It's another superb
Monday with our next email from Elder Merrill. He talks about the passing of
time and foreign keyboards:
Hi ya. How is everyone doing? Whenever I think of something
to write home about, I put it in my planner, which I have open in front of me
right now. I am always excited to hear you guys. I have found a
surprising switch here with time. I have really fast days but really slow
weeks. It feels like forever since I wrote you, but the days themselves have
been so rapid. I know that seems strange, you'd think with fast days would come
fast weeks, but that's not how it is right now. Well, maybe that's just because
I'm new at the moment...I have a feeling that the weeks will feel faster as I
go along here. It's funny, as I'm typing, the computer spell-check is on
and so every word I type has a red squiggle line under it to show that I've
spelled it wrong, because none of these words exist in espanol.
He also gives us some
warnings and advice about mailing items to Argentina:
If you ever want to send me a package for something like
Christmas, my year mark or I don't know...my birthday or something (cough)...I
have some instructions for you. When you send packages here, there's a danger
of 2 things happening. The package gets lost or some of the contents get stolen
by the people in the post office. There's nothing to do if it gets lost
but if you want to get a package to me around the time of a special date, you
may want to send it about a month in advance. Now, to prevent it from being
stolen, wrap the package in tape nice and tight, to make it too hard to try and
open it. The final thing is to put 2 pictures on the package and make sure they
won't fall off. Put a picture of Jesus Christ and a picture of the Virgin Mary.
That may seem a little weird but the Spanish people don't want to get on the
wrong side of the virgin and stealing from missionaries that might (or might
not) be from her church would probably look bad.
He talks a little bit
about the local culture:
I have to take a bus to another city every week for a
meeting and the buses are all double-deckers. It's so fun riding them! You
would think, being in Argentina, that this place would be more hispanic-like
but a lot of people (and I agree) have told me that this place is a lot more
like Europe instead. Dogs litter the streets like cacti do back home in
Arizona. Not a day goes by without me seeing more than 30 different dogs.
Naturally I like animals but the problem is that a lot of them don't have any
homes, so they are wild, and wild they are nice to humans and make me want to
pet them, they probably have fleas and mites and ticks, so I'll have to refrain
from touching them at all. Not a whole lot of cats here.
Then it's a few words
about the weather before he signs off:
September is when spring should start, so things should
start warming up a bit. I'm not thrilled to be going through another
summer, but that's all good really. I made it through South Carolina
walking all around there and that place was so humid, I could feel the water
particles on the air as I walked around. We had a lightening storm here a
couple of nights back and boy was it LOUD! It felt like the storm was right
above our heads and then moved off...I wonder if we'll be in store for any
more? The stars here are awesome by the way. I bet I see a couple of different
constellations then you do in Arizona, makes me wish I'd paid more attention to
what constellations there are in the night sky. Don't worry about food
here. It's all good. I just wish they had a bit more variety. I eat pretty much
the same things for dinner every week, but like I said, it's all good, so I
can't complain.
What a great letter
this was from our dear son this week. We are glad he is doing well and he
sounds like he is adjusting nicely to Bolivar. Keep up the good work
Elder, we are keeping you in our hearts and prayers!
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