September 12, 2011

Dear Family.

Wow. The office is literally insane. I don't even know where to begin. First off, President is never here. He is always in the mission home. But the assistants are here all the time. This week the new missionaries came in and the old missionaries went home so that was crazy. I have been learning all my duties in the office as well. We get to drive the mission van which is awesome. We basically don't follow the rules of not leaving your proselyting area because we always have to drive all over Bahïa Blanca to run errands. The missionaries are ALWAYS calling me asking about their things, ordering materials, etc. And I am really getting to know a lot of them (by their voices at least haha). Oh and my P Day basically doesn't exist now because we spent all day doing errands and other things that had to be done. Today we went to Walmart! It was weird.

But I love it.

And as strange as it may seem because I am in the office all day, my companion Elder Araya and I still managed to find more investigators this week than I ever have in my whole mission. Our goal each week is to find 15 investigators. And we actually did it! We don't know the members, the streets, the area, anything. But the week was amazing! Elder Araya is an amazing missionary. He is a fantastic teacher, very obedient, and at the same time, friendly and talks to EVERYONE. We wander the streets and talk to everyone in sight, knock doors randomly, and have found such great people! He has taught me a lot about following the Spirit and searching the guidance of the Lord. Yesterday, we were in this little area between two houses with absolutely no desire to knock doors. And he says, "We need to pray and ask the Lord for a new investigator to teach." So we did. We walked out from that area to the street and look over, and recently, a man had walked out of his house and was just enjoying the nice weather while leaning against his fence (we are finally able to work all day long in just short sleeve shirts because the weather is nice). So we contacted him and went inside and taught him! Later, we found 6 more investigators the same day!!

And my Spanish has improved a ton in this week. We talk a lot about it and practice in the street both English and Spanish. But the unfortunate thing is that two new missionaries are coming in today. They couldn't come last week because they hadn't received their VISAs. So President did some last minute transfers and what is happening is Elder Whipple (my trainer as Materials) is leaving to train a new missionary and Elder Howard (MY MTC COMP!) is coming in to replace the Finance Elder. Elder Whipple was the Finance Elder's companion but now he will be with Elder Araya and I will be with Elder Howard. AGAIN!

Well I have to go now! We´ll see how things go. I know I am going to have success in this area. A lady Elder Davidson and I were teaching in Balcarce is getting baptized this weekend so I am happy!!

Thank you everyone for your letters! I get to go and pick them up from the post office myself now haha.

I love you all!

-Elder Ryan Garrison