¿Tengo veinte años ya? (I have twenty years already?)

Hey there...

Yeah, that doesn´t make me homesick at all looking at those pictures
of Lake Powell...ha ha. I hope you all had a good time and got back
safe and sound. That is crazy that dad actually threw up playin
punishments! Ha ha ha! I bet his brothers just got a kick out of
that. I think I may or may not have to introduce that game into the
misión mendoza. Ha ha. There is some stuff here that would go just
swell for that game.

It has just kinda been one of those bring you up then drop you down
weeks ya know? We had a ton of success just finding incredible people
this week but we still just can´t seem to find a way to get people
inside that chapel at least for one little hour! Holy cow it can be
frustrating. Ha ha.

As I said, we have just been finding lots of incredible people. We
were able to put some good baptismal fechas(dates) so we will just
have to see if those are able to follow through. Hoping and praying.
Our top candidates for baptism in the upcoming weeks shall be Adriana
Peralta, Silvia Saavedra, and the familia Valdez.

It still is super hard to focus inside houses because all of the focus
is on the tv(los olimpicos). There have even been times where we ask
nicely for them to turn off the tv for a few minutes but we get
rejected with a nice response saying no. Ha ha. Argentines are very
hard core fans and supporters of the sports even though they don´t
like sports. I get updates a lot from the family we live with and
tons of other members. I hear china is leading with us on their tail.
Go US!

Yep, just kinda passed the birthday by just like any other day. It
was a pretty cool day. Maybe the Lord wanted to bless us a lot on the
b-day because He allowed us to get to know some awesome people. To
let you know, yes, I was able to get the ice cream cake that I have
been desiring. It was one of the most tasteful, dulce de leche-ful,
and happy-ful cakes that has ever entered into my own stomach. I wish
I could email the taste of it just so you could try it, maybe sometime
in the near future. Yep, I wanted to do something crazy for my last
night in my adolescence but I couldn´t really think of anything that
would be appropriate for a missionary to do. Ha ha. It was a good
day though...Oh, and I am still expecting the package. It will be fun
to get another sweater.

For Pday today we cleaned all morning while listening to the
thundering voice of Bruce McConkie telling us to figure out our own
personal salvation with fear and trembling before God. Ha ha. I love
listening to old talks. But seriously, they are really good!
Everything in our house has been leaking so it was a little
frustrating this morning but I think I already got over that
frustration now. We actually got out and played sports(for the first
time in a LONG time). I brought my frisbee(thanks mom) to a cool
park(surprisingly there are not very many parks appropriate for
playing frisbee and stuff because they are made terribly with trees
and big rocks everywhere, but fortunately we found a good one today)
and we played for a while and it felt really good to run(I don´t run
in the mornings anymore like I have done once in a while with other
comps, mostly because it is now really cold outside in the mornings).
Then after we went to the closest place we could find to grab some
grub. We all were able to get some lomos and chori and enjoy
ourselves playing Monopoly Deal Cartas. Good times!

Good week! I hope all of you can say the same...especially for those
who spent it at lake powell...love yall.

Un abracito,
Élder Larisch
La iglesia es verdadera

 Chef Dev

The breakfast burrito

E. Wahl eating pancakes

feliz cumpleaños to me

grido cake...mmm

 can't wait to dig in...

 my photo collage

 elevated bed to help me sleep better with this cold

 E. Galati

eating chori with the gang

The bish

Oh, ni sabía que iba a cumplir esta semana...¡Que Bueno! (Very Good Week)

Hello Everyone!

Wow, it looks like it is my birthday this week or something by looking at my inbox. Ha ha. Thanks for all of the emails. I feel very loved. I don´t know what is going to happen on friday for a celebration or anything yet, but I am for sure going to buy an ice-cream cake from Grido, the ice cream shop.

Well, I would have to say that we had a super good week this go-around. Saturday was our day of the most success. We had some super good lessons with members with the spirit surely present. I noticed that the joy out of missionary work really does come out of just watching the spirit do work in the lives of others while sometimes you barely feel like an instrument in the Lord´s hands because you just can´t believe the sorts of miracles that you see right before your eyes.

We had an amazing surprise mini conference with Presidente Ávila and the asistentes on Thursday and talked about some amazing things to us. We left that day with a huge prayer of faith expecting miracles and we had miracles that day. Friday we went back and had a part 2 of the conference to tell stories of the miracles that happened to us because of faith.

