Hey everyone!!

I hope that everything is going swimmingly in the states as I report in the goings on here in Argentina.

If you haven´t gotten the memo… there is a ton of changes in my contact information so here is everything… spread the word… I still expect letters… and pictures.

Address:
Misión Argentina Resistencia
Entre Ríos 435
CP 3500 Resistencia
Chaco
Argentina

Email:
sarah.tritsch@myldsmail.net

It looks like emails sent to my old email get forwarded to my new one, but I don´t know how long that is going to last, so please get into the habit of sending your emails to the new one.

Bueno… Back to business.
Here in Ituzaingó we are working really hard at the “sowing” end of things… and we have found a few people who seem really promising. We are teaching a woman named Rafaela, who is the maternal head of a very big family… 8 in her house and she has a lot of influence in two others. We hope that if we can teach her and get her to the font, the rest will follow.

She is VERY catholic, but seems to be receptive of the things that we have said… a shrine to Virgin Maria taller than the door greets those who enter her home, but she really likes the idea of modern day prophets… but no contact is entirely without problems… she can´t read. We are trying really hard to find a way to make it so she can grow a testimony of the Book of Mormon without offending her. Any ideas anyone? We can´t ask her to read the Book of Mormon and audio recordings are a little hard to come by.

God also helped us a TON when three people who we hadn´t visited, one we did not know, showed up to church on Sunday. Mariana, the daughter of Nora and Oscar came to church WITHOUT Nora and Oscar because some of the young women invited her. Nora and Oscar could not come because Oscar was getting treatment, but we were really surprised and exited to see Mariana there, igual. Miracle of member missionary work right there.

Then we met Maria de Pilar, the mother of one of the members, that up and decided one day that she wanted to go to church with her son… we went and visited them Sunday and found more than just a passing interest.

Then Vicente came too. I really don´t know much about him, he kind of just walked in off of the street, but, we are going to visit him tomorrow during divisions.
Which reminds me, we are going to do divisions again with LaValle, one of the areas of Hermanas in Posadas, but this time Hermana Galbraith will come with me in Ituzaingó. I am really excited to work with her because for the first time, I get to do divisions with someone more experienced, and with Hermana Galbraith, I hope we can do some really awesome things for the day. Hermana Galbraith goes home this traslado, and it’s really my last chance to work with her.

It is really weird to see her go… she has been in my district since week one… my companion has changed twice, but she has always been there… and now she will go, and maybe me too… I am so happy that I get to do divisions with her at least once.
Well, I am running out of time… but I love you all.

Chaucito, eh?

Hermana Sarah Tritsch

Big changes in the mission...

New office address, and new email system, which means new email.

This is my current contact information

Hermana Sarah Tritsch

Misión Argentina Resistencia

Entre Ríos 435

CP 3500 Resistencia

Chaco

Argentina

sarah.tritsch@myldsmail.net

Please send word and change it on my blog.

Even though the address changed, its really better, because Myldsmail is now linked with gmail and adding pictures and stuff like that is tons faster.

Love Ya.

Hermana Tritsch

Hey Everyone!

Kind of an uneventful week, but here in Ituzaingó, sometimes no news is good news... we have kind of hit a brick wall with many of our investigators, and those that were progressing either stopped or have big challenges that have nothing to do with the doctrine (i.e. Matrimonio) so we have turned our focus in finding new ones, as well as working more with less active members and recent converts... The members all seem to be fresh out of references for us, so we get to tract the old fashioned way... Door to door.

Blazing hot here, which heats the sand which burns, but at least all the people are outside... makes it easy to find people (they can´t hide from us.... jajaja). It also makes it also easy to find people half naked... one of the unfortunate side affects of working in a beach town... We got temporary relief this morning when it rained torrentially... I am actually wearing a sweater right now, if you can believe it. Its actually okay when it rains on P-day because it did not rain yesterday, Sunday, and tomorrow won´t be so hot, more frescita.

This morning, Hermana Casco and I took a photo tour of Ituzaingó, took lots of pictures before we got rained out... I am sending you some of the good ones, as well as the picture I promised you last time. I really love being with Hermana Casco. She´s a little quiet, but super patient and super understanding... the members have taken to her right away.

I have been super obssessed in my personal study with the idea of covenants… I was reading in the Book of Mormon about the 2,000 stripling warriors, and I thought it was cool that they were willing to go war to defend the covenant thier parents made… a covenant that was not even their own, because that was how important it was... and I got to thinking that my parents have made covenants too, eternal marriage, and even though I haven´t yet taken that covenant, I am earnestly fighting to preserve the sanctity of the covenant that my parent´s made, a covenant that I hope to make too someday, but not yet.

And then the thought entered my mind that it did not say they would not MAKE weapons, just that they would not USE them, and a really funny-cool picture entered my mind that the 2,000 stripling warriors had to be outfitted, and their parents had to use the talents and skills almost-forgotten, that the sons probably had never seen them use before, to defend and outfit their sons. That probably suprised the pants of the 2,000 stripling warriors, to see their parents doing all of that.

Anyway,
Food for thought

Until next week.
Hermana Tritsch

Hey everyone! Hope everyone enjoyed the Spanish lesson last week, but here I am reporting again in my native English… hehe.

Traslados happened again, and I find myself, for the fifth transfer in a row, still wandering the dusty streets of Ituzaingó – this time with a new companion… Hermana Laura Ayelen Casco. Hermana Araya is busy abrasando su mama in Chile right now, hopefully happy to be home, and missing her mission too.

Hermana Casco is super awesome… she has almost 16 months in her mission and will likely “die,” o sea, finish her mission in Ituzaingó, like Hermana Araya… They say that everyone starts or finishes their missions in Ituzaingó… I guess it still holds true. She is from Chubut, Argentina, although she is been here so long, she feels like she really is from Corrientes Capital – her last area.

Our numbers were uncomfortably low this past week although with preparing Hermana Araya to go and Hermana Casco to come, then travelling to find her, last minute meetings, and despididos, we really only had about 2 and a half days to really work… But that’s no excuse… goals are goals.

But this week is without disruption, so we can really see how we work together… I think it will be awesome… She is really chill… its very easy to be at peace and I don´t know what it is, but its much easier to have patience with others and myself when she is with me… she gushes tranquility, which is really funny because her main hobby is all things circus-clown oriented… The goofy kind not the scary kind.

Sorry I don´t have a picture of her yet… Well, I do, but I forgot my camera in the apartment, so I don´t have it now… I will send some next week, I promise.

Still dying of the heat… although I am perfectly happy here if it means not going to Formosa.
We are still working heavily with Débora, trying to make sure she starts her new mormon life on the right foot… it’s a little difficult, with the problems aforementioned, but I think she will survive… live up to the task. To help our cause… we are working heavily to reactivate her family… difficult, yes. Improbable? Definitely. Worth the effort? A million times over.

Well I gotta bounce, sorry this one´s short and all that jazz, but I miss you all and thanks for your letters of support and love… I got a stack the day after I wrote my last blog.

Chaocito.
Hermana Tritsch