I can't believe that I'm actually writing this email from Argentina! It has been a crazy few weeks and I don't have nearly enough patience to write about it all, but I will write a little here.
My companion's name is Hermana Arechaga and she is from France. So she has been teaching me a little French. She's been here about 7 months and speaks Spanish, French and English. So she's pretty awesome.
Our area is in Santa Rosa, Barrio 4. It is a super safe area and there are soo many dogs. We have a dog that supposedly has followed the sisters everywhere for the past 7 years - but he has yet to follow us. We will see, haha. The people here don't have a lot of money, but they are sooo generous. We have lunch everyday with the members and they always feed us so much that we leave stuffed full, haha.
The language has been really hard for me and I've found myself being frustrated sometimes. My companion encourages me to share a lot in lessons, and I've had to really rely on the Spirit to allow me to know what to say. Most of the time I only understand about 10% of what is said when we're speaking with people, but somehow I have always been able to share what they need to hear. It has been really cool!
I had my first baptism on Saturday! It was really awesome and the Spirit was very strong. I'm not sure how to do pictures today, so I will send some next week - but it was of a little boy named Bautista and he is 11. He was so happy and excited and it made me feel like the work is all the more worth it.
Funny experiences:
Funny and also kind of sad, haha. This morning while cleaning we lit a lighter and because we have a gas heater some of the gas was in the room and it exploded. It was funny until I realized that it had really burned my companion's arm and singed her hair. She is doing okay now though!!
We meet a lot of people contacting on the streets and while shaking hands with an abuelo he tried to steal a ring right off my hand!
The church is 45 minutes from our house so for the baptism on Saturday we slept over at the STL's house and there were 6 hermanas in one tiny bedroom haha. It was a good time.
A lot of people here catcall us on the streets, they're not used to seeing Americans, haha. But some people have told me that I look and sound like an Argentinian.
Our house sometimes doesn't have hot water, and we live in a very poor place. But, it has been really humbling and made me very grateful for my house back home and even my dorm room at Utah State.
Spiritual experience of the week:
We were tracting and we had a strong impression to stop by this lady's house. When we walked in the ward mission leader was already there, before we were. We shared a little message with her and I had no idea what was being said, but I shared my testimony with her. Afterwards she began crying and told us that she wanted to eventually come back to church. We told her that it was no coincidence that all of us had shown up at her house at the same time. It was a strong testimony to me that the Lord knows who we are and what we need, when we need it!
While we were tracting I had a feeling we should talk to a lady we passed by, but I ignored it and thought we would talk to her later. We spent 10 more minutes looking for this investigator when we finally turned around to go talk to the lady. We found out she was actually the investigator we had been looking for. It taught me that when the Spirit tells you to do something, you should do it quickly and the first time instead of putting it off.
I have a lot more I could write but we don't have more time today because we are at an internet cafe and have to pay by the hour, so hopefully I can write more next week. So if I didn't reply to your personal email I'm sorry and I'll try to write next week!
The mission is hard, but the blessings of the Lord are immense. I'm grateful to be here and have this opportunity to serve with all my heart for this short amount of time.
Love and miss you all!
Hermana Spackman
Dinner in Buenos Aires her first night
Arriving in Argentina after flying from Mexico City
Her new District
Google Hangouts with Mom at an Arcade. She had to pay by the hour to use the Internet
Working in Santa Rosa
Her first Baptism
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