A Good Week!

It was a good week! We had a baptism! Her name is R. and she is 70 y/o. The Elders before me were teaching her but stopped because she needed to quit smoking. Elder Huefner and I were riding our bikes and saw her on the street and stopped to talk to her. She told us that hadn´t smoked anymore and really wanted to get baptized. We started teaching her again and the baptism was great. The water was freezing! Her brother was the one who baptized her.

I got to go on splits with the Elders from the area next to us. My companion for the day was Elder Oyarce. He is from Chilé and speaks no English! I really had to use my Spanish that day. It was very fun. Oh and our power went out on Friday. I thought it would only last a few minutes like back home when the power went out every once in a while. But minutes turned to hours, and then to days. We had no hot water for like 2 days. So to shower, we had to heat up water on the stove. It wasn´t ideal but hey at least I have a sweet story to tell! I´ve learned that Argentines have really creative insults, Like this one said I look like Captain America before he was experimented on hahaha I was laughing at that one. Oh and I finally got attacked by a dog! This big pit bull just knocks me over from behind and tries to bite me. I stood up and picked up a rock and it ran away. It was crazy.

Also, soccer is nuts here. We were in a lesson yesterday and then I just heard fireworks go off. I was confused so I asked the guy what was happening. He said that BOCA just scored. (There are two major teams in Buenos Aires, BOCA and River, I´m a BOCA fan). As we were walking home, people are in the streets just yelling, everyone is honking their horns, Everyone´s radio is on full volume. You can hear the game anywhere you are.

Last story, we almost got robbed. We were riding our bikes and a guy on a motorcycle comes up to and says "give me your phone." We were just like wait, what? He says "I´ve got a gun and I´m gonna shoot you if you don't give me your phone." I was just thinking, "this guy is riding a motorcycle, how is he going to take our phone and hold a gun at that same time without letting go of the handlebars" haha. We just quickly turned down a street and rode away quickly. It was kind of funny.

I totally forgot that was Halloween yesterday. I was laying in bed and I said to Elder Huefner, "Hey I think it´s Halloween today." I am definitely improving in my Spanish. I can talk and understand much better than when I got here. I actually have trouble talking English sometimes. Elder Huefner goes home on December 30. He is from Bountiful Utah. His personality is to always follow the spirit. Like we will be late for an appointment and he´ll say "Elder, stop I feel like we should knock on this door." (By the way they don't knock on doors here. We stand at the gate and clap a few times).

I realized how great our ward back home really is. I sat in sacrament meeting and saw maybe 40 people there and I remembered how packed the whole building was at my farewell. And no one cleans the building at all here. We have no ward council or mission leader to work with. It gets frustrating trying to work with members because they don´t want to come to lessons with us or anything. I´m grateful for the ward back home. (Shout out to Las Sendas!!! Another lesson learned for a future leader...) 

Well, I keep seeing more miracles every day!

Yo soy Elder Gygi