NO SMOKING

Monday already??

This week passed kinda quick for me. But it was a great week anyway and saw a lot of success. We had district meeting last Tuesday in Fontana which is like 20 minutes down the road. There I interviewed an investigator for baptism that the Fontana elders are teaching. He ended up getting baptized over the weekend. So congrats to them! 

After last P-day in the afternoon we went to the District Presidents house and his wife taught us how to make ´´Pionono´´ which is basically a rolled up cake. haha it was really good. I attached a picture of that. Then this week we also had divisions and Elder Freeman from Las Lomitas came  with me to Ibarreta. But the part that was less awesome is that we had to wake up at 3am to catch a 4am bus to Las Lomitas because it is a 2 hour bus ride. Then I had to take another 2 hour bus ride back to ibarreta and got back at 9am. It was long and I just slept the whole time. But I enjoyed spending a day with Elder Freeman. He is from Oregon and studied i think 3 semesters before the mission at BYU-Idaho and another small school in Oregon. We found some really good Alfajores together called ´´Sin Culpa´´. Each one costs $15 pesos which is kinda much for an alfajore but it was really good haha. 

This Sunday was probably the best Sunday in my mission so far. We had 5 investigators in church. 4 of them were the entire Cano family. The other was our investigator from a couple months ago named Rodrigo. He is the guy that had a lot of smoking and drug issues in Buenos Aires and Elder Taylor and I started teaching him. But told us he was moving back to Buenos Aires until mid April. Well Elder Urquidi found him last week and got him to church again! He is such a cool guy. He is very humble and nice. But he told us that he will be moving to Bueos Aires and staying there until October. So we are going to have to contact the missionaries directly cause he is more than just a reference. haha he is an investigator with 2 church attendances. But the Cano Family loved church. We had some really crucial lessons this week with them. We taught the Law of chastity and the word of wisdom... we had been saving those until they had experienced church because they aren't married and the dad smokes. And it was a miracle! They told us that they tried to get married last year but just got lazy and didn’t put in the effort to get all the things for it. But they said that they will get married and accepted and are planning to get married on the 19th....the day before their baptism date! Then when we taught the WoW, we had the president Falcon (Branch Pres)  come with us. He was an alcoholic before he meet the missionaries and literally turned his life around. So that helped the dad see that it is possible. He told us that he smokes like 10-12 a day. Then they all came Sunday. It was such a powerful testimony meeting and afterwards I taught the Gospel Principles class with the 5 investigators and the wife of the branch president while Elder Urquidi taught the youth. I taught ´´Fasting¨ and what it means to fast. Celidonio (the dad of the Canos) shared that he got up that morning and didn’t smoke, which apparently he does everyday... it is just a fix, like drinking a cup of coffee. After all three hours President Falcon gave Celidonio a blessing. He basically has to quite smoking in one week.... so keep him in your prayers. 

Oh and with the Mothers day call this sunday… we will most probably do it in the house of the district president. So we will see what happens with that. I will call at 4:30pm our time, 1:30 your time. The only thing is I don't know if the computer will have a microphone. I think all will turn out to be fine. You guys just be ready on your end and I will try and figure out all the things. The time is 45min-1hr. So lets try to follow that schedule. Cause the whole zone is coming here to talk.  

But yeah that was basically the week. I made tacos this morning and we cleaned the crap out of our little house. I hope you all have a great week. You all sound soooo good. I am glad the graduation went smoothly. I am not surprised that kenz lost her name cord.... typical! 😂  

Have a great and fun week! Love ✌

Corbin Keicher

Sitting in chairs(obviously) at a part family's house

Inside the house of the part-family with them and their parrot

Pic with Elder Freeman

Dead Dogs and Baptisms

Interesting week! The biggest thing that happened this week was Multi-Zone conference in Formosa (3 hours from Ibarreta). That happened Wednesday and I enjoyed it a lot. It was kind of bittersweet because that was the last conference with President and Sister Franco and my last interview with Pres. Franco. But crazy thing happened on our way to Formosa that morning. As we were arriving to Formosa, there was a little bit of traffic. We were going like 10 MPH when a dog attempted to cross the road. There was a Toyota truck in front of us that didn’t even blink an eye and plowed over the back side of the dog going 10mph. I was in the back of the shuttle half asleep when the spouse of the driver started freaking out. I woke all the way up and saw the aftermath of it all and heard the poor screeches of the dog. The shuttle driver stopped and they moved the yelping dog to the median of the road and we continued on. Half a mile down the road the Toyota truck had pulled off the road, so when we passed by them the ´´spouse´´ lady stuck her head out the window and said so many bad words in Spanish to the guy in the truck. As a missionary you don't really hear that side of the language. It was just a funny/sad situation all together and probably wont ever forget it. 

