Life is Good!

This week has actually gone rather well. Things are still a little bit sluggish in the area of finding new people but the great news is that we have been working really hard with the people we have and have been seeing some good results. It has been the week of preparation for the next two weeks and what they will hopefully have in store for the Lord. So remember the name Jimena Nogales? I started working with her in the middle of my first transfer here. That is about five months ago. Well, Elder Marsden and I started working with her again awhile back and it has been good. Not only is she coming to church and is super cool now, but her dad is getting active too. And the best part... she´s getting baptized this weekend! But that isn't the best part! Remember the name Rocío Lozano? Well she is getting baptized this weekend too. The coolest thing is that Rocío is 16 and Jimena is 15 and they are good friends now and they are getting baptized the same day and they are totally into it. I'm super stoked about that. Gonzalo Tapia, the eternal investigator who has been trying to get married for six months. Wedding bells will ring on the 18th of September at about 11:00 am and he will be baptized shortly after. That is a story of perseverance. My goodness gracious has it been a long time coming. Okay. So lot´s of names to remember. Next name: Pilar Jeres and her daughter Maria. Elder Marsden and I also picked them up again recently and they said that they will be baptized on the 19th as well. Now that one is still a little bit up in the air, but hey, they are progressing again. And Isabel... well, still being Isabel and still stuck with her (I wouldn't think the word dirt bag would be too strong) boyfriend because he won't marry her, he won't leave her house and he won't talk to us and she is too much of a softy to do much about it. We are still working that one out.... but yeah, so things are looking up. Things are going good now. I love my bishop... just in time to leave... :) The ward is working better. There are quite a few less active members that are coming back.

So we recently did divisions with the elders. Elder La Loma and I worked with a new Elder in the mission. His name is Elder Ayllon and he is Bolivian but he grew up in the states since he was 6. He's a way cool kid. We ran into a really funny old man while knocking doors who wouldn't tell us his name then we got him laughing making a couple of jokes and he told us he doesn't believe in anything then went on to tell us how he prays to god every night. That is good at least... right.

I have been having a cool variety of experiences in the mission lately and I am loving it. I have got to tell you, the best part of the whole thing is the entertainment. You get the whole gamut walking the streets in another country. If I could I would take more pictures to show you but sometimes it just isn't practical. For example, an 80 year old woman with no teeth but so many cocaine leaves in her mouth that they were falling out. You know the good life!
Chaucito queridos.

Elder Rose on left and Elder Marsden on far right. Elder Marsden is Jeff's current companion.

Bowling for preparation day

Enjoying a little American cuisine at McDonald's

Elder Rose and Elder Marsden

Desperation while tracting - teaching two donkeys!

All is Great!

Hey Y´all.

Fantastic to hear from you this week. Thanks for the emails and not forgetting about me :) I am glad to hear that all is going well. Things here are going good. They have slowed down a little bit lately but they are more consistent I guess. It has definitely been getting hotter here lately. This past weekend was the weekend of the Santa Rosa, which they say is always when the weather changes. It is kind of like Groundhog's Day in the states. If it is cold on the day of Santa Rosa, it's gonna be cold for a while and vice versa. And guess what! It was about a hundred degrees yesterday so I guess that means that it´s gonna be hot. It has been pretty hot but I like it.

I got my haircut today and we ran into the mission president in the barber shop. It was actually kind of funny because the guy cut my hair super super short. Luckily president went right before I did and he didn't get to see the hack job. The mission president is a really cool guy and way smart. I am glad to have him around. So today was good. We did our studying and all that in the morning and then we went out to get our hair cut, ate lunch at McDonald's :) a little taste of America. And then we went to centro and I bought a couple of jerseys from some of the teams around here. Oh and I also took two of my pairs of shoes in to be resoled and fixed up. I'm on my third pair of shoes already... we´ll see what happens, I will be alright, I think I will just have to get them resoled every so often. But yeah. On that note, if there are any soccer jerseys or anything like that that you would like, or any sort of souvenirs you would like tell me now while I am in a big city cause I will probably be leaving in a couple of weeks. Okay!