We met some superb families this week including the Flia. Tello, Flia. Valdez, and the Flia of Neli. We are starting the get accustomed to the way that the prophet wants us to work. We are starting to get really good references from members sharing the gospel with their friends and neighbors. The hardest thing that we are working on right now and the thing where Satan seems to be hittin us hard is the investigators attending church. We have had two goose eggs the past weeks, but that is just because we are basically starting from scratch. It is going to take patience and a bunch of diligence to get some of these familes to the church on sunday. I was told in the MTC that the Latino people just love to say yes, but from that commitment the missionaries don´t have too much of a promise. We need to be involved with every little thing we can do to get them to church whether it be calling them in the morning to wake them up, passing by their house to walk with them, etc. Takes some prayer and faith to get these peeps to church.

I am still meeting tons of new people here every day here in San Juan showing my pictures a lot. There was a few comments from members that I would like to share with you. Ha ha. As bishop´s mom and a couple other members were looking at the pictures, they kept mentioning how handsome dad was and how he looks really good because he does biking. They said that maybe someday I will be as good looking as my dad. Ha ha! Then I showed them how I was even starting to bald like dad is. No offense, but I don´t think I want to start looking like you too fast. Ha.

Yeah, the weather is starting to change a lot. I almost died this morning of cold having to go out and hang up the wet clothes at 6:30. It probably wasn´t very smart but it definitely was necessary. I don´t know when it will change again, but I think for now, it is going to be super cold.

Grandma, STAT: there are very few dogs in Argentina that have owners. STAT#2: there may or may not be more dogs that human beings in Argentina…actually, yes, for sure there are more dogs that anything else in Argentina. STAT#3: I may have seen the biggest and hairiest dog in the world on Saturday. His name is Tango and I will get back to ya with a picture.

I am still feeling pretty sick, but according to the mission enfermero(nurse), I am good to go out and proselyte as long as I drink lots of water, cough in my sleeve(not in the face of anyone, basically), and moisten my hands with sanitizer once in a while along with continual washing of hands. Right now it consists of a minor headache with my ears hurting every time I blow my nose, every time I sneeze I feel like my brain is going to come right out of my nose(like they used to do with the future mummies in Egypt), and the Laryngitis is to my advantage making my voice deeper. At least I am alive right? Ha. Nah, I´m doing pretty good. Don´t worry about me too much, maybe just a couple more prayers and I´ll get healed. Thanks.

Oh man, some of the hardest temptations to this point in my mission of being disobedient have come right at me. The Olympics have started and I am going crazy. I am super lucky that the work I am doing is much more important than any athletic event, but wow, I thought it was hard to stay focused when the discovery channel or something is on in the houses here, but now the Olympics, soccer, tennis, basketball, countries playing against one another. Someone may or may not need to record all of it so on September 8th of next year it will be available to watch. ¡Aguante los Estados Unidos!

This has been a pretty good p-day so far. We got panchos(hot dogs with more sauces and stuff that you could ever imagine), I bought a new sweater for really cheap(I hope that is alright, I just wanted one more to put a little more diversity in the selección. It was only 100 pesos(like 20-25 bucks). I really wanted to buy some of this art that this guy was doing in the street here in Centro San Juan. It was really cool spray paint art that he finished in less than 10 minutes. It is great entertainment. I think I may stop by next week to purchase on of his pieces. They go for 40 pesos! Crazy!

I saw E´ Squires(MTC comp) for the first time in about 7 months in the pancho shop. He is doing really good. He has been serving for 5 months in the Chimbas zone(one of the most successful zones, statistically, in the mission).

Gosh, sounds like everyone is just having themselves a good time at home. Everyone was safe over the holiday and Dad barely survived the hike. I will be willing to do that in the future. Ha. I bet that the ABBA concert just fulfilled all of your dreams in one night. That´s great that Kaitlyn is off to New York. Wish her luck from me if you see her before. That sounds like a really cool mission. I can´t believe that Jim is going to Ghana! He will miss his moustache for a couple years. I know that mine is developing very well right now and will be ready for full bloom in about a year or so. Is he going to speak English or Afrikaans? Dang, have fun in Lake Powell. I hope you enjoy it in honor of me or something. Ha. I am very jealous. I have a few pics of Lake Powell in my album that I show everyone. Tell grandpa happy birthday for me when you see him next. I hope he gets a chance to go fishin to celebrate.

