Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Happy New Years!

Hey everybody! 

This week ended up being super awesome! We had a lot of good stuff happen this week. It was Christmas week of course. So, we got to skype home on Christmas and that was super legit! It was awesome to see my family and grandparents and cousins and aunts, etc. And,I even got presents. haha Even though I´m 6,000 miles away I got a legit all blacks jersey, hockey blanket, and quote book. thanks a million Mom and Dad and Tessa. 

And then we had the branch activity on Tuesday and that was pretty fun even though we had to leave early to get back to the apartment in time, so we didn´t get any food. Then, we had the zone activity with the missionaries on Wednesday, Christmas Eve. We had a Ping-pong tournament, Grido icecream, and a white elephant gift exchange. Elder Giles and I won the ping-Pong tournament, but there was no time for the final game so we dont know who the real winner is. And I gave a sledge hammer as my gift and got a little pottery bird thing. 

On Christmas we passed by la familioa gomez and had a great time we them. I gave them gifts as well, that I hope they like... I gave jorge and Patricia a book in English to learn, I gave Cintya a mate cup, Celeste gum and chapstick, Mauricio a hat, and Brisa some playing cards and chapstick. Than, as a family gift, I found my favorite tv series in one of the stores here and gave it them as a present. I gave them 5 seasons of the tv series 24 along with one of my missionary tags. So, that was awesome and they really liked it. And, to top off the awesome week, we had a White Christmas. We had the baptisms of both Delicia and amalia and all went well with those and it was a great way to finish off a great week. 

The quote for this week comes for the new year. We are all usually setting goals and this is a quote that comes from President Thomas S. Monson. It reads, "When performance is measured, performance improves. When performance is measured and reported, the rate of improvement accelerates." I love this quote and how applicable it is to everything that we do in this life. We must measure what we are doing if we want to get better and we must hold ourselves accountable as to whether or not we achieved what we were going after. Thank you to everyone who wrote me thi last week for Christmas, I hope you all have a great New Years, and I hope to hear from you all soon.

Les Quiero,
Elder Joshua Clarine

Monday, December 22, 2014

Christmas!!

Merry Christmas everyone! 

This week was a good one. Everything has been going well with the investigators as well. We are on track to have a white Christmas with the baptisms of Delicia, Amalia, and Aldana this week. So pray that everything goes well for that to happen. 

I´m super excited this week for Christmas Eve and for Christmas. Mostly because I get to skype home. Thats super important for Christmas, the family. Be grateful that you are with the ones you love and be appreciative of that constant gift. 

This week we had a couple of cool moments like picking mangos from the tree of a member and then them letting us take a bag home for helping, leading the baptismal service and playing the piano for the missionaries in Quitilipi, and just talking about and sharing Christmas traditions. I wanted to keep it simple this week. Just remember to focus on what is really important and take time this Christmas, whether you celebrate it or not, to be grateful for all you have. 

The quote from this week comes from what I wrote down while listening to Eduardo  Gavarret and it says, "Make the decision to act and to change your life today." It´s really straight up. And, with the fact that we are at Christmas, we can make the decision to give a gift to Christ. To give Him, as our gift, our personal dedication and commitment to be better people and live how he wants us to. Have a very merry Christmas, remember why we celebrate this holiday, and I hope to hear from all of you soon. See you next week with pictures.

Les Quiero,
Elder Joshua Clarine

Monday, December 15, 2014

White Christmas!!

Hey Everybody!! 

This week was definitely a good one. I don´t have a whole lot of news or little details, but what happened was exciting. On Saturday, we had the white night and had the baptisms of Ezekiel and Yamila. Aldana was still on a trip with her aunt and uncle, so she wasn´t in town. But, the other 2 baptisms went really well and it was a good night. There were 6 baptisms overall and it all went smoothly. I played the piano for the baptismal service and a good amount of people came and it was really nice. And, Amalia and her baby are doing a lot better, and it looks like they will be home by Christmas. So, Amalia and Aldana should both have their baptisms on December 27th if all goes according to the plans. Also, Delicia is doing incredible. Her back hurt this week, but she still made the effort to come to the baptism and to church. she is progressing really well and really fast and she just accepts everything and really understands it. It´s so awesome to see. So, she should also have her baptism on the 27th. 