At the end of the conference our zone and a couple other zones were just waiting to get all our interviews done. We found ourselves standing in the middle of the cultural hall talking with Sister Franco. It was soo fun talking to her. She is so ´´Trunky´´ which means is ready to go home. She filled us in on our she got called to the Primary general board. She said that she did a Skype interview with President Henry B. Eyring where he extended the calling. She said that she thought the skype call was for President Franco but turned out to be her. She said she is super nervous about having to give general conference talks. Which I would be too. Then she talked about a couple of movies and filled us in a little bit on what is happening in Syria cause we literally have no clue. I just learned about that the other day. After the interviews we went to a grocery store called Carrefore and did some shopping where I bought Tabasco, Tostitos, and Prego. A bottle of Prego here costs $11! crazy... but sooo worth it! haha

As far as the missionary work this week it was a success! Friday we did divisions with Fontana which is like 20 minutes down the road! I spent the day with Elder Ferriera from Rosario, Santa Fe, ARG. He has 2 transfers less than me I think. But we passed by a lady there who is LOCA!! She is a total inactive member and is 68 years old. To explain a little she is married to a Jewish guy who is 48 years old. They got married LAST YEAR. and to make it even crazier, this jewish guy lived in the states for 15 years in Miami and Seattle and other places. I told him I was from Colorado and he looked at me and said ´´oh...Denver? sí?...y aurora?......y Colorado springs no?¨ haha So he actually knew a little of the map but English... couldn’t speak it at all. But he, being Jewish, left after 3 minutes to go shopping. So we talked to the lady where, to make a LONG story short, is very mad at God, mad at people, mad at her neighbors, and just mad at life/the world. It was very frustrating trying to explain to her that staying in her house all day not doing anything wasn’t going to help her situation. She hasn't left her house in months supposedly. But anyway that was the most exciting thing about divisions.

Then Saturday we had the baptism of Raul. It was a success and there were a ton of members there. Also Fabiana Cano and her daughter came to the baptism as well, which was awesome!! Afterwards we ate food and the youth had mutual. On Sunday we had a great lesson with the youth. There has been ¨wars and rumors of wars¨ between the young women of the branch. They have been excluding and grouping off and saying mean things on facebook. So Elder Urquidi taught a lesson to them about contention. Then we watched the video about Bullying with Elder Uchtdorf talking! It was a super good lesson and they all liked it. But that was basically the week. It has been raining a lot here lately.. I am getting kind of sick of it haha.

I hope everyone enjoys the week up in Logan at the graduation for Mackenzie. I bet it will be fun! I hope you all have a great week!!  

Elder Lake and I meet once again

Selfie with Maxi Falcon (the son of the branch president)

Tender Mercies

Another week gone! 

This week was a lot of fun! First off we worked last Tuesday in the colony after the district meeting. Elder Urquidi and I have been making an effort to try and work more there because they average 8 people in church and it is the same family. So we left and visited the colony and visited with a few inactive members of the colony. I mentioned a long time ago but the colony doesn't speak spanish natively. Their native tongue is called "Pilaga". And while they are suppose to learn spanish... some of them only learn the basics. So the only active member from the colony came with us on these visits and translated for us so we could communicate effectively to them. Then Wednesday and Thursday we enjoyed another trip to Resistencia. We had a meeting with all the Zone Leaders in the mission with a guy from Buenos Aires who is supplying the mission with new water filters. So we had to learn how to set them up and pick up filters for our zones. On our trip back the bus played a movie!! They played Allegiant... it was a true tender mercy hahaha. We got back to Ibarreta at 1:30am Friday morning. Then on Friday we had a great day. With all our travels and work in the colony we weren’t able to work in our area much. So we had a lot to do. We ended up having 7 lessons friday with a lot of investigators. We have an investigator who is part of a part-member family. His name is Raul and is 30 years old. He is a little special so his ability to learn is kinda slow. But we have him set to be baptized this Saturday. We had a lesson with Cristian and taught about the power of prayer. He is humble and is reading a lot in the book of mormon. Then we had a lesson with the Cano Family. They are doing awesome. I am so excited for them. They also went to church yesterday and loved it. Fabiana (the mom) accepted a baptism date for the 20th of May as well as the whole family. The dad (Celedonio) is a little apprehensive about it but says he has noticed that his family is more united and happier since they started reading the BoM and doing family prayer every night. But there is a possible problem cause they are not married and he might be married to another woman.... so that would complicate things.... but we will continue teaching and visiting them this week. But that was basically the week for me. We saw many miracles this week with our investigators and with this area of Ibarreta.

