Netafim in Recon? 11/21/2017

Hows it going all!

Well this week was FILLED with a bunch of fun activities and a lot of success. In the begining of the week, we went to  a school in Reconquista because an English teacher named Julio stopped me in the street a couple weeks ago and asked me to go and present myself to his students and share with them the american culture. So we went and it was super fun. I basically just talked to them for 25 minutes and explained who we were, why we are here, and I explained a couple cultural differences between the states and Argentina. It was super fun and they seemed super intriged. But being in their school made me feel so grateful for the type of education i got at legend, even though there are always things to improve on.... the resources are there and was honestly privledged in comparasion to the type of school I visited. 

The class i visited. They would be the equivalant of juniors and senors in high school in the states.    

 We also had a really fun activity Friday night that turned out not exactly how w because there were more investigators than members at the activity. haha There were 4 investigators, 3 members, and 4 missionaries. But it was still super fun. We did a scavanger hunt for a tresure chest. We hid 10 clues all around the church property. There were 2 groups and they had to race to find the tresure. In the tresure chest, we put  all the spiritual tresures that we need to value, The sacrament, temple, book of mormon/biblia, prayer, mondern day prophets, etc. and I also bought 12 alfajores to put in because there needed to be a temporal tresure as well haha. We were a little disappointed with the turn out of members but the good thing was that the investigators didnt mind and had a good time. 

Yesturday, we went with the preisthood to ``puerto`` which is 15 minutes from reconquista for their fishing activity. That was super fun. Unfortunatly we are allowed to fish in the mission, or be in a boat. When we got there, all the of preisthood, crossed this small part to go fish from the island because there was a lot more space to fish. So we had to stay on the other side but luckily, 3 guys stayed with us and we went to a different part to fish. Also in puerto, there are a bunch of abandened ships, there was this really old/rutsy one that we went and explored. I took some cool photos on that. But after returning back to reconquista, we learned that every cyber was closed because of some holiday... and the church has been without internet for 5 days because someone forgot to pay the bill so the internet got cut. SO not sure how much longer we will be without internet. So thats why I am emailing today. 

Abandoned ship we explored    

The boat you take to the other side. Literally like 50 yard/30 second boat ride.     

Elder Oliva and I on the shore of the river    

 My comp elder Oliva needs to get a root canal, so we went to the dentist last wednesday, and we walked into his office and on his wall he has a huge painting of the maroon bells in the rocky mountains. So I took a picture and the dentist was like, ¨you like the painting?¨ and I explained to him that that mountain is where I live... close to my house. 

The Dentist office and Maroon Bells painting

And then you wont believe what I found this week. We were walking back from lunch. and as we were walking I was casually looking at a group of buildings we were passing, when saw a building that was a tractor/farm supply warehouse. Well on this warehouse was a NETAFIM ¨drip irrigation¨ sign. I stop walking and just stared at the sign for like 15 seconds. My comp was like, ¨what is it?¨ haha I went and entered the building and asked a group of three guys that were seated there, ¨Do you guys sell netafim.¨ The fattest guy look at me and arrogantly said, ¨we used to but not anymore, its too expensive.¨ I pulled out my leatherman that has the netafim logo on it and explained to them that my dad works for netafim. THen the fat guy kept talking about how expensive netafim is and that it would take 12 years to start seeing benefits.... blah blah blah. I left and took a picture with the sign and then we left. But who wouldve thought that there was netafim in Reconquista Argentina... well there used to be.

NETAFIM

To update you all on out investigators, this week Luciana and Eugenino Ortiz attened church, this time with their 13 year old daughter antonella. We learned this week that they are Married!!!! so now we are going to put some goals with them  and teach the word of wisdom and see how they progress. Also Alejandra and carlos attened church as well and they are doing well. We learned that Carlos is married to another woman and will have to get divorced in order to get baptised. And here ethat process takes a ong time... 3 months with lawyer or 2 years without lawyer. And I am not sure they will be able to affored a lawyer. So we will continue working with them but for now things with them wont be as fast as one would want. 