So the question about holidays and festivities unique to Argentina. The thing that you have to understand is that the people of Argentina live to party and sleep the siesta. There is a special holiday for some saint or virgin about twice a week and when there isn't a holiday; they usually find a reason to party anyway. That is one thing that they've got on us, they definitely know how to party. This whole month that is coming up starting on the 15th or something like that is the "Month of Miracles" so that means that it is a month of people being permanently in party mode. It is enjoyable as long as you know how to steer clear of the drunks and all that stuff.

This past week went pretty well. We had the zone conference on Friday so that was a whole day and then all the stuff that went on that my comp and I had to do to organize since he is zone leader. We didn't have the baptism but she is still on track and went to church and all that. The mom also went to church again so that was cool. We are working with Rocío for this weekend if possible. Then Jimena Nogales we have started teaching again and her dad who is a less active has been coming back to church. Gonzalo still isn't married. And Isabel is still trying to figure out what she wants to do. We did divisions yesterday and we resurrected a couple old investigators. Pilar, the lady who almost got baptized is listening to us again. Along with a young couple who never really progressed but we wanted to give them another chance. We went around looking for old people that other missionaries before us had taught also, and we found a couple of people that still live at the same addresses and we will see what happens. I will also have to meet the new investigators that Elder Marsden found on his division as well, so I am happy about that.

Things really are going well here. I can´t really complain about anything. I would send you a picture of my haircut but you would probably laugh so I better not. It may just be the shortest I have ever had it cut. EVER! I am doing well. I am enjoying the work and I am gaining the confidence and abilities that I feel I need to be able to have success. The young kid, Gustavo, we baptized got the priesthood last week so that was super exciting. It is cool to see that sort of thing happen because sometimes you don't really realize the extent of the change the gospel can have in someone´s life. I keep learning and trying to remember everything that I learn every day. I´m super stoked to hear that you are all doing great. Thank you for bringing blessings to my life by praying for the Lord´s work and praying for me. Enjoy the blessings of the gospel that you have and make sure that you share them with others. I Love you. Take care and I will be thinking of you all the time so don´t even worry about that.

Be Good and Learn Stuff
Elder Jeff Rose

Here´s the update from the other land down under!

August 25, 2009

Well the good news is that we had a baptism this weekend. The bad news is that there was only one. Gonzalo still hasn't gotten married yet. I guess if you think about it there were 2 baptisms cause another kid from the ward got baptized but our baptism was Gustavo Vilte. And boy do I have a story to tell you. So we had a meeting in the church around noon and started filling up the font. Then we went to pick up lunch and brought it back to the church. Everything was going well and all of the sudden the church ran out of water. Who´d have thought that that would happen right? So we run out of water and we decide to go out and knock some doors and see if we can make good use of the time that we had. When we got back to the church we had water which was a blessing. The baptism was scheduled to start around 6:00 and around 5:30 everyone started arriving. Everything was on track until someone made the comment "doesn´t the font need more water?" We were like "what" and we went to look at it. Apparently one of the little kids that was running around had pressed the button to start the pump to drain all the water out of the font. So now we have about six inches of water and a baptism in five minutes. What to do? We asked the families and left it up to them and they said to go on and so we had to stall for time. We did everything in reverse order, ate refreshments first, did the talks and all that and when it came time for us to enter the water there was still only about a foot and a half of water. So needless to say it was interesting trying to get the kid completely submerged. The first time his feet floated up so I had to kneel on the ground with him sitting with my leg covering his legs to keep them under and hold him under for a couple seconds to make sure everything was all right. That was fun. The story of a week! I don´t know if I will have a baptism that crazy ever again in my life. It was good though. He was confirmed on Sunday. Needless to say I had a huge headache from all the stress and it still hasn´t quite gone away. I think I need to be drinking more water. So it was a blessed thing that p-day was today.
This past week has been super crazy. It is getting hotter here, the crazy religious festivities are at their prime and it seems like the adversary is working harder than ever against us. The work moves along as long as we are doing the things that we are called to do. If there is one thing to learn or rather re-learn from all of these experiences is that the harder you work, the harder it seems that everything else is working against you. We have tons of great experiences that I would love to share with you but honestly there just is not the time. I have started writing in my journal more frequently in order to have the stories to tell when I return home. I would love to hear what is going on at home and know how all of you are doing. The best things to hear as a missionary are those things that keep you inspired and remind you of home but at the same time they don´t make you think about home or wish that you were in a place that you cannot be. I am so thankful to all of you for the things that you constantly do for me. If I can be extremely sincere for just a second I would like to tell all of you that each and every one of you has had an influence in me being here, getting here, staying here, and all that. I want to thank you for all that you do and the constant love that I feel through your emails and letters. Keep doing what you are doing and showing your love. All the missionaries really need it. We have all come to the conclusion at some point in time during our missionary service that more than numbers, more than fun times, more than anything else, really the only thing that we need is a friend to feel that someone cares and on top of that that our God is there for us and that he will always be with is. Mira que te mando que te esfurces y seas valiente; no temas ni desmayes, porque Jehová tu Dios estará contigo en dondequiera que vayas. Josua 1:9 remember that guys. I love you all. Take care and be smart in what you do and say.

