Ramos Mejia- Week #59 cont.

Argentina Primary is just as good as American Primary

So tired…no p-day…guraahgahag

P-Day count for the transfer: I/4 …So I am really at a loss of what to write this week. I mean, a lot of stuff happened, but man I am fried. We have been really busy basically since the transfer started. Once again we will not have a P-day, due to the fact that four missionaries that were assigned to Venezuela were reassigned due to visa problems, and show up today, so we have been getting everything ready for them. I have to make their orientation binders, so I have been printing things off like crazy. I didn’t have the actual binders with the church logo on them, because they come in the shipments that I order every couple of weeks. Well, I made an order like 3 weeks ago, thinking that it would make it here in plenty of time, (they usually show up in a week and a half) plus we just kind of found out a month ago they were coming. So I have been waiting for this shipment and everything, which had a ton of materials the missionaries have been asking for. The binders were in there, as well as a bunch of lesson 1 pamphlets, which a lot of people use to teach the first lesson. Well, for two weeks we haven’t had any pamphlets in the whole mission, and I have gotten some heat for it from some missionaries. At first it made me feel kind of bad that they didn’t have what they wanted, but then I realized it is not a requirement to have a pamphlet to teach a lesson, so I just started to tell people to hand out copies of the Book of Mormon and quit complaining. No where does it say that a lesson 1 pamphlet is the key to conversion, or the lesson, or that you can´t teach without one. The first missionaries bore pure testimony of the Book of Mormon, and baptized thousands. Elder Sabey made a good point when he said, “When have you ever heard a General Authority say, ‘I gave my friend a lesson 1 pamphlet’ NEVER! They always say, ‘I gave my friend a Book of Mormon.’ So do the same.” Anyway, about 20 minutes after we left to go distribute the mail to everyone…the shipment came hahaha…so a whole lot of frustration could have been avoided if we would have left 20 minutes later. Not a big deal though. I just laugh now.

News flash, President just told us that the new financial secretary is Elder Maxwell, from my MTC district. We are basically taking over the offices. So on a less stressed upbeat note, there were a ton of miracles this week in our missionary work. Germán showed up to church, clean-shaven, and with a smile, which was so nice to see. We have a lesson with him tonight, and we plan to re-set a baptismal date with him. Anyway, as is probably obvious, we don’t get to work the whole day in the missionary work, because we are working here in the offices, so sometimes it can feel like if we only had more time we could be having so much more success. This week, however, has shown me that the Lord is blessing us double in the missionary work, for the time spent in the office. We have wanted to find some new investigators that will progress towards baptism (like every other missionary on the planet). Well, we showed up to Church, and sat through priesthood class. Our Sacrament meeting is the third hour of the block, which is weird to think about in the States, but is the regular schedule here for most wards. So we are about to go into Sunday School, and some woman comes up to me asking me questions. She asked where gospel doctrine class was and everything. I had never seen here before so I introduced myself and all that good stuff. Turns out she wasn’t from here. She is from the south of Argentina, and brought a friend who lives smack dab in the middle of our area. Her name is Elvira…yes…like the song, which I have sung about 100 times since Sunday. They met on the internet, and the member came up to Ramos to take a class and has been staying with Elvira. So they decided to come to church together, and she LOVED it, she is going to bring her 19 year old son next week…if he wants to come. Our members are sooooo cool! They just swooped in and scooped her up to make her feel welcome. We were playing the role of the directors of the play, telling members to go say hi to her, and sit by her in class and in Sacrament Meeting, showing her how the hymn book works. It was great. We have an appointment with her on Thursday, and a member she already met and became friends with is going with us. We are in the best ward in the mission. So even though we aren’t in the street as much as other missionaries, the Lord still blesses us with success.

So, the highlight of the week also happened on Sunday. It was a national holiday…Dia del Niño. Children’s Day. Yes…like mother’s day or father’s day, but for children. Best holiday ever invented, and it is legit here, too. The children get presents and everything, and everything shuts down, no one wanted to have us over, the usual big holiday treatment. Well, in celebration of this great holiday, the Primary had a special treat, and guest visitor…US! Elder Sabey and I taught Sharing Time in Primary, and it was probably the highlight of my mission so far. It was all combined, so we had the little tikes as well as the older kids who were too cool for Primary with us. Little do they know, that ten years from now when they are on missions, the only thing they will want to do is be in Primary again. So we played all the games we could remember from our Primary years, and surprisingly they weren’t familiar with any of them…so either it is different down here, or they have done away with the old primary traditions. We also did a few magic tricks for them and got them just hanging on our every word, after which we taught about the Book of Mormon and the Spirit. I think the teachers enjoyed it just as much as the children did. One sister came up after Sacrament Meeting, a good hour and a half after we taught Primary, and said, “Elder, you still haven’t told us how you did that trick.” And she was dead serious…haha, actually it was kind of awkward trying to get away without giving her the secret to the trick. Anyway, I had a great time, and can see why missionaries are in the class with investigators and new members, and not the Primary, because the kidnapping charges would probably sky-rocket. I wanted to take one home with me ha…but not like in a creepy way…the kidnapping was just a joke. Also, last week I found out that when you are really stressed and busy, it is helpful to sing Primary songs. And well, I am the material guy, so I have huge stocks of the Children´s Songbook in Spanish, and this whole week I took the liberty of memorizing primary songs in my spare/stressed time, in preparation for Sunday. It totally paid off too! I knew 3 of the 4 songs we sang.

I have also found that I can’t feel bad when I have an apple in my hand. Strange, yes, but an observation I made during the week. If I am eating an apple, I feel good, physically, and mentally. And with that little piece of information, I will leave you for another week, and hope that we have a P-day soon…because I ate 5 apples yesterday. Is that healthy?

I love to see the temple, I’m going there someday…next week…

Elder Gilmore