Visit to the farm was awesome

Eric holding the Rosario banner in the Mission Home at last week's special zone conference

Eric with Elder Bryce at the special zone conference

Eric in front of the mission home in Rosario. If you click on the picture to enlarge it, you can see decorative iron bars on the main floor windows and doors.

The grounds of the mission home

Hey everybody,

It's really late in the day here, so I have just 20 minutes to write you. We went up to the agricultural farm today with the senior (couple) missionaries and just barely got back! It was a great day. They picked us up at 10:00 a.m. and we all drove out to their house, where they tempted us to use their webcam to talk to our families, ha ha!! We aren't allowed to, of course, but it was nice of them to offer.

For lunch, we had the most American meal I've had since I've been in Argentina. I love the United States!!! I love South America, too, but it was just so great to have an American meal, of a good roast with mashed potatoes, jello, chocolate-chip-cookies and rolls! The couple was so nice, and it was so fun to just eat American food while talking English! I love having Argentina meals, too, but it was so good to get a taste of food from back home.

They drove us around the farms, not all of course, because the church owns thousands of acres down here. The church owns so much land down here in Argentina, it's quite unbelievable. Another surprising thing is how few people work the farms, at least for much of the year. There's two office guys, and two farmers, and two more who work in the factory with the silos. This is possible because the church's farm is set up very well. They have great technology, and run it sooo efficiently.

Congratulations to Marisa and David! I'm glad I'm on the computer late enough in the day to hear the results of the ultrasound, because I have been on the edge of my seat. That is so great that they are having a girl!!! Woo hoo!

Also, congrats to Darbi and Devyn on their competition, wish I could have seen it.

Family Home Evenings here are cool. We had one yesterday and another the day before. The first one was awesome, we watched the new Joseph Smith movie (somehow Elder Celis got a copy and Elder Petersen copied his.) Then we had a quick lesson and a very spiritual testimony meeting and the family had bought us sodas and cookies! It was great and I think they're all going to be baptized someday. The spirit was very strong the whole time, and the mom was crying because she felt it. The only problem is her ex-husband showed up and was mad at us because he had to wait outside for us to finish the movie, because he didn't want to be a part of it. (Many male Argentines hate all churches.)

The next day we had Family Home Evening with the familia Rios, who live in a metal one-room house. The lesson went great, the kids are already baptized, and the parents want to be, but they can't because the husband is an illegal citizen. I would love to get some ideas of simple, fun games we can play with the families, so feel free to send me any that you can think of.

We didn't have the Daylight Savings Time change here, although it probably wouldn't really matter one way or another. All I know is Argentines usually show up to anything an hour or two late anyway, ha ha.

School just started for the kids here. It was supposed to start a week or two ago, but all the teachers went on strike, but now it is finally started. The kids go for four hours a day, either from 8 to 12, or in the evening. The siesta is still going strong here, and doesn't stop just because the kids went back to school. Venado Tuerto is fairly small, so the siesta is HUGE here. In the actual city of Rosario, it hardly exists, but here, everyone takes the siesta. I know that Dad said that in Spain he found the siesta to be the best time to work, and maybe that would be true in a bigger city here in Argentina, too, if everyone went home just for lunch and then went back out to work. But here in Venado Tuerto, everyone SLEEPS after lunch from 2 until 5 or 6, and they get mad if we try to contact them during those times, so it's hard to work during the siesta. President Villalba has told us to try to get all our appointments set up during the siesta, so we don't have to disturb anyone who isn't expecting us.

To answer the question about how the people who live in the shacks without doors can have bars on their windows (since I said everyone has bars on their windows here)...well, everyone but the really poor people have bars on their windows. But the houses that are so poor that they don't even have doors, well, they're just out of luck and get robbed a lot. But frankly, most of those families don't have much to steal anyway. It is still sad, though.

Someone asked me if I am dreaming in Spanish by now. I sleep so deeply that I don't remember having any dreams at all, but Elder Petersen tells me I've been talking in my sleep in Spanish a lot.

It's time that we have to go out and work now. I love you and thank you for everything!

Love you all!!
Eric

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