that every week you guys write to me. I am starting to understand when people say that it is crazy that we talk with our family twice a year on the phone. It is crazy. But it’s all good. ONE YEAR YAHOO!!!!!! I love you all.
Love
Elder Pickett
Monday, September 13, 2010
Transfer week and Pictures
[Note: This week was transfer week so Allen didn't get much time to write. He only had 10 minutes so he downloaded some pictures and we chatted a bit. I told him that he had to share at least one small story from this week. He has a new companion, elder Christopher Allen Hart from Las Vegas, Nevada.]
OK. We had family home evening Saturday night with two families. It was great to see people doing family home evening. The topic was about the family. How to raise a good family is such a difficult world. The children down here in Argentina have a very hard time with everything. They have a lot of pressure on them with temptations and all. I see a lot of kids everyday that get caught by the lies of Satan. That is why I am so glad I was raised the way I was in the place where I lived. I told them many a story of my childhood and how Mom and Dad raised me with strict rules. They were all in awe. Then afterward we ate some really good empanadas. .... How is that for a short story lol
Capilla en Mariló - street view
Capilla en Mariló - building
Some random photos of him and companions:
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
OK. We had family home evening Saturday night with two families. It was great to see people doing family home evening. The topic was about the family. How to raise a good family is such a difficult world. The children down here in Argentina have a very hard time with everything. They have a lot of pressure on them with temptations and all. I see a lot of kids everyday that get caught by the lies of Satan. That is why I am so glad I was raised the way I was in the place where I lived. I told them many a story of my childhood and how Mom and Dad raised me with strict rules. They were all in awe. Then afterward we ate some really good empanadas. .... How is that for a short story lol
Capilla en Mariló - street view
Capilla en Mariló - building
Some random photos of him and companions:
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
Monday, September 6, 2010
Here we are in September
Dear Everyone,
Another week complete in the mission and some more great experiences. This week a lot of stuff happened. And when I say this week, I mean this past weekend. We had a so-so week but it was really busy. We had to do a lot of things in preparation for our baptisms. We didn’t have gas in the church (still) and so we had to move to the chapel in Trujui.
I’m going to talk about what happened Saturday because that was the busiest day of the week. So after situating all the talks and figuring out all the clothes and refreshments and stuff, we went to the church in Trujui to start filling up the font. We start to fill up the font and there was no water pressure. It was just dribbling water out of the spigot. And we had about 4 hour and a half hours until the baptism was to start. It takes about 3 and a half hours to fill it. So we went frantic looking for ways to fill up the font. The water pressure was just fine in the bathroom and so we became plumbers. We disconnected the water pipe below and started filling up buckets. Yes, I know, that is really slow. We did that for some time while one of the missionaries from Trujui was playing with all the water pressure valves. Finally he figured it out so that we could get the water pressure to start working.
So that was just the font. Now we had to deal with the dirty, wet clothes that we got from another area because we didn’t have any clothes. We had to wash these clothes on the spot. So my comp went into the kitchen to wash the clothes. As he was washing the clothes, he pushed down on the sink and it fell through. If you all haven’t seen my comp, he is huge. All we could do was laugh because the sink was put in very bad. We kind of fixed the sink by somewhat gluing it to the cement that was already holding it in. We hope that it didn’t fall on anyone yesterday at church. So after getting the clothes all clean and putting them up to dry, we left to go pick up our baptismal candidates. They didn’t know how to get to the other church so we had to take them. We got to the baptism a little late, but to our greatest surprise, no one was there! We start calling and asking where everyone one was, por suerte everyone was on their way. We had everyone show up that we needed to show up. By that I mean, we had the bishop, our two talks and like three other members, with six missionaries. 4 of us from Mariló and 2 from Trujui. Some great attendance no? But I played the piano and I got some great comments because I did some improvisations of some hymns and they turned out good. Never knew playing around on the piano for so long would pay off. So the baptisms went well and everyone is happy. The refreshments afterward were really good. Facturas. Mmm, I love facturas. And by the time everything was over, the day was over and we went to the apartment. Sunday was also a good day because all three of them got confirmed also. I got to confirm one of them. It was my first confirmation that I had done in my mission. And let me tell you, it is hard to speak in Tú when one is used to speaking in Usted and in Vos. And that was my week.