Other than that, we had grido and some pizza this week and that was pretty good. There´s this place called the gringo loco, the crazy white person, and their pizzas and burgers are super good and they are really cheap. Other than that, we are still playing ping pong every p-day and we´re getting kind of too good. We just write emails and then spend like all the rest of the time playing ping pong haha. That´s about it for this week though. 

The quote I wanted to put in this week was something that I wrote down while listening to George Klebingat and it reads, "It´s not possible to see or do something bad or perverse and expect to feel virtuous." It´s a really simple quote and holds a lot of truth. We cannot fill our lives with things that are known to cause misery and expect to be filled with happiness. Anyways, thanks to everyone who wrote me this week, I hope that everyone is getting the Christmas spirit and really trying to focus in on the true importance, and I hope to hear from you all soon.
 
Les Quiero,
Elder Joshua Clarine
 
Top: Us with Ezekiel
Bottom: Us with Yamila
The train tracks
All of the baptisms.


Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Christmas!

Hey everybody!! 

This week was a good one! We started out and didn´t have district meeting since the zone leaders traveled on that day and we just didnt have it. Then, on Wednesday, La hermana Urban gave us a bunch of mangos from her tree which was legit because mangos are my favorite fruit and they are really good. Then, Elder Giles was going to have to travel to Cordoba for 3 days to do his visa stuff, but his papers didn´t come in, sohe didnt go anywhere. No exciting news from cordoba haha. 

Then, I titled this letter Christmas for 2 things. First, because its December clearly, and second, for the reason why I didn´t email yesterday. It was another argentine holiday and we had a zone meeting in which they focused on Christmas. The church gave us these new pass along cards and is having us use this cool christmas video from mormon.org to contact and teach the people and it has gone really well. I really like they video and recommend it to anyone who is interested.

And, as far as the investigators go, we have both good and bad news. The bad news is that the dad of la familia ramirez is still being lame and won´t let them go to church. The good news is that Delicia, Ezekiel, Guadalupe, and Claudio came to church and Delicia, Claudio, and the kids of la familia suarez want to be baptized. And the great news is that if everything goes according to plan this week, then we will have the baptisms of Ezekiel, Aldana, and Yamila this week! So keep them in your prayers. 

That´s all the exciting news this week and the quote this week comes from what I had written down when Neil L. Andersen spoke and I wrote, "we can´t be that great of a help to others unless our own personal faith is both present and unwavering." I like this and it applies to all our lives. We cannot help others in something we are not yet proficient. Thank you to everyone who wrote me, the computer won´t read the camera so we´ll hope for pictures next week, and I hope to hear from you all soon.

Les Quiero,
Elder Joshua Clarine

Monday, December 1, 2014

14 months!

Hey Everyone!! 

I had actually hit 14 months already when I wrote you guys last week, but hadn´t noticed it. Crazy how fast the time is going. We´re already in December!!! It´s Christmas time! It´s just weird to me that in 30 days we will be entering 2015, the year in which I come home from the mission!!! Weird stuff for sure.  The mission spans over 2013, 2014, and 2015, and I´m almost done with both the 2013 and 2014 part. 

Anyways, the highlight of this week is that we finally got a hot shower. I don´t know if I had mentioned, but we have just had freezing cold showers for the last 2 months. And, Thursday morning was the first time that I have had a semi-legitimate shower in a long time. So that was pretty awesome. 

I don´t have a ton of time, so I will just updates on all the investigators. Amalia is still in the hospital...for no reason, but should be back this month. Her kids are still doing well and came to church and are on track to be baptized the 13th. Then, la familia Ramirez is also doing well. We have been praying for them and they even talked to their Dad and were going to come to church this week, but I don´t know what happened, they never showed up. La familia Rodas is doing well and still like when we visit but live forever away and it´s hard for them to come to church. Then, I did divisions this week with Elder Lee and those went well and he´s a cool guy. 

We had district conference, like stake conference, this week. So, just a ton of members and the mission president talks. I played the pìano both saturday and Sunday and played the organ for the choir as well. It was some good stuff. Oh, and we´ve been playing ping pong every P-day in the church and so we´ve been getting pretty good at that. 

I´m kind of out of time today, but I still wanted to put in something that I wrote down while listening to Dieter F Uchtdorf. It reads, "We have the promise that God will talk to those who come unto Him and humble themselves and sincerely search for an answer from Him." I love the promise and how applicable it is to all of us. I´ll send pictures next week since I´m out of time today. Thanks to all who wrote me and I hope to hear from you soon.

Les Quiero,
Elder Joshua Clarine