Elder Jeff Rose

P.S. - While I am waiting for all the pictures to attach I’ll let you all know a little something. There is something that is really cool that happens in the mission. You get to see a lot of people that you have worked with in the past progress more than they did while you were with them and sometimes even get baptized. That has happened to me twice so far. Maybe I have already told you about these experiences but they are super special for me. There was one man named Ramón who Elder Nichols and I taught in Pocitos who got baptized a while back. Then there was a lady that lived in Bolivia but was coming here for bone cancer treatments. Elder Jara and I taught her all the lessons but she had to get baptized in Bolivia because she lived there. I say lived because one week after her baptism she passed away. The little miracles of God´s work are so cool. I hope sincerely that at least once in your lives you can experience the joy of knowing that at least one soul has returned back to our Father in Heaven due to some small effort on your part. Love you all. Take care.

Other little notes: I’m still no good (absolutely no good) at playing soccer; at least not compared to here in Argentina. We have been playing a lot lately on p-days and we have plans to go to the church next door to play soccer for exercise in the mornings. We keep running into gypsies who want to rob us. Ever seen a gypsy before? If not you´re lucky.

Oh yeah, and for this weekend, hopefully Gonzalo will get married, baptized and confirmed.



Argentina Sunset


Elder Rose, Sister Vilte, Gustavo Vilte, and Elder Marsden


Elder Rose and Gustavo Vilte preparing for the baptism


Solis Pizarro Zone


Lucas Miño and family prior to baptism

Greetings from beautiful Salta Argentina

So things are going super well here and I am happy to say that the progress of the work is speeding along. Since Elder Marsden and I have been working together we saw a little bit of a slow start but the work picked up and we worked hard the first week and the fruits are being seen. This weekend we have two baptisms scheduled along with a ward baptism. The people who should be getting baptized that day are Gustavo Vilte and Gozalo Tapia. Gustavo is the son of a member who had been less active for 15 years when we found her. Now her son wants to get baptized and she says that she is never going to fall away form the church ever again. So that is sort of a double whammy because it is almost as if she has been reconverted, and we actually may have to re-baptize her because nobody can find her records.

The second, Gonzalo Tapia is the guy we have been working with forever in Rosario de Lerma, and technically we are not sure whether he will be able to get baptized because he is still not married but he said he is doing it this Friday. So that would be the wedding on Friday, interview and baptism on Saturday and the confirmation on Sunday along with the Aaronic priesthood maybe.

What a weekend right? We have also been spending a lot of time with Isabel Cayo who still needs to fix her situation with living with her boyfriend, which she is trying really hard to do but he isn’t making it easy, and she has the goal of a baptism not this Saturday but the next. Along with her we have Rocío Lozano. She is the 16 year old daughter of a family who listened to the missionaries a long time ago. We are teaching the mom and one of the brothers as well but they aren´t progressing as quickly as she is. She has a baptismal date for two Saturdays from now as well.

