November 2012 - Revisiting Lujan

Happy November, family! Can you believe it?

All right - I´ve much to write about this week. It seems like so much happened, and all in just a week. Wow. I´ll try to get it all in!

First off... we got bikes again! Hurrah!! The long-awaited day arrived, and suddenly we are able to do so much more than normal! We did better this week than we´ve ever done before. In fact, the whole zone of Chivilcoy did better than normal! Each week, we can see the results of all the other zones and areas of our mission. And this week, Chivilcoy came out on top! Quite a change from a year ago, when Chivilcoy was either last or second last every week. We´re seeing the change in campo that President predicted, and that we´ve been working towards since getting here! It´s nice to be a part of that, and I´m happy for the success of the other Elders and Sisters in Chivilcoy. I love my zone! We´re all good friends, despite the fact that we only see each other once every 2 months or so.

On Thursday a General Authority came to our mission - Elder Jorge F. Zeballos. My companion and I were excited to go and learn from him. Unfortunately, we stayed up late on Wednesday night getting ready for it - shining shoes, organizing, etc. I say unfortunately, because we also had to get up at 2:00 in the morning to get there in time. So, although I´m sure that the talk was very good, I honestly didn´t get anything out of it because all of my energy was going into keeping myself awake. Rats. That was a good opportunity I missed. But, lesson learned - next time I´ll choose to follow Mary´s example instead of Martha´s. 

But, here´s a fun thing: The ´Mission Tour´ with Elder Zeballos took place in... Luján! So I got to return to the place of my mission ´birth´. It was fun to walk around and see the city that I spent my first couple months in. And, even better, three of the very members that I had been hoping to see there in Luján happened to come into the chapel during our 5 minute break, and I so I got to talk to them. That was nice! Tender mercies.

Getting home was tricky. Due to a recent rain, parts of Luján are totally flooded - including the Catholic cathedral (see photos) and the bus station. Ack! So there were far fewer buses leaving Luján than there normally were. We waited a few hours for a bus, but one wasn´t coming. So, we took a bus to Mercedes, waited for a while to take a bus to Chivilcoy, then waited a while to take a bus back to Bragado. While we waited in the bus terminal, we formed a missionary choir and sang hymns, which was fun. 

I gave Elder Hougaard a haircut. He bought a pair of electric clippers, and gave me one first. Then, a few days later, he taught me how and I gave it a try. It turned out really good! Maybe you can see it in some of the pictures.

We bought ice cream to celebrate Arnaldo´s baptism and ate it outside. That was fun!




We really are being blessed to be instruments in God´s hands, in finding and teaching people.

And, we met and taught an English teacher. In English!

There are lots more experiences that I would like to share, but I´m afraid there´s just not time! It´ll have to wait until next week. 

Thanks for your love, your support. My favorite part of P-day is reading your letters and imagining how life is for all of you! Have a wonderful, wonderful week!


Love you all so much!
Elder Andrew Stockton