HOLA!!! [Ups and Downs]

First Mission Conference: Hna Hooke is just to the right of the adults in the second row:)

September 22, 2014

Hello on my 2nd p day in Salta! [p day = "preparation day"--write letters, do laundry, grocery shopping, etc]

Sorry I will do my best to write a good letter but it literally took a half hr to load my email....pretty sure this computer has every virus known to man. Anyways.

Hope you are all doing well, and thanks everyone for the emails! I love to read them and know that I do read them even if I don{t have time to respond! 

This week was very up and down, as probably every week on the mission will be. Oh also sorry for saying last week that I was sick, it probably worried "Abuelita Lori" [Em's little nickname for me...], but don{t worry I{m fine now. 

Anyways, this week we got to go to Vaqueros, a nearby little town in our area. It is much poorer and more rural with random goats and sheep running around. But I love it there, it{s my favorite place so far because it is beautiful and the people are soo nice and humble and good, and the kids run up and hug us when we pass by. Probably kind of like Guatemala, mom! The sad news is that we found out also this week that Vaqueros is no longer in our area. [Missionaries are assigned to certain geographical "areas," and sometimes the boundaries are changed.] We even had an investigator [a person interested in learning more about the church], a really nice lady named Rosio, who is getting baptized. Maybe we can get special permission to go to her baptism.

I think I mentioned Facundo last week, the bf [boyfriend, for all of you older generationers:)] of a recent convert who didn{t believe in God. Well we invited him to pray to ask if God exists and he said that after he prayed he got really happy and energetic like he just wanted to start running. So he called his friend and they went running. Haha. So we will keep working with him. He was our only investigator at church yesterday. Speaking of church, it's a group of about 10 people who meet, I played piano, Hna Platino directed. Everyone is very nice though, and gives us good food. [ A "group" is the smallest organized unit in the church. Larger congregations are branches or even larger are wards.]

What else what else...I don{t have time! I guess I will say that the saddest part of the week was a lesson we had with a lady who entered the temple, served a mission, and is less active in church now. She KNOWS the church is true and she knows it is her responsibility to teach her daughters but she has just hardened her heart and she would rather deal with the consequences of not doing so. It was very sad to see. Please pray for the Aguero family. The daughter is already a member and her dad wants to be baptized but something happened and he was too embarrassed to come back to church. It{s too bad. Some things like this frustrate me. 

Anyways, enough negativity, this week we worked a lot and couldn{t find new people to teach, but we will continue working and next week will be better!

Love you all! Thanks for the thoughts and prayers!

Hna Hooke