Elder Marsden and I have been having a lot of fun while working and have seen some really cool stuff happen. Like I said, it started off slow but now we have gotten into a rhythm and we are just cruizin´ along. We have found a few new investigators, had some good experiences with members and I have been learning a little bit more about what it means to run your area since this is my first experience with being the companion with more time in the area. It is a great experience though. I am super glad that I have the opportunity I am having to learn at this point in the mission and not later.

Well, some of you have asked about some interesting expressions that we have down here in Argentina. Let’s see what I can think of. It is kind of funny how many English expressions sneak there way into Spanish. For example: “a Full” means exactly that... like “to the max.” A lot of the kids down here say “de diez” which literally means “of ten” or “out of ten.” It could mean something like “that´s awesome.” I figure it comes from on a scale of one to ten who is it... so it is 10. Instead of saying “como está” which means how are you, they say “como anda” which means “how does it walk.” When someone asks you something or tells you something and you want to say you agree all you have to say is “meta.” Which means “goal.” There are a lot of expressions that also mean absolutely nothing in the real world but in the mission among missionaries they have there own special meanings. Here is an example of a typical conversation between two people.

¿Che! Como andás?
Todo bien! Y vos.
Acá estamos. No pasa nada. ¿Y que pasa con vos?
Todo de buena honda.
Ese partido anoche, ¿lo viste loco?
Nah che, estaba renegando con trabajo, me dio bronca el jefe.
Que lastima, che... bueno, nos vemos la proxima.
Que bien, cuidate ¿no?
Dale che. Nos vemos.

Yeah, so that is pretty much it. It is super cool now being able to pick out people´s accents and tell where they are from and understand pretty much everyone says. It is a huge difference when you hear someone talking as they pass you in the street and you can just pick up on what they are saying right away without having to listen too intently. I still have a lot to learn though.

So everything here is just going great. It is good to hear from all of you and know that you are doing well. Thanks for your emails and for letting me know that you care. I keep you all in my prayers and think about you every day. Love you all a ton. Talk to you later.

Hasta vernos juntos algun día. Les quiero todos. Cuidense. No hagan nada que no lo haría yo :)
Elder Rose

New Companion

August 11, 2009

Hey everybody. Elder Rose again. Well, transfers have come and gone once again and there was actually a change this time. I am still in the same area, Solis Pizarro, and I am now working with Elder Marsden. It is actually really cool because I knew him up in Tartagal when I was there. If you find the picture of my whole zone up there right before I left (it will be near the one of me with the branch president and his wife and daughter) you can see a picture of him. He is one of the taller ones, light hair, skinny, he is a super cool kid. He got here last night and there are some other changes too. We live six in our apartment and all but two of us changed, so there are some new faces. One is yet to be known because he will be a newbie, but I’m super pleased about whom I am living with. Elder Jara was transferred to Tucuman and he will be zone leader there too.

The past several days have been mostly taken up by Elder Jara saying goodbye to the people he wanted to and him packing and all that. As for the investigator situation: Gustavo has a new date for the 15th of this month. Isabel is still waiting on her boyfriend to move out. Gonzalo, I’m not completely sure because I haven’t talked to him in a few days but he should be getting married soon. And then there are all those other investigators that are out there slowly progressing.

So I heard some super awesome news. Last night when we were getting dinner, Marsden and I were talking (he was still in my old zone after I left) and he told me that Ramon, one of the guys me and Elder Nicholls were teaching in Pocitos, got baptized!! I almost flipped out with excitement. He told me that a lot of the people that we found up there and were teaching have gotten baptized or are super close. It was one of those moments that just make being a missionary all worth it. I hated thinking that all my time up there had just been a waste, but now I know that there is something that has come from mine and Elder Nicholls’s efforts. It was a moment of pure joy.

Today for p-day 8 of us elders went to go shopping for the week, then went out to centro, developed some pictures, looked around some stores, went to eat lunch and just hung out, got to know each other, shared stories. It was a good time. I’ve got high hopes for this transfer. Things are looking good.

