Sooo... I saw grown men cry this week.... After the Germans slaughtered the Argentinians 4-0, grown men wandered the streets drunk and crying as if the outcome somehow affected their way of life. Thankfully no riots, but I have heard of that happening too. The next day, everyone forgot about the World Cup and la Obra Misional got back to buisness as usual. Hermana Madariaga (argentinian herself) and I actually prayed and thanked Heavenly Father for the loss, because it was cutting into prime proselyting time... that, and the final would have been on a Sunday Morning and we would have been missing all of the investigators and half the members, who would have been at home watching the game... I pity the German Missionaries, but then again, I don´t think the Mundial Fever is the same there as it is here.

We have a new rule here in the mission, that we need to try and put baptismal dates with people in the first lesson, the first meeting... Anyone who is or was a missionary knows thats kind of a really gutsy thing, and Hermana Madariaga and I were really kind of freaked out at the prospect, so we asked help of presidente in interviews and he showed us a really tranquilo way to do it, and so, with a little courage, we put it to work and found that within our cache of investigators, two more fechas bautismales.

One girl, Julieta, is a daughter of a woman who is menos activo, and another Noelia, is a friend of Familia Mancuello (the family of circus people), Julieta came to church and seems very sincere... but we want to reactivate her mother or baptize her sister too, so she does not have to be alone... I don´t want what happened to Débora in Ituzaingó to happen to Julieta. Noelia accepted the fecha bautismal, but still has not come to church yet, so we are not so sure what we should do... we don´t want to leave her yet because she is keeping all of her other commitments.

Another woman that we are teaching, Mabel... is totally awesome. She came to church for the second time yesterday, which was fast and testimony meeting... I explained to her what was happening so she wouldn´t freak out that people randomly stood up in the audience, that she was not expected to do the same, and she expressed a desire to bear her testimony at some point. "Not today." she said, "Maybe next month." And then in Relief Society she volunteered herself to help in a service project serving meals to a bunch of young single adults that are going to sleep in the Capilla during a big conference. ALL BY HERSELF SHE DECIDED THAT! She is quickly becoming part of the ward!!! But no investigator is completely golden... She has to get married, and her marido (the man who acts like her husband but is not married to her) is from Paraguay and doesn´t have Paraguayan or Argentinian documents... makes marriage super dificil... She might be an investigator for a long haul.

Well, Time is almost up...

Love you all,
Hermana Tritsch

Hey All!

Hope everyting is fine on the home front. I am so glad for these weekly letters or maybe I would be fresh out of journal entries... I enter the pench so tired in the nighttime, me da fiaca to write in my journal... We work really hard and Hermana Madariaga helps me be more obedient. She is helping me a TON with my language, we call her the "Gendarme Linguistica" but its exactly what I needed. My other companions never corrected me, so I have picked up alot of nasty habits like, "wear the bus" instead of "take the bus" among other little gut-busters. Well, my companion at least gets a crack out of it... jaja.

This week we were all ahead full with menos activos, and found much success with this. Many people came to church yesterday that had not been at church in a long time, and I like to think that maybe one of our visitas gave them the animo to come to church. The chapel has two sets of banks with the isle in the center, and normally everyone sits on the same side, but yesterday there was so many people that there were also people who had to find space on the other side... Its a little thing but its enough to make a missionary extraordinarily happy.

Now I am going to tell you what it is like during the World Cup in Argentina.... Especially when they are winning. In the United States, there really is not anything like it. There are big, crazy fans in many sports in the United States, but here in Argentina, its really the only sport. Yesterday, Argentina played against Britain (I believe) and the whole city was dead, but we could hear the game playing from all the houses.

When they scored a goal (and from the sound of it, Argentina scored several) The whole of Posadas shouts and cries and makes tons of noise. You could lay down in the middle of a normally very busy street and take a nap if you wanted and nothing would happen to you. And missionary work? You can almost forget it. The only ones that wander the calles are people with black tags. All of our citas told us to come back after the game, and noone wanted to listen to us for fear of losing a goal.

I am quite happy that the United States is no longer in the running for the World Cup. OR it might be dangerous for me to be in the streets. Jaja.

Love Ya,
Sarah

Hey everyone!!
This week went by superfast… Yesterday, I forgot that tomorrow was p-day… but alas, here I am for another entry.

These past few weeks we have had a very high number of new investigators, and we rana round town trying to follow up on them… some of them had little interest, others were not home (on purpose or on accident, we will never know) but others really had some interest… I am a firm believer that when people have interest, they show it quickly… for example one of the new investigators from this past week, Mabel.

Mabel and her family live right next to her sister Yolanda and we started teaching them and their 8 year old daughters, Augustina and Sabrina (They have other little kids that listen, but these are the ony ones that are of baptizing age.) (Mabel´s marido also listens from the doorway…) They both showed a ton of interest, and very quickly put into practice the commitment of family prayer. Mabel is a little shy to pray out loud, so she asks her children to do it. But this last time only Mabel and Augustina listened to the charla. They only have about 20 minutes before we loose the attention of the kids so we teach them one or two principles at a shot. This last time, we taught her and her small children Prophets with the book of pictures Dad sent me (thanks… I really have no idea how this lesson would have went without them) and it went really well. We volunteered a member to come by her house to find her and accompany her to church, and Mabel and Augustina CAME TO CHURCH!!!

It was fantastic! They really enjoyed the meetings and are exited to come back the following week. When we finish with lesson one, I think we are going to be able to put a baptismal date with them. Their desire is sincere, and that is what matters.
Momento Milagroso con Miembros: Remember my circus family, well, Yanina y Yamila, the “little people,” and also Angel, a friend of the Mancuellos got cordially invited by Fabiana, a girl in our Ward, to go watch the Argentina game at the institute, and also attend the class. Milagro de milagros, they went, and very quicky won the hearts of all that are involved… Now… how can we get them to church? Well, Fabi and our ward mission leader, Lucas are working on that, still. I would not doubt that they are going to do it. The invitation of a member to go to church is a million times more powerful than that of a missionary.

We have also been working with Familia Garcia, a married couple that has been members forever, but are now inactive because of the death of their son a few years ago. Her son died in a car crash when he was preparing to go on a mission, so she felt bitter that God took someone away from her that was preparing to serve God.
Well, yesterday was the birthday of the hermana, and we really celebrated it up, with a little cake that we made and candles… it made her so happy that she told us that this next Sunday that she will come to church with a nonmember friend… Its a striking difference from the first time that I know her… all sad and bitter toward the church and God but now really exited to return…

Stuff like cakes, pavadas, really, sometimes can make all of the difference. She is also allowing us to put together a JAS noche de hogar in her house… We were thinking if we fill her house with jóvenes again, it will probably help her reactivate. A little unorthodox, but nothing in a mission is orthodox.

Thanks for Reading this…

Hermana Sarah Tritsch

Drop me a line if you want to at: Sarah.tritsch@myldsmail.net