That sounds really good that dad was able to talk to the priests up there about the missions. It is exactly what those boys need engraved in their brains right now. There should not be any other thing that should be even competing with a mission right now in the lives of those boys. I hope they all are able to leave for two years and experience something different than anything they could experience not wearing a black plaque.

Cariñito,
Elder Deven Larisch
La Iglesia es verdadera

Panchos...Yum Yum

Elder Marsh from Riverton 

Cool guy doing way cool spray paint art that most of us bought. They were 40 pesos each! I think I want to buy one next time

 Flia Milesi

 Flia Ferrero

 Flia Robert

Flia Sanna

My goodbyes to... Hna. Roldan... 

 Roldan Y Jose...

 Mateocito...

my district...

and Chiquita!!!

¡Bienvenidos a San Juan! (Welcome to San Juan!)

¡Hola de San Juan, Argentina!

Dang, that is kinda hard leaving an area like that with 6 good months
behind ya. Had some hard despedidos, but the tears make me stronger.
Psh, I didn´t cry...Especially with Chiquita reading a letter I wrote
her along with the one from my parents...Nah, but really, I will miss
just about everyone in that area that I got to know and I still will
continue praying for a lot of them because they are awesome. I hope
that É Toledo can keep it up over there and just baptize like Alma or
somethin.

Yep, I got here all safe and sound traveling with a few other
missionaries headed this way also. Man, I feel like my whole mission
just changed. I am in just a whole different environment. I love San
Juan. Back in my other areas, the things that I always heard from the
members about San Juan was that it is SUPER hot in the summers and it
consists of a lot of chicas lindas. There are more dead dogs than
normal in the street. Kinda sad. It has a lot of country area but
also got that city touch to it. It has been super hot since I have
been here. I actually think I got sunburnt today. It is just crazy
how the weather changes here. The Zonda here is just a huge weather
factor that just changes everything. It is kind of miserable when it
is pretty chili in the morning so you put on a sweater or two then an
hour or two later the sun comes out and burns your face of and makes
you sweat uncomfortably. Complaining doesn´t make anything better
though.

The mission boundaries are all of the region cuyo, to answer mom´s
question. Look it up on Google earth or something. It contains three
provinces. Mendoza, San Luis, and San Juan.

There is a lot more in this area than I have ever had. A few
Gridos(ice cream), a bunch of good panaderías, and much more close to
the house. I even feel a bit spoiled to have so much close to us.
This area is going to take a lot more out of my shoes because
everything is pretty spread out and there are a lot more dirt roads.
San Juan is supposed to be a pretty peaceful and tranquil part of
Argentina even though I we have had a couple super drunk, old guys
come up to us and talk to us(even though I can´t understand what they
are saying because all I can focus on is the stong smell of cheap wine
flowing out of their mouth). Don´t worry though mom, I´ll be safe
here.

We just live in a two-man pench that is rented out by some really cool
members. The familia Camargo is really nice and we have our own
washer and dogs(Mordisco, Negra, Ángel, and Agustín. I will have to
send pics next week). It is now a pretty good looking pench, small
but good, especially after we deep cleaned the thing all Wednesday.

My comp, Élder Wahl is from Arizona, he is tall, and he likes to
party. He is a pretty cool missionary. He is a hard worker and is
really good with people. A very soft speaker and one that I am
expecting will touch the hearts of many good people this transfer. I
am pretty stoked to have the opportunity to work with him and teach
him a bit and learn from him a bit so that we can have the highest
level of success in this area). We are going to baptize more or less
a thousand.

We are working in a ward that just barely got combined(from a ward and
a branch) and now for this transfer it looks like Presidente wants to
try something out. So he split up the work and put two other
missionaries in this ward. Unfortunately the part where the other
Élders are working is where the best investigators are that Élder Wahl
has been working with. But the good news is that we are just finding
a bunch of new investigators by completing our ¨open the mouth¨´s
every day. Hopefully the Lord is preparing some of these people and
their families to get baptized...