I just want to tell you all how much I love you and I want you to know I appreciate your prayers and thoughts on my behalf. I appreciate each and every one of you who are reading this email so much. Just for the fact that you are interested in what is going on makes me happy. Stay strong, do it right, and always remember that we rely on God for everything. I wish you all well and I keep you in my prayers.

Fuerza Chicos!

This week has been a pretty good one.

The investigators that we are teaching are still all on track apart from the baptism that we were supposed to have on Saturday. That didn’t happen which is actually a sad story because it resulted in us stopping teaching her. She told us that she really does have interest but she was mostly just listening to us because it was like having a good friend. She always followed through with the commitments we gave her, but she just wasn´t willing to take the step yet. But what can you do?

At least I can say that I have been free of pit-bull fights (don´t worry dad, all 10 fingers still intact) and that we have been working up a storm and have some good stuff planned for the weeks that are coming up. Our eternal investigator, Gonzalo Tapia, who lives outside of our area, is actually very close to getting baptized. He should be getting married in a couple more weeks. Isabel Cayo and Gustavo Vilte have baptismal dates for this weekend but we are still waiting on a few things before that can happen so we will see. (But they have the goal firm in their minds). Then we have found some super cool investigators lately, one of which is the Lozano family. It is the dad, Guillermo, the mom, Marcela, and the three kids Nicolas, Rocio and Augustine.

Nicolas was actually a kid we were teaching a while back who lived with a ward member but we found the rest of his family, the other four. They actually live on the opposite side of the street from our area but we got permission from president to teach them. The mom and the two kids went to church on their own on Sunday and they loved it, I have a good feeling about them. They have listened to the missionaries before so we will see if that means that they will eventually just stop listening again, but I have a lot of faith in the Lord that He will help them along and I feel like at this point they are more prepared. It was actually interesting the story of how we found them. We had been teaching Nicolas and one day we ran into his mom in the street but we had never met her but she called to us and asked if it was us that were teaching him. We talked for a bit and she asked us if we could pass by her house. It turns out that it was in the other are but we live with those elders so we gave them her address and they went by. After a while though they stopped going by because it is the far edge of their area and they had a hard time finding her at home. It is super convenient for us though so we asked president about it and he said of course we could do it as long as she was going to get taught. So we went over and found the whole family at home and taught them the first discussion. It was kind of wild because they have tons of questions and there is a little bit of sibling rivalry and step children versus step father thing going on, but the second time we went by it was super good, I felt way good about it. So we will see. The moral of the story is that we really have no idea how things are going to work out, we just have to trust that the Lord does and things are going to work out good if we are doing what we should be doing when we should be doing it.

I hope you are all well. I love you all a ton and I hope to hear from every single one of you soon (That´s my guilt trip :) take care.

Elder Jeffrey Rose

Dog Revenge and Other Interesting Experiences!

So let´s start off with the interesting experiences that happened this week. First of all, I got my revenge on the dog population of Argentina. All those dogs that bit me before now know not to mess with me. We knocked a door of a lady we have taught a couple of times and her six year old son came to the gate. He recognized us and opened the door to let us in but the only problem was that their pit-bull was off his chain and roaming freely about the yard. As soon as the gate was opened he ran out to the street around the corner and pretty soon you hear a bunch of people screaming. So I took off after the owner and Elder Jara followed behind me. When we found the dog, it had another dog, (a boxer), by the throat and was at the point of killing it. So I got down on my knees and took the dog by the neck and tore it off the other dog. So now I have an angry pit-bull in my hands so I grabbed it by the collar and twisted it tight so I had it in a choke hold and it couldn't bite me. Then I dragged it back to the house and tossed it inside the fence. Thankfully, I didn't get hurt and both of the dogs are going to live. It was a crazy experience.