But that was basically the week. I only took pictures on the bus and in the terminal. Everyone sounds good. We will be traveling to Formosa as a zone Wednesday for a multizone conference with president and sister Franco. So that will be fun. I hope you all have a great week. 

Nos vemos. 

Elder Keicher

Elder Reggan and I in a taxi to the bus terminal

Us waiting for our bus

Elder Urquidi and I sitting in the bus to Formosa

Our VIEW

It's a BONFIRE

What a week.

Probably the fastest week of my mission. I will start from the beginning. So Tuesday night after our Pday we went and visited the Cano Family. They are my favorite family I have met here in ARG. We have been teaching them for almost a month now. We watch the #PrinceOfPeace Easter video with them and taught about what we celebrate on Easter. It was awesome. The mom (Fabiana) started crying during the video. She is awesome. She has a coworker in the hospital who is a recent convert and she told us that they have been listening to General Conference talks together. Then she downloaded general conference onto her phone. It was a great lesson over all we had with them. They have 3 kids (Damion13, Iara 10, Mía 7). Then Wednesday we got onto a bus to Resistencia. But when we were buying the bus ticket, the guy at the ticket office told us that there were only enough seats until San Martin in Chaco which is like 2 hours from Resi. So we got onto the bus anyway at like 2pm. At 6 we arrived in San Martin and the Choffer came up (because it is a double-decker bus) and told us we had to get off..... so that was disappointing. And the next bus that left for Resi left at 8. So Elder Urquidi and I went to the center of San Martin and ate ´´Facturas´´ or just a type of pastry croissant. But they were really good. The place we ate them at was really good too... called Pan-Crem. Then we got to Resi and stayed the night in Barrancares in Resi with another companionship of ZL´s. Then Wednesday we had Leadership conference which was fun. Wasn't anything too different than Multi-Zone conferences. And I got to see my trainer Elder Butler. Then on our trip back to Ibarreta we got stuck in the capital of Formosa because of weird bus schedules. So we spent a night with some ZL´s there. We ended up having to take a bus from Formosa at 5am back to Ibarreta Friday morning. 

That night on Friday we left in the District President´s car for El Potrillo. What they usually do is stay in a hotel in a town called Juarez then travel the rest of the way to El Portillo in the morning. But as we were arriving in Juarez, there was a ´´Corte de ruta´´ which means people were blocking the highway. This happens quite often here because of protests from the aborigine/Indian people who do it to protest against the government. But there was a lot of contention between the indians and the city of Juarez. They had blocked the road with huge trees and had lit them on fire. It was a BONFIRE and was quite childish of the indians to block the whole highway. We got to the blocked part of the highway at 8:30pm and the police said that they were going to start letting people through at 11:30. So we just sat there for a little bit. Then we started hearing that the city of juarez was pretty dangerous and someone had died from the conflict of the Indians and people of juarez... so we made the decision to just go back to Ibarreta and got to El Portillo when the City of Juarez is passable and not pretty much at war with the Indians. Sooo we didn't make it to Portillo this week. We will see in the next couple weeks what happens. 

Easter Sunday was good. Nothing to special happened. But one thing I really loved was during 2nd hour we watched all the videos on Mormon.org on the ´´principles of peace´´. They are different videos in spanish than the english ones but they were SUPER good. I invite you guys to go what the videos that are in english if you haven't yet. They teach these principles through the experiences of other people. I enjoy them a lot. I was reflecting a lot of the meaning of Easter a lot. For me I have never really thought much about Easter... just a time to paint eggs and eat chocolate. Many people just use the holiday as an excuse to drink and party. But when you really think about the significance of it all it should illuminate your understanding. Alma 7:10-12 talks a lot about the significance of Easter and same with the 2 min video the church came out with here 

I really hope you all had a great Easter and hope you all have a great week. I am glad you are all doing so well and are making the wise decisions that will bless you and your families in the years to come. There is a HopeWorks video of a cool black dude that I think you all should check out here 

Anyway love you all!! Chau

Elder Corbin Keicher

¨Ten Veces Mas Fuerte¨

Hey Fam! 