Thank you Mom, Dad, Abuelita y Grandpa for your emails. Also Cui, Christian, and Britney. I hope all is well with Grandpa Packard. Send my love to him. I love your pictures! Please keep sending more. I’ll try to be better and send more. I love you all and thank you for all your support. And Gracias Abuelita y Grandpa por la Corbata. Tiene colores de River!! AGUANTE!
Love,
Elder Pickett
[His computer at this internet cafe didn't have a USB port for him to hook up and send pictures but after sending his letter and me publishing it he found one that had USB port and he sent the following pictures]
Another week complete in the mission and some more great experiences. This week a lot of stuff happened. And when I say this week, I mean this past weekend. We had a so-so week but it was really busy. We had to do a lot of things in preparation for our baptisms. We didn’t have gas in the church (still) and so we had to move to the chapel in Trujui.
I’m going to talk about what happened Saturday because that was the busiest day of the week. So after situating all the talks and figuring out all the clothes and refreshments and stuff, we went to the church in Trujui to start filling up the font. We start to fill up the font and there was no water pressure. It was just dribbling water out of the spigot. And we had about 4 hour and a half hours until the baptism was to start. It takes about 3 and a half hours to fill it. So we went frantic looking for ways to fill up the font. The water pressure was just fine in the bathroom and so we became plumbers. We disconnected the water pipe below and started filling up buckets. Yes, I know, that is really slow. We did that for some time while one of the missionaries from Trujui was playing with all the water pressure valves. Finally he figured it out so that we could get the water pressure to start working.
So that was just the font. Now we had to deal with the dirty, wet clothes that we got from another area because we didn’t have any clothes. We had to wash these clothes on the spot. So my comp went into the kitchen to wash the clothes. As he was washing the clothes, he pushed down on the sink and it fell through. If you all haven’t seen my comp, he is huge. All we could do was laugh because the sink was put in very bad. We kind of fixed the sink by somewhat gluing it to the cement that was already holding it in. We hope that it didn’t fall on anyone yesterday at church. So after getting the clothes all clean and putting them up to dry, we left to go pick up our baptismal candidates. They didn’t know how to get to the other church so we had to take them. We got to the baptism a little late, but to our greatest surprise, no one was there! We start calling and asking where everyone one was, por suerte everyone was on their way. We had everyone show up that we needed to show up. By that I mean, we had the bishop, our two talks and like three other members, with six missionaries. 4 of us from Mariló and 2 from Trujui. Some great attendance no? But I played the piano and I got some great comments because I did some improvisations of some hymns and they turned out good. Never knew playing around on the piano for so long would pay off. So the baptisms went well and everyone is happy. The refreshments afterward were really good. Facturas. Mmm, I love facturas. And by the time everything was over, the day was over and we went to the apartment. Sunday was also a good day because all three of them got confirmed also. I got to confirm one of them. It was my first confirmation that I had done in my mission. And let me tell you, it is hard to speak in Tú when one is used to speaking in Usted and in Vos. And that was my week.
Thank you Mom, Dad, Abuelita y Grandpa for your emails. Also Cui, Christian, and Britney. I hope all is well with Grandpa Packard. Send my love to him. I love your pictures! Please keep sending more. I’ll try to be better and send more. I love you all and thank you for all your support. And Gracias Abuelita y Grandpa por la Corbata. Tiene colores de River!! AGUANTE!
Love,
Elder Pickett
[His computer at this internet cafe didn't have a USB port for him to hook up and send pictures but after sending his letter and me publishing it he found one that had USB port and he sent the following pictures]
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