But that was my week. I hope you all have a great week. Read ether 12, I studied that chapter this week and loved it. Lots of things to take from the chapter about faith. 

Elder Keicher

Argentines playing soccer

Progress in Reconquista 11/13/2017

Well how is everyone? 

Well we had a great 1st week to the transfer this past week. The most successful since arriving here in Reconquista. I am excited to work with Elder Oliva(my new comp) from Cordaba because he is a hard worker. Super focused, and because of this, we were able to really see some progress this week. Alejandra and Carlos(50years old) are a couple that we have been visiting with, where Alejandra is an inactive member and Carlos is her unofficial spouse of 4 years. Well we had 2 really solid lessons this week with them. We got put into contact with them about a month ago because they were going through a really tough time economically. This week on Tuesday they told us in our lesson that things were starting to improve, but when we returned Thursday, they were super frustrated and worried and overwhelmed because they were just spent physically and mentally with all the economic worries and problems. Well, Thursdays lesson was super spiritual and in the end Carlos offered his first prayer outloud. At the end they both were in tears and the spirit was felt so strong. Well the next day(friday) Carlos got offered a full time job with a construction company and they both came to church Sunday, Carlos for the first time and Alejandra for the first time in 25 years. They stayed for all three hours and were also able to meet with the branch president(pres Borda). 

Also Sunday, we had Luciana and Eugenio attend church. That is another cool story. We just started teaching them 10 days ago.  Friday we did some service in their house where we hauled dirt in wheelbarrows into the back yard. They don't have a phone but we invited them to go to church then on Friday. Well, fast forward to Sunday, we were getting ready for church and at 8:25am there was a knock at the door. I thought it was Brother Patroli(Sunday school teacher) because he sometimes stops by Sunday mornings to grab our church key to open the church. But I opened the door and it was Luciana and Eugenio on their moto. It was the first time in my mission that an investigator came to our house to pick US up for church haha. So we had those 4 people in church Sunday and we are excited to continue teaching them this week. We still have to figure out if they are married to other people and see what word of wisdom problems they have before we can think about putting a baptismal date with them. So we are there with our investigators.

Doing service for Luciana and Eugenio

Nothing to exciting happened this week. I attached a picture of what looks like the sky, but if you look closely you will see a bunch of black dots. Well those black dots are spiders, we were walking and we came across a massive spider web with a bunch of evil spiders. Kinda nasty.  

The spider web

A spider

The branch here is also going to head over to Puerto this next monday for a fishing activity. We are 15 minutes from the paranà river which is a pretty large river that seperates the provencies Santa Fe and Corrientes. So I am looking forward to that. Then here in 2 weeks, Lucas( recent convert) is going to take us to the air force base.... it will be SUPER sweet to get into and see an Argentina military base. Let Trump know that if he needs any details on Argentina military strategies, he can let me know. But thats it from me. I hope you enjoy your week and remember to study the scriptures, say your prayers, and live after the manner of happiness. Love ya!! 

Elder Corbin Keicher

A pic from today, cool big painting in centro

Our district

New Transfer 11/7/2017

Well we got pictures this week! yay! 

And we had transfers! Elder Souza left for Formosa and Elder Oliva came from Formosa to be my new companion. He is from Cordoba Argentina and finishes his mission in 2 transfers(Jan 29). Elder Mayta is an Elder that was in our zone who got sent to Ibarreta!! I got him pretty excited to go there where i spent 8 months before coming here. I gave him some letters to give to members and the cano family. So that was neat. 

Me and Elder Oliva

 This week we were able to have divisions with Avellanda, Elder Giforos and Elder Ashby. Its a unique situation with them because They are from the same MTC group and after their first 10 weeks here they got put together as companions. They are doing great though and are working hard. In their area, there is a large sunflower field, so we took a 5 minute detour to take pictures. I am just use to potato fields or corn fields or wheat fields... but seeing a sunflower field was interesting. 