We have been working with Cecilia and Luis, an awesome couple that
just needs to get pushed into the water because they are too good.
Cintia is another awesome lady that everyone at church thinks she is a
member because she comes to church each week but is not yet baptized.
She also has an awesome son who just turned 7 yesterday that is super
smart. He is learning English and reads out of the Libro de Mormón
perfectly and fluently. Can Mallory do that? These people go to the
other missionaries now...ugh. That´s alright, we´ll just find more
awesome people here. We have already had some super spiritual lessons
with some less active members so we are expecting to see something
come out of that.

Today, I woke up feeling pretty sick(like with a cold or something)
with a bad coff and gunk all in the throat. So instead of doing
exercises, I just put a blanket out and layed on it doing mental
exercises with my eyes closed. The only thing that remains with me
right now is the sore throat. Hopefully that will go away ASAP.

.....due to these below normal quality computers I will not be able to
send pictures this week. I have a lot though so be ready next week to
be all caught up.

Well, gotta go. Thanks for the prayers. Till next week.
Abrazos,
Élder Deven Larisch
La iglesia es verdadera

That is awesome that Cade is doing a mini mission and is on the path
to receiving the priesthood and going on a mish. I am so proud of
that kid. He is going to be a changed person when I next see him!
Tell josh to write me more than 4 words when he emails me...
No, I don´t get to talk much to other companions. There are some
strict rules here on not calling other missionaries because obviously
missionaries have very well abused that privilege of having a phone.
So we don´t really get to stay too much in contact with old comps or
anything.
That is crazy about the flooding in St. George. I can´t believe it
went up to Luberta-long-leg´s thighs. Isn´t that like 4 feet tall? I
am glad they had a good time over there.
I can´t believe that dad just keeps winning races over there. He
needs to move up to bigger game. I have been able to share my pics a
ton here in these first few days getting to know everyone here so
everyone knows that my dad is a famous cyclist that always takes
first.
Have fun doing all of the 24th activities. I´m sure dad is going to
be the first one over to sleep at the parade. Catch a homerun for me.
Eat a hot dog for me.
That´s awesome with Jimmy, let me know where he´s goin.
Yep, there is a couple Élders here from Riverton. There was Élder
McMullin that was my district leader for a transfer in Godoy Cruz,
Élder Sorenson(don´t know him), who É Stearns from my last area
trained, and I recently met É Ethan Marsh who just barely got here and
is being trained in the area right next to mine(he worked with me at
Rose Creek as a sweeper but I didn´t know him very well).
Thanks for that analogy. I will totally use that this week in my lessons.

¡Me Voy! (I'm going!)

Good Afternoon Loved Ones,

How is everyone doing today? I am doing pretty good. I guess you could say that we had a very eventful week. Teaching myself to juggle, finding out that I am leaving Godoy Cruz, being senior comp to my brother, asado in the acequia, and a BAPTISM!!!!!

Yeah, that´s right! We were able to follow through with the baptism of Lautaro Bohigas. It was kind of an iffy baptism because it didn´t appear like he had very much support to stay active. But with a ward like this with so many members willing to help out, he was able to do what he wanted. He was super stoked to get baptized this whole week. His whole family showed up to the baptism, even his pops who is a huge inactive that is wine-crazy. We even made him a case for his book of mormon customized with his name on it.

Other big news is.........¡me voy! I am leaving San Ignacio, Godoy Cruz to go to Libano A., San Juan. I get to go to a different province. The mission covers all of Cuyo(which is three provinces of Argentina:Mendoza, San Juan, and San Luis). It is supposed to be a really good area with lots of good people. It is like 3 hours away in bus so I will not be as close to the offices anymore, but it´s okay. I will tell you about it next week. I will be comps with É Wahl, who just happens to be my mission brother(he was trained by Ë Hudgens also). I will get to be senior comp also. It´s gonna be sweet!

San Ignacio was such an awesome area. It is also one that I can leave feeling good because we made a difference here. A missionary feels good leaving an area if he sees an increase of the faith of his investigators, new converts, and members. I am going to miss a ton of families here that I have grown really close to over the past 6 months. I have a lot of saying-bye to do tonight and tomorrow. Ha. It has also been a good time being comps with É Toledo this transfer. It went really fast, but I feel like we both learned a lot from each other. He may be one of the coolest chileans that I know, even though there are not that many that I know well. Ha.

