Ethan's Ten Percent in Argentina: A Whole New World in ARGENTINA!

Okay so leaving the MTC was a horrible nightmare. Not leaving (i was dying to get out of there) but packing. All my christmas presents wouldn't fit and we also got about 20 pounds of books and stuff while at the mtc and it overloaded my suitcases. They were both already 49 pounds each before all the new stuff. But i refused to leave anything behind...so i decided to just make one bag super heavy so i would only have to pay for one. So i put everything in one suitcase and left the other at exactly 50 pounds. But then i couldn't close the suitcase!! And i had to be at the travel office in 10 mins! It was a really bad situation. I was having a panic attack so i prayed that someone would help me. And as soon as my prayer ended, my companion comes in with this huge hockey bag and told me to just throw my whole open suitcase in there cause we didn't have time to change anything. So we did that but then the problem was that I couldn't carry it alone...it didn't have wheels. So the two of us carried it up to the travel office and dropped it off at the bus and it became their problem haha. I was really stressed out though because i knew i couldn't carry it alone very far. Once we got to the airport the whole group of 20 missionaries walked off without me cause i couldn't carry my bags hahaha. And i felt so alone, so i prayed again that todo estara bien. Once i got my bag to the desk i figured out the problem...it weighed 92 pounds! But the man at the counter was a miracle worker. He found an abandoned suitcase that i could use as a carry on and i put half of my stuff in that and it all worked out with me not having to pay anything. I was 42 pounds over, and i normally would have to pay $300 or more for that, but i didn't have to pay anything. Some other elders had to pay $100 for being 3 pounds over. It was a millagro for me.

But I finally made it! Its a miracle...20 hours of flying on 3 different planes. The flight wasn't as bad as I expected...I was asleep most of the time. When we landed in Buenos Aires, they put all our stuff on a bus and drove us to another airport, which was unexpected. They abandoned us in the airport there for 2 hours, and we couldn't understand anyone so we just stood there waiting, and our guide finally came back. We flew from Buenos Aries to Cordoba. They gave us some really good Argentine food on the plane that got me excited. Once we landed, the mission president and his assistants where there to pick us up. Me and 2 others rode with the assistants in their car. As we drove a long a busy rode the car broke down and we had to get out and push it really far. It was 100 degrees and we were wearing our suits and cars were swerving everywhere...it was loco. Welcome to argentina haha. The drivers here are absolutely crazy.

Another crazy thing about Argentina is the animals. There are cats and dogs absolutely everywhere here. You can't go anywhere without seeing them. They just go where ever they want doing whatever they want. Lots of the people we teach here have kittens or puppies and its fun to play with them during the lessons. I can't understand anything the people say, so i convert their animals. just kidding haha i actually am trying really hard to listen and understand but its kind of discouraging to be so useless. There are also a lot of horses here. People have them in their front yards, and there are a lot of horse pulled carts in the streets. Its cool.

When we were getting our new companions anounced, a bird pooped on me. And i only have one suit jacket, so it was really annoying. But the funny part is that elder smith didn't know and he patted me on the shoulder and it got all over his hands hahaha. ñoño. As i was walking to the computer place today, another bird pooped on me and it landed in the exact same spot (my left shoulder) its getting kind of ridiculous. But Arielle told me it means good luck. In that case, bring it on!

My companion is awesome. Elder Gonazlez, from paraguay and he doesn'te speak english. Spanish is his second language, he grew up with a native american language from paraguay. Its hard for us to understand eachother but he is really cool.

We had to run to church yesterday in the pouring rain (over a mile) and by this time my suit jacket is discusting. It was so muddy and gross, thankfully a sweet lady from the ward does our laundry haha. The members here are so nice, but i can't understand anyone. They give us food and stuff all the time though. I had to give a short talk in spanish on sunday to introduce my self, it was bad haha.

The food here is actually really good! I had fracturas for the first time on saturday night (so good).

We celebrated new years with the bishops family! They are really cool. We shot off fireworks and everything.

Everything is going good i guess. I just need to learn español! I miss america and all you guys a lot too. I love you all and Im going to attatch some pictures now.