While I was there I had the privilege to interview their investigator Angelica for her baptism that took place this past Saturday. To introduce Angelica, she is a woman who honestly has had the short end of the stick her entire life and has gone through just awful things. She is 45 years old, lives with her family and recently had her mom pass away. But like I said, it was a privilege to interview her and see the faith she has for a better world despite the things she has gone through(addictions, abusive husband, death of a child,etc). It strengthened my testimony on the atonement of Jesus Christ to know that it does not matter where we have been, what we have done, or who we are... if we leave the world behind us, and follow the commandments of God, we can find true happiness in our lives. 

We also were able to have an open house in our church Saturday. It was honestly super fun. A lot of members came and a few non-members. In a church open house, the sister missionaries give tours of the church, starting with a presentation of Jesus the Christ, and then to a presentation of the basic believes of Latter-Day Saints(BoM, Prophets, Apostasy, PoS, etc.) Then they lead the group to the baptismal font, where Elders present Baptism and the gift of the holy ghost, then they pass for the different organizations of the church that are presented by the members. Everything ran smoothly, except for a couple members who gave 20 minute presentations at the primary and seminary stations. 

Open House "reference table"

Tour in action

Open House baptism presentation

Setting up the open house

The branch at the open house.

 We have an investigators named Luciana that has a baptismal date for the 25th of November,. She was a reference from a member and so we are working hard with them. It was funny, we were talking about how to receive an answer to our prayers and luciana responded, ¨I know that I have received an answer from God when he gives me a property with cows and other animals.¨ haha but she has a lot of desires gain a relationship with her heavenly father so we are working with her on that. We also have been working with the Ponce family who are baptized members. They got baptized together a little over a year ago and now only the dad(julio ponce) and a couple of their kids are active. His wife has gone crazy and denied everything about the church ever since one of their older daughters gave her some anti-mormon materiel and now wants nothing to do with the church. It has been rough on her husband Julio because he is super strong, in fact is going to be called as the elders quorum president in a couple of weeks. We have FHEs with them usually every week to keep them animated and to support Julio.

Painting in the Ponce family's house

It was a good week, and I am excited to work with Elder Oliva. I hope you all have a  great week. 

Elder Keicher

Our Zone with Pres Patania 2 weeks ago

Sister Douglas and I representing Parker, CO in ARG

Me, My "son" and My "grandson"

Eating a CHICKen nugget 

cool flower, eh?

Visit from Elder Packer 10/30/2017

This week was pretty normal! Nothing to much to update you on and I forgot my camera today... so this wont be the email you were expecting. But we had a great meeting with Elder Packer from the seventy and his wife. They talked a lot about the difference between conversion and testimony. Then talked about how missionaries can have the spirit with them. Sister packer highlighted some points that draw the spirit away from us as missionaries. Things like, unclean/messy apartments and contention between companionships draws the spirit away from us and makes it difficult to be effective as missionaries. There was a point in the training when Elder Packer was listening to an elder respond to his companion, and after the elder finished, elder packer asked what his companion thought, and thats when Elder packer found out that his companion was sitting in a different row. He then asked him and all the other missionaries to get up and sit next to their companions. And that is when every single missionary, except for me, elder souza and a couple other companionships, got up and had to rearrange themselves so that they were sitting next to their companion. It was kinda embarrassing and interesting because sister packer had just got done talking about having unity between companions. But overall it was super fun and productive. I got to meet Sister Bethany Douglas from Parker, we got to talk for a bit and we took a photo(that I´ll send next week). If was weird talking to someone from Parker in Argentina... but she was cool and she had gone to a year at USU too. I also got to catch-up with Elder Taylor(an elder I trained) with his missionary he is training right now. And I finally got to see Elder Hannah, who was in my MTC district, but I hadnt seen him since we landed in Argentina back on August 2nd, 2016. A full 16 months had passed without seeing each other. 

This past Saturday we had an Open House in the church where we opened the church for 3-4 hours in the afternoon and we set up tours of the building with members at stands explaining the different organizations of the church. It was super nice and there were 8 non-members that showed up and we received varies references. We have another one this Saturday for the other church in Reconquista. 

This next week, we have 3 baptisms planned in the Zone(none in our area), and we have transfers Sunday! So next week I will be writing on Tuesday. But that was my week! I will talk to you all next week! Chau

E´Corbin Keicher