This week we had some good success with our investigators and it looks like I am going to be leaving this area with a few baptisms for the comp of É Toledo next transfer. We have a lot of members right now that are helping us out by giving us their friends to teach them, with even a few being taught in the house of the member(no better teaching atmosphere I tell ya).

Ofelia finally let us do service at her house this week. It was pretty fun because we very rarely get to use informal clothes in public, matter of fact I don´t even like it because it doesn´t feel right. Ha ha. She let us harvest a bunch of lemons and mandarins from her trees in the back. I was the one to take the real advantage of the lemons while the others were trying to make some lemonade. I all the sudden had the small desire(Alma 32) to learn to juggle. As I started, I almost got very discouraged because I could not juggle for 2 seconds. But the good news to the story is that I kept of trying and practicing(especially when my comp was in the bathroom which was a considerably long amount of time) and eventually I got it. Élder Larisch can now juggle lemons. Hey, it is big new for me okay?

For P-day today we decided to have an Asado. So we went and bought lots of cow meat and some chorizo, built a fire next to the acequia, threw the meat on the tray, and played us some Aljedrez(chess) in the acequia. Not going to lie to you, it was some of the best meat that I have ever eaten(other than those chicken hearts that I ate at Rodizio Grill a couple years ago that I threw up all night, those were good too).

I don´t have too much more time to inform ya on all the good deets, but next week you will hear more. Take care and keep prayin!

Un abracito,
Élder Larisch
La Iglesia es verdadera

That is awesome that Kaylee had her twins. They look great! I can´t believe Joshy is already home! That means I only have like a year left. I better get working harder. Ha. Micah looks super older with his bowl cut. Ha ha. Don´t forget to tell Joshy that he needs to write me and I can write him through you. Tell Joshy I don´t drink mate. It is against the rules here, but we are offered it every single day by people, but we have to decline it. There are a couple reasons why I think it may be against the rules but I don´t really know the real reason. I drink a ton of herbal tea and sugary hot milk! Yum!

 Elder Hunter goes home today :(

THE  ASADO!!! (ROAST)

My good friend Matías. What a great guy. he always passes by our house and tells us about his superhero adventures with his dogs. He really likes the Avengers!

Here is where we did our "ASADO"

A dish called Pollution

Feliz Día de Independencia Argentina

Yellow!

Ha. I like the translate feature that they have new. I can read your email in spanish and write in english. Maybe I´ll write in spanish next time and you can push the translate button over there.

We had an alright day celebrating the northamerican holiday of the 4th of July here in Argentina. There wasn´t much we could do but I made sure to spread the news so I told many in the streets to have a happy 4th of July. I also have an US flag car freshener that I carried around so I also had the benefit of smelling good so I didn´t even have to put on deoderent...................

¡Feliz Día de Independencia de Argentina!....even though they don´t even do much here. The only spirit I have seen here is É Stearns and I wearing ties of Argentine colors. I really think that all of the Argentines are super sick of all of the other holdays that pass just about every other day so now they don´t even remember their own Independence Day. That´s too bad..............

(I hope that this works when it gets to your computer...

Super good week! Had plenty of ups and downs but looking at it from an overall status, I am very satisfied.
We were able to seal a baptism for this next saturday with a kid named Lautauro from a less active family that we have been working with for a while. He is 11 years old and loves to play "fúlbol" as they call it here. We are helping him and his sisters to come to church each week with other member families. We will send pictures of how the baptism turns out next week.
Sol(15), another that we are working with has a date to get baptized this weekend also but she did not come to church yesterday so we will be seeing what we can do. She may or may not get baptized on Domingo after church.
Carlos, a friend of Hno. Cobos(member) showed up to Sacrament. We are stoked to start working with him because it sounds like he has a family.
They changed our church meetings around on us. I was so used to going to Priesthood first and Sunday School, then end with a spirit bomb in Sacrament. Now it is even harder to get investigators to Sacrament because THEY JUST WILL NOT WAKE UP "EARLY" ON A SUNDAY MORNING! All caps seems like I am super frustrated, but I put up with it. I know that as long as we do all that we can, the Lord is going to bless these people in His own due time. Patience and diligence.

I have one more week in this area as I am entering week 6 of this transfer and I will find out where I am heading before next Monday so I will inform ya next week. I would say there is about 95% chance that I leave here as they usually don´t allow missionaries to stay in the same area for more than 6 months, although it does happen.

