Hermana Hill - Bahía Blanca Argentina: October 2014

Buenos Dias to all of ya´ll who are all over the world... ;)

It´s another beautiful beautiful day en Bahía Blanca! We go from days with all of our winter gear, to days where we can´t leave the house with tights on because of the heat... Welcome to spring! Today is especially beautiful, cause not only is the sun shining, but there is a art festival across the street in the main central. What does that have to do with anything, you ask? well, I get to sit here writing, listening to the accordion players. They´re so cute! Little old men with little old Argentine hats (I seriously adore the cultural hats here.) Occasionally, the sound of panpipes floats into this little old internet cafe! I can´t wait to go walk around and see more of the culture of this country that I love! (There is definitely someone playing "la cucaracha" on a pan pipe right now, haha!!! I love this place!)

This week was wonderful! And hard. But more wonderful because of those hard moments. I don´t have to share all of it, but friday and saturday of this week, we had an experience that I wont soon forget. Friday was one of the hardest days we´ve had yet. We´re working a lot right now to find more people to teach, so we spent a lot of time knocking doors. Okay, really it was a lot of time clapping outsides of gates. I don´t know how the argentines know when someone wants to talk to them or the neighbor, but hey, it works! For those who don´t have door bells, we clap :) It´s good that I have lots of practice from all the concerts I went to last year, watch out, when I get back, my clapping skills will blow you away. ANYWAY... haha I don´t really want to talk about clapping. With almost every door that we knocked, there was a person who wanted nothing more than to tell us to stop talking and go away. Woo! yeah! that was the bestest. Why was this different than any other day you ask? Well, because in this area, we don´t really get a lot of that. We get more of, "otro momento chicas! Estoy REY occupada. Ciao." But not this day. This day was filled with people who just told us to stop talking. And there really wasn´t anyone to teach. We didn´t really gain any new investigators. It was really hard. And we felt bad because we didn´t feel like we were fulfilling our purpose as missionaries.

But the next day was different!

After our studies, we started preparing for lunch in the casa, when we got a call from the young women in our ward telling us that they had pizza for us in the chappel and would love to eat with us! Woo! 1- pizza is the bomb. 2- who wouldn´t want to hang out with these happenin girls!? It was so much fun!! And it was great to get to know the ward better and to feel like we could help them out (I know that doesn´t make sence, because THEY were the ones serving us, but I hope that what we shared with them helped them). They´re so great. Right after, we began our fast for fast sunday the nest day. Here, since the main meal is lunch, we fast after lunch on satruday till lunch on sunday :) We felt good and excited to get to fast to help the work in our area! Almost as soon as we had left the church, we decided to talk to a girl outside who was waiting for a bus. And guess what! We had an amazing little lesson with her and she want´s to meet with us more. She´s 19 too, and her favorite color is purple, just like my companion. Anyway, what I´m trying to say is, we really feel like we can connect with her and we´re pumped to get to know her and to help her with her family that she has to take care of! Almost exactly after talking to her, a member from another ward called us and told us that he met a girl at work who wants to hear the gospel and who lives in our area! He gave her a Book of Mormon, and when we called her to work out a time when we could meet, she was SO NICE. she even closed the conversation with "¡Un Gran Besito a ustedes! ¡Ciao ciao!" And the rest of the day was FULL of miracles. We talked to members of families that we had neverbefore had the opportunity to talk to. We found people that had lost contact with us. We found new investigators. We had many lessons.

To go with all of these things, was a feeling of intense joy and gratitude. It wasn´t just because it was a great day, but that we could feel Heavenly Father changing lives and changing our own lives. I felt so much love for the people in this area! Even and especially the ones who didn´t want to listen to us. I wan´t them too to have the gospel in their lives. It´s hard to feel love sometimes to everyone, but man, it´s so true that praying for charity and seeking to have it in your heart will set you free! I´m so so grateful for the message of this the restored gospel. I´m so grateful to get to share it! I´ve seen it change lives. I know in my heart AND in my head that it´s true. I´m so grateful for our Redemer Jesus Christ. I don´t have enough words to express what I feel!

I´m out of time for now, but I love you all so much! Thank you for your letters and your prayers! They mean so so much :) I hope you all get a chance to study the talks of conference! It´s so cool that we get to hear modern revelation!

Okay, I´m really leaving now, really ;)

¡Les Quiero!

Hermana Hill

Oh what a wonderful week!!!!

I can´t even begin to express how much this week has meant to me. I've learned so much and really, miracles are real. Okay, I don´t have much time, so before I forget- Dad: I´m in the same area, Villa Mitre 2, which is an area just outside of the big city Bahía Blanca. Also mom: winter is back, but I am definitely warm enough, and I´m grateful for my sleeping bag that helps me tons.

And now for the fun part of writing: telling you about the amazing week!

This week was the baptism of our dear Rodrigo! We prayed so much that the downpour of rain would stop long enough that people could come to listen to conference on Sunday. And it did! We woke up and the sun was shining, as soon as the afternoon session stopped and everyone was in their houses, the sky opened and poured again. As a result, there were a lot of people at the stake center to listen to conference and consequently, there were a lot of people for the baptism of Rodrigo!!! Rodrigo is the bomb. He said hello to literally every one of the hundreds of people at the stake center. And they all love him! He shared his testimony after his baptism and it was wonderful! We took a ton of pictures, and all the members had cookies and brownies (brownies from us misioneras) and mate and cake. We are all so happy to have gotten to be there with him and watch him make his sacred covenant. There was a lot of adversity against him before this, his family and him got sick, the rain, the baptismal font wasn't completely filled and the water was cold, his mom doesn't have a phone right now, and he lives far away, and well, a lot more. But we worked HARD so that everything could work out. We didn't give up. We called members to give people rides, give talks etc. We ran all over our area to get him there. But really, it wasn't us that made it work out. Here's something that I know- because we put in all of our effort and had faith that it would work, it did. Heavenly Father helped us find ways to get it to work that we never would have thought of before. He softened the hearts of many people to help us, to help Rodrigo. If any of you are in need of a miracle right now, work with all of your might for it. Don´t give up. Fast, pray, study. Don´t have fear. Heavenly Father loves you SO much and is waiting and wanting to bless you!

I hope you all could watch conference!!! I loved it! I didn't understand all of it cause it was in Spanish, but I loved it nonetheless and learned a ton! I know that Heavenly Father helped me to understand what I did, cause I don´t know how much I would have gotten without His help!!! Read and pray about the words that were spoken in conference, I know with all my heart that they´re true!

Sorry that I didn't have time to write more this week, maybe if I have time next week I can write you more about this one ;) love you all!!! Stay true to the faith! May God bless you and keep you!

Con Mucho amor,
Hermana Hill :)

¡Ciao ciao!