Changes

This week was good. I have my new companion and we are working hard. Hermana Azcurra is from Mar de Plata (really close to Buenos Aires). She´s 30 years old, but doesn´t look it at all. (I attached a photo of us that we just took). Libertad B will be her last area as she finishes her mission in April. She was Hermana Reales´second companion, too. I´m already incredibly impressed with her and how she teaches. She asks really great questions and checks for understanding. I´m going to learn so much from her. I hope I can take advantage of every minute and every experience. We´ve found a few new investigators that seem really great and that can progress. One of them, Ramón, is a little old man that we found the first night Hermana Azcurra got here. He has the sweetest smile and a sincere desire to learn and understand what we have to teach him. He´s 83 years old! He got up early yesterday so he could come to church with us and told Hermana Azcurra during sacrament meeting that he just doesn´t know how we arrived at his door at just the right time. Hermana Azcurra told him that God sent us and that God knows exactly what Ramón needs. He´s wonderful.



I´m going to be playing the piano in sacrament meeting every week now, since Hermana Reales is gone, I think. It will be good for me, since I wasn´t sure if I´d really have the chance to keep up with it all, but there isn´t any time to practice. I sight read everything. It doesn´t always work out so well, but it´s better than trying to sing everything a capella. My sight reading will improve, too, which I´m sure I´ll be grateful for in the long run. Hermana Azcurra likes to sing in almost every lesson. I love it, but it´s sometimes difficult because her voice is lower than mine and sometimes she´s a little off pitch. Sometimes I can´t hit all of the notes in every song because they´re too low, but It´s okay. It doesn´t have to be perfect to bring the Spirit.



Every week I´m more and more amazed with the youth of our ward. Hermana Azcurra says it´s really rare to have so many in one ward here in Argentina. To me it seems like a small group, but that´s just because New Mark has so many youth. Yesterday we were short 1 lesson with a member to meet our goal of 15 for the week. We called one of the youth in our ward, Hernán, and he said he could come with us at the last minute. He´s only 16, but is incredible. He´s been studying Preach My Gospel and taught amazingly well in our lesson with Ramón yesterday. He helped him understand the concept of agency. He´s going to be an incredible missionary. All of our youth are. Their helping us is helping them prepare for their own missions. If there´s any way possible, I would encourage all the youth to go on visits with the missionaries. Here they even help us in tracting. They really are the future leaders of the Church and I´m confident that the Church will be in good hands because they put their confidence in God.



Well, I´m out of time again. Hermana Azcurra sends "saludos" to you all, meaning she says, "Hello."



un abrazo,



Erin