Well... things just got different. I'll just start off with what happened with transfers. Elder Taylor and I both had 2 transfers in Ibarreta II so anything could have happened. But Saturday during our afternoon studies President Franco called me... and extended a calling to me to be a Zone Leader!! I was completely shocked. He told me that I would be serving as a Zone Leader in one of the 13 zones in the mission. SO boom... I started packing my bags. But Sunday night the "Tablero" or Transfer document came out and I replaced Elder Higuera as the Zone Leader in the Ibarreta Zone! Elder  Higuera as you may or may not know is traveling home as I speak cause he finished his mission. And my new companion is Elder Flavio Urquidi from São Paulo, Brasil. And President Franco combined Ibarreta into one area. Elder Taylor got transferred to Las Palmas in the provence of Chaco. I didn't get transferred... I am still here in Ibarreta but am now  zone leader with Elder Urquidi. There are 4 areas in total in our zone. I will attach the ´´Tablero´´ to this email. But the Ibarreta zone is basically the northern half of Formosa. We will be making trips to ´´El Potrillo´´ weekly which is about 6 hours north of us. We will be making a trip up there this friday staying in a Hotel and working there Saturday and then returning. So it will be interesting. I also was made the district leader of one of the 2 districts in the zone. SOOO I will be serving a whole different mission this transfer haha

This Wednesday evening Elder Urquidi and I will be traveling for ´´consejo´´ or a cousel conference with all the ZL´s in the mission. They do ´´consejo´´ at the beginning of every transfer to meet with President, get money for trips, and to pick up anything for our zone (water filters, letters, packeges, etc.). We will then head back to Ibarreta Thursday evening. 

I was sad to see Elder Taylor go... he is a super good missionary and will be doing great things in his mission. I definitely learned a lot from him. 

As far as the work goes here in Ibarreta, we have a family that  Elder Taylor and I started teaching a couple weeks ago that are so awesome. They are so interested in the lessons and enjoy what we teach. The dad is named Celedoño and his spouse Fabiana. Then their three kids Damian(13), Mía(7), and their youngest girl of like 6 years old which I honestly always forget her name. But they are awesome. I am very excited to continue working with them this transfer. We also have some investigators in the other part of Ibarreta that the Zone Leaders work in. But I don't know them yet. The investigator Isabel is still doing good. She is the older lady that is like 68 years old. She got interviewed for her baptism 2 weeks ago but got pneumonia and wasn't able to get baptized. And just this past week we past by her and she told us ¨Elders, I have bad news..." then went on to say that the night previous her adult kids where telling her that she can't get baptized into the Mormon church because she is too old and can't think straight and that she ¨can't play with religion¨.  Which doesn't make any sense because she is a super intelligent old lady. She is so ready but just doesn't have the support of her kids. We told her to pray and to continue going to church to be able to get the confidence and the reassurance to get baptized. 

Funny story.. we were in a trio yesterday because Elder Freeman from Las Lomitas was waiting all day for his companion to travel all the way to Ibarreta. We were in a lesson with a guy and we were teaching Lesson 1: The restoration. I was talking about how we can receive answers to our prayers and know what God wants to say to us. I look at this guy and told him, ¨Realmente va a sentir El Espíritu ten veces mas fuerte en la iglesia¨ hahahaha I totally threw the english TEN instead of diez.

And the funny part is I didn't even notice until after the lesson when Elder Urquidi and Elder Freeman told me I said that. I felt so dumb. I don't know if the guy even caught it. There was a loud weed-whacker going off right next to his house and we were halfway yelling out lesson one. It wasn't the most effective lesson. 

I love you all and hope you all have a great week. 

Conference JAM

Hey Fam,

WOW what a great conference weekend. I absolutely loved all of it. It was great to see and listen to all the apostles talk and hear and receive revelation. My two favorite talks were Elder C. Scott Grow on coming to know God,

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2017/04/and-this-is-life-eternal?lang=eng

 and then the second was Elder Runland's on The good shepherds Love.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2017/04/our-good-shepherd?lang=eng

Those two were really powerful for me and felt like they were talking directly to me. All in all, Conference was a success. And all of us were super surprised and excited when we saw and heard mission Presidents wife, Sister Franco, get called as 2nd counselor in the Primary general presidency. We heard that she got the call from Henry B. Eyring last Tuesday that she would be receiving that calling. President said she is super nervous but is totally going to do an awesome job. But I ended up watching it in English in the family history room in the church for most of it. Some other Elders came to Ibarreta in the zone so that they could watch it in English as well. 