Today for P-day we headed up to the zoo again because none of these other kiddos had seen it. I hope you got all the pics that I sent because I sent a bunch.

Spiritual Thought
Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.
1 Timothy 4:12
In Priesthood this past sunday we learned from the teachings of George Albert Smith about how we as members can do missionary work and this scripture really stuck out as our teacher, Hno. Sanchez, explained it to us. This scripture illustrates one very effective way of proclaiming the gospel, being an example in the way you live your life so all your neighbors and family members can see. The first phrase "Let no man despise thy youth" is a very powerful statement. As a missionary, most of the people that I talk to are very much above my age. According to society, the older you are the wiser you are. When it comes to proclaiming the gospel, as we say here "¡Ni Importa!(it´s not even important) because anyone can gain a testimony at any age if they pray and ask God for the truth and then share it. Have no fear in being an example of the believers!

Thank you for all of the prayers and extra support that I am always receiving. Que Dios les bendiga.
Un Abrazongo(porque estoy contento),
Élder Devencito Larisch
La Iglesia es verdaderísimo

E. Stearns and I and our Argentine color ties

¡Dejalo a nevar! (Leave it to snow!)

Good day!

Hows the weather over there? We just got our first snowfall today and I think it is still going out there. I don´t know, I am all nice and cozy in here in this club. Ha. I can´t get over how weird it is that they have this Ciber that is dark and blasting with Adele, Madonna, and Katy Perry all the time!

I can´t believe it´s already time to celebrate independence over there. On the 9th we will be celebrating independence here, but I will surely be blasting the Star Spangled Banner on the 4th while in the house. Since we forgot to celebrate Christmas on the exact opposite side of the year I think we will have to wait until the next time it snows. I really don´t like the weather here. It is dry and hot some days then snowing and frío the next day, it is all messed up!

This week was a really good week for the work here in our area. We unfortunately are not expecting any baptisms for this weekend(but we still continue praying for miracles), but the next week(my last week here) is looking very bright for a full harvest! We had 4 good investigators attend church yesterday and hopefully we can get more next week so that we can hit at least 5 baptisms on the 14th and 15th. Gonzalo, Victoria, Lautauro, and Sol were the ones at church. They are all just a bunch of younglings from 10-19 years old but they are good and are hooked up with great members. We met some great people this week! Corina, a SUPER old friend of Hermana Robert(yep, that´s her last name) who let us in her house the other day to chat and she was just super interested in everything we had to offer so we set everything up for her to come to church on sunday, but guess what, her children stopped her from going somehow. I don´t get that sometimes. It happens to us often. We commit people to go to church and their parents or children stop them from coming. Ugh. It is frustrating because often it is just the attendances at church that stop people from getting baptized. What a shame. Ofelia is doing good. She keeps gifting me paintings of Florencia Molina Campos(a famous argentine artist) because I complimented one of the calendars that she had. She is pretty great.

Had a sick day this week where I don´t even know what happened. It usually is like that because I don´t have a mom to diagnose my sickness all the time. Ha ha. I had a bad stomachache and headache and felt really weak and dizzy. But the next day I was fine and went out to work. There really is no worse feeling in the mission than staying in the whole day when you are supposed to be out there teaching people. I hated it.

I enjoyed the newsletter of all of the missionaries. I´m glad that everyone is doing good wherever they are in the world because they are sharing the Gospel and enjoying themselves at the same time.
Thanks for all the pics. Lagoon sounds fun, it looks like Mallory and Braylon were having the time of their life on Puff...ha.
I will be sure to keep Aunt Kim in my prayers. I hope everything goes well with the body scan. I´ll also add Kenny in there too. That doesn´t sound like a fun disease/disorder to have.
Good luck in the Tour de Riv. Break a leg!...but not really. You know what I mean.

Spiritual Thought

The new bible videos on the church website are pretty good! Hope for a better, more heartfelt spiritual thought next week when I have more time and I actually plan one.

