February 22, 2010

semana 24- Salta

¡Hola Todos!
Quick questions: any advice for helping out a 1year-2month old child that just scoots around on her butt and doesn’t have the knowledge of how to crawl or stand up (she walks with the help of mom just fine)? And I have an hermana requesting a good waffle recipe (it took me about 10-seconds to remember what that word was in English!), of course making it from scratch.
It sounds like the family has had a fun week! I loved the pictures, especially the torch on top of mom’s cake—HILARIOUS! I’m glad you enjoyed the arroz con leche recipe! I’ll be looking for more recipes here pretty soon ;) Yeah, the winter olympics really don’t get covered down here; I’ve heard nothing from the people. Hope it’s fun though!
I got another baptism this past Saturday!!! Rosa Quiroga is the sister of the Relief Society President in another ward and has put off listening to the missionaries for 20 years and finally decided it was time with us! We’re currently working on teaching her 19, 15, and 14 year old kids too—perhaps baptizing the 14-year-old by the end of this transfer! Speaking of, that’s coming up really quick! I could very well be headed out of La Loma for good! We’ll see...
I started reading the Book of Mormon in the MTC and I just finished it again this past week. Everyone really should read the book: it will change your life for the better! I have read through it 3 times now and I’m still finding amazing things in there!
One of the hermanas in San Lorenzo fed us pomegranites!!! That’s just the 2nd one I’ve eaten in my entire life and I love them!
As for the weather, it’s very humid now, thanks to the fact that it rained just about every day this past week! It made carrying 10-kilo bags of flour 17 blocks to another member’s home difficult! I dare you guys to try it out ;)
That’s about it for my week. I’m also in a hurry so I don’t really have too much time to double-check...
I love you all!
-Elder Powell-

February 17, 2010

semana 23- Salta

WOOHOO, MY FIRST BAPTISM!!! :) I’ll get to the details in a sec.
First off, since it’ll be in 2 days, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!! I hope you have a wonderful week! I hear everywhere is getting piled with snow this year...except for the places that usually get snow! How’s the weather for you this year?
We decided to help out this member pour some concrete in his house to level out (and raise the level of) the floor of one of the rooms. A big thank you goes to Tyler Forbush for giving me the basic knowledge of concrete pouring! My comp is studying civil engineering in Chile so he actually knew more than me, but we’re pretty sure it’s the nicest floor in his entire home!
The baptism was great! Unfortunately the computers are hit-and-miss on recognizing my camera, so I’ll have to try next week to send you the pictures. Her name is Mirta Arce, a single-mother of 2. We actually had 2 baptisms on Saturday: the other was the granddaughter of the member we poured concrete for. Of course, being my first baptism, the horror stories happened: we entered the baptismal font and the water was WAY cold! And then I had to do it twice because air got into her sleeve. That’s not the end of it though: I get back to the bathroom and I realize that I forgot to pack my towel, so I had to do what I could to dry off the best I could! But with all of this going on, the baptism was still really nice and we’re hoping to have another baptism this next Saturday!
Well, that’s about it for this week. Hope all goes well for everyone!
I love you all!
-Elder Powell-

P.S. New email address: jeffrey.powell@myldsmail.net
The myldsmail system went through a major update and is now powered by Gmail (super nice :D ) I had to go through a whole transfer-over process, and in the process, they generated this email address for me. I think I'll be getting instructions from my mission president this week about the system. I wouldn't be surprised if the address changes again, but we'll see.

February 2, 2010

Semana 22-Salta

Hola Todos,
I’ve known for the longest time that Spencer Finn (and Jeff Winkfield from one of the north wards) was heading home at the end of January. I really, really can’t believe the time has already come! Devon Wood goes next transfer, followed by Witter Case, and then right as I hit my 1-year mark in September, Matt Birch heads out as well!!! For now, I’m sitting at my 5-month mark tomorrow, but hey, I only have 19 months left!
I was looking at what Matt Rawlins was saying about Haitians being exquisitely clean and there’s kindof a connection to Argentines as well. They themselves aren’t very clean, often VERY much in need of a dentist and someone to fix their black and green toenails, and they throw trash around in the streets as well, but often I find that they have a fettish with washing the floor inside their house, and then finishing off with washing the sidewalk in front of their houses. Of course, it’s only clean for about 2 seconds, but that’s what I find them cleaning the most.

As for dad’s question about Argentine government and police: I don’t see very much government around here. I do see the police just standing around doing nothing about 90% of the time though. We always get a good hello from them though! I’m not sure if there are closed areas due to danger in the mission, but I do know Tucuman is known to be a little more dangerous.
Elder Contreras speaks no English at all. He speaks a little quicker thanks to his Chilean roots so it’s a little difficult to talk with him, but we’re doing fine. He has the ganas (just a little bit stronger than “he wants to”; ask one of the Spanish-speakers) to work in the richer parts of our area that Elder Young and I didn’t really touch at all. We’re especially looking forward to working hard in this area called San Lorenzo. We have to take a 15-minute bus ride to get out there (don’t ask me why it’s in my area, it just is for now), but the houses there range from the Hainsworth’s house to the Hawkins’ home! We dug out the address of a less-active family there and visited them yesterday and they are still a great family, reading scriptures, praying, etc., just not going to church because of the distance. We’re starting up a project to start up a branch out there! I’ll definitely let you know how it goes! It was a little tough leaving Elder Young, but he’s in 100-120 degree weather!!! I’m just fine here in Salta where we get a nice drizzle and rain every once in awhile!Baptisms haven’t happened yet, but we’re super-close with a couple people...
Thank you family for your Christmas love notes: they finally arrived on the 27th!

I tried out Argentine McDonalds for the first time today. The triple mac meal (not sure if you have triple macs in the US now, just add one extra patty to the big mac, that’s it) costed me 22.50 pesos, which is about 5.92 dollars. I still thought it was expensive though; I’m used to cheaper food here! Regular box of Frosted Flakes (Zucaritas in Spanish) costs about 9-10 pesos = 2.50 dollars! I enjoyed the taste of Americanized food for a little bit though.Well, hope all goes well for everyone this week!
With Love,
Elder Powell

P.S. I’m also making my ‘mission pics’ picasa album public so that people can check it out. http://picasaweb.google.com/cpu3140(/MissionPics)Thanks for letting people know!