Next, the wind that hit last week was stronger than I realized at the time and it tore roofs off of houses and destroyed a lot of stuff. Some of our investigators were affected. Yesterday we went to do service for a family in our ward and had to shovel dirt and move it around to fill in holes and level out the ground. Good thing I got some good practice with Brother Mcgarry before the mission! I was able to win the contest to see who could fill up the wheelbarrow fastest with dirt.

It got super cold here for a while and I mean super cold. One day it hit 8 degrees below zero Celsius. I’m not sure what that changes to but it was cold. (It is 18 degree Fahrenheit). We did divisions that day and I worked with Elder Lowder. I had a blast; he is a super cool kid.

Oh and I don’t know if I told you, but last P-day we went to the offices for a surprise birthday party for President Northcutt. It was pretty fun.

So transfers are rolling around again in about a week and a half, we´ll see how that works out.
At this point who knows what is going to happen, all the old patterns in the mission for transfers have been broken.

Alright, so now for the investigator update. On Sunday we had five investigators in church which was awesome because all of them have baptismal dates for this weekend or next weekend. Pilar and Maria Jeres are going to be baptized this weekend. Then next will be Gustavo Vilte and Isabel Cayo. And then Gonzalo, the younger guy that we are teaching in another area that needs to get married. He just has to wait for his new marriage date to come around which hopefully is soon.

Two very important things happened to me yesterday. First, we were walking down the street and I saw a man heading towards us and I said to myself, "I’m going to talk to him" and he got closer and closer and closer and as I was about to talk to him my companion said something to me and instead of talking to the man I looked at my comp and the man passed by. "Darn" I thought "I wanted to talk to him." We walked about 10 meters farther and then I hear someone yelling "Muchachos! Muchachos!" I turned after the second yell and I saw the man standing at the corner waving to us. I went to him and he asked if we were the Mormons. I said yes and he asked if we gave classes to the people. I said yes and he looked at me and said in a voice that seemed to be almost at the point of tears, "Could you give me the classes?" Of course I responded yes and we wrote his direction down. After he walked away I felt the feeling of a mix of guilt but at the same time amazement at how the Lord gives us second chances sometimes. The moral of the story is though, what if he hadn't turned around, I never would have talked to him and he may have never had the chance to listen to the message of the restored gospel. What should we learn? Don´t count on second chances. Do what you should do and do it the first time you feel that impression, because second chances are few and far between.

The second experience…. Elder Jara and I were in the street and it was getting dark and while walking to a lesson, I saw a lady walking towards us. I was about to open my mouth to talk to her because I felt that feeling again (this was the same day) when Elder Jara started to talk to her. When he had talked to her, even though she had no interest, I said to him "that’s funny, I felt like we needed to talk to her too." Isn´t it so cool how the Lord does that. It´s like he knows that sometimes we ignore those promptings and his children are so important to him that he has a backup plan. The even cooler thing is that we both had the same feeling in the same exact moment.

Things are going good here, it is crazy, but the Lord definitely takes care of us. I used to say that the mission is hard. But it really isn’t. It is hard if you think of it as something that you have to do, but it becomes easier when you think of it as something you want to do and as soon as you gain a true desire to work and the love for the people. There´s that love for the people that everyone always talks about. I always thought it was so cliché to say that, but it really is so true.
If you don´t love the people then you don’t have anything. One of our investigators, Isabel, said something the other day. She was talking to us about going to church and how people have been telling her she is crazy and all that we always hear. And she said this: "at this point it doesn't matter whether you two (me and my comp) are here, if someone comes by to pick me up for church or any of that. At this point, I’m committed; at this point I am going all the way and never coming back." That hit me hard. The question is the following, are we at that point in our own lives? Are we that dedicated to Christ and to this church that we can say that as well? I hope we all are.

I want you all, each and every one of you to know how much I love you and how grateful I am for the support you give me, your emails, your prayers and your thoughts for me. It really does work miracles. The wife of a good friend of mine in the mission passed away recently and something he said hit me hard and is sort of my new theme. A simple two words. With tears in his eyes he yelled to us all "fuerza chicos!" “Strength boys and girls.” It´ll get us all through this. I love you all. My thoughts are with you.

Elder Jeffrey Rose