Un Abracito,

Helder Larisch,

La iglesia es verdadera

Ofelia se viste en blanca (Ofelia dresses up in white)

Yellow!!
Well, I don´t know if you skipped to the pictures that are attached to this but I´ve got some of the best news in a while!
OFELIA GOT BAPTIZED!!!
Yep, it is all just a great story. We have been working with her for way too long because she could not realize how ready she was to get baptized. We have been visiting her a lot and having just bomb lessons with her and we would talk about her will to be baptized every time and it was just a different doubt or some other reason that just didn´t really have much to do with what it says in the scriptures about the prerequisites for baptism. Our bishop even dropped the cane(bajar la caña: a phrase here meaning to throw it down on someone who is not doing something right, action usually done by leaders of the mission) on us a bit because he would see her on the progress report each week and nothing changes. We had a spiritual impression to have a charla(lesson) with member with one of our converts in their house, Hna. Chiquita, and we had amazing results! We went in to this lesson kind of trying to make it a charla franca, meaning that we were going to tell her that she has to get baptized or we are going to drop her for a while so we can take the Gospel to many others that are waiting for it. But surely we did it with words of love. With that, a few scriptures of encouragement in the book of Jacob, and an amazing testimony from Chiquita(which was one of the coolest things to watch because she relates to Ofelia a bit with her past because she spent a good time in the Espiritista church as well as many other churches and was able to testify of the cleaning power of baptism of water and of the holy ghost), we put it in front of her for the last time except we didn´t even ask it in question form. Ha. The spirit was so strong in that house that myy comp was like "Ofelia, we are going to come do a blessing on your house tomorrow night with one of our leaders and he is going to do a quick interview and we are going to have you try on some clothes and you are going to be baptized Saturday night at 18:30." Right after that Chiquita ran to her room and grabbed a brand new towel that she must have just bought or something and gifted it to Ofelia for her baptism. There was no room for the doubts or fears this time, she showed her faith and finally agreed to be baptized.

Super awesome experience and the baptism and confirmation went well. Not too many people showed up for the baptism and we had problems with the hot water, but nevertheless she made covenants. One of her neighbors came, but she had to leave early and didn´t really have too much interest...as you can see from the picture. Ha.

We are working on a few more baptisms soon. We have a couple fruta baja kids getting ready and another older lady(I don´t know why we always have better luck with the older women...ha ha).

Interviews were really fast but good. The latest Liahonas please me.

Today was supposed to be a special day. With the other Elders that left last transfer we had planned to have Christmas today and party it up but that plan kinda fell(since we didn´t have snow on December 25th here...). I guess that will have to wait until July 25th or somethin like that. We ended up going to the Persa again in Mendoza Centro(downtown) and do some compras(shopping). I had to get a sweet Argentina jersey that was súper barato(cheap)(95 pesos, which is like not even 30 dollars so it was basically a steal!). I´ll have to send ya pics next week.

I will not lie, I do not like the weather here. It is even worse than Utah. There is something called the Viento Sonda, which is a very hot windstorm that usually passes during winter and it is just killer. You walk out and it is freezing in the morning so you want to bundle up with like 37 layers at least, but no, an hour later it is blazing hot and you are getting sunburnt and sweating bullets. I have not passed a real Viento Sonda yet with all of the hot wind and stuff, just a couple minor ones. I had Ranch for the first time in like 10 months at a members house that has a son living in Utah. You would be super surprised how many Argentines are living amongst all you Utahns over there. It has got to be that we meet like one person each day who had a son or daughter living in Utah. I guess I won´t have to look for an Argentine woman on the mission anymore, I´ll just find one there....ha ha ha. Just kidding okay!? But really there are a lot of pretty girls here, it is true. But right now I am serving a mission. Maybe on the last day when I am buying souvenirs or something I will take one home with me...ha ha. Just kidding mom!

Wow, just an overload of news this week! The whole fam writes me and everything, ¡I feel so loved! Is Caitlyn really getting married??? To who??? Everybody is just getting married while I am gone! That is awesome that Dallin is heading out and I feel bad for Derrek having to give up his plaque. I dread that day...ha. I just can´t even imagine it right now.
That is awesome that Dad took first place in his race!!! How many were in his age group? That is a sweet pic of his leading the group. Now I can tell people here that my dad is a professional biker and that he hangs out with Lance. Ha.

Keep all of the missionaries in your prayers(especially me because I need the help). Love y´all! See ya around next week.

Un abrazito,
Hélder(as some spell it here) Deven Larisch
La iglesia es verdadera