But this past week was good. Some disappointment with Isabel. She went again to Formosa to go to the Hospital where she got diagnosed with Pneumonia. She got back friday night and so we went by Saturday morning and she was really good. She was so much better. So we are rescheduling her baptism for next weekend. We will see if she really has the desire to be baptized. We have had some really neat contacts and people we are visiting right now. One named Cristian who used to work for Radio here. He is probably 35-40 year old man and SUPER nice. He has one kid and a wife and live a pretty humble life. But we taught him one time 2 weeks ago and then the next visit we had with him he told us about a dream he had. He said that he was being shown a city in heaven by an angel and in this city this angel was showing him these mansions. The angel told him that these mansions were being reserved for those that live a good life according to the commandments of God. So we shared a scripture in Ether that talks about how God is preparing mansions for us and to obtain these we must follow his commandments. But unfortunately we didn't have any investigators that went to the conference. With all the inviting and committing people to conference.... not one person showed up. Which is just so frustrating as a missionary, because we know that they will be blessed and will receive revelation that they don't even know they are searching for.

I don't have much to say.... i am kind of blanking this week on what to say. OH, funny experience I had walking home Saturday night. Priesthood session ended and Elder Urquidi and I were walking back together. It was like 11 pm and night. and I was wearing my suit shoes which don't have any traction on them cause they aren't made for walking. Anyway, we were walking on this dirt path and it was literally pitch dark, and the pathway changed and sloped all of the sudden and I completely fell. I just sat there for a little and Elder Urquidi took a picture of me on the ground. Hope you enjoy that pic 

So that was basically the week. I am super excited to finish this transfer of

f strong. So you know, this is the last week of the transfer so I will be writing on Tuesday next week. I want to stay in Ibarreta cause I like it but we will see what happens. You all sound great. I wish you all luck and especially Mackenzie on her surgery tomorrow. Love you all... and I hope you go back and listen to the talks again!

Love,

Elder Corbin Keicher

Racing in River Streets

Well hello fam,

This week was filled with fun. We had divisions with the zone leaders Friday. That was a lot of fun. I went with Elder Higuera from Louisiana. He goes home in 2 weeks. He used to be the financial secretary. Super cool guy. We went to the colony just out of Ibarreta in the morning that day and visited a recent convert and visited another family. Then we spent the afternoon that day working on the other side of Ibarreta. I had never been over there because it is not our area. But I enjoyed that a lot and learned a lot from Elder Higuera. He went to John Hopkins for 3 years before he left and he knows Latin/French. Kind of a genius. But we heard some bad news on Wednesday. We had planned this last week to go by Isabel everyday to prepare her for her baptism. But she has been sick for some time and so she went to the hospital here in Ibarreta to get some Cough medicine and the hospital didn't have any to give to her. So Thursday they left for the capital of Formosa and got medicine over there. Lucky she got back Friday (the day of divisions) and so Elder Urquidi did her baptism interview and all was well. But she was still pretty sick so they gave her a blessing. Then afterwards she told them to come by the next day (Saturday) in the morning to see how everything was. So we went by and told us that she got absolutely zero sleep and said she didn't feel well enough to get baptized. Just a weak sick old lady but it was a downer. I just hope she gets better and stays motivated. So we reset her baptism for this Friday. 

Saturday is rained 190 millimeters (7.48 inches). Which is a lot. It started Saturday night and dumped all night into the morning. When it rains here the streets are either literally rivers or super muddy. So we went to church and it ended up being us 4 missionaries and the branch president at church yesterday. So we did the hymns, the sacrament, then each person shared a little something and then we went out and helped members and investigators who where flooded. It was kind of a weird Sunday and one I will always remember. 

The work in our area is great. We have a lady who we met 2 weeks ago who was a friend of a family we have been passing by called the Cano Family. This lady is called Rosaura and she is a friend of this family. We gave her a book of mormon 2 weeks ago. Then during divisions Elder Taylor and Urquidi went by the family and this lady rosaura had read 28 chapters in the BoM in those 2 week. Super cool. But the problem is that she lives out in "campo" or in the country about 30 minutes away and only comes to Ibarreta ever other weekend. So we are going to try and get permission from president to go visit her out there. 

But everything sounds super good on your end. I cant wait to her all the details for the wedding. Congrats to Chalet!! That is exciting.  I hope you are all excited for GEN CON this weekend. I know I am excited. We will be making a bunch of Brigadero, a brazialian dish, for it cause it is so good. Elder Urquidi makes it. He told me that Logan would definitely know it. but see ya. Have a great week.!! 

Elder Keicher