January 11, 2010

Here's the latest from Elder Ludlow. We spoke with him on the phone during a layover in Dallas, where he was waiting with a group of 40 missionaries, all bound for Argentina. That must have been quite a sight in the international terminal. As you will read, he arrived in Argentina on Tuesday, January 5, received his assignments and got right to work. Here is what he had to say...

I'M HERE!!!! 6 months of waiting from the day my call came(7-July-2009 to 5-Jan-2010) The change I recognize in myself from 6 months(ok more like the last 2) is intense. I'm really happy. Lets start with where I left the MTC. I left the MTC on monday at 8:00 am and got to Villa Dolores(my area) at 4:00 am wednesday. There were breaks in there but thats about 24 hours of travel time and 13 hours of waiting... But yeah it was weird getting dropped off in Salt Lake and all of the missionaries I was with being all "Welcome to Babylon." It was seriously weird going from the MTC where the most skin you was when someone wore a short sleeve shirt, the only time you heard music was when you were in Devotionals, and TV was the big screen to watch Music and the Spoken Word, to the airport where there were girls in short skirts and low tops(why would you do that in Utah in the 30 degree weather? I don't know) with music over the loud speakers and TVs all over. Major culture shock. Then we hopped on that plane to Dallas and then we were there for 5 hours. Fun... Again there was some major culture shock. oh well. Everyone sounded good when I got to call. =) Ok the Buenos Aires flight left at 7:00 pm texas time. That was the longest flight of my life. like there was no way I was sleeping ever. babies crying people watching movies(which we were told not to do) and missionaries twitching in their seats from want of a bed and to be asleep with the lights out at 10:30. =P Well after the longest plane ride of my life we landed in Buenos Aires to a 30 degree Celsius with 45% humidity from the 30 degrees F 0% humidity in utah. It was so nice. Ha ha. Well we started through customs and we began to get in one of the lines to pay the customs fee of $131 American(that the MTC gave us) and we get pulled aside and put into the next line. We kinda freaked out for a second, but we were fine. It was weird. The only problem was this line was long and all the missionaries who were in the line were standing there with the passports out waving them around looking like the biggest tourists. I was like "oh man we are going to get put in the other line that no one comes out of, put your stupid passports away."(an in head quote) well customs after that was a breeze, got our luggage and met Alberto. He was all like "Passports!" and we were like "huh why uhhh" we gave them to him and he runs off and we go "what the crap" he actually just made copies but for how long he was gone... lol he was with church travel so it wasnt that big of a deal. Anyways. we then got bussed over to the smaller municipal airport for interior flights and met up with some of the other missionaries(the natives) who were going to cordoba. 3 were going to cordoba and we talked with them and learned some castellano in exchange for english phrases. Im sorry to say that I am now learning castellano Sarah, and Dad. *shoulder shrug* Well we all got onto our plane and flew into cordoba where we met President and Hermana Olsen. They are nice. President Olsen is intense, but nice. We took care of logistic stuff and got our first interview with president, and then we had dinner(empanadas, where have you been all my life?!) and got our companions. My companion is Elder Robison. He is from Newport Oregon, and wants to be a chef when he gets back. He leaves on the 31st of March. Then as we left the mission home to go to the bus station it started raining. Its not normal rain. Its hardcore rain and wind and thunder and lightning. Its awesome. Well our bus didn't leave Cordoba until 1200 so we got to wait for 2 hours and absorb argentina. There is no shame here. Immodesty in the USA has nothing on Argentina. and that crosses gender borders too...eww. anyways... Yeah long bus ride into Villa Dolores, but there was a thunder storm with lightning so it was kinda cool. The buses are weird, but not that bad. I finally got into the pension(apartment) and crashed at about 4:30. and my luggage came finally on thursday. good thing I took a step further and packed extra beyond the 1 day they told me to. Well day 2 we spent getting food for me and taking care of errands for the branch president because the Elders who were here before lost the keys, and day 3 we finally did some work. We rode bikes that day. I must define a bike. It is a busted piece of junk that has been duct taped and welded together from pot metal. That is a mission bike. my bike at home is reallllllyy nice, and works. The bike I rode had small tires, a busted chain, and a seat that went place it shouldn't. It was really fun for the 20 miles I rode that day. but it was a great day none the less. We started the day and tracted a bit and then we had lunch(lomitos are a beef steak, a piece of ham, a fried egg{which goes on every food here} and mayonesa sandwich) then we took the bikes and rode out to an area called piedra pintada, which we found out is where the rich North Americans who don't want to be bothered live and where everyone goes to camp. So no success there, then we rode down into the ghettoish area(this is the really actual ghetto where the houses are like cardboard) and we found a whole bunch of inactive members there. like literally the whole neighborhood. Apparently some rich australian missionary couple came and basically bought baptisms...so we spent some time trying to invite people to church, and that was unsucessful. Then we rode down to the other part of the city and ran into more members. the inactive ward mission leader(awkward) and a few families. We also met the Relief Society President who is the nicest old lady ever!! it was her 56th bday and she invited us to come back later and have pizza. SO GOOD. Argentine pizza is legit. like really really good. its not the same as american pizza, but still its pretty darn good. That was that day and then day 4 we walked alot. like the far end of town, to the far end of town in the middle of the siestatime so HOT. We did do alot of good finding though. We found an older lady(Alicia) that we will have to see about, and a big 40 year old hombre named Gaston and they are both pretty interested. Then we met with our investigator with a baptisimal date Lucas. Hes 21 and he is looking for forgiveness, cuz he says the catholics just told him to say some hail marys and he would be fine and everyone else told him he was going to hell. Its an amazing oppotunity to teach a young man with so much faith. He wasn't feeling well and we were talking about the priesthood and how it has the power to heal. He stopped us and said "so you have that?" we said yes and he said can you heal me? I have had this flu problem for awhile" We said do you believe you can be healed? He said if I can receive an answer from God that the Book of Mormon is true then of course I can be healed. So we did. The lesson had a completely different note from then on. Then we taught English class to our only student who showed up. Irene is 8 yrs old and is a little sweetheart. Then we watched a movied(its english class and movie night every saturday) UP! I love the spanish words for fun things like the cone of shame(Cona de verguenza) and funny other stuff. Then we had church yesterday. Umm the EQP is nuts. We have the new manuals and he looks at it and goes like whats this, and teaches this long discourse on how we would have been conceived spiritually..... icky. anyways... We have had some cool storms that are over the mountains and the clouds come without the rain, but we get to see the lightning. Thats really only the stuff that goes on here. Next week I may have more news to give. Other than that I would suggest that if ANYONE wants to get in contact with me they should email me instead of sending me a letter. Its like a 8 week wait for letters, from pouch to customs to the office to me. so please email me.

Bye for now, I love you all. =) The Church is true the Sky